Part 1: The Red Worm
.
A lot of people plead desperately to some unknown power in the universe to give them a change of atmosphere. Some sort of migration that takes place naturally so that they don’t have to run away deliberately from the issues they face in life.
I was one very lucky person in terms of migration.
By the end of the eighteenth year of my existence, I may have successfully migrated to three different countries. If the universe wills it.
I was two years old when it all began. The funny part is, I vaguely remember it. Hard to believe, I know. All I remember is, my Grandmother’s voice comforting me over the phone that everything will be alright.
Good thing I didn’t know at the time that I was 3,465 kms away from her, in an absolutely foreign country.
I remember my first day in school too. It’s awkward, seriously, when I think about how I can remember things that no one else can. No one sane enough.
I could say that I grew up assuming I was insane because I thought over about things in an inexplicable weird way. Remembered things too.
My initial years were pathetic. I was quite fat and tall for my age. Got bullied and alienated, some crazy fights over chicken nuggets, and people assumed I was evil.
Sad. One of the rare cases where the bullied person gets to be the evil one.
And I wasn’t THAT irreproachable too.
The only soothing experience I went through on a daily basis, was the way my mother dressed me up for school.
My uniform was a crisp white shirt underneath a blazing red pinafore. Accessories include a pair of tight white socks; jet black shoes that didn’t require any sort of polish, which shone like they were made of metal; a single coconut tree of hair located in the midst of my triangular shaped head, held together by one out of many colourful Love-In-Tokyo’s; two colourful clips that went along with the hair tie; an overweight Scooby Day bag and more depressing items like school books, a tiny tiffin box and a tiny carton of chocolate milk along with it; and an ID card pinned to my chest to show I was part of the Dammam D-3 Bus.
After dressing me up, my mother would pick up the circular container of Cremé 21 and apply that gently on my face and neck, run her hands around my face, fondling it in her palms and kiss me on my forehead.
It was quite ritualistic.
She would still do that without blinking an eyelid if I ask her to do it now, or even thirty years later.
And I still ask too.
Later she would proceed to force feed me a cup of sick smelling milk with nothing but sugar in it. I absolutely hated that stuff. It ruined the ritualistic caressing of my face every time.
.
I made a total of TWO friends in Kindergarten. A girl named Keziah. And Fathima Enaas. I chose Keziah because 1) We spoke the same mother tongue 2) She got bullied too 3) She was as weird as me. I chose Enaas because 1) She was beautiful 2) She was damn fair 3) She never talked 4) I bit her finger on the first day of school, which caused her to run away from me, which made me guilty, and I ran behind her wearing a Ghost mask, screaming sorry.
She never spoke to me again.
Keziah and I roamed the grounds together; sat on swings and sang nursery rhymes together; poured a carton of chocolate milk in the bag of the tall boy who bullied us together; blamed each other when the teacher caught us together; ate Traffic Light lollipops and ice pops with the money Dad gave me for buying Proper Food, together.
It was a companionship that happened because no one actually bothered to talk with us.
I swear, my childhood version would roll over and laugh if I told her about my friends now.
.
Once a carton of chocolate juice fell on my uniform, and I was sent to the janitor for a dress change. Navy Blue Pinafore. Something the Seniors wore.
My Oh My. The transition from ‘The Class Punchbag’ to ‘The Popular Fat Kid’ was quick.
The popularity lasted for a total of 210 minutes.
I was ‘Punchbag’ and ‘Kid-Who-Peed-In-Her-Dress’ the next day.
Demotion was a sick idiot, I tell you.
.
The last day of school was ritualistic. Every year had one at the end of it. We prayed to the Water Gods and splashed bottles upon bottles of water on each other until the teacher came and swung us out of the class.
And I anxiously waited outside my Kindergarten classroom for the next year.
Primary School.
Another building.
Blue Pinafore.
.
Next Up:
Part 2: The Blue Worm
-The Violet Woman
#TrueStory
No comments:
Post a Comment