What do you  mean I’m  too  African and I have to act less African in order to fit in? I turned my head to the left and my eyes following I looked the girl up and down as if she done lost her marbles. She was shocked at the way I reacted to her statement  that she couldn’t even repeat it. She took her lunch tray and got up as if someone just ruined her day. I seen her marching away with her braids swinging back and forth as if she was forcing it. I turned back around and decided to eat my homemade lunch my mom packed for me cassava leaf with white rice. I can heart the little snickering and laughing at the other table while I eat, but I wasn’t letting that get to me I don’t want them thinking they can get to me easily.

It’s recess and everyone is in their little groups of friends I have no one since it’s my first week and I started school late. I decided to just jump rope and stay to myself. Until a group of boys came and called me a “African Booty Scratcher”. I stopped jumping the rope hit the ground so hard accidentally I hit myself with it on the side of my ankle. I turned around towards the boy like I was a villain in a scary movie. I marched towards him and pushed him off his feet. I smiled like a brick was lifted off my shoulders. The boy got up and walked away with a shocking face on him he didn’t know I was capable of sticking up for myself and his friends noticed that too because they were also shocked.

I noticed what I was going through this process they call Bullying. My first time going through it just because I’m African and I don’t hide the fact that I am African. They hated the fact I was so comfortable and confident in showing my culture that people had to bully me out of it. They realized they couldn’t so they wanted to hate me for it.