First, a woman.

I am a woman.

Some are allured, and some are intimidated.

Sometimes I must sit through meeting listening to foreigners mansplain what I am capable of analysing.

Other times I must console my father and mother that this is not history repeating itself but rather a life that needs to be lived.

I explain and defend my points of view more than anyone else. It is almost a silent demand that I do so with my every move.

Sometimes I laugh at jokes I don’t find funny just to give the preparator of feebleness a sense of charisma they very much lack.

I’m the one who laughs in a way that sometimes looks like crying. A laugh that holds back tears.
A smile that emerges from behind sadness like a craving for hope.

I am expected to follow. I am expected to be saved. But I come out of these shackles like an awaited saviour taking the lead.

I’m the one who listens to troubles as if they were her own but when I speak out I am deemed a rebel and possibly too loud.

Sometimes I act impressed in very unimpressive situations.

I’m the one who swallows ignorant insults forcefully because oblivion is a disease I don’t have to time to treat. Especially when it infects patients who remain to stay in denial.

I’m the one who is capable of walking like a storm but is rather expected to take a stroll like a light breeze.

But not today.

Today, I come uninvited because I am called upon by the oppressed.

And I walk into the minds of the oppressors like I own the place.

I am first, a woman.

Second, a revolution.