“I’m scared,” Said Said, a 20-year-old college student, sent me. “The bus I traveled on broke down on the flooded road between Nazimabad and Teen Hatti. We had to go off and find our way home. We had no choice but to wade in the almost knee-deep water.”
“We were scared, which in some places was the water in the waist deep for men, and we are both hardly 5 meters. As women we can’t ask for help from anyone. I don’t know how we got home.”
Saima said they did not dare to ask anyone for help and for obvious reasons. Many families passed in tall vehicles and offer to give them a lift, but they chose to wade through water and meet other threats rather than seek help.
Fortunately, Saima and her friend Sughra reached home despite the difficulties, even if it took a long time.
Thousands of women over Karachi faced similar problems as different parts of the city received about 145 millimeters of rain from 1 p.m. 8 in the morning of August 19th.
People were stuck in offices, schools, markets and elsewhere due to the heavy rain that caused destruction, making commuting extremely difficult.
Like thousands of other drivers, female drivers and cyclists stood over problems as some left their vehicles either broke down or stuck in the water.
Shama, a teacher, had to leave his car almost in the middle of the road. “I was forced to turn off Sharae Faisal. People knocked on my window to warn me. I knew they were trying to help, but I was afraid of ‘attention’. Some people tried to push my car near the curb, but only managed to move it a little to the side.”
“Although I was afraid of getting out of the car, an elderly gentleman came and asked me to come out and said it was dangerous to keep sitting in a submerged car. He said, ‘Grab on my arm and I will pull you out.’ I was reluctant, but then a couple came to wade through and the older man asked the woman to hold my hand.
Many young girls, probably school or college students, drove through the flooding water that held each other at the shoulder or holding hands, went into formation. They had formulated a plan to deal with the situation which showed that they could tackle it.
Sometimes, as Shama added, however, she knew that the older gentleman was trying to help her, but she said that when a very young age, girls and boys are generally separated based on religious, cultural and social norms. However, Shama realized that at extraordinary times, we had to do it normally for women and girls to allow rescue staff (mostly men) to save them.
Other questions that women were facing while commuting in the heavy rain were fear of their personal security as well as their loved ones. Fatima, a 25-year-old married woman, traveled with her husband in their low Japanese car. Soon this car was unable to tackle flooding water washing over the roads.
“This car is not made for Karachi roads; it comes from a city that is well planned and does not have to tackle a foot or more water,” Fatima said. “However, I was more afraid of the safety of my husband when our car broke down on a street. I was afraid that street criminals take advantage of the situation and our vulnerability. I was too scared to take my phone to talk to the family.”
Based on the past, Fatima probably had good reason to be scared as the media often reports on active street criminals in serious traffic jams.
She added that she did not dare go like many others did because she has lived a protected life and felt vulnerable outside the vehicle.
“I realized that women like me are so protected that we don’t know how to” survive “on the road in normal times. I’m one of the many women who say they don’t know how to cross the road. I’m sure I wouldn’t be able to navigate myself on a flooded path, with my” designer phone and handbag. “I wanted to be a goal.”
The most important thing is to train women about what to do in such situations. It is also important to educate society about the important role’s rescue personnel in extraordinary situations such as flooding and heavy rain. They are trained to work in dangerous circumstances, but cannot do their jobs if the people they try to save are not ready to be saved because of social or cultural limitations. The government has to create attention campaigns so that people know that the rescue staff are trained to save their lives.
On the other hand, the rescue teams need to be trained in how to do their jobs while understanding the cultural and social sensitivity. They must be trained in harassment and sexual harassment in the workplace and that there are serious consequences in the event of breaking someone’s confidence.
