Article January 1, 2003 Issue

“Will you forgive me?”

Arturo Palomino,—Huancayo, Peru

I'm from Peru. Last year I attended seventh grade at a public school in the US, in the city of Boston. It was a big change for me. Besides the language difference, school was a lot noisier, and the kids were more concerned about the way they looked and the kinds of clothes they wore than they are in Peru.

One day I went to school wearing the same clothes that I had worn the day before to avoid having to wash them a lot and to save a little money. I had to pay to wash my clothes in the apartment building next door. One boy at school made a big deal about it, and he told me to be more considerate. I said that I had good hygiene, that I wasn't doing anything wrong, and that my clothes weren't in bad condition. But he started to spread this around to everyone, and the boys in my class began to tell me that I was a filthy person, that I was very stingy to do such a thing to save $1.25, and that they didn't want me as their friend. I didn't know what to do, so I kept quiet.

Another day a boy grabbed my drink and made an obscene gesture with it, and then a group of them threatened to beat me up. Fortunately, nothing happened. I felt humiliated, and I had to control myself to avoid fighting back and hurting anyone.

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