Programme Erasmus + Europe on the move : Migration Biographies
Interviews
call me a star , genius etc . – he taught me for a few months- I remember that my grades were all 10 except for four 9 . He also did the same thing with two or three of my classmates , who -in my opinion- were not in the same level with me . I don ’ t t think that I have a wrong self-image , cause a few months later , a teacher from Thessaloniki came to our school . She did not know any of us and she commended me . After that , the next time we took our grades I had all 10 except from 1 nine .
Then I went to the 6th grade . In the end of the 5th grade I started noticing some behavior changes . Some of my best friends started avoiding me . We were all in all 11 kids -9 girls and 2 boys- and two of my best friends started shunning me . This situation annoyed me . Another girl told me “ I refuse to go to the marching school parade with an Albanian girl holding the Greek flag ”.
Q : Those were probably her parents words .
A : Probably , but I have met this woman several times and she is a really good woman . I just can ’ t believe that one kid told that , just because their parents used to have this belief .
Teachers had to choose one student from the 5th grade -obviously the one with the best grades . Teachers did not choose me immediately , although my grades were the best . The teachers chose to select by ballot . So , another student had been selected by a ballot , between many other students . That was the first time I felt discriminated and I did not like it at all .
In the 6th grade all of my classmates started avoiding me . All of them ! There were 3 or 4 girls , who were “ the school bosses ” and they ruled the class . That year I felt being bullied for the first time , especially from one girl , who was bad with everyone . I remember once we were painting our own Easter eggs , her eggs were not good enough , so she changed them with another girl ’ s eggs . From that act you can realize the character that her parents have created . So , in the end of the 6th grade most of the kids had rejected me .
With these girls I was attending after school lessons as well -English etc- and because we were having classes together and the private school was in New Moudania , we were going together with their parent ’ s car . Once they planned to leave 10 minutes earlier and they left me waiting . After that I went to her mother ’ s house , who lived near the meeting place and she told me that the girls had already left . So , their parents knew and stayed idle . Eventually my uncle took me there . They were surprised when they saw me ; it was indescribable . They told me that they were looking for me and they could not find me and a bunch of excuses . Another time they told me that their mobile had broken down . Then I understood that this was the last straw . They explained how their parents always do their transportation duties and my dad had never taken us . I had already told them though , that my own dad couldn ’ t do that and if there was a problem they should have come straight up and let me know . They didn ’ t trust him too , they were too spoiled to rely on an Albanian …. Worse things happened at school when they would take my art album and write “ ALBANIA ” inside . We used to leave this album at school under our desk and draw things while being there . There were some pages of mine in there and they would tag them with the word “ ALBANIA ”. I didn ’ t realise it for a while and one girl saw that I wasn ’ t irritated due to my ignorance and took the album by herself under the desk saying : “ what is that ? who could have done that ?” She would also throw herself on me or stomp her feet etc .
I was very careful with my books and notebooks as I wanted to have them all completed and once they had taken my notebook of physics , and they had hidden it . I was sad that I didn ’ t have it . I asked for a new one from the teacher and I spent a week to do the exercises again from scratch and after a week when I was finished they went to the library and they pulled it out and said “ Oh , this is the one you were looking for ” and I said
“ thank you so much but you can keep it now as I don ’ t need it any more ”.
Q : What happened with the flag ? Eventually they didn ’ t give it to you , did they ?
A : No , they gave it to me because the law says that during the first celebration on the 28 of October it is held by the best student and during the second celebration on the 25 of March by the second one .
I had already started to realize that I was being kicked out and one day while playing with my smaller brother I found out that he was being bullied . So I yelled at him and told him to come to the supermarket with me . But the kids followed him and they started blaming him because they thought that his actions were wrong and that he
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