by: Roman

I am the quintessential Nazareth school chic...I mean, I was. You know:  the loud, rowdy, fun loving, boy crazy, and to a certain extent snobbish [not to say all NZ chicks meet this profile but that is what the outside world has perceived us to be].  I was very stuck up, even among my peers and siblings. I always thought that I was better than people around me; though I did not go around telling people that sometimes, when situations forced me to, I would tell you to your face that I was ‘it’.

I cannot take all the credit for the way I used to feel. I was raised to be stuck up. I was raised to look down on people who didn't share my outlook, who didn’t have the same level of intelligence, who didn’t have the same socio-economic background…everyone in my surroundings drilled me to be that way; therefore, I was a product of my environment.

I am the youngest in my family. We lived in a neighborhood where most people cannot even have one meal a day. There were only certain families in the neighborhood that could afford to send their kids to private school, and those families stuck together. I was only allowed, if I was even allowed, to play with kids from these families. I was never allowed to mingle with the neighborhood kids (the menderteNoch, asadagi yebedelacheww, as one of my uncle referred to them [may the Lord forgive him]). The thing was, I really wanted to play with them, go abebayehoush for Ethiopian New Year with them, but it was not something open for debate.  So, by the time I reached junior high, everyone had me convinced that I was simply better than them so I joined in and stopped associating with the neighborhood kids. On top of that, I had made enough friends from Nazareth School, and I had finally made it to the ‘in’ clique; associating with the sefer lejoch could have made me lose my new and hard-earned status!!!

At school, I was even snobbish than most, especially when it came to people of the same caliber. I believed that I had to show them that, at the end of the day, I was much smarter and more exposed than the rest of them. In all honesty, until I got to high school, I hated everyone at Nazareth, and a lot of people did not understand me that well. You see, I did not join Nazareth from kindergarten -- I joined midway through elementary school. When I joined NZ school, I was just a happy-go-lucky child ready to embrace everyone and be embraced in return.  But lo and behold, being ‘addis gebi’ at Nazareth School was the equivalent of being an alien in this world. You are forever branded with that name and somehow seen as the untouchable.  By the time I joined Nazareth, everyone had established their groups, and new entrants were not welcome in any group.

For two years, I used to sulk alone, immersing myself in books and hating my parents for subjecting me to those lonely and torturous days. I read a lot; I mean a lot. In the fourth grade, I used to go to the British Council and borrow books like ‘David Copperfield’, ‘Little Women’ and all the classics and bury myself in them. The fact that I read those books bothered my classmates and even some of my teachers. The fact that I preferred to speak English earned me the ‘yemanech gureNa…ahoun yamrbNal bela new?!” label. I did not care because I had to convince myself that I was better than the rest of them, and any comments that I got from everyone did not make a difference in my life.

The only comments that caused a commotion in my life were the ones that were given by people whom I held in high regard, but when I got negative feedbacks from them, I would react in a way that they would not dare make those comments again. I was very defensive and vocal about my feelings. I had no yiluNta (to some extent, I still don’t have that much yiluNta...).

Junior high was much better; I had made NZ school my home and warmed up more.  Then, through some divine intervention, I had finally gotten acceptance in the ‘in' group. I never wanted to belong to any particular group. I couldn't fit into any one group completely:  I was very academic -- not to brag but I just loved learning; I was always two years ahead of my class.  I took my education more seriously than the average person my age. I was very competitive, mostly with myself, and highly, obsessively focused on my grades. I would be fighting over a 0.5 points with the teachers, and since I loved to argue, I spent most of my werQama gizay at the principal office k'astemari gar eyetekaseskuN.

Despite this obsession, though, nobody ever accused me of being geeky, bookish, timid, reserved and Chewa like the rest of my Qelem friends. In fact, I could not stand people who fit those descriptions though now I admire these qualities most in a person. I could only associate myself with the Qelem crowd during exam weeks, but during the normal season, I was with the duryE, Chefari rebels of the class. I loved hanging out with them, hearing what happened at the home parties over the weekend and who kissed whom, and all the latest yeketema gossip.  Mind you, I never went to any Chifera, but in my mind, I have very vivid images of what went on. Besides, I had all the latest info on all the happenings.

My siblings and cousins were denbeNa ager yaselechu Chefariwoch. One of my cousins, up to this day, has been in the Chifera mode for at least twenty years. She has been beaten, shaved, metaTened and the whole nine yards. Her stories could be made into several books.  More than that, she knows everyone and their mother, and through her, I got to know everyone and some of their mothers J Additionally, by this time my literary interests had shifted from Charles Dickens to Sidney Sheldon and the sleazy romance books. And an interest in the opposite sex was starting to knock on my heart.

