MusicMarketplace.com
On an orientation day held at a private Catholic school where I was about to start junior high, my mother and I got into the hall to receive the school’s uniform items. There was a long line of students and their mothers in front of the counter. Most of them were those who came from the school’s privileged elementary school. Since they had known each other for years at the elementary school, they were greeting, chatting and laughing cheerfully while others from public elementary schools like us were standing tensely in line with no acquaintances around. As those from the privileged school obviously sent out an air of wealth, I saw a clear barrier between them and us even though we were standing in the same line. They were privileged enough to let someone they knew who just arrived at the hall cut in line. Every time a pair of a mother and a child showed up, an acquaintance standing before us called them and let them cut in. It seemed our turn would never come. On the contrary, the line was getting longer and we were falling back. Growing up inside a small hamlet, I had thought my family was the richest. But now I realized that once stepping outside, there were many much higher-rank people who even didn’t have to wait for their turns in line. Suddenly, a mother whose child was also from a public elementary school shouted in anger, “You have money, but not manners!” A few other mothers including mine joined her and uttered complaints to the private school mothers. Although we were saying a right thing, they gave us a contemptuous look as if we were some poor protesters against wealth. It seemed they hated to be associated with us. I felt gloomy about the future considering I would spend junior high and high school years here with their kids while my mother had to endure only one day. We went home by bus feeling so discouraged and miserable…
