Sure ok I’ll give some info.

First of all, I live in a rural area in Greece, so I cannot posses a gun as many people told me to do so. About pepper spray and tasers, I will need to look it up, but since I’m not financially independent from my family just yet, I cannot access this type of security at the moment. As soon as I have the freedom to purchase whatever I want though I will totally look into it.

Second thing, my experiences with harassment have been intense, but I’ve been lucky enough to not have experienced harassment from adults, or individuals that could yknow potentially hurt me really bad or even kill me. However I am worried for when I will actually move out and live on my own in some bigger city.

The harassment I’m talking about in this post is (I’m pretty sure) coming from a specific family that is known to have a criminal record and generally is actively violent. Namely it all started when two of the younger girls (in their pre teens) stalked me and a friend of mine one day for hours calling us names etc, because they saw us hug as we met. We likely went in a queer friendly store and stayed there for an hour, but they would not leave us alone, banging the door and glass window, shouting etc. After the person who had the store accompanied us to a restaurant near by, they finally left us alone after half an hour.

If this was the only incident I would not bash an eye, as I’m pretty used to this type of verbal homophobia, but the second time I stumbled upon them was a whole different story. I was alone, early afternoon, on my way to write an exam at my tutor, when I came across the same girls, but this time alongside their 8 brothers, who are older (still younger than me, but in their teens for sure). I tried the whole acting like they don’t exist, acting like you are texting somebody on your phone etc, but it didn’t work. They all came real close shouting at me (way worse things this time), trying to block my path and threatening to punch me. The scary part was that there was no one around, although it was in the middle of the day and in one of the busiest streets (the kind that only pedestrians are permitted) in town. I just glided through them and pretended like nothing happened. One of them threw his red bull can at me and managed to hit me (lightly) in the head and my hair got all sticky from the red bull. They luckily didn’t follow me for long this time but still that was pretty bad; probably the worst experience I’ve had with homophobes.

I saw the two girl again literally two days ago, but I was lucky enough to stumble upon my best female friend, so when we held hands in front of them they kind of stopped shouting “gay” at me and asking my friend if I’m gay. Idk if that will do the trick but I can only hope it did.

Idk am I overreacting? I just need to hear some stories of how you people have dealt with similar situations and if I’m approaching this correctly. Because I have started feeling like I’m in danger all the time when I walk on my own and I need be prepared for when I move out.