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"Her name was Yuk-Fong. That was the problem. Except I didn&amp;amp;#8217;t know it was a problem, which was another problem. It was my first day of school in America. I was 12 and had just moved from Seoul, South Korea, to a suburb of Baltimore. Yuk-Fong, a refugee from Vietnam, was the only other student in my English as a Second Language class. &amp;amp;#8220;Yuk-Fong&amp;amp;#8212;what a beautiful name,&amp;amp;#8221; our ESL teacher said. &amp;amp;#8220;Am I saying it right? Yuk? Fong? Some may not appreciate the musicality of those lovely syllables, Yuk and Fong, together, if you see what I mean.&amp;amp;#8221; (I spoke only a few words of English at this point, so what I actually heard was &amp;amp;#8220;Yuk-Fong. Blah, blah. Blah, blah, blah? Yuk? Fong? Blah Yuk, blah Fong, blah, blah.&amp;amp;#8221;) I had no idea why our teacher (whose name I wrote down only as Mrs. P) spent our first class saying Yuk-Fong&amp;amp;#8217;s name over and over, looking into her eyes and smoothing her hair. My name, Angela, on the other hand, she said only once. At the end of the class, I did what any reasonable preteen girl would do under the circumstances: I decided to hate Mrs. P and Yuk-Fong. My intense jealousy of Yuk-Fong festered over the next week as I noticed that the students seemed taken with her as well. &amp;amp;#8220;Hi, Yuk-Fong. Bye, Yuk-Fong,&amp;amp;#8221; they smiled and said so loudly as they passed her in the hallway. Ignored, I felt invisible, like Cinderella&amp;amp;#8217;s ugly stepsister, who I was growing to realize had been terribly misunderstood. All that changed a month into school. A cute ninth-grade boy came up to Yuk-Fong and said, &amp;amp;#8220;Is your name Yuk-Fong or F&amp;amp;#8212;k-Young?&amp;amp;#8221; She just looked at him, silent. I didn&amp;amp;#8217;t understand but figured she was paralyzed by the prospect of talking to such a popular boy. So I swooped in to help. &amp;amp;#8220;Her name: Yuk-Fong,&amp;amp;#8221; I said, enunciating each syllable. He frowned at me as if figuring out a difficult equation in his head, then said in slow, enunciated words, &amp;amp;#8220;F&amp;amp;#8212;k. Yoo.&amp;amp;#8221; I shook my head and said, &amp;amp;#8220;F&amp;amp;#8212;k, no. Yoo, no. Yuk-Fong.&amp;amp;#8221; He shook his head as if the conversation were too hard for him to attempt again, then walked away. I wondered if I had embarrassed him, correcting him in front of everyone like that. Did he have a speech impediment or memory issues? Maybe I should apologize. I heard a sound behind me and turned. It was Yuk-Fong. She had understood, and she was sobbing. Next: Angie finds a hero in her aunt&amp;#x27;s paperback novel &amp;amp;#187; Although I had renounced Mrs. P long before, I couldn&amp;amp;#8217;t help but feel bad for her during the two-hour extra-long ESL class that afternoon. She stammered, rubbed her temples, and paced. She mimed, scribbled on the chalkboard, and flipped through English-Korean and English-Vietnamese dictionaries. The following is what I got out of that afternoon: 1. The kids were not being friendly to Yuk-Fong. They were making fun of her. 1a. Kids are mean. Middle school kids are meaner. American middle school kids are meanest. 2. Yuck means &amp;amp;#8220;disgusting.&amp;amp;#8221; 3. F&amp;amp;#8212;k is slang for &amp;amp;#8220;sex.