Life In Hell

At First Sight

I was just a kid, maybe around ten, when I first saw them.

The Refugees.

At first sight, they seemed every bit of the traumatized kids my mom had made them out to be.

But then I discovered that they were ballsy.

For starters, they broke the school rules like they owned the place.

They weren't like us.
And there were many of us.

There were students from all kinds of places, like Fiji, Kiribati, Tuvalu, and even the Marshall Islands.
There were even students who had more than one of these unique identies, I as well as some friends, to name a few.

We also had a lot of teachers who came in from overseas for work.
A lot of locals weren't exactly teacher-material because of their inability to follow the rules. So to make things easier for our non-Nauruan brethren, the Principal decided to add an extra rule to our already long list of school rules.

Avoid speaking in MOTHER TONGUE. Its rude to others!

The refugees did just that.
And we had a love/admire/hate relationship with them for it.

Ms Jane was a strict woman, with a no-nonsense attitude.

She told one of the male refugees to answer a question on the board.
His whole group erupted in anger.
At least...that's what it sounded like.

They were very loud and their harsh accents accompanied every foreign word that came out of their mouths.

Ms Jane paled and stammered out an apology, her age of 54 years finally becoming evident on her features.

All the other kids laughed and the refugess laughed along with them.

I frowned as repulsion ebbed throughout my very being.

Ms Jane didn't deserve that.

However, I shook off the repulsion, and smiled weakly.

They weren't raised under the same circumstances as me, so of course they would be different.

I should give them a chance.

And that's what I did.