Overcoming Social Despair by Gafurul

Overcoming Social Despair by Gafurul - April 2016 Scholarship Essay

When I entered middle school, I had just moved to Bangladesh, where my parents are from, and I was often bullied in school. I was an easy target for all of the students because I was raised more strictly and in a completely different environment than them, and therefore, I was quite different from the rest of the students. Furthermore, it was difficult for me to adjust to the customs of the school and country while living under such social pressure. My parents grew up in a traditional culture and I was also raised me similarly, so I was not used to the environment at my school. Moreover, I was considered much less mature than many of my peers, and, well, “uncool” by many of my peers, which genuinely upset me. On top of this, it was very easy to get me angry, and when I did, I tended to lash out, an many students enjoyed ending monotonous classroom boredom by enraging me for their entertainment. Because of all this, for a few years, I felt quite isolated, only finding minor solace in friends, who most of the time chose to hang with their other friends over me. Sadly enough, some of their closer friends didn’t really like me, so we couldn’t all hang out together. And then slowly, those few friends I had groups of friends I had drifted from me eventually rejected me as well because at some point, I started to feel like when I realized that I was too different than them to hang out with them anymore. too immature to hang out with them.

In America, schools are mostly separated into elementary, middle, and high school, giving students a chance to start fresh if they needed. Unfortunately, my school in Bangladesh was all three combined, so I had to deal with the same crowd all throughout my school life. To deal with this, I often took out my anger on them to try to deter them from taking advantage of my weakness and social incompetence, which didn’t always work out. It did occur to me at some point that I should just try to find out what they talked about and find similarities between us, but that wasn’t an option for me either. They all spoke in Bengali amongst themselves, a language I still struggle with to this day, so it was a language barrier that was too difficult for me to cross. Moreover, the culture and interests were completely different than what I was used to and I was left with very few options to help with my social life.

I wouldn’t exactly say that my high school was the best four years of my life, but it didn’t stop me from trying to make the most of what I could. Of the friends I did have, I communicated with them for as long as I could, whenever I could. Friendships grew and, eventually, I socially matured alongside my peers. I managed to deal with their provocations in a more controlled, adult-like manner and over time, they stopped bothering me altogether. I went to friends’ houses fairly frequently and built some lasting relationships. Eventually, I managed to get settled in the environment and was satisfied with my decision to try socializing with my classmates instead of trying to shun myself out from them. Despite all the external pressures I faced, I stayed resilient and was finally saw what I could’ve missed out on if I just gave up on everything.

People say life’s a roller coaster, especially in high school, b. But what I learned is that when things get bumpy, you could either hold on tight or just let everything go and get out of this madness. But if your choice was just back out and you think you just avoided the hard part, you’ll later look up on that roller coaster from the ground, see where the tracks could’ve taken you, and see the amazing thrill ride that you just missed out on.