In 2015, she began writing about the country’s long-standing problem with groping – or chikan, in Japanese – often experienced by schoolgirls on public transportation. Today, Ogawa, a writer and cofounder of Press Labo, a small digital content production company in Shimokitazawa, an inner-city Tokyo neighbourhood, often writes about Japan’s gender inequality and sexual violence issues. “ didn’t think we could do anything about it.” “When I was in high school, every was a victim,” says Ogawa. “He seems to have thought that I was pleased with his act,” the now 36-year-old reflects. She felt ashamed and complicit, she says. She believes that people saw what was going on, but nobody helped. But he grabbed her hand and told her: “Follow me.” Ogawa ran away. He was aggressive and it hurt, she remembers. A man began to touch her, putting his hand inside her underwear.
She was about 15 and on her way to school. She recalls one incident particularly clearly. Besides, her parents had never spoken to her about such things and how she ought to handle them. It would be improper to express anger towards an adult, she thought, and she worried about attracting attention. “I could not understand that adults were excited by touching me.” “I thought of myself as a child,” she reflects. Each time, she would run away, unsure of what to do. After that, the groping and sexual assaults – men would often stick their hands inside her underwear – became a regular occurrence as she made her way to or from school in her uniform. Some years later, on her first day of senior high school, she was groped on the commute home.
When she reached home, she repeatedly washed the spot where he had pressed himself against her, although she was conscious of not spending too long in the toilet, in case her family noticed that something was wrong. She recalls feeling shocked and physically sickened.
A man standing behind her pulled down the band of her culottes and underwear, touched her bare bottom, then pressed himself against her. It was a public holiday and she was on the subway. Tokyo, Japan – Tamaka Ogawa was about 10 years old when she was sexually assaulted for the first time.
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