I moved to a charter school in 6th grade. I did not want to change schools and leave my friends. At my new school I felt so out of place. Everyone had their group and everyone knew each other. The worst part was that I was the only black girl in class.

I started looking at myself differently. Before, I did not think about race or color because I went to schools that had a lot of diversity. But now I was 11 and was in a school with predominantly Latino students. I didn’t have any friends and I ate lunch by myself. I felt like a spider, something icky that no one wanted to see or be near. I began to see myself as ugly and undesired.

In class I sat alone, until one day my teacher created a seating chart, arranging us into pairs of two. I was placed next to this one girl who had curly lioness hair. Although we were paired up she did not talk to me or even look at me. She would scoot her seat away from me to be closer to her friends.  I remember hating myself for not starting a conversation. I was afraid of her rejecting me.

Then one day there was a math problem. She looked over at my paper and said “Woah you know what you're doing.” She then scooted her desk next to mine. At first our conversations would only be about math, but soon we talked about our hobbies and crushes. She invited me to sit next to her and her friends during lunch and invited me into their conversation.

As I sat there and listened, it became apparent to me that I cannot relate to any of them--the things they did after school, the music they listened to, the food they cooked. I became anxious. I was afraid that they would drop me because I was not like them.  To prevent that I decided that I needed to change. I started listening to Rap music and changing the way I talked. I started straightening my kinky hair. I knew I was damaging my hair, but I did not care. If it kept me being their friend, then I would do it. I did not want to feel that loneliness again. But I was not happy with myself.

Then in 8th grade I was placed in a class with another black girl. I was excited that there was another girl that looked like me. My first thought was getting closer with her. But as the school started I learned that she wasn’t that well liked by some of the people in my friend group. I was hesitant. But I watched her. She did not care about what people thought of her. To me she was brave and strong. I don’t remember when but one day she came to me and struck up a conversation. She asked me where I was from. At that time, I purposely did not want to tell people that I was Kenyan because I felt that if I did it would separate me. So I said that I was born in Africa. When she asked me “where” I was shocked, no one had asked me that before.  “Kenya.” I said shyly.

She had a huge smile on her face and said “Me Too!” She pulled out her hand and showed me her bracelet with the Kenyan flag. I was shocked, I had never met another Kenyan student in this country, let alone at school. Soon I learned that there were other students in school from Kenya.

I felt free. It was like I automatically fit in with them without trying to. That year we became sisters. I started braiding my hair again and convinced my mom to buy me a bracelet. I stopped trying to match others and did the things I wanted. But I still missed my other friends. At first, I was worried that they would not like me because I was not like them, but to my surprise most of them welcomed me.

Looking back, I feel like I overwhelmed myself for no reason at all. I was so focused on making friends and not feeling lonely that I forgot that I also needed to be happy too. I think the idea of “finding your people” is really important because finding your people can help you find yourself too.

© Alicia. All rights reserved. If you are interested in quoting this story, contact the national team and we can put you in touch with the author’s teacher.