I don't want you to feel sorry for me, that's not what this is about. I have grown into the man I am today because of the sum of my experiences, but I am not a victim of my experiences.
When I was a kid, I moved around a lot. My parents were from Jamaica (Dad) and Haiti (Mom) as I mentioned in my previous blog. Born in Montreal, I bounced between Jamaica, Montreal and Haiti quite a few times.
I remember when the actual bullying started in my life. I was fortunate to have not been among those who suffered through bullying from the moment I entered school like many other people out there. But that all started changing when I was rounding up to my tenth year on this planet.
It was my final year in school at Hopefield Preparatory (a.k.a. Elementary) School, and a kid that had repeated his final year sat behind me in class. He would put his feet on the back of the legs of my chair and shake his feet against them. I wouldn't be able to concentrate on whatever I was doing. Over and over I would ask him, tell him, snarl at him to stop, but he kept on coming back with it. One day, it would seem like he was the coolest kid and I would be part of the group he would talk to, the next he was tyrannically annoying the living crap out of me.
One day when I couldn't stand his crap anymore, and my anger got the better of me during lunch break I saw him in the area we would have our school plays in and I jumped him. I ended up with a busted chin for that, since he just flipped me off his back, but I am pretty sure he stopped bugging me.
In another instance, for some reason the North American holiday "Halloween" made it's way to Jamaica and I was taking part, I remember it clearly my dad took time to pain my face, I had decided to go as "Two-Face" the criminal from Batman. Yep! I was a big geek even back then, and there was this kid a couple years behind me who just had nothing better to do than to target me whenever I was around. I was in a "costume contest" and when my name was called and I went onstage, he laughed. It was one of those laughs that has nothing to do with happiness, just laughing to put the person down.
I moved to Haiti and attended high school there. My first year I was in a school that I didn't get into any trouble really, not in the bullying sense. There were always tussles here and there, but nothing serious. It's when I went into another high school in Haiti that things got rough. My first year for a reason I still do not remember, a kid from a higher class had me pinned on the ground with his thumb digging into my throat. Threatening to burst my neck. Needless to say I was in tears, angry and frustrated because I was much smaller in size and couldn't do anything. Worst part was, I thought this guy and I were friends...
The teasing happened on a regular basis, but I mostly didn't care about what people would say, it's what they would do that would set me off. I was called "Froggy" and "Frog eye", apparently my big eyes made them feel a certain type of way. But people stopped messing with me directly, the cowards would mostly attack from behind.
After one more year in that school, I moved back to Jamaica. In retrospect I wonder if it was because I wanted to get away from the experience of bullying in Haiti. Maybe it did have something to do with that.
When I went back to Jamaica, out of the three schools I applied for Campion College, Wolmer's Boys School and St. George's College for Boys, for some reason I decided to go to St. George's. As a matter of fact, I knew why. When we got onto the campus of the school it was so big and beautifully kept, that I wanted to be at this school. My previous high school experiences were small schools, with barely anywhere to hang out, or play without getting into somebody's way. This place was huge in comparison! Campion and Wolmer's just didn't cut it in my opinion at the time.
I want to remind you, my first name is Kym (deemed a female name) and I was about to go into highschool, full of boys whose testosterone levels are kicking into overtime. Having just come from Haiti and the Coup d'État still being in full effect, there were lots of Haitian refugees fleeing to Jamaica, Cuba, the US and anywhere else they could go.
As soon as they (my classmates) found out I was from Haiti, the razing started. "Did you come over on a banana boat?" If I didn't loan someone a pen, or 'lend' them some money, I became a battybway (homosexual) and a refugee. My dad always told me to walk away, so I did. Telling myself they were just words. Sometimes I would cuss them out, the best way to get a boy in Jamaica riled up was to tell them to go "suck yuh mada". Needless to say I would shout that one a lot!
I had met a kid from the states during orientation, him and I ended up in the same class together and we sort of struck up an uneasy friendship. During this time he had boasted about getting into fights and how he allegedly won those fights. Seeing as how I never won any fights of my own, I kind of evaluated in my head, "if somethin' goes down with him, it's going to be either him or me, and it won't be me."
Eventually, he and I drifted apart. No falling out, he started hanging out with people I didn't like and so I was already used to not developing any attachments to people in school since I was never there for more than a couple of years. I befriend other geeks kind of like myself. Typical story, but hey, that's what happened.