By the time I finished junior high, I was tired of NZ school and ready to move on to someplace better, not only for academic reasons, but because I wanted to go to a coed school with a Western way of thinking.  Unfortunately, that did not materialize. So, in the ninth grade, I made Nazareth School my love. I accepted my fate and started to join in the madness. I would never skip school because there was so much fun going on. There was an influx of addis gebiwoch so I was pardoned for my addis gebinet -- I gladly lost my label to the new entrants. I was one of the girls, and enEm beterayE, I was given the privilege of labeling others as addis gebi.  I was really warm and welcoming and even made friends with some of them. My interest in academic excellence was waning and I wasn't intense any more about my school work. My main goal had become to be like my cousins:  Chefari, duryE, yeketema ateramash…but while still maintaining my grades, of course.  I just loved school. I happily floated among different people and did not want to belong to any one group. I was stuck up through and through ...the fact that I thought I was Qelem, arada (self perception, which can be totally wrong) and well exposed, added to the fact that I knew yeketma Chefariwoch (thank you, Cousin), made me think I was the s***…so I went around without a care for anyone or anything…

Until...

Midway through tenth grade, I became very philosophical and started to read left over books in the house from my revo uncles who were involved in the student movement back in the day. What I read really affected my way of thinking. I was ready to abandon all worldly things and join the communist way of thinking; at the same time, my next door neighbor was trying to recruit me to be a Jehovah's Witness...at school, this girl truly changed my life, outlook, and personality (to this day, I have the utmost respect for her). She would come and share the Word of God with me.  By the end of tenth grade, I found God (or rather, God found me). I abandoned all secular stuff -- the hardest decision was shredding my Tom Cruise poster and taping over my Michael Jackson tape which had been my most precious possession till then. But was determined to do everything that would make me right in the sight of God. I immersed myself in the Bible and made God my refuge, my life and my everything. Up to this day, I know that was the biggest and most important decision of my life that had the greatest impact on me. It had stopped and still stops me from doing many disastrous things.

I was ready to evangelize the world; at every occasion, I would share the Word of God with my friends, and to some extent succeeded in converting some of them (some of my converts are more Christian than I am now). I was so ambitious and I took my mission seriously. I even tried to convert my Granny; that almost got me thrown out of the house. My new calling wreaked more havoc in my relationships with others. I had the triple whammy: I was a Qelem, a cute Christian freak (or so I would like to think), who did not want to abandon my duryE cousins and friends because they were so much fun.  If you knew me, you would know that I do not belong in a typical PenTe environment; I was just too untamed to fit in there. I thought out loud; I still think out loud. That is taboo in the Christian world, or for that matter, in the habesha culture. I was told "Ayderegim, aybalim, newr new, enday!" my whole life…and to this day, I get very uptight when I'm in a typical habesha environment.

Now, I was torn in different directions and it was not fun. My duryE friends were not happy with my new conversion; my PenTe friends wanted to yank me away from my ‘bad heathen friends’, and my Qelem friends did not approve of my association with both groups…as one of the Qelems (she used to irritate me out of my socks) came out and told me, I was aQuwam-less.  Boy, did I make her regret the day she was born!

I made a quick tally of the pros and cons of things, and within a month, moved to the US before finishing high school.

The US was a different story. It created a different kind of confusion though I liked the fact that I did not have to fit into any one group. I was not about to start the cycle again with complete strangers, and here, I did not have to impress them.  I had a hard time fitting in with the habesha crowd because all of us have hang-ups about different things. The fact that I went to Nazareth school mattered to some; some thought I was stuck up and others did not think I was worthy. The fact that I wanted to go to Harvard (even though I didn’t get in, which is besides the point) instead of a community college made a lot of people see me as gureNa. The fact that I did not want to take remedial English (in fact, I cursed one of my uncles out for suggesting that) made them think I was full of myself. The fact that I only applied to good colleges, the fact that I preferred being a math tutor rather than work for minimum wage (nothing wrong with that)...the list went on.

The most hilarious criticism I ever heard was "You know a lot of people”!!! Only in the habesha community is knowing a lot of people a crime!  I know people not because I go knocking from house to house but because I come from a big extended family and most of my cousins and siblings are very sociable people within their age group; as the youngest at the time, all of them used to drag me everywhere they went.  (Anyway, why should I have to justify why I know so and so?)  Another good one was "You reveal too much of your personal stuff."  I really don’t care if I reveal too much about myself as long as I am not accused of going around talking about other people behind their backs.  Anyway, I was jaded about my peeps and did not want to prove myself to anyone...I just told everyone to back off and made my own decisions and mistakes and went off to college.

