Being a woman

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"I (...) consider being female such a unique gift, such a sacred joy, in ways that run so deep I can't articulate them.  It's a special kind of privilege to be born into the body you wanted, to embrace the essence of your gender even as you recognize what you are up against.  Even as you seek to redefine it." Not That Kind of Girl, Lena Dunham, pg 131

I have always loved being female, even as a young girl.  I like dressing up in pretty things when I want to.  I take pride in being a fierce, outspoken woman in a world that prefers women be meek and silent.  I'm thrilled to have been born female and to identify as female.  But it comes with its inherent challenges - challenges that, unless you are a woman, you may have no idea even exist.  Allow me to illuminate some of these things.

Being a woman means:

knowing right off the bat a lot of men will have absolutely no interest in reading this;

being sexualized before even knowing what that means;

never being "enough" - thin enough, pretty enough, natural enough, sweet enough, sexual enough, chaste enough, feminine enough, ambitious enough, independent enough, a good enough mother...

being taught to dread fine lines and grey hair because it means your social value and attractiveness as a woman is in decline;

society seeing your sexuality as amusing and/or grotesque past a certain age;

having to constantly explain why you don't want to have kids;

having to constantly explain why you choose to raise your kids the way you do;

realizing you are a woman when men start giving you (often unwanted) attention:
      "The group of women was racially and economically diverse, but (...) (a)lmost everyone first realized they were becoming a grown woman when some dude did something nasty to them.  'I was walking home from ballet and a guy in a car yelled, "Lick me!"'  'I was babysitting my younger cousins when a guy drove by and yelled, "Nice ass."'  There were pretty much zero examples like 'I first knew I was a woman when my mother and father took me out to dinner to celebrate my success on the debate team.'"  Bossypants, Tina Fey, pg 15

somehow always being in competition with other women, even though we all face similar misogynist barriers and should be working together to break them down instead of trying to break each other down;

having different feminist issues depending on ethnicity, socieoeconomic standing, gender identity, ability, and other factors that contribute to the concept of intersectionality;

learning to recognize when another woman is trapped in an unwanted situation (on the street, in a bar...) but being afraid to intervene;

having to vie for space while also apologizing for taking that space;

being told to smile by strange men, as if this is something we owe them simply for being a woman in a public space;

being able to recognize the exact moment a man decides he's going to impose himself upon you, and learning how to brace yourself for it;

knowing how to politely turn a man down;

being called a bitch for politely turning a man down;

learning how to avoid confrontation instead of telling someone who is in your space to fuck off;

being called a slut, a tease and a prude - depending on men's and/or society's expectations of you at any given time;

being expected to be available for sex when a man wants it, but not allowing yourself to seem like you want sex too much, for fear of being labeled easy;

not reporting a rape because you're ashamed that it happened and you know the justice system will only capitalize on that shame;

knowing that speaking out about women's issues could bring about cruel, misogynist trolling and get you simplistically labeled a man-hater;

having your insecurities used as a marketing tool;

being uncomfortable in various situations without being able to pinpoint why;

having men talk over you, especially to other men;

having to regulate your emotions for fear of being labeled "too emotional" or "crazy";

struggling to redefine what femininity is to you, or what you want it to be;

feeling guilt and shame for failing to do enough to avoid being a victim of harassment;

having the responsibility of sexual health and birth control put on you by society while having to pay a ridiculous amount of money for it;

receiving unsolicited comments about your appearance or eating habits from strangers and loved ones alike;

not necessarily being taught how to love yourself and then being vilified and slut-shamed for making "poor decisions" in an attempt to seek validation;

exercising to better yourself in the eyes of society and having people judge you for being overweight while doing it;

being responsible for regulating men's responses to you;

feeling shame and embarrassment about perfectly natural things like menstruation, post-natal depression and miscarriage;

constantly bargaining with yourself about what you should and should not eat, and feeling the need to justify these things to yourself and others - constantly trying to convince yourself you've "earned" that piece of cake or extra slice of pizza but feeling guilty about it anyway;

knowing what it feels like to have a strange man rub his erection on you in a crowded bar or after a date and feeling shame that you said nothing about it because you didn't want to make a scene...