The kid from the States and I eventually got into a scuffle. I think I made a smart-ass comment to a friend of mine about one of the members of his new "gang" and he decided to start kicking me in the butt asking me to say whatever I said again. I refused and told him to stop kicking me and leave me alone. The kicks came repeatedly, and after several times of telling him to stop kicking and leave me alone, I snapped, I got him in a headlock and screamed in his ear to leave me alone. He started flailing his hands at me and raking at my face so I bit down: HARD.
I remember exactly what he said about stomping a kid into the ground and I was ready to kill him if I had to. 13/14 years old. My mind was made up. He started huffing and puffing and screaming "YUH DEAD NOW!" I stood there watching him, ready for whatever he was going to do. A bunch of my classmates came in and held him back. I walked away, and went to the school Chaplin. I knew he wouldn't attack me in there, but I knew he would have backative. That was how school bullies worked. If you wounded or embarrassed them, they would find a way to get back at you.
He came and found me in there, but I looked him in the eye, and he just walked away. Me and him never exchanged words again. But another person would set their sights on me soon after. A tall boy would decide that my head was a mosquito and he would constantly sway the back of my head. Days and days of this in between when the teachers would get to class. One day I had had enough, I am pretty sure I cussed him out and took up my stuff to report him to the teacher.
The teacher was nowhere in sight and I had calmed down and was bringing my stuff back to the class, he was talking to the class Beadle (class president) who would issue demerit points for bad behaviour and telling him that I told him about his mother, which I didn't, and I lost it. I lunged at him and unfortunately ended up underneath him. He fed me knuckle sandwiches, but most of them landed on my forehead because I deliberately kept my head tucked into my chest. Technically I started the fight, out of frustration, yes, but I did start the fight, but he got suspended because of the damage he inflicted on me.
I'll never forget our Dean of Discipline came into the class the next day, I was actually fully healed because I toughed it out and put tiger balm all over my face, and the kid came back to class. The Dean said that he was a threat and that he was to leave the compound immediately. I had never been so happy to be on the "losing" side of that physical altercation in my life. People in my class stopped messing with me, but there was six classes for every grade.
Remember the guy from the states? His "gang"? Well they were part of a group we knew as the "Dutty Cup Crew" -- uptown gangsters so to speak. One of their biggest mouths was in another grade. He started ragging on me every once in a while, but since we were in different classes it didn't happen very often. If at all.
When I moved up to my fourth year of high school, that was my third, he and I ended up in the same class. By that time I had made a solid group of friends but the teasing still came. Because of my name variants of Kym were spewed in my direction: Kymmesha, Kymberly, not very original but whatever, I didn't really care. Fourth form (as we called it) was pretty uneventful. Not much happened aside from the regular name calling. My friends and I would adopt our "bully" names. I had one friend who was called Shoeshead because well, his head was kind of shaped like a shoe. Another friend of mine, he has a very fast metabolism and so he was extremely skinny and they called him Antz.
Me, after a brush with Nair on my head (yes, we did some stupid shit as kids) I got the nickname: Kojack. Ironically, from the same big mouth. While in Fifth form, that's when the kettle started becoming steaming and cracking with pressure. The big mouth would run off his mouth a lot. Then I would just cuss him out and be on my way. One day, the fifth formers were allowed to buy food just outside our school gate, Patty and Grotto bread, as I came out of the front entrance of the 5th Form building, I saw him and his crew sitting on the wall, I made my way to the school entrance and a stone just shot it's way past my leg. I don't remember if I looked back, or even stopped, but I knew it was him. Since the stone hadn't hit me I did nothing.
When I went back to the 5th form block, I stopped and looked at him. I considered casually walking over there, throwing my drink in his face, then kicking him off the wall he was sitting on and stomping him into the ground. I remembered my father's voice "just walk away". I did.
Fights were common, especially in an all boys' school. We had some very simple rules:
- Let the two guys fight it out.
- Don't interfere unless/until a teacher comes in.
- No third party was allowed to join the fight. It had to be a fair fight come on now!
- Once a fight has been stopped, it will not resume for a second round.
So a kid from the "Dutty Cup Crew" and one of my classmates, a very awkward, nerd, but extremely solid asian kid got into a fight in the class. The Dutty Cup kid was getting his ass whupped but good! My classmate may have been an awkward kid, but he knew what the f--- he was doing! I have no idea why they started fighting but big mouth somehow got behind my classmate and started smacking him in the head. So right there rule number three is violated. We broke off the fight.