By the time I got to college, I had to bid the good Lord farewell because I had to survive. As it is things were tres, tres complicated and my Christianity was about to bring quel dommage! to my social life -- i.e. I was about to become a lone dove. Me and the Lord congregated and I told him that I loved Him dearly but to follow him the way he wanted me to was tooooo much for me at that age.  I explained that one day, someday, I would have him back in my life. I packed all my evangelizing tools and put them in storage. Unfortunately, or maybe fortunately, God had made so much of an impact on my life that I was not able to indulge in the craziness guilt free like the rest of my friends. Every time if I did something 'unworthy', I would be consumed with so much guilt while the rest of my friends did not even think twice about it. I am holding some serious Qim against God for having that much influence on my life. Looking back now, I thank him because I never went tooo far -- I just did enough of everything and got a good dose of the world.

I met some great people, three people in particular who helped deconstruct my snobbishness. People who helped in completely erasing my hang-ups

Ruth….I will be indebted to Ruth forever for opening my eyes to who I really was. I was in a technical field in a college ranked in the top ten and we had some pretty sharp kids in my class, and I mean cutting edge sharp. Because of the nature of the field, guys outnumbered girls, but the girls were the cream of the crop.  They worked harder than the guys.  Ruth was this Israeli girl who was obsessed with school. She was this annoying li'l rat who would rub everyone the wrong way. She was in many of my classes and she would always say something that would make feel like I was the dumbest creature ever created. She knew her stuff thoroughly. I was very cautious around her because being average was not sitting well with me.  I did not want any one to remind me that I no longer was the smartest kid on the block.

Ruth and I had a long and hard evening organic lab together that sometimes went on until midnight. We all got there wiped out but Ruth was always energized and did all the things according to the manual. She could never have a lab partner because she would repeat the lab until she got the desired result. One typical day, while the rest of the class was repeating the experiment for the zillionth time, and I was repeating it for the zillion- and-one'th time, she came sobbing hysterically to the queue where everyone was waiting for the scale. She said she was not able to get the right result and she had no time, so she wanted to cut into the line before us.  All the guys were willing but I told her "Loookie here, we are repeating it for the millionth time, and we have been waiting in line; that it was not the end of the world if you are not able to get the right result…” 

She looked at me and told me off -- that she was not in competition with me or the rest of us. I was ready to jump on her but my friend Mike, bless his heart, pulled me away. I went home fuming with rage. I was pacing up and down trying to see what the cause of this whole outburst was. I stepped back and tried to see if the situation merited such a reaction and then it dawned to me. I used to be Ruth back in the day and I guess seeing myself in someone else was a good thing. I did not like what I saw so I got on my knees and asked the Good Lord for forgiveness (even though God was no longer a major part of my life, I had not completely turned my back on him.... there were one too many days when I had had to plead and negotiate when my grades and my sanity were at stake). From that day on, I make a conscious effort to be aware of other peoples feelings.

The two other people who had a major impact on me were my guy friend and my ex-boyfriend…both came from very privileged backgrounds but they were humble.  From talking to them you would never guess that they grew up with money. They both could sell ‘sand to an Arab and ice to an Eskimo’, their social skills were so excellent. They knew people of all ages and backgrounds and behaved the same wherever they went.

I came to America with a joneya full of hang-ups, major hang-ups: preference for Sainjo guys and ye-Addis Abeba lejoch but I was not beyond redemption. Thanks to the Good Lord and my friends, now I am able to see everyone the same way. In fact, now I have trouble with my old friends. I have changed and they have not. I hate going to the gatherings of the so-called, self-appointed classy people. There I feel like I am being sliced, diced and put on a chart. They have a lot of hang-ups as well as some requirements that I do not care to know or meet. I remember an incident where a certain guy who went to Lycee was about to marry outside his 'cast' (i.e. a non-Lycee'an, non-Sanfordian, non-ICSan); there was so much commotion that it was sickening. They made it sound like that it was the worst crime ever to be committed on the face of the earth.  I made a mental note to myself then that I would never, ever marry someone from Lycee; hey!  I don’t want the Lycee'ans to make all that noise on my behalf….ere yiQribiN!

Now, I have friends from all walks of life……I love people regardless of their race, socio-economic background, education and, the latest addition to my list, sexual orientation.  I work in an environment where having a tattoo that says ‘I am gay’ would still not make my colleagues' sexual preferences any clearer. I had to overcome my bias and accept and embrace them as one of us and see them for who they are. I don’t care what you do, where you went to school, where your daddy got his Ph.D. or where your itibit was buried; I just want to meet inherently good people who share mutual love and respect.

I have patched up with the Good Lord and promised never to abandon or trade him for anything...I have made the following words the basis and the foundation of my life:

‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind; and thy neighbor as thyself’

Because when you love God, you also have love for him and his creations.  Just simplify things and see that, deep down, we are all human, with the need to be accepted and loved; we all have that in common.  And regardless of how classy or unclassy we tend to see others to be, we have to treat them "as ourselves". We have to respect, respect and respect others...