Observation, through someone else's eyes

Passing judgements. That's common to every one, irrespective of their social, political, religious leanings or standing. It is one of the easiest arts to master, a luxurious indulgence of what one presumes to be his or her 'intelligent' observations and an unwelcome prying into someone else's life.
So, I mostly stay indoors, walled in by the one-room and excuse-of-a-kitchen apartment. When I have to leave, I speed across the lobby, hop on to my scooter and dash off, which act is seen as an un-feminine and ill-mannered behaviour by the judgemental neighbours. Propriety demands that I exchange some banal talks with them, smile at them whenever we are led by circumstances to meet in the hallway, pay all the elders, irrespective of whether they deserve it or not, my obeisance.
I loathe the courtesies, and have always avoided them, on principle. Had I been a man, maybe I would have been excused these 'lapses' (men are supposed to be free birds and they sometimes just live on their own terms, in their own world, so what). But a woman is supposed to be a slave to the rule book that was laid down mostly to subjugate them and make sure that they remained where the men or rather, the part of society that had more clout, wanted them to stay.
So when I zip off on my scooter without bothering with the niceties, I can here the disapproving murmurs following me. About how I have not 'turned out right' and how my parents must be so sad to have a daughter (a 'daughter' is the key word) like me. The days I wear shorts and stroll around, the neighbourhood ladies curse me (actually curse). It reminds me of tales when women were termed as 'witches', luring men to their doom. Seems like my legs, which, mind you, like me are quite 'un-feminine', would entice the men -- husbands and sons et all -- and lead them down the road to perdition.
When I go home, relatives roll their eyes on the freedom I have got. The fact that I take my own decisions, that I wear pants, that I decide which man I stay with and which one I boot (instead of the other way round) are signs of my having gone haywire. Too liberated, I hear them say. Fighting for it, every step, is how I see it.