The humiliation from strangers

By starting a camping journey in the US, we put our daily experience into similarity with those living in minivans or RV, those perceived as having no piece of land or home.

Yesterday we went to Ranch 99 in San Diego to buy supplies and stock up to the long trip to Baja del Sur. After shopping, it was 6 pm, and I got hungry. We decided to have some food that we just bought. We opened one door for the air to flow and had some sushi.

A car stopped by right next door. A woman in a security uniform with a drooling dog walked to our door and said, "You can't eat here!"

My boyfriend answered her that we were having dinner, what's wrong with that? She was clearly embarrassed because there was no law stating that you couldn't eat in your car in the parking lot. Then she went down to the apparent stigmatizing harras statement with campers, "You can't sleep here."

"We don't sleep here. Did you see that?" - My boyfriend asked her.

The security woman was about to leave but decided to leave the final bitter humiliation and a smirk: "Your plate is from Idaho! Do you have waves in Idaho?" She saw we have four surfboards on our rooftop surf rack.

"Yes, there are river waves in Idaho!" My boyfriend got less patient. She left.

I was slow, and contemplating this conversation took me a while. From the beginning, by speculating that we might be homeless, the security person felt they had the right to come and harass us. I wrote it as "the right" because that is the mentality I see in the air in the US treating people living in their cars. Even if the person does nothing wrong, security guards feel like these people are vulnerable enough. An easy bullying target. That was why this woman came to us in the first place.

In the book Poverty, by America, the author Matthew Desmond quoted, "Poverty is embarrassing, shame inducing. Misery (misère), the French sociologist Eugène Buret once remarked, “is poverty felt morally”.” By starting a camping journey in the US down to the south, we put our daily experience into similarity with those living in minivans, campers, or RV in the US, those perceived as having no piece of land/home aka security. With that appearance, we are subjected to this minor harassment from anyone who thinks they can make petty jokes about us like this security lady. We face shame-inducing responses like this in the US. It makes me wonder about those who live in the cars I saw over the journey. How can they feel sane? How can they keep their dignity? How do they move on in life if those people aim at them and bully them everywhere they go?

That security woman, facing educated and reasonable answers, was fended off. She didn't back her claim with any law or rule of the place because there was no rule at that premise in the first place. Then, when she couldn't do anything about it, she threw out a harassment anecdote: "waves in Idaho," hoping to hurt us. But rarely anyone out of Idaho knows that Idaho people do surf; they surf river waves.

This narrow-minded person hoped to humiliate us to the last interaction because she meant to do that. It was the first intention she came to us, not to protect the place or customers but to bully someone vulnerable enough. It is out of her scope of work as a security guard. Security means keeping the place safe and the customers can feel comfortable shopping. We just shopped in the grocery store; then, their security guard tried to humiliate us for eating the food we just bought from them.

We have been traveling through several countries to surf throughout the year. I only face harassing actions and words like this in the US. This society builds on the constant and subtle humiliation of vulnerable populations, like immigrants or people living around the poverty line.

In Mexico last week, when I was drinking coffee by the beach after a surf, a man told me to get into a blanket to be warmer. He often came to the beach to drink beer with his friends. He saw us sometimes when we surfed there. He asked me how to help a woman feel comfortable and enjoy the beach like me. He had just gotten married, but his wife didn't enjoy the sea as much as he did.

I put this mundane conversation with this Mexican man into this piece of writing to remind myself that I have a face, a fate, and a life. I get cold easily and love the sea. I am not a number with an Idaho plate to be humiliated.

Traveling is challenging, mainly to keep my headspace clean with sanity when interacting with unpleasant moments. As much as I enjoyed talking to this man and his wife by the beach in Mexico, I felt upset when the security lady smirked at me with her rude words.

I try to be honest about these moments and understand how people do what they do, even if their acts do not generate wealth or profit. One harras those more vulnerable. One takes joy in humiliating others. One bullies for the instant pleasure of nothingness. But I am always decisive in not letting those around me define who I am. I am not to be humiliated, belittled, or talked down. I write about it to make sense of how things come together.

Is it the pleasure of traveling? You can put yourself in a larger perspective instead of being stuck into some system that demeans you for its profit.