I was walking home from a friends house when I was about 13 and I was in my school uniform; shirt, trousers and blazer, when two middle-aged white men came up behind me and started talking about my arse. They started getting closer to me until they were right behind me and they were trying to touch me. Needless to say, at 13 I was terrified, having never dealt with this before, and not in an area where I was familiar, and so I started walking faster, turning every time I could, but they continued to follow me.

I then ran down the street and ended up knocking into a lady walking home with her shopping bags and asked her for directions back to my school so that I would know where I was going to get home. This made the men behind me drop back and eventually I got away from them.

I then arrived on the road opposite my school and as I was walking down (it was a dual carriage way) a man in a van started yelling at me from his window and leaning half of his body out of it, trying to grab at me saying, “Come here gorgeous”.

That was the first time I was ever harassed on the street, but from the age of 11, men I didn’t know catcalled me.

Optional: Do you have any suggestions for dealing with harassers and/or ending street harassment in general?

It depends on how you feel at the time. At first I was too scared to do anything and so I ran away, but when it was boys from my school doing it, I reported it to my head of year. The next time it happened on the street I kicked the man and ran away because he had his head in my boobs. After a while you get used to having to deal with it, but the best you can do is to report it to someone who can actually do something about it.

– SKA

Location: London, UK

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See the book 50 Stories about Stopping Street Harassers for more idea.