&amp;amp;#8221; You should never say, write, or think this word. 4. Sex is something you should ask your mother about. By this time, I was tired of the drama. I just wanted to learn some English. Was that too much to ask? I decided to take matters into my own hands. My aunt had told me that she had learned English by reading American books, writing down any words she didn&amp;amp;#8217;t know, and using her English-Korean dictionary to look them up. I went to her room and browsed through her collection, most by an author named Sidney Sheldon, and chose one with a bleeding black rose on the front. I loved Bible stories, and this was called Rage of Angels. I lay on my stomach on the floor with my dictionary and notebook, and began, one word at a time. I soon became obsessed with Rage of Angels and its main character, Jennifer Parker, despite her notable lack of wings or horns. To me, Jennifer was the embodiment of everything good about America: a &amp;amp;#8220;bright and idealistic and achingly young and lovely&amp;amp;#8221; lawyer who overcomes a Mafia conspiracy to become, simultaneously, the best attorney in America, the secret lover of a U.S. senator turned president, and mistress of the most powerful Mafia leader in the country. A careful reading and translation of Rage of Angels not only taught me the meaning of previously unknown words like consigliere and phrases like &amp;amp;#8220;making fierce love, naked and wanton,&amp;amp;#8221; but it also taught me that anyone can overcome any obstacle in America, a land of possibilities. Throughout this period, I also developed an obsessive attachment to my aunt&amp;amp;#8217;s tattered dictionary. It had its limitations, I knew. It couldn&amp;amp;#8217;t teach me what girls at school meant by &amp;amp;#8220;Gag me with a spoon,&amp;amp;#8221; nor the meaning of Izod, the shirts everyone wore with tiny alligators stuck on them, jaws open as if ready to tear into their hearts. But it was perfect for my encounter with Jane, a classic blond popular girl. Jane came up to me in the hallway, put her mouth to my ear, and whispered, &amp;amp;#8220;Your epidermis is showing.&amp;amp;#8221; I learned later that this was a popular mean-girl trick: Whisper this to a girl and she&amp;amp;#8217;d spend the next half hour in the bathroom trying to figure out what exactly was showing. Tissues from her stuffed bra? A period stain? But already used to not knowing what most words meant, I just looked at her and asked, &amp;amp;#8220;How do you spell?&amp;amp;#8221; &amp;amp;#8220;What?&amp;amp;#8221; she said, frowning. &amp;amp;#8220;Epidermis. Please spell.&amp;amp;#8221; I flipped open my dictionary. &amp;amp;#8220;E-P-I-D?&amp;amp;#8221; Jane just looked at me. Her frown lines deepened and traveled up her forehead like train tracks. I shrugged and scanned the words until I found it. &amp;amp;#8220;Here. &amp;amp;#8216;E-pi-der-mis. Skin.&amp;amp;#8217; You know this? That word means &amp;amp;#8216;skin.&amp;amp;#8217; Skin is showing. That is what you say?&amp;amp;#8221; Jane&amp;amp;#8217;s cheeks reddened, her eyes everywhere but my face. Until this point, despite having witnessed Yuk-Fong being bullied, I hadn&amp;amp;#8217;t experienced it firsthand. I thought of how Jennifer Parker stood up to injustice. &amp;amp;#8220;You are,&amp;amp;#8221; I scanned through my notebook to find the description for Jennifer Parker&amp;amp;#8217;s lover&amp;amp;#8217;s evil wife, &amp;amp;#8220;a &amp;amp;#8216;honey-voiced bitch.&amp;amp;#8217; Yes?&amp;amp;#8221; Feeling triumphant, I put the notebook in my bag and turned to find Luke, a boy from math class, smiling. He put three fingers on his forehead in a W and said, &amp;amp;#8220;Winner!&amp;amp;#8221; My first thought was, Luke is pretty cute. Next: Why language barriers and middle school yearbooks don&amp;#x27;t mix &amp;amp;#187; Emboldened, I looked for further phrases to impress Luke. After one difficult math class, I said to Luke, &amp;amp;#8220;Mrs. B is a &amp;amp;#8216;powerful, relentless inquisitor,&amp;amp;#8217; yes?