The kid from the crew came back again and slapped my classmate in the face, true to rule number four we pushed him off and stopped that fight. When I was returning to my seat, I noticed big mouth and another classmate of mine, a much shorter guy, squaring off. The short guy was reprimanding big mouth and telling him that he should let the guys fight it out.
Pause for a second. In an all boys' school, many of us carried weapons to school. You name it we probably had it. I personally carried a bowie knife and at one point a ratchet (pocket knife with a big blade) to school.
Big mouth was reaching into his back pocket, and I knew he was going to be pulling out a knife. It was like a scene from a movie. I ran between them and shoved big mouth back, he fell against the table and before I knew it he was swarmed by a bunch of my classmates slapping the living daylights out of him. I turned to my friends and someone jumped from behind me and chucked me in my chest. The member of the crew, we'll call him shrimp, that was actually behind me and the american kid falling out. He was met with a barrage of slaps and fists before being shoved right out of the classroom, all before he even hit the ground. I started charging, I was cursing in creole and everything! My crew: Antz, Shoeshead, and our gentle giant who joined us in 4th Form: Yeti (because he was just so damn big!) stopped me from joining the fracas outside.
Following that, I was the target of their affection. After school that day while waiting for my dad to come pick me up, the kid from the crew, the one that fought with my asian classmate, came up to me and pointed in my face joined by a younger member of the crew I'll dub shrimp junior. It was an intimidation tactic. He came and pointed in my face, actually barely touching my nose, I slowly put up two fingers on my right hand and pushed his hand away. The kid flashed his hand away "Don't touch me!" while snickering shrimp junior called him off like a trainer would call back a dog.
We were pretty close to graduation by now, so there were a lot less classes. One day, Shrimp and another member of the crew actually were coming to find me in the bathroom. I had already returned and was halfway back to the road that runs through the school. They continued to walk and then Shrimp said "Battyman" I walked right up to him, and stepped on his Clark's (I remember because back in the day, stepping on a man's Clark's which were considered high fashion, but I never cared) and said "SHRIMP (I didn't actually say shrimp I said his name) DON'T F--- WITH ME." I was right in his face. Millimeters away from his face. His partner commented on how I looked like I wanted to kiss him, I just flashed him a look and walked away.
During this time, classmates who never spoke to me before were asking me what was going on. Some guys who were doing over their fifth year would tell me that if I needed backative, just let them know. This was fascinating to me, because even my own nerd crew, I never considered them backative. I always was kind of in a "Me against the world" kind of mindset. The "Dutty Cup Crew" didn't really both me again. Except for big mouth... I kind of provoked him, but can you blame me? I don't remember what I did precisely, but during rehearsals for graduation I believe he caused some kind of disruption, and the teacher asked who did that. I pointed his ass out. I didn't give a shit. The teacher threatened to not let him graduate from school.
When we were exiting to line up to do the rehearsal again, I exited before him and he came at me with a retractable xacto knife... I don't recall flinching, though he might recall differently. By the end of the day I had at least one ratchet passed to me and people let me know that they had my back. I graduated from high school, and no one ever tried to get physical with me again.
Sure the teasing happened every once in a while from different people of varying ages from kids to grown ups, mostly because of my name. But then I tell people, "I bet you'll think twice when your girlfriend says she's talking to Kym or Kymmie, or she's going out with Kymberly one day."
A lot more things have happened to me over the years... I had to become an extortionist and a little bit of a bully myself once because a kid who refused to pay me my money for the books I had sold him. I in turn got told to leave him alone when his cousin pulled a knife on me. That's just one incident that I can remember. So I was not a perfectly good student, but I did my best.
You know, it was only recently that I actually shared a fraction of what I am telling you all now with my dad, and he said something that I will never forget "You never know what your children are going through once you leave them." You may be reading this, and thinking, "That's not going on with my child..." but you may be surprised what happens, what secrets they have.
Again, I do not care for your pity, or your "awwws" this is a small part of my story and I am much stronger for it. I didn't have it too bad compared to some people in life, but I certainly did not have it easy.
I hope you appreciated the read.
I appreciate you reading.
Warmest Regards
See you on the other side
--
Kym Dominique-Ferguson
The Jamhaitianadian
