Have you ever had an online/real life stalker?

Marengo wrote: »

Yes a mad Russian poet who was fascinated with hurling and wanted to promote it on a worldwide basis. Originally met me in my place of work. Her name is Mary Duniyva. She launched a High Court objection to the Dublin spire as she wanted her design used, she's a sculpture too. She wanted to paint me in a pair of shorts, no top, with a hurl in a 'Swan Lake' pose! Plagued me ringing work for 2 years and arrived in work a few times.

If you google her you'll find more about her.

Mary Duniyva. There's a name I haven't heard in almost 30 years. I had a three hour encounter with her once, when I was trapped on a train sitting opposite her. I was 8 and half months pregnant and she spent the journey regaling me with horror stories of dreadful labours, epic blood loss and cords wrapped around babies necks. There were no other seats on the train to flee to, and as you can imagine I needed to be sitting. Hahah what a mad ould bag of spiders she was/is.

I was backpacking through Iran a couple of years ago, doing a bit of couchsurfing to save money, stayed with this guy and his family for two days. Everything seemed genuine at the time, I had already met a lot of really hospitable Iranians, so I didn’t think it was unusual when him and his family were being extra friendly.

Iranians are always willing to help tourists, buying them lunch, coffee, giving them lifts here and there, even strangers invite tourists in from the street and cook dinner for them, tourism in Iran is fairly new, so they spoil tourists.

Anyway, after I had left Iran, I kept in contact with my host, we had each others WhatsApp, we didn’t speak for a few weeks, then he would randomly text me every couple of weeks, it was all small talk, nothing major, just casual conversations.

Then, out of the blue, he began asking questions about moving to Ireland, he then began almost begging me for information, that was all cool, I gave him all of the appropriate information, told him to research some English schools in Dublin, gave him the contact of an English school in Dublin that was well known, told him about the skilled working visa, he didn’t qualify for that one because he didn’t have a skill that was highlighted on the website, I gave him some additional options, like getting a job with an international company, and then, after a few years, ask for a transfer to Ireland.

He thanked me for the information, but kept claiming that the best option, studying English in Ireland, was too expensive. He then began bothering me almost every day, like do you have any Irish friends looking for staff and all of these questions, I kept telling him that they would be unable to provide him with the correct working visa, this went on for a while and it didn’t seem to register with him, then one day he text me saying that he wanted to move close to my parents house in Ireland, at this point I began to get freaked out, I told him that Dublin is a small city, so he’s always only a short bus stop away from wherever he wants to visit.

I then began distancing myself, he would send an average of three texts a week, I rarely replied, but when I did, he then got very deep, telling me about the corruption in Iran and that he needed to get out, I again told him that he should contact a language school in Ireland and they would be able to provide him with a visa, that option was legal and quicker.

After a few weeks of trying to pressure me, he then sent me a message of his friend’s coffin that had just died. He was looking for sympathy almost every day and then tried to make me feel guilty for not trying to help him. I again explained that it was really difficult to get a work visa in Ireland, unless he had a skill, or unless he was willing to study. He then went a step too far, he began telling me that he was in trouble because of a protest that he was involved in. I didn’t reply to his messages, then randomly his wife started contacting me. I didn’t reply at all, he kept messaging me until I finally blocked him, though strangely enough, a few months later, no idea how he found me because I don’t use my real Facebook name, put in a friend request. I immediately blocked him.

It was all such a strange experience and one that caught me by surprise. I met so many Iranians and almost all of them were the complete opposite. It was more of a reality check, now I’m extra cautious about who I give my number to and keep my friendliness to a limit

Graces7 wrote: »

yep. same here.

Yeah i had one too- what ia up with that?

fryup wrote: »

sad lonely people with too much time on their hands me thinks :cool:

Not always or just that. Some of these stalkers go on to be murderers or violent, some have serious anger problems. Did you see that lovely looking girl who had the head kicked off her by her ex recently enough, it on the papers and TV, I think? The CCTV footage of that assault was absolutely horrible. He lay in wait for her - in other words he stalked her.
I have zero problems with people who are sad, zero problems with people who are lonely - these are very ordinary, human conditions which we all will experience to lesser or greater extents and they do not provoke most people to stalk. Although, it is true that in some people they may provoke some minor preoccupation. But people who seriously stalk are unsettled in other ways, me thinks, and sometimes they are very dangerous people.