&amp;amp;#8221; When I saw Luke arguing with a guy, I asked him, &amp;amp;#8220;Is that boy &amp;amp;#8216;truculent and sarcastic&amp;amp;#8217;? I am sorry.&amp;amp;#8221; Luke just smiled and shook his head in apparent amazement at my conversational skills. My crush on Luke reached its height in May with the Alligator Incident. After a week of ESL classes on the importance of fashion, I decided to Americanize my clothes. We couldn&amp;amp;#8217;t afford new ones, so I asked my aunt for my cousin Mike&amp;amp;#8217;s outgrown Izod shirts, cut out the alligators, and sewed them onto the beautiful vests my mom had made. There was a lot of giggling in the hallways that week. Luke, though, never stared or laughed. Whether it was indifference or a silent condemnation of the teasing, I didn&amp;amp;#8217;t care. The important thing was, he didn&amp;amp;#8217;t contribute to my humiliation. I was grateful. When yearbooks came out a few weeks later, I asked people to write in mine so that by the time Luke signed, it would be full of notes. Most kids, though, just wrote their names or &amp;amp;#8220;Have a nice summer.&amp;amp;#8221; So I went into the bathroom and wrote out fake gushing notes to myself about how much I&amp;amp;#8217;d be missed, how I was the best friend in the world, and then handed the yearbook to Luke. He scribbled something and gave it back with a shy smile. I went back into the bathroom stall and read: &amp;amp;#8220;Dear Angela, You are so square. &amp;amp;#8212;Luke&amp;amp;#8221; Tears veiled my eyes. He didn&amp;amp;#8217;t just sign &amp;amp;#8220;Luke&amp;amp;#8221; or write &amp;amp;#8220;Have a nice summer.&amp;amp;#8221; He wrote something special, just for me. And he started with &amp;amp;#8220;Dear,&amp;amp;#8221; which is a term of affection. But square? The only dictionary definition was &amp;amp;#8220;a rectangle with four equal sides.&amp;amp;#8221; That didn&amp;amp;#8217;t make sense. My head was oval. And my body was, no matter how you looked at it, not shaped like a square. More like a thin line. Square must mean something good, I decided. He probably meant I was well proportioned. Or neat and organized, at least. Or great at math. Everything might have been fine if I hadn&amp;amp;#8217;t decided to show off to everyone that I had a personal, special note from Luke. After the next class, I handed my yearbook to Jane to sign. Her picture was on the same page as Luke&amp;amp;#8217;s. She passed the book back, laughing. &amp;amp;#8220;You really are square.&amp;amp;#8221; Perhaps square wasn&amp;amp;#8217;t a compliment after all. This suspicion gnawed at me the rest of the day and grew as kids kept saying, &amp;amp;#8220;Hey, square,&amp;amp;#8221; as they passed by me. At lunch I asked Mrs. P what square meant, saying I&amp;amp;#8217;d heard it on TV. She told me that square means &amp;amp;#8220;someone who doesn&amp;amp;#8217;t belong, doesn&amp;amp;#8217;t fit in.&amp;amp;#8221; Someone who&amp;amp;#8217;s weird. I managed not to cry until I got home. Next: Angie gets her revenge on Luke &amp;amp;#187; Meet This Year&amp;amp;#8217;s Contest Judges! They picked Kim&amp;amp;#8217;s story out of thousands of entries. Here&amp;amp;#8217;s why: &amp;amp;#8220;Because even in an extremely cruel situation, she sees the humor.&amp;amp;#8221; &amp;amp;#8212;Jane Smiley, Private Life &amp;amp;#8220;I loved her point of view&amp;amp;#8212;both aware of things and not.&amp;amp;#8221; &amp;amp;#8212;Ann Brashares, The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants series &amp;amp;#8220;Her characters are sharp. I can hear them speak.&amp;amp;#8221; &amp;amp;#8212;Jesmyn Ward, Salvage the Bones &amp;amp;#8220;There are great little details, like the alligators on the Izod shirts.