being expected to stand up for yourself in some situations, but being seen negatively for doing so in other situations;

knowing that when you say "no" it still may not be taken as "no";

being labeled crazy and demanding for being honest about what you want, what you need, what you expect;

being shamed for breastfeeding in public;

being told you're still really hot "for a mom";

being condescended to when showing emotion, as if our tears or anger are cute but inconvenient;

learning that beauty and compliance are the rent you are expected to pay for inhabiting a female body;

being told as a child "boys will be boys" when they hit you, pull your hair and throw sand in your face... then, as an adult, being expected to ward off abusive men - "Why didn't you leave?  What did you do to stop it?"

being blamed for your own rape;

being told you're getting too angry during a conversation about equal rights and your experience of injustice as a woman, injustice you've experienced your entire life (why wouldn't a person be mad about these things?)

going head-to-head with a misinformed man about feminism and equality and having him belittle and deny your experience, even though you a) have lived the experience as a woman and b) (in my case) have formal education on the subjects of gender studies, gender history, and feminist issues;

knowing some men will read all of this and still refuse to get it.

You say tomato, I say oppression

In the news these days: leaders of a socialist country attempt to keep their citizens safe by further ostracizing a section of their population?!
Also see: men continue to regulate women's bodies.

Seriously though, did you guys even know what a burkini was before this week?  I sure as hell didn't.

In case you haven't heard, several places in France are now banning (Muslim) women from wearing their choice of bathing suit, in a move that serves only to further divide an already tense population.  I totally understand a leader's desire to ensure each citizen's freedom from oppression, especially in a secular society, as France claims to be.  However - and I can't believe I even have to point this out - restricting people from wearing something they choose to wear as part of upholding their faith is oppression!
Look, I know that many Muslim women are forced (by their male counterparts) to wear certain things and adhere to strict rules, and it bothers me as much as it does the next free-thinking gal... although perhaps this is just my own white person's misguided understanding of the situation.  Either way, many Muslim women also choose these things for themselves in order to adhere to the religious code they've been brought up with (the same way people of other less highly publicized and vilified religions adhere to their chosen religion's own rules).  And if we're talking specifically about controlling women, consider Christianity: if I were to ask you about the women in the Bible, whose names would come to you?  The ever-pure Virgin Mary and Mary Magdalene, a dirty, dirty whore.  These are two opposing views of women exemplified in the most read and revered book in existence (a book written, edited, and re-edited a bazillion times by - you guessed it - men!)  You can't tell me this opposition is an accident.  This is very clear allegory used as a cautionary tale to women and an outright simplistic reduction of women's character into two specific streams - because of course, if a woman is not one, she must be the other!  This is just one example of myriad ways this particular religion oppresses women; without getting too deeply into a wider discussion about religion in general, there is no doubt in my mind (and in the mind of anyone else who has critically studied religion) that a key part of most religions is the control of women (and of course the general population as a whole... but again, I'm not getting into that today).

All this to say, we can't accuse one religion of oppressing women when too many others are guilty of the very same thing.

However, the buzzword-du-jour continues to be Islamic radicalism, so of course we're going to latch on to what those crazy Muslims are doing, get up on our high white-person horses and tsk tsk about it.
But what they're really doing in France, rather than reversing female oppression, is persecuting ladies who just want to go play in the water like the rest of us, without sacrificing their religious ideals.  French leaders are also playing further into people's misguided fear of Islam (ie fear of what they do not know or understand), thereby broadening the existing divide between their citizens.  To my mind, this is simply a knee-jerk reaction to the recent horrific attacks in France... which is understandable, of course, but when making any decision, appropriate sensibility and level-headedness must be used.  That is not what we're seeing with the decision to ban burkinis, and consequently this move serves no one positively.

I'd also like to point out that in many cultures women wear full-bodied bathing suits without religious connotations.  When my sister and I were at a water park in Singapore, we were some of the only women in western-style bathing suits; most other women and girls were in suits that covered their arms and legs - and Singapore is a decidedly multi-ethnic, multi-religion, and extremely civilized country.  I can't say for sure if any or all of the women at that water park were covered up for religious reasons - although I doubt they all were - but certainly the choice was made for the sake of modesty, which is an important aspect of Asian culture, regardless of religion.  Armed with this knowledge, again I can only conclude that the ban on the burkini stems directly from people's misinformed fear of Islam.
If women were simply choosing to cover up for modesty's sake, taking religion - and more specifically, Islam - completely out of the equation, I doubt this would even be an issue.  (And of course, no one has a problem with someone wearing a full body wetsuit, because again, religious connotation.)  But inject into the situation a (historically xenophobic) country's anger toward a certain faith and suddenly something has to be done about this non-issue. 

