A new school, and boy, did puberty hit me hard.
Hormones totally made me haywire. What was once a studious student suddenly had a hard time concentrating. With that, and a very competitive school, I really tanked.
The plus side was that I had friends who lasted me the whole four years. I was a little needy with the person I saw as my best friend—but that was just one of many lessons in a process that would become a very long list. The school gave me some good and some bad-tasting memories. Favouritism was rampant among the teachers. It was only years later that I was told I had been a favourite of one teacher. Talk about living in my own world—I did not even realise it.
Secondary school ended, and I moved on to a higher institution. Did I mention I went to an all-girls school? Higher education meant there were males around. Me, with my low self-esteem and the standard of what was considered attractive—I was not that. What I did not realise was that I was not made for this country.
Where I would thrive and find my voice as a female would be across the world.
I was proactive in fixing problems. There is nothing I cannot fix when I put my mind to it. I did not wait for a boy to help me carry something heavy or act like a damsel in distress. I spent four years being told you can do anything—and I did. We all did, to the point that graduates of my school were known for believing no problem could not be solved.
The boys in our society still saw the girls as fragile, as if we would not know what to do.
They were wrong..
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