"Will a new class mean, no friends?"
Ever since Crystal didn't make the cut for her desired stream, she is forced to "live with whatever she has". Being alienated by her old classmates, she hesitantly accepts her fate being with NONE of her fire-fo...
This year, our school's Youth Day was themed around inclusivity. We had activities that would help us walk in the shoes of our peers with disabilities, but these activities also felt like a reinforcement of differences for me.
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The other Crystal and I were frequently leftovers when it came to group work for different reasons, and it showed. Crystal Yeo was ostracised by the entire cohort, but I was a social butterfly with my not-as-available friend group (the other members weren't in the same class). Hence, we would be the leftovers at group work. I was lucky to find a group quickly. One of my classmates Darius noticed I was struggling to find a group and he recommended me to join YX's group. I got the green light to be in their group instantly.
Crystal Yeo's group needed a reminder from Mr Chen about inclusivity before they even bothered to call her in. She went along with it, but I knew deep down they didn't want to be with her. They were just putting up an act just not to piss Mr Chen off. - Blindfolded, YX guided me to find the ball. I listened carefully to her instructions on how to draw the ball in. Positioning myself, I kept throwing the balls across the classroom, not really caring about accuracy or anything. I only got 2 balls in, but that didn't matter. I actually surpassed my own expectations for that game; some balls did go in!
While I got a little bit of guidance here and there, Crystal Yeo got cheers as she seamlessly threw the ping pong balls in blindfolded at lightning speed.
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Those cheers didn't sit well with me. Knowing how they truly were near her, I could tell all their cheers was an act. It felt like they were nailing their hardest school assignment, and turns out being a decent human to Crystal Yeo was difficult for them. It then dawned to me how lucky I was to take a different path rather than be with her, because there was a possibility I'd suffer the same fate as her. - The next game was to do a word search with some filter that made it tough to see.
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Gosh, the lenses were glaring! My eyes were hurting just by wearing it even though I was wearing my normal glasses on top of it. Nonetheless, I took the highlighter and let it dance around the piece of paper, soon being able to decrypt the fuzzy words in front of me. I then passed the pen to YX, who continued the chain in her group to find the words. - The last game was a sign game. I tried to coordinate my hands to do sign language, but sign language was easier said than done. I had to memorise the letters in a limited amount of time and there were hand symbols with very awkward positioning. Some of the words had very similar hand gestures and I had to transition them at an indescribable speed. Nonetheless, I gave it my all and still got 2 points for my time. Not much, but honestly being in a team that actually wanted me than a team that invited me for show was all I wanted. I didn't have to think too hard of losing and winning in those kind of teams.
But deep down, I knew that I made up my mind about something that could change my life. All this was for the best and there was no turning back with this decision I've made.