So now we are singling out specific women to make a point.  Lovely.

What are these women supposed to do?  Not got to the beach?  They certainly aren't going to go against their religious convictions and buy a western-style bathing suit simply to appease people.  In fact, a French leader's demand that Muslim women use a different bathing suit is no different than someone or something else telling them to cover up; either way, women are being told what they can and can not do with their bodies.  Whether it's in the name of religion or secularism, it's the same thing, and it's wrong and it's ridiculous.

Simply because a country identifies as a secular society, this does not give leaders the right to take away people's religious freedom.  I myself am not a religious person and therefore do not advocate from the point of view of any religion; however, I am an advocate of a person's rights, and religious freedom is one of those rights.  Do I believe the world would be a more peaceful and sensible place without organized religion as one more way to divide and control us?  Absofuckinglutely.  But a person's right to practise their chosen religion should be given the same respect as a person's right to live by no religion at all, and we can not talk about human rights while picking and choosing which human rights to uphold.
Beyond this, as tempting as it is to point at what we perceive as oppression and declare it wrong (in this case, the forced covering of Muslim women's bodies), it is not up to us to decide what is best for someone else.
A country looks to its leaders for guidance, and a leader's reaction to any situation can and will greatly affect the larger population's reaction.  By banning a damn bathing suit, France's leaders are continuing to tell its citizens that people practising Islam are to be feared, at a time when understanding, acceptance and unity are needed most.  The move to ban an innocuous garment only serves to further divide the people of France, which will absolutely do more harm than good.

Things I've learned traveling

Don't you love reading unsolicited and patronizing advice from people on the internet?  Neither do I!  That's why this post isn't titled "My Top 10 Travel Tips" (as much as I love alliteration...)  Instead, this post is more of a compilation of things (in no particular order) I myself have learned and/or need to remind myself whenever I travel.  Take it or leave it.

You will get scammed!
Regardless of how many well-meaning travel blogs you read or security warnings you heed on your country's Travel Advice and Advisory pages, I can guarantee this will happen to to you.
During my Euro trip in 2009, I had a flight to catch from Milan to Paris.  When I got off the train from Florence a very nice man approached me and asked if I needed help with my luggage.  Being a relative travel newbie I went along with it.  He asked me where I was headed and I told him I needed to find the bus to the airport.  So he very eagerly led the way to where I was going, chatting along the way about how he was from Morocco and worked at the train station, helping people get to where they were going.  We conversed in a combination of English, French, and some Italian, and he was a very nice man.  I did notice he wasn't dressed in a uniform or anything that official looking - his clothes were rather worn, actually.  When we got to the bus, he handed me my luggage, put his hands out to me, and said "s'il te plais, tu peux m'aider?" (Please, can you help me?)  Aaaah, the jig was up!  So he didn't really have a job at the train station, he was a beggar who, in return for helping travelers find their way with their luggage, expected recompense.  I felt so silly in front of the bus driver and all those passengers - I couldn't believe I had fallen for this!  I handed him a few Euros and boarded the bus in my shame.  (In all honesty, this was a pretty mild case of being taken advantage of and he obviously needed the money, so I didn't feel anything more than mildly embarrassed for myself).  And I'm sure there are maaaany other times I've been taken for a sucker, times I wasn't even aware of being taken advantage of. 
To add insult to injury to this story, when I finally arrived at the airport I realized I was at THE WRONG DAMN AIRPORT, which meant I had to get back on the same bus I had just got off of, pay a second time, get back to the train station, get onto the proper bus to the proper airport and pay a third time.  It was an expensive night and a real hit to my solo traveler's confidence.
This brings me to my next lesson:

Double check your damn flight info, you idiot.

