Once, when I lived in a bad part of town, I was walking to the local 7-11 which was just a few blocks away from my apartment. I took the shortcut and went through the alley to get there, which was what I usually did. As I was walking down the alley this time, a car full of people slowly drove by me and then immediately stopped 40 yards behind me. Two rather large men, who could be line backers in the NFL, started jogging in my direction. What was peculiar about it was that they werent jogging towards me but off to an angle, as though they were going to the nearest dumpster. I was walking backwards now, keeping an eye on what they're doing. Then, as they were about 15-20 yards away from me, they immediately turned towards me and started sprinting. It wasn't until about a second later, when one of them said, "dont let him get...," that I snapped and grabbed the mace from my coat pocket. One of them got within an arm's distance from me before I sprayed him in his face and the other guy who was not far behind. He fell to the ground, got back up and they both ran back to the car. I realized that they were probably going to mug me or worse. And if I was not prepared, I might have been killed or serverly hurt/handicapped.
There was another incident, which was recently in east San Jose, where some gang-banger was harrasing my girlfriend and I in the mall. As we were walking out of the mall and towards our car, the idiot was following closely beind. I was not going to waste time trying to reason with him as to what his problem was. So as we reached our car, I quickly turned around, pulled out my folder, flicked it open and took a defensive stance. Whatever problem he had, it disappeared quickly as he cursed us, turned around and walked away.
What you did, Kyui Su, was the best thing as you were in numbers, and the situation had time to play itself out. I never look for a fight and just walk away from any potential one at all costs. But in a situation which is sudden, unknown, and can't be avoided, I try to prepare and defend myself as though my life depended on it.
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~Howdy
"Wow, BOB, Wow!" - the Arm
http://www.firewalkwithme.org