Breaking

Beginning of a "Fresh start"?

"Korean"  -  "English"
It wasn't what I had hoped for when I moved here, but what can you do when your are forced out of your own country. I wished that I could stay with my only friend, but that wasn't possible. When I was fifteen my parents had to move me and my two younger siblings out of the United States and straight to Seoul, South Korea. My father had already gotten a job there since he had duel citizenship. My mother got a job teaching English, she was born and raised in the U.S, but my father was half Korean and half Chinese. This story isn't entirely about them so I'll cut to my side. I have an eleven year old sister and a nine year old brother, Toni and Luka. We were homeschooled up until we had to move. It got too dangerous in the U.S so we had to go. Now I admit that I didn't like the whole idea of us moving to a different country, but I complied because I knew that it was the best decision for our family. I needed to be mature about this. We moved out of America really quickly. We sold a lot of things, like our car, any toys, even a lot of books. I knew that we would be able to blossom in Korea.

It was the beginning of summer and I wanted to find a part time job to pass time."Hello," I say as I bow when I enter the cafe. For context, my father taught me and my siblings Korean at a younger age. "Are you by any chance hiring?" I said as I look at the cashier. "Let me check with my boss real quick.." The woman says as she head through the back curtain. I wait patiently for her to return, but something caught my eye and made me turn. I look in the corner of my eye before turning to the big glass window. A boy, he was just walking with his friends I assume but our eyes seem to reach each others gaze. "Excuse me miss...." The woman said as a turn back to her bowing to apologize. "Sorry..." I said. "It's okay!" She says with a sweet smile. "We are hiring, how old are you?" "I am fifteen years old ma'am." I said as I show her my student ID card. "Perfect, let me grab you a tax form and we can put you on the schedule." She says as she goes through the curtain again. That was weird I thought to myself. Did they just hire me on the spot? My phone buzzed and it was my mother calling me. "Hey hun, can you stop by the grocery store and pick up some things for me before you head home?" "Yeah sure ma." I didn't want to tell her about me getting a job because I knew she wanted me to spend my time either studying or making friends, when in reality I'm too smart for my own good and I don't like talking to people unless they talk to me first.

Summer went by decently quick, but I still enjoyed it. I saved a lot of money and was able to buy my school books. Soon it was my first day at school and I had to go straight to the administration office. As I head there I can hear people starting to whisper. "Yah, look at her hair.. and her shoes..." I can hear these girls talking about how I look, but then I hear this. "Bet she is a lesbian.."  When I heard that I clenched my fist in anger but I still composed myself. I reach the office and I fill out some paper work. I was asked if I wanted to be in any clubs, I asked about an art one and they said that I could join this one, but there isn't a lot of people there. Good, I can be by myself. The lady hands me my schedule and I bow. I head to my classroom. I wait at the door to be called in. "YAH!! QUIET!!!" The homeroom teacher yells. "We have a ne-" She was cut off by a boy running into the classroom, probably because he was late. "Ahem!" She coughs and gives him a horrible stare as the rest of the class snickers. "As I was saying, we have a new student in this class. Please be nice and make her feel welcomed." She turns to me signaling for me to come forward. As I walk through the doorway I could already feel the eyes staring at me. "Please introduce yourself." She says to me as I face the other students. Let me just point this out, I do not look Asian at all whatsoever. Hell the only thing that looks 'Asian' on me, is my uniform and my eyes. So when I open my mouth to speak everyone was in aw. "Hello." I bow. "My name is Moon Yoo-Ryung, please take care of me." I lift up my head to see everyone start to gossip. Yoo-Ryung was my Korean given name. "Thank you Miss Moon, you can sit by the window behind Jia." The girl that she was pointing at stands and bows as I walk to my assigned seat. This is going to be an interesting school year.