When I was in Year 4 (which means that I was about 8 or 9 years old) I read the book Wonder. I didn’t understand much of it and I also didn’t like it. Now however, I re-read it and I was simply fascinated about how mean some people can be.
If you are not familiar with this book, well it is about a boy named Auggie Pullman who suffered of Treacher Collins Syndrome. It is a syndrome which can affect physical appearance and make you talk in a slightly different way. Auggie was home schooled most of his life, however his parents decide to send him to school. Wonder is about “not judging a book by its cover” and allowing people to fit in, no matter how they look like.
However, I’m not going to just talk about this book, I would also like to write about MY experience with bullying. Now, I am in Year 7 and I don’t get bullied so much, but when I was younger I used to get bullied in school a lot. I recall that there was a group of 4 girls who sometimes pretended to be my friends and sometimes they called me names and told me that I was a crybaby. One time, one of the girls (she was the meanest of them) wrote on a wall in the playground with a permanent marker “Maria e proasta”. I had no idea that happened, until one of the other girls came up to me and showed me. I didn’t tell anyone (not even my parents), because if I would have, those girls would have run after me and they would have said “snitches get stitches” and then they did a crybaby face insinuating that I would start crying, which most of the times it did happen.
Indeed, however, I remember doing something bad as well. I remember just cracking under all of the pressure and giving them a taste of their own medicine. I wrote on a whiteboard (not with a permanent marker though J) saying that they were all dumb. The teachers did find out and that time my parents found out as well. It was complicated and I don’t want to get into a lot of details, the point however is that my parents decided that I have to move schools.
Now, I am happy and I don’t get bullied at all (well just a little bit sometimes but it’s insignificant). I would also like to say that when my parents first told me that they were thinking of making me go to another school, I was very reluctant to the idea and I was really terrified. Turns out that I am much better now and have a lot of friends.
What I have learnt from this experience, is that if there is anything that is bothering you or upsetting you, you should tell an adult and you should never, ever let yourself go down to the same level as the bully. Always be better than the bully and never try to give them “a taste of their own medicine”, because if you do, than you yourself will be considered a bully.