Choose your travel buddy wisely!
People can be very different when so far out of their comfort zone (or their existing neuroses even more pronounced...), and friendships can be forever altered (or ended) if your personalities and styles don't match up.  This may not be something you're aware of until it's too late...

Be nice to the flight attendants.
Same goes for the people who run your hostel or guestroom, or anyone who is providing a necessary service.  These people take a lot of unnecessary crap from rude travelers all the time.  Just be nice and respectful and you will be appreciated (and maybe remembered) for it.

Sometimes, you will be the ugly tourist.
One day in Cambodia my sister and I had plans to visit part of the Angkor Wat complex.  For some reason I thought it would be ok to show up in jean shorts and a tank top, knowing full well it absolutely was not (don't ask - I don't know what I was thinking, either).  When the person at the gate refused me entry, I threw what can only be described as an ugly feminazi shit fit, pointing to a white male traveler (in similar garb to mine, though I think his shorts were much longer) and shrieking "AND WHAT ABOUT HIM?  YOU LET HIM IN?  HE CAN WEAR WHAT HE WANTS BECAUSE HE'S A MAN?!"
I can not tell you how ashamed I am of this behaviour.  I know what certain cultures expect in terms of dress, especially at sacred sites.  There is no excuse for this.  Don't be this person.

Forgive yourself but learn from your mistakes.
Guess who will a) handle such a situation with grace and understanding next time, and b) be properly attuned to cultural expectations from now on?

Apparently it's weird to clap for the pilot after a smooth landing?
I recently read this in one of those "flight attendants tell all" articles, and it really surprised me.  Apparently it's enough to simply say thank you, I enjoyed the flight (or whatever) when getting off the plane...  In any case, being the only person to clap once a plane has landed would definitely make you the in-flight weirdo.

Booze+allergy meds=sleep on a plane!
I know drinking at high altitudes is not the best idea, and mixing booze with sleep-inducing drugs is never recommended... but it's truly the only thing that has ever put me to sleep on a plane (and helped me sleep for 6-8 hours, no fucking joke.)  It was miraculous.

Flying somewhat tipsy is super fun.
Judge me.  I don't even care.

Listen to your gut.
This totally goes for day-to-day life as well, but when you're in a foreign country, the ability to trust your own intuition is an important skill to have.  It's better to walk away from a situation that makes you uneasy than to give in to a fear of missing out on some random travel adventure or fun story.

Do what you want, and don't feel bad about "wasted days."
Speaking of fear of missing out, don't feel bad if you ever spend a day doing nothing but sitting in your hostel room, writing a journal or some postcards, or watching endless Harry Potter movies in the lounge.  Travel is exhausting, and it's ok to give yourself time to refuel.  A person needs a mental health day every once in awhile and it's totally ok (and necessary!) to give this to yourself on the road.

Your worst hangovers will happen on travel days.
At least, this has ALWAYS, without fail, been the case for me.  I think it's because when I'm leaving a city, I sometimes want to have one last hoorah there before moving on.  This means painful wakeups the next day, even more painful bus rides, and possibly vomiting in the streets of Athens in front of a supremely nice couple from Germany and Belgium who insist your nausea must be because of "the heat."

Ocean water solves everything.
If you are traveling in a place that's almost always hot and/or sticky, and you find yourself and/or your travel buddy mysteriously becoming increasingly irate, get ye to the nearest watering hole and dive in (provided you are close to water, of course... if you're not, sucks to be you).  Without sounding too evangelical, there is something obviously super cleansing and rejuvenating about letting yourself float in a body of water.  I can almost guarantee doing this will dispel any pent up negativity you were feeling before.  For me, even the promise of a refreshing dip is enough to make me feel giddy when I'm so physically and emotionally exhausted I want to curl up and do nothing for the remainder of my trip.

Keep a journal of your travels.
When I'm away, especially on longer trips, I try to write in a journal every day.  Sometimes every day is not doable, but if you have the time, it's totally worth it to jot down what you did that day, how you're feeling, and whatever you've been experiencing.  Years later, whenever I reread these, I am reminded of more specific aspects of my time away that I may have forgotten, and it always makes me smile (and sometimes cry).  I am always thankful for this!

