This little girl from Malvern, Worcestershire, UK was being bullied at school because of her Gypsy roots or for being a traveler. Her mother is of a Romany background and people see Gypsies having bad reputations in society, because all you hear about travelers is they steal, do scavenging, leave litters and start fights, stuff like that.
When she was four months old, she lived in a second hand caravan towed around with a battered Ford Transit Mark II pick-up together with her young parents for about a year before moving in with her grandparents. Their caravan had a toilet, shower and gas cooker and they set off parking on roadsides at Wales and other places. Her parents were always in constant fear of someone throwing a brick through their window or being stoned because locals didn't want them there. It was hard for them and they had very little money and travelers were not accepted. They would always kept extra money for fuel just in case police want them to move away, because if your were without cash and no fuel, police impounded the van. And when Christmas time came, there was just enough money for her parents to buy a rattle or a teddy bear for her.
After a year they moved in with her grandmother and lived in a council house. Council houses were built for people who don't have jobs and are low of income. When she was 2 yrs.old all she wanted to do was sing. She was given hand-me-down clothes by her Romany gypsy Aunt and as a result her fellow classmates branded her as 'GYPO' or 'PIKEY'. When she was 7 or 8 her parents gave her a karaoke machine as a Christmas present, she appreciates it a lot and never stops singing.
Her uncle Jessy would recall who is as well her neighbor: "I used to hear Cher singing in her bedroom, I could hear her kick the karaoke machine to get it going. She'd be singing from 5pm until it was time for bed at 11pm."
Growing up she never forget her gypsy roots and often visited her Aunt and cousins living in a caravan. At times she's had to put up with kids calling her 'gypo' and 'pikey'. School was tough for her because of all the bullies.
“School was disastrous, I hated it. I went from being bullied at a young age to going AWOL. I’d do stupid things. I was a brat. It was my cry for help because no one was listening." she said.
There were happy memories at school as well despite of all the bullying, it was everytime the school had a talent contest and she got a chance to take to the stage and sing. She liked it because she loved what she was doing, singing is the only thing she's good at, according to her.
Her talent shone through at an early age, and she was dubbed “Cher the singer” after her dazzling performances in school talent competitions. And joined local singing contest as well and won.
She even tried auditioning on X-Factor when she was 14 and did a country song but she did not make it through, judges told her she was young and it was not just for her. When she was at secondary school, other girls at college bullied and laughed at things like how she have done her hair and what she was wearing. She tried to look different to everyone else and always tried to stand out.
She wasn't that unpopular in general, only few people dislike her but did everything they could to make her life a misery.
“I take it in for a about a second and then I tell myself to laugh. If you don’t laugh, you’ll cry," she said.
One of her classmates said, "She wasn’t a coward, so when these girls started abusing her, she would more often than not get into a fight. But because she was always so small, she would usually lose."
Everytime she went home from school she would tell her mum that, this boy said this and this girl said that. Her mum would always remind her--- 'STICKS AND STONES MAY BREAK MY BONES BUT WORDS NEVER WILL'.
