Last Thursday as I was standing outside of my apartment building with a friend, a stranger approached me from behind and slapped me, very hard, on my rear end.
The moment reminded me of the time I was in a minor car accident, so physically jarring that I was rendered speechless. My friend yelled a few choice words at the stranger, a tall white man in a dark jacket. He paused, and with his back to us, lifted both his hands in the V sign, like Richard Nixon on the steps of the plane after his resignation. Then he went on his way.
Like most women who live in big cities, I am harassed on the street every single day, and I almost never talk about it. Thursday night was the second time in my life that I was physically hassled; the first was eight years ago on a Jewish service learning trip to Ukraine, when a stranger in Kiev pinched my ass. A Russian-speaking friend who saw it happen told him off.
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