One day I was walking the Mawlawi Street, I was so scared of that street hoping to get to the end of the street quickly so the men on that street wouldn’t touch me; I walked panicky because of the male gaze until I got to the end of the street! Then I heard a man who was selling men’s underwear. He was swearing out loud to another man and fighting with him. Suddenly I remembered the day that my underwear got bloody; I was ashamed to tell my mum directly so I wrote it on a piece of paper “Mum, I am bleeding I think I’m on my period please help me” then I hid until the evening out of shame.

When I was 20, my mother used to buy me underwear, sanitary pads, and bras until the day I saw the fighting man. That was the first time that I was in Bazar to buy my stuff by myself.

In the shop, I picked a bundle of sanitary pads up and gave it to the guy behind the cashier, at first he puts it in a clear plastic carry bag but then he decides to put it in a black one. While smiling he says “so that won’t be visible, or it would be a shame”. This was so insulting, it makes me think, why should I be invisible and voiceless?

2016
(Arising) a project at Reykjavik art Museum in Iceland, the project curated by Yoko Ono.

 for the Kurdish version click on the link below :

https://files.acrobat.com/a/preview/560bc4fd-5a60-497b-b908-af1050582592

u