MORRO VELHO – SKIPPER SAVES MY LIFE

MORRO VELHO – SKIPPER SAVES MY LIFE
C 2004 JoJo

I thought long and hard about whether to write this experience or not. But I decided that it was in fact, a part of my history, and let’s face it, life is not a bed of roses. Bad things happen to us all.

Do you know that the statistics prove that one in three women will be sexually assaulted by the time she’s 20? That’s a very high number which increases exponentially when it comes to the lesser charge of sexual harassment.

I was ten years old, and on my way back from school at the end of the day, when three 18 year old Brazilian boys waylaid me. They surrounded me, and beat me with whips. I don’t think I was raped (my memory on the event is sketchy), but I was whipped, sexually mauled and molested. I started screaming, they took flight and I went home, battered and bruised, with weal marks all over my body.

My mother was absolutely beside herself, having always feared for our safety. I was not examined by a medical professional because in Morro Velho, there was one hospital which was miles away from where we lived, and there was no public transportation of any kind – we either walked, or rode a mule.

The next day, Mum sent out houseboy Kenny to meet me and he brought Skipper, our Airedale dog, along with him, on a leash. On his way, he passed those three young men who were once again waiting for me, and saw to his horror, that this time, they had knives, which they were in the process of sharpening. As he passed them they ignored him and carried on honing their knives.

He picked me up at School and as we approached the three thugs, I hung back, but Kenny told me not to be afraid. He unleashed Skipper, and Skipper went mad. The boys turned tail and ran, but they couldn’t outrun Skipper. He’d leap onto one of them, knock him down,then do the same to the other two. Those young men hit the dirt hard and got bitten on the buttocks, over and over again. Kenny whistled for Skipper and reluctantly, he walked back to us, but he had a happy gleam in his eye.

I have no doubt that those boys had intended to gang rape me this time, stopping me from screaming by threatening me with their knives, and I am sure they intended to kill me at the end so that I couldn’t identify them. Strong though Kenny was, they were armed, and it would’ve been three against one – there’s no way he could’ve fought them, especially as he was a cripple. Skipper saved both our lives that day.

Next day, Dad took Kenny down into the village, and he identified the three young men.

Morro Velho had a police station, located miles away in a town named Nova Lima, but there was no court house and only severe crimes got referred for trial, to the nearest major city, Belo Horizonte.

The three guys were arrested, but there was no trial – in rural remote areas, the Police have their own way of dealing with criminals and would be rapists.

I won’t go into the gory details of what the cops do to them. Let’s just say, there are few repeat sexual offenders in Morro Velho.

Later I ran into those three men and when they saw me, they scurried to the other side of the road like frightened rabbits. They looked absolutely petrified.

I wasn’t traumatized by this attack because the culprits had been caught and punished. But I was traumatized by a later sexual assault on the part of a 16 year old boy named K., whom, along with his brother R., were taken in by my parents for a period of three months, because their father needed surgery in Rio de Janeiro, and their mother accompanied him.

R. was a nicest, sweetest lad in the world – he was and still is my friend. But his brother K, was a sexual molester. He thought nothing about pushing me against a wall, rubbing himself against me and taking liberties with my body.

I remember saying to K. “I’ll tell Daddy,” and he laughed in my face and said “He’ll never believe you. And he was right.

I told Dad what was happening, and he didn’t believe me. And so the molestation went on – for three painful months.

There never was a resolution to the sexual abuse I’d suffered. I was traumatized by what K. had done to me over and over again during the 3 months he lived with us, because I wasn’t believed, he wasn’t held accountable nor was he punished. I had nightmares about it for years.

About 20 years ago, R. told me that K. came to Ottawa on business regularly, and he’d given him our address so he could pop in to see me.

All that horror I’d endured at this man’s hands came surging into my mind. To my astonishment, I sat on the sofa and wept bitterly. I immediately emailed R. and told him to tell K. he was never ever to show his face on my front door because if he did, he’d regret it. Naturally R. asked me why I felt this way, so I told him.

Oh my, he was extremely upset, and apologized profusely to me for his brother’s horrible behaviour. He must’ve suspected that this was the case, because K. was later given six of the best across his backside, for sexually molesting girls in the local swimming pool. Their fathers believed them, (unlike mine), and measures were taken. K. received his thrashing on stage, in front of the entire school.

Interestingly, Dad never apologized to me for having disbelieved me when I told him what K. had been doing to me for months. I honestly believe the thought never crossed his mind that he owed me an apology.

It’s a well known fact that most women who are victims of sexual assault are ashamed to come forward and talk about it. More often than not, they don’t even report it to the police, and keep the fact buried deep inside them, never to be mentioned or talked about. And they suffer terribly for it. We all know this is wrong. There is nothing to be ashamed about – we were victims, not responsible for what happened, and by feeling ashamed about it, and not bringing it out into the open, it is empowering rapists all over the world, who count on their victim’s silence in order to get away with their despicable crime.

There is one final thing to tell you about this – as a result of what happened to me when I was a child, I was determined never to be in a position of helplessness again, so I took classes in self defense. Thank goodness, I’ve never had to use what I learned in these classes, because I haven’t been attacked but I do know what to do should it (God forbid) happen. I think every woman should take these classes. If women knew how to defend themselves, I believe violence and rapes against women would go down by leaps and bounds!