More Than a Game
I fell in love with gaming when I was 9. My dad came home one day carrying a blue Best Buy bag with an imprint of a small, rectangular box sticking out the side. My eyes shifted like a cat following a ball of yarn—from his face, to the bag, and back to his face— […]
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Not Your lesson
One afternoon at the beginning of 8th grade, I was sitting in the room where Model United Nations (we called it MUN) met after school. Under the guise of open and inclusive debate, students played the roles of ambassadors. We talked about every political topic under the sun: the Iranian Revolution of 1979, the immigration […]
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Better Apart
My mom and I fought all my life. Sometimes, she insulted me and used foul language, saying things like, “You’re never going to be sh-t,” or “I should’ve never had you.” On occasion, she hit me. Nothing I did seemed good enough for her, even when I got A’s in school. She was angry at […]
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My Name is Boluwatife Ogunbodede
In 5th grade, I moved from Lagos, Nigeria to New York City. Right away, I learned that my name, Boluwatife (pronounced bow-luh-wah-tea-feh), is a tongue twister for many Americans. They just cannot get it right. In school, almost everyone butchered my name. With every mispronunciation, the laughter of my ignorant peers was never far behind, […]
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