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so, something that's been difficult about living in the city has been dealing with the reality of "hollerin'"...this is a phenomenon where a male will "holla" at a female using a variety of methods including words, whistles, and body gestures.  the goal is to let the female know that she is physically appealing to the male.  awesome.

consider the following examples:

1) tiffany, my TA at Bird Street, gets "holla'd" at every time we take the kids outside.  it's pretty ridiculous, and she has a good sense of humor about it, it's become somewhat of a running joke, but is still totally inappropriate...do these guys not see the 20+ kids running around and realize that maybe then is not the time?  then, and this is not funny to me, one of the parents called her on our school phone to ask her out.  

2) on sunday, walking home from church, some dude yells at me: "hey man, your girlfriend's beautiful."  i said, "that's my wife, knock it off!!!"  and then he had a bunch of other things to say, most of which i didn't hear as he was (luckily) on the other side of the street.  and he was probably only 16!  what the heck.  amy was grateful for the "protection" but also glad i didn't get punched in the face.

3) i've even seen at starbucks on charles street (a very different area of boston!)...our manager had to ask a guy to leave because of some of the things he was saying to my co-worker abby.

all this in the span of one week.  i'm sure most, probably all, the female can offer their own examples, i've just been a little overwhelmed with the concentration of incidents here in the last couple of days.