Kindergarten in Vietnam

Have you ever lived in two countries? Or have you even thought about moving to another country to live? Maybe you haven’t, but I have. I used to live in two countries, and it was really hard for me to get used to two absolutely different cultures. I was born in Slovakia and by the year i turned 6, i came to Vietnam. At first, I didn't know any or maybe just a very little Vietnamese so it was very hard for me to communicate to others. I always had to ask my mom or dad to translate for me. When I first came to Vietnam, the first thing my parents did was finding schools for my sister and me to study. My sister went to a primary school, and I went to a kindergarten school. I studied in a school named “Trường Mầm Non Bé Ngoan” (Good Kid Kindergarten).

I was very hyper when I heard my parents saying that I would go to the kindergarten but was trembling from fear and thinking a lot about the first day. I had a lot of fun with my friends back in Slovakia so I had always thought I would have the same enjoyable time as I used to. But I was WRONG!!! On the first day, I tried to talk to them, say “hi” and tried to play with them, but they just ignoring me. My Vietnamese was not good, so sometimes I still mixed up with words from Slovak language. Sometimes they couldn’t understand what I said, so they thought I’m a weirdo. They hit me, didn’t play with me, and sometimes didn’t even talk to me, they always told me to do this-do that for them. I didn’t know anything, so I had to listen to them and be their “prisoner”. When it was our play time, everybody was playing together-everybody except me. I always had to sit in a corner of the room and played alone, whenever I wanted to join them, they gave a glare and went away. They didn’t even think should how I felt-it hurt. I couldn’t feel my heart beating, my hands wanted to fall off-I was desperate.

Every weekday was nightmare to me. When I got home, my eyes felt hot and something wet came out of them, but I didn’t realize what they were because I felt so miserable. I was too busy think to myself how foolish I was to follow them and “beg” them to play with me all the time. I could no more see happy lights, I didn’t want to eat or talk, all I wanted was to get out of that school and go back to Slovakia.

Everyday, when my mom came to school and picked me up, she asked the same question: “How’s your day darling?”

And the only thing I could answer was: “My day was great mom!” and forced myself a fake smile. I didn’t want to tell her the truth, because I know she would feel bad and might find another school for me. It was really hard for my parents to find a school for me since we just arrived to Vietnam few months before.

But everyday with those tears on my face, I just couldn’t take it anymore and I told my mom what happened to me. My mom felt sorry and she asked me if I want to change school and obviously I DO want to but I told her: “No mom, I don’t. There will be only few more months mom, I will be ok.”

I stopped crying so I won’t make her feel sorry anymore. She told me that it would take time to make new friends and told me not to feel sad anymore. I nodded and watched television. After that day, I didn’t care about anything anymore. Now, when I think back about that situation, I always tell myself: “Life is unfair! It can never be perfect! So don’t expect it to be like what we expected!”