Irina didn’t notice Silje’s frown. She asked out loud, “Silje, did you see that? Kail just looked at you. He is with Felicien and the others.”
Irina was watching her with obvious curiosity, so Silje reluctantly answered, “Oh, yeah. I saw him in the hallway just a little while ago. I already said hi to him.”
Why was he looking at her again? Gosh, Silje hated Kail so much.
Irina replied, “Oh, I see. You said hello to him in the hallway.”
Just like all the other girls at school, Irina was very interested in Kail. She continued to chat, “Now that I see it, he doesn’t hang around with Brigit anymore. Silje! Kail has been very docile lately. He hasn’t caused any trouble at all.”
Like heck he didn’t!
Silje thought angrily as Kail continued to watch her.
He was doing it again, staring at her like he wanted to eat her. Ignoring it as best as she could, Silje tried to focus on her meal. She wanted to finish her lunch as quickly as possible and leave the cafeteria.
Just then, Silje couldn’t believe her eyes.
Black hair, black eyes, and a noticeable warm skin tone. An Asian boy was eating lunch in the corner of the cafeteria.
What?
Silje’s eyes widened at the obviously foreign male student. She thought she was the only Asian at this school. When Irina noticed Silje’s stare, she explained, “He is in tenth grade. He transferred to this school recently.”
“Really?”
When Silje seemed to be shocked, Irina continued, “He came from a public school apparently. Probably got a full academic scholarship to attend this place. As you know, there aren’t that many private schools in this country. He must’ve not known what might happen to him in a school like this.”
Suddenly, something shocking started to happen. The kids started to surround the Asian boy and threw milk cartons at him. Silje’s eyes widened in disbelief.
“Oh!”
Silje moaned as she watched in horror. It was like déjà vu. She remembered being covered in milk and being hit by various objects. Yet she couldn’t believe it was happening to someone else now.
How could this happen here? How could this happen in the middle of the cafeteria while everyone was eating lunch!
Watching the scene, Irina added, “He’s Pakistani. His parents are from Pakistan. I wonder why they came all the way here to this faraway country.”
Silje sometimes wondered the same thing.
Why was she brought all the way here to this country and why was she severely bullied like this?
As she watched what was happening in front her, she felt deep pain. She wanted to look away, but she couldn’t.
While Irina ate her cream puff, Silje couldn’t help but stand up and scream.
“No!”
But the kids who were tormenting the boy only glanced at her and wouldn’t stop. The other kids continued to eat their meals and ignored what was happening.
Silje watched the boy who was being beaten by the lunch trays. He was covering his head with his arms in a pathetic attempt to protect himself. Silje’s eyes blurred.
How… how could something like this happen? It was happening in front of everyone, yet the teachers feigned ignorance and continued to eat.
How?
The bullies surrounded the Asian boy to block the way while they bullied him, but there was no way people couldn’t see what was happening.
As they continued to hit him hard with the trays, Silje felt crushing anger and guilt. Her blood boiled, and when she was about to go help, Irina grabbed her hand.
“Don’t! You know there is nothing you can do. Even if you go tell the teachers right now, the bullies will just stop and pretend that they didn’t do anything. If the teachers approach them, they will just walk away like nothing happened. And when no one’s watching, they will do worse things to that boy. Can you deny it?”
Silje stared at Irina and shook her head.
“No!”
This shouldn’t happen. Under no circumstances should something like this be allowed. This kind of violence… This kind of racism…
However, her hands became wet with cold sweat. Her eyes looked anxious and fearful as she watched the disturbing scene. No matter how calm she tried to stay, Silje couldn’t help but clench her hands as she watched the violence she herself had to endure. Her face became red and she started to gasp for air.
She couldn’t just watch and do nothing. She knew she had to do something for this Pakistani boy.
Silently, Silje balled up her fists.
Irina was right.
Silje already knew it after her meeting with her teacher Maria. But in a way, perhaps she wanted to deny it.
In a country like Norway, it didn’t make sense that such violence was tolerated at school. Nonetheless, it was happening and although Silje accepted her fate, it was not okay for the same atrocious thing to happen to someone else.
Secretly, Silje never lost hope for her situation would eventually be recognized. She had been waiting silently, but when it was happening to another person, Silje finally went to the guidance counselor to report what happened to the boy.
Here, she finally lost the last bit of her hope. Reality was too cruel and unbending, and she was powerless against it. When Silje reported the bullying of the Pakistani boy, Jamal, she was told that she was mistaken. Jamal’s own homeroom teacher denied it.
The worst thing was how all the teachers in the teacher’s lounge reacted. They all said the same thing.
“That doesn’t make sense. Something like that would never happen here.”
“It would never happen in our school.”
They were clearly saying that the school wasn’t going to do anything about it and that if she had a problem with it, she could leave at any time. At this rate, the only way for her to do something for Jamal was to file a report to the appropriate ombudsman and shut the school down.
Was this really the only way? To make an enormous deal out of this and thereby exposing her quiet life as well? The very thing she didn’t want?
Despite the bleakness of the situation, Silje didn’t despair. Instead, she realized that something needed to change. She needed something, a trigger, that could help solve the problem. A small fire that could thaw the ice.
She knew she could just ignore it, but her conscious wouldn’t let her. The fire in her could never allow her to remain silent about such an injustice to another human being.
Silje was still being bullied, so she knew the exact pain that Jamal was experiencing. She couldn’t just ignore it.
The fists and the kicks. The verbal abuse. The physical and emotional pain of it all. She would never be able to forget them, and she felt sad that Jamal was in the same situation as her.
So how could she help him?
She didn’t care about herself. For her, all she had to do was just continue to fight back and she knew she could endure it all. However, Jamal was different. He was now exposed to the violent bullying and he seemed to have no will to fight back.
How could she help? Silje thought hard. Was there even a way? The voice inside her was persistent, telling her that she had to stop the bullies from tormenting Jamal.
Deep in her own thoughts, Silje walked aimlessly. Lunch hour was almost over and the next class was about to start.
Suddenly, when she looked up, Silje realized where she was.
“…”
She stood dumbfounded.
She wasn’t standing in front of her next classroom.
Instead, this was Kail’s next class.