Slutty Curls

I always avoided this but as fate would have it I ended up being in Delhi, that too studying gender. I have always maintained that Delhi is the rape capital of India because of the way I was raised, always pitying the condition of my cousins in Delhi. That was till I landed here.
Rape is not just this gang rape on the moving bus, it is also happening in our homes, behind classrooms, in offices, in trains, in toilets, in subways, in shops even in temples. No surprise here that my mother back home in Himachal does not sleep, even if she has fever, till I safely reach home in Delhi every night.
So it was one of those nights again, the late night. My friend was working ‘late’. Apparently 7:30 in the evening in Delhi is ‘late’. So she was working late and I had to wait at Indraprastha metro station. Just on the very day when the Government of India decided to block the stations that would let way for the protestors. Democratic eh?
I stood there in the pink ‘women only’ area, letting train after train pass by me. When the clock ticked eight, fog came gushing in. It was beautiful and I would have loved this and sung songs if was back in Himachal. Nature charms me and I lose myself to it; but not here, not in Delhi. Between those mixed feelings of awe and panic, I plugged myself and opened my curls that were tied up in a bun till now and put on a cap. I had no muffler with me and my curls were serving the purpose. Snug.
Fog was taking over and now it was difficult to see beyond 20 feet. It was 8:15 and some men in a group of five were walking towards the pink area. I being the only woman standing there, went up straight to them and firmly said, “Can’t you see the pink sign, ‘women only’? Peeche jao!”  So they looked at the sign below, laughed and turned back. Now I know being a woman, I can differentiate between a normal laugh and an eve-teasers laugh. But can I? This place has played with my mind so much, I got confused!
If I become a silly lily at times, I laugh it off. So do men. Was that a deliberate laugh or a genuine one?  While those men turned back, I kept judging my intuition.
Finally at 8:28 my friend came in. I rushed to the train and chided her for being ‘late’.
Six stations passed by us and we got off the train.
 “Please tie your hair,” she told me.
“Why?”
“You don’t want undue attention, do you?”
No conversation after this. I obeyed. Tied my curls and put on the small hood fighting to protect my neck. We left the station to find a rickshaw that would take us back home.
I am disgusted, with men, with this city but above all with myself.