Out of the oasis and into the desert.

Its taken a while but the realization of how different life is outside of MoHo is slowly trickling in. I work for a completely male team i.e. everyone is male, and I am the new female addition.

Having studied in an all girl's school for 7 years and then an all women's college for 4 years, one would think that this experience would be quite a shocker. Contrary to such belief it was pretty banal. Men are men. Awkward for most part, or maybe cuz they are IT men? Who knows. WHat did surprise me was the inherent tendency to belittle women. Not in a malicious way, necessarily, but in an even more tragic manner. In a very normal way.

We were out to get lunch, 4 guys and myself. I am the youngest of the lot, straight out of college, doe-eyed and an immature newborn to the world of IT (even though I am less technical, such that I am a consultant). Come to think of it, maybe I should have allowed myself more maturity, nodded in the right ways, pulled my hair back in a tight bun and barely smile except for a stern matronly pull of the lips. Alas, that defies my character. My persona. So I smile a lot, wear bright clothes, tie my hair loosely and (here is the KILLER) order Very-Chanilla Italian Soda for beverage when everybody else ordered DIET (freaking!!) Coke. Who drinks diet coke!! Drink the goddamned real think of you must drink soda...ahem, anyway...

So we were getting lunch and I had already gotten a few weird looks for Verry-Chanilla (if you haven't guessed it by now, that is a distorted, sort of wanna be cute form for Cherry-Vanilla) but ignoring that I was drinking along, trying to keep track of conversation and figure out how to eat the open sandwich in front of me. Thats when the guys started talking about basketball and how one team really sucked.

Someone says, "oh blah blah blah...team X plays terrible"
Someone else says, "oh blah blah blah...I should start watching women's basketball instead"

*burst of laughter around the table, i stay quiet but have an amused/confused look on my face"

Someone else else says, "well watching team X is like watching women's basketball, so why switch"

*burst of laughter around the table again*

Thats when one of the guys looks at me and with a sheepish grin says, "No offense"

Should I have replied, "None taken"? Cuz that would have been a lie, but then again I didn't act quite offended either...Maybe I should have smiled and said "Fuck you, you male chauvanist pig" or simply stormed off, or said, "well, I truly don't think you should be making such comments" Unfortunately, all I did was ignore the statement and pretenD that nothing happened. The more I thought about it the more I was affected by the conversation, my lack of reaction, or late reaction for that matter.

I can't go back in time and even if I could I would, most likely, not do anything too differently. Why? I don't know...I admit it, I don't have the courage, YET, to stand up to such mockery. But I definitely will. Courage comes with experience and confidence in one self, and thats exactly what I am working up right now. Well, that is the hope at least. So piece of advise for anyone who does not have an immediate reaction, or does not know how to react to such "little" things that are the building blocks to discrimination across the world...choose your battles. We can't take everyone and everything on at all times. We pick our battles, we strengthen our defenses AS WELL AS our offenses, we build courage, tighten our armors and sharpen our swords and we fight, but in due time. You can't make a warrior without practise and a practised warrior is one with scars. Don't be afraid to get scarred. My little anecdote was more like a scratch but don't be afraid to get brutalized in these "real world battles". Jokes, burns, sarcastic remarks, belittling conversations, disbelief in ablility and what not, the list goes on. Scars will serve as reminders. Dramatic as this sounds, lets not ever forget. We still are second class citizens in a patriarchal world. MoHo was an oasis. The desert is where life begins. Wooohoooooooooooooooo!!!