Carry yourself with confidence, but don't be afraid to look like a tourist.
This is a big one for me - I hate looking like a tourist... which I realize is ridiculous because, of course, I am a damn tourist!  Sometimes you will need to ask a local for help, or stop to look at a map, and that's totally allowed.  The real problem is when you're fumbling and bumbling around, looking like you can't tell your ass from your oh-so-discrete passport fanny pack.  Thieves and scammers are opportunists, and if you make it obvious to them that you're an easy target, then an easy target you will become.  If you keep your wits about you, stay aware of your surroundings and your belongings (in other words, if you make it difficult to be taken by surprise or taken advantage of), you will largely be left alone.

The more someone badgers you for your business, the less you want to give that person your business.
Someone following behind you, repeatedly crying out "tuk-tuk tuk-tuk tuk-tuk" is not only annoying (and who wants to encourage that kind of behaviour?) - it is a sign that you should keep walking until you find someone who isn't so obviously keen to rip you off.

Eat where the locals do.
Ask your taxi driver, hotel concierge, or someone walking down the street where they eat.  Pay attention to places that are busy and full of locals - that's where you want to be!

Stock up on all the drugs.
Take Dukoral before going to a place known for dodgy water, dodgy food, and dodgy bowels.  I've spent a lot of time in such places, and the worst I've experienced was one day of sort of questionable (though not urgently uncomfortable) poops in India and a one-night close call of food poisoning due to bad seafood in Phuket.  I attribute my strong constitution while traveling to Dukoral, god of digestive issue prevention.
Bring water purification tablets - they make the water taste like chlorine, but you never know when you're going to be somewhere bottled water isn't easily accessible.
Bring diarrhea medication, in case the Dukoral and water purification tablets fail.
Know your body and what it might need under certain uncomfortable or extreme circumstances.  I myself am a huge fan of Gravol.

You will at some point vomit and/or poop your pants.
You can be as diligent as you want with the medications, but shit happens... sometimes literally.  Clean up and move on.

Traveling is just getting from one place to another.
Before my first big solo trip to Europe, I'd lay in bed terrified, thinking to myself "What the hell am I doing?! How am I going to pull this off?" I had to remind myself that traveling is literally just finding a way of getting from one place to another.  I still have this same moment of panic before a big trip, and I still have to remind myself of this.  The only difference between getting yourself to your job every day and getting around while traveling is that you're in a different, unfamiliar place (also, that working is lame and traveling is awesome).

You can't just talk about traveling - you have to take tangible steps toward doing it.
This is one of my all-time biggest pet-peeves... I HATE hearing phrases like "I wish I could travel," "one day I'll get to (such and such a place)," or, my favourite, "you're so lucky!"  Ok, I am lucky to have been born a privileged white woman in Canada who has the opportunity to make my dreams a reality... but chances are, you also have this opportunity.  But unless you start saving, sacrificing, and planning, you will never get to travel, you will never get to wherever it is you want to go, and I can guarantee that.  I live a really simple, sometimes boring existence when I'm at home, because I am always saving for travel.  I don't go out and party all the time, I don't spend money on fancy coffees every day, I can't remember the last time I went shopping for new clothes.  (I also don't have children, just sayin...)  I make my travel goals a priority and I make those goals happen, which is something anyone is capable of if it's something they really want to do.  This goes for any goal a person has, really.  Stop talking about it, and, in the immortal words of the insane genius Shia Laboeuf - JUST DO IT.

People don't actually want to know the intricate details of your trip...
...and you may not want to talk about it anyway.
Aside from maybe your parents, when someone asks you about how your trip was, they probably don't expect you to launch into a lengthy summary of your time away.  Unless they ask you specific questions, you can assume that their interest is pretty minimal.  I often don't want to talk much about it after the fact anyway, for a few nebulous reasons.  I get pretty bad "travel hangovers," meaning I'm often really unhappy when I get back from a trip.  Getting back to your life and realizing that nothing around you has really changed, while you have definitely changed, is a very weird thing to sit with.  You have amassed all these unique and amazing experiences and perspectives, and now you're back to the same old thing.  How do you explain this feeling to people?  I would just rather not.  Being a pretty severe introvert I would generally rather keep my memories and experiences to myself.  And that's ok.

Don't take travel advice as gospel.
Figure it out yourself!