How a Little Girl Helped Me Survive Japanese Kindergarten

<p><strong><em>Trigger Warning: This essay talks about bullying. Please take care of your mental health while reading.</em></strong></p> <p>&ldquo;Laaanjuuuu?&rdquo; Ms. Takahashi called out the class roster as she protruded her lips out like a duck.</p> <p>She glanced around the room of eager children sitting on colorful mats.</p> <p>My name is Ranju, not Lanju, I thought, as I raised my hand sheepishly, my insides boiling.</p> <p>Ms. Takahashi checked my name off her chart. Bulldog Akiko, the class bully, giggled and I felt a punch right through my left cheek.</p> <p>Kae, her apprentice, followed with rumbustious laughter. One blow to the other cheek. Knocked out&mdash; another day in my life.</p> <p>Life as a Nepali in a Japanese kindergarten was rough, to say the least. But this is not a sob story.</p> <p>It&rsquo;s about how a little girl helped me survive&nbsp;Japanese&nbsp;kindergarten, and how as a result, I changed my name.</p> <h1>Matter of life and death</h1> <p>&ldquo;Ms. Takahashi called me Lanju again,&rdquo; I told my mom for the umpteenth time.</p> <p>&ldquo;How many times do I need to tell you, they can&rsquo;t roll their Rs,&rdquo; Mom muttered as if I had said the most ridiculous thing.</p> <p>My mom was a simple woman who married an intelligent man 13 years older, a man raised in poverty in Nepal, who went on to win a graduate scholarship at an Ivy League in New York.</p> <p><a href="https://medium.com/the-narrative-arc/how-a-little-girl-helped-me-survive-japanese-kindergarten-254a6b80d165"><strong>Website</strong></a></p>
Tags: Little Girl