&amp;amp;#8221; &amp;amp;#8212;Erin Morgenstern, The Night CircusPhotos: Smiley: Michael Lionstar; Brashares: Sigrid estrada; others: Courtesy of subjects The next morning, Yuk-Fong came up to my locker. &amp;amp;#8220;I heard what happened,&amp;amp;#8221; she said. &amp;amp;#8220;I am sorry.&amp;amp;#8221; I nodded but couldn&amp;amp;#8217;t say anything. I felt terrible: I had never told her I was sorry when kids made fun of her. In truth, I had been relieved it was her, not me. I&amp;amp;#8217;d tried to put distance between us. But why? We were the same, she and I. It made me think&amp;amp;#8212;maybe I deserved what happened. Maybe it happened for a reason: to help us come together. I thought of what Jennifer Parker would do in this situation (that is, if she didn&amp;amp;#8217;t have easy access to Mafia hit men). I gripped Yuk-Fong&amp;amp;#8217;s hands. &amp;amp;#8220;I want to tell Luke he is a bad, bad guy,&amp;amp;#8221; I said. Even to me, though, &amp;amp;#8220;bad, bad guy&amp;amp;#8221; sounded inadequate. So when she nodded, I asked for her help figuring out a better insult, the worst insult, to express my hate. &amp;amp;#8220;I know!&amp;amp;#8221; she said. &amp;amp;#8220;My cousin told me a slang word for the boy sex part.&amp;amp;#8221; &amp;amp;#8220;Member?&amp;amp;#8221; I guessed. &amp;amp;#8220;His hard, throbbing member pressed against her thighs,&amp;amp;#8221; a sentence from a new book from my aunt, was one of my latest notebook entries. &amp;amp;#8220;No&amp;amp;#8230;&amp;amp;#8221; I flipped through my notebook. &amp;amp;#8220;Organ?&amp;amp;#8221; I said, spotting the sentence from Rage of Angels, &amp;amp;#8220;His hard organ began to pound into her again until she screamed with pleasure.&amp;amp;#8221; &amp;amp;#8220;I do not remember,&amp;amp;#8221; Yuk-Fong said. &amp;amp;#8220;Is organ a slang word for the boy&amp;amp;#8217;s part?&amp;amp;#8221; &amp;amp;#8220;Here,&amp;amp;#8221; I said, showing her Rage of Angels. &amp;amp;#8220;And it is slang,&amp;amp;#8221; I reasoned, &amp;amp;#8220;because my dictionary says organ is &amp;amp;#8216;a musical instrument.&amp;amp;#8217; Not,&amp;amp;#8221; I pointed to the word, &amp;amp;#8220;what this means.&amp;amp;#8221; &amp;amp;#8220;Yes,&amp;amp;#8221; she said, convinced. &amp;amp;#8220;That is the word. Organ.&amp;amp;#8221; We waited until after lunch, when the cafeteria was almost empty. Luke was walking out, alone. I went up to him. &amp;amp;#8220;You,&amp;amp;#8221; I said, &amp;amp;#8220;are an organ.&amp;amp;#8221; &amp;amp;#8220;What?&amp;amp;#8221; Luke said and frowned. I don&amp;amp;#8217;t know how many months passed before I figured out the true meaning of Luke&amp;amp;#8217;s frown: not, as I&amp;amp;#8217;d thought, a mix of indignation and remorse but rather befuddlement and slight fear of a skinny Korean girl. It wasn&amp;amp;#8217;t until a year later, when my vocabulary grew, that I went up to Luke and said, &amp;amp;#8220;You know, I&amp;amp;#8217;ve been meaning to tell you, you&amp;amp;#8217;re a f&amp;amp;#8212;king dickhead,&amp;amp;#8221; and watched his face turn a bright puce. It would be still many more years before I threw Rage of Angels and my dictionary to the bottom of my closet. But before all that, I stood in front of Luke, blocking the cafeteria exit, and looked to Yuk-Fong for encouragement. Then I turned back to Luke, formed my fingers into an O, put it against my forehead, and repeated, &amp;amp;#8220;Organ. You are a hard, throbbing organ.&amp;amp;#8221; Angie Kim, our essay-contest winner, is a Stanford- and Harvard-educated lawyer turned consultant turned dot-com entrepreneur turned writer. She&amp;amp;#8217;s also the mother of three young boys."^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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