I (27F) was at the airport bathroom just now, putting some make up on waiting for my second flight of the day. I travel a lot through this airport so I went to a bathroom that's kind of hidden and I knew would probably be empty.
A cleaning guy came in and said something in German (which I don't speak) so I figured he was saying something about him being a man so I answered automatically with "don't worry, I'm almost done."
Like 5 seconds after two early 30s women come in holding hands, one has short hair. The guy says something to the one with short hair and the other one answers with what I can only assume was her saying they are both women.
He looks at me and starts talking, again, in German, and I say "sorry I don't speak German". The woman tells me "he just thought she's was a man because of her hair" and I say "oh okay."
I keep putting make up on but the guy keeps talking to me and says in very broken English something including the words "lesbian, uncomfortable, wait outside". I don't know what he's saying but I'm getting pissed and the two women tell me they are sorry and to please ignore him.
He switches back to them and starts slightly blocking them from going into the bathrooms and pointing at me. I don't know what to do but I'm angry at this point. I look at them, the one with short hair is looking back at me, uncomfortable, the other one is talking to him, visibly annoyed.
He switches back to me says something about "uncomfortable" and "lesbian" again and I said, almost word for word "Shut up and f--k off, if anyone is making me uncomfortable it's you, so get the f--k out and leave them alone".
He looks at me shocked, scoffs and leaves. The long haired one looks at me pissed and says "Great, now we can't even do anything about it even if we wanted to. Hope you feel better, thanks for saving us girlie" (ironically). Now I feel bad but I really think I was trying to do the right thing? Maybe it was my tone, I'm extremely tired and also LGBT so that's why I reacted strongly I guess.
I don't know if they were saying something I couldn't understand. Cleaning guy did not look or sound German so maybe they were just trying to communicate too and I thought he was being agressive?
AITA?
SigSauerPower320 wrote:
NTA? But in the future, you might want to know what the person is saying before you freak the hell out on them. While you are likely correct in your assumptions, your response was a little much. That's something that could be reported to airport security/management.
Remote-Passenger-7880 wrote:
NAH just because idk exactly why they're so upset. A random dude was aggressively trying to drag you into the situation, you told him he was making you uncomfortable and to f--k off. That's the appropriate response to a random man aggressively speaking at you in a bathroom.
OP responded:
Honestly I'm wildly assuming now but I think that might be it. The girl with the short hair looked fed up and the other one looked very pissed. But again I was not fully understanding so maybe I shouldn't have said anything. I don't think they were AH either I was just taken aback (the man was an AH tho).
Adamlbaconstraps wrote:
YTA. You assumed half of what he was saying so may well have got the context completely wrong.
You also went out of your way to do exactly what you were asked not to which is the bigger issue.
Interesting-Sky6313 wrote:
NTA.
He was also bothering YOU. You were defending yourself as he was making assumptions about you. You also had a right to be pissed. But you shouldn’t go to “f you” so fast. You over did it even in your own defense.
AVeryBrownGirlNerd wrote:
NAH but I may be biased because I've been in similar experiences before as someone who was put in the middle or was being attacked.
He dragged you into this and you responded accordingly.
However, I understand why they didn't want you to handle it. In my experience, when I faced similar people, I didn't want to be a bother (not suggesting this is right or wrong. Just a truth of mine.) He's the clear AH because he was being aggressive and a har-sser. You're good.
Thatonecrazywolf wrote:
I'm going to go with NAH. I am a butch lesbian and I see both sides here. If an employee was harassing me such as this, depending on my mood I'd either record the interaction and report the guy, or I'd tell them to f--k right off as you did.
If I had to guess, they were trying to get enough of a reaction out of him to justify reporting him, and you telling hin to f--k off intruded on that plan. But also, he was being annoying as f--k to you. Even if you weren't defending them, I'd be annoyed as hell if a man was bugging me at the bathroom trying to talk to me and act all dumb and macho.
1962Michael wrote:
NAH.
As a man, I've had cleaning ladies (European airports) come into bathrooms and start cleaning the stalls while there are guys standing at the urinals. I assume the male cleaning crew are instructed not to do this.
The guy was there to clean the bathroom. He may have just been trying to tell them that he wanted to close the bathroom as soon as YOU were finished. It doesn't have to have anything to do with appearance or orientation.
General-Fishing9633 wrote:
"By now I've been putting on makeup for about an hour and I've missed my flight and I look like a clown. And the Gestapo just won't leave!"
OP responded:
lmaooooo if you have any tricks on how to cover up naturally dark eye bags from 2 days of no sleep + wing an eyeliner the size of half my face while trying to understand whats going on in a foreign language ill appreciate it, it happens more than youd think.