Sloppy Kisses

The first time I heard the moist smack, the kind you might make to demonstrate your enjoyment of a juicy steak, I was walking to work.  It came from an older, weathered man riding a horse and buggy, who smiled toothlessly at me in between pursing his lips to make the “muah-muah-muah” noise.  I walked faster. 

The “sloppy kiss” is one of many such piropos, or cat calls, that women in Nicaragua endure daily as a matter of course.  The practice is so engrained in the culture that it’s not uncommon for young boys to cat call adult women.  My friend had this happen to her, and recalls the six-year-old boy’s mother giggling, almost to say “my boy is becoming a man!”.  By the time boys are in their teens, they’re firing out piropos by reflex.  Once while walking to the grocery store with two female colleagues, an entire construction team put down their shovels to whistle at us from half a kilometre away.  I guess they were just close enough to be sure we were women.

Personally, this attention puts me on edge; it makes me feel less safe walking the street. Maybe these guys think their judgment about our bodies will be seen as a compliment, but I’d prefer they kept it to themselves.  To my mind, this behaviour reinforces the culture of devaluing women that is a major problem here.  In Nicaragua, gender-based violence is tragically common:  almost a third of women report having suffered physical or sexual abuse from their husbands or long-term male partners.  Unfortunately most women do not speak out or report abuse out of shame or because this behaviour is so commonplace that it has become invisible.  One in six Nicaraguan women agreed that wife-beating is justified if the wife is unfaithful.

Gender discrimination plays out in the economic sphere as well.  Women are denied access to property rights, and they have a harder time accessing credit, which limits many from improving their economic lot through entrepreneurship.  In the tiny restaurant beside my office, I see young girls – age 13 or 14 – laughing with each other as they spend the day making seemingly-endless quantities of tortillas.  Girls are less likely than boys to finish school, since parents pull them out early to help with housework or to assist with crops.

These norms, among other things, were on display at the annual El Torovenado last weekend, a zany celebration where people dress up and parade through the streets.  In addition to zombies and goblins, there were men disguised as Nicaraguan women from folklore, wearing stoic expressions and carrying giant baskets of fruit on their heads.  A small boy in a police costume wore a provocative sign around his neck: “corrupt policeman waiting for his bonus.” More troubling social commentary was conveyed by men dressed as pregnant schoolgirls.  Was the idea to mock these girls?  It particularly bothered me because teenage pregnancy is so high in Nicaragua – there are 109 teen pregnancies for every 1,000 births.  And women who give birth before age 15 are three times more likely to report partner violence. I worry that mocking pregnant teens intensifies their shame, making them less likely to speak up about abuse, and legitimizing the abuser’s actions.

As an expat volunteering here for only a few months, how much do I accept this deeply engrained devaluation of women vs. work to change it? Cuso International, the organization I work with, supports local organizations who run programs to empower girls and provide boys with “positive masculinities training.”  As for the piropos, there are different views on how to handle them.  Some say it’s best to ignore them.  I like the approach suggested by my Nica Spanish teacher: look at your cat caller, smile and say “God bless you.”  Since 80% of Nicaraguans are Christian, maybe he’ll be forced to consider that harassing women on the street isn’t very Christ-like.







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