It has been over a year since I moved to my new home in the heart of the city but I feel like I don’t belong here everyday. This lifestyle happens to be different from my previous lifestyle, There’s no good friend to hang out with. The majority of the people my age in the community are into alcohol, drugs and parties which I am not a fan of.

I am on vacation and I wake up every morning to see my mom getting ready for work, my siblings getting ready for school and I am the lonely one at home throughout the day. There’s no one to keep me company so I cater to a few chores and when I am done there is no one to talk to. The best person that keeps me company at home is my phone. At times I call my girlfriend who lives a few blocks away from my house and we talk on the phone for hours or she sometimes spends few hours at my crib. When I don’t get her, I am bored and end up sleeping, because I cannot mingle with my neighbors as they are involved in things that I am against, so I keep all by myself.
It was on this day that I decided to take a stroll through my hood about 6 to 7 pm. As I walked past a certain large house I froze when I saw something that was completely terrifying. I saw group of young boys and girls my age smoking weed and other bad substances. In split seconds every member of that group’s attention was drawn to me and from the kind of stare I received I knew that something negative was coming. I heard one of them asking why I was standing like a dumb man and looking at them. He said I should get going now. I came back from my nightmares and started to leave, but as I left I heard names that was not pleasant and I left and kept my silence.
After a few weeks whenever I walked through my hood I heard a variety of names that were not gratifying and I asked myself is this really my hood? Of course this is my hood but if it is my hood why am I being treated like an outsider?

The community in which I reside have a lot of people with so many problems. One of those problems is improper sanitation. They don’t care about their health and others’ health. They dispose of their waste carelessly. Their trash is thrown everywhere in the community and their children even poop right outside – not too far from their kitchens. Their dishes are always dirty and scattered all over the place and because of this reckless behaviour we are not too involved with them. They call my family a whole lot of names like Kwee (civilized people) and it makes me feel like a total outsider.

Even these people’s kids have not been trained properly. For this reason some of them are involved in a lot of bad habits like smoking. Some even deal in drugs and drinking alcohol and parties. Not just any party but parties where you get a whole lot of bad substances like codeine, lain and weed. Because of this mom advised me to keep my distance. I knew this was the best advice so I stay away from these people and their kids and cope with the feelings of being like an outsider.