From making sure I get the perfect “food porn” photo at restaurants to frantically searching the house for aesthetically-pleasing items to incorporate into a flat-lay, I think it’s fair to say that photography is the thing I take most pride in doing. I have a few other hobbies outside of photography, including blogging (duh) and developing my vocal and music production skills, but I think that photography is what I enjoy, and excel in, the most. I love experimenting with angles, light and shadows, the act of composing a photograph, and the process of editing the photos afterwards. During lockdown, I’ve been trying to keep myself busy with my hobbies, as most of us are probably doing. I started thinking about why I enjoy the things that I enjoy; What ignited my passion for photography? As triggering as it was to delve into a part of my past that I’ve suppressed for years, during my routine overthinking-in-the-shower session, I finally figured it out.

My experience of being bullied wasn’t the worst experience ever but, hey, it’s not a competition. It affected me a lot and I still find myself thinking about my experiences to this day. It began in secondary school, when I was about 12 years old. For the sake of this blog post, let’s call the bully ‘H’. One day, I was walking home from school with my friends when an insanely tall guy came towards me. I’m mentioning his height because I was quite tall in comparison to the rest of my 11 year-old peers (I was about 5ft4) and I distinctly remember his height being extremely intimidating to me, before he had even said anything. He asked me “Are you Jakira?”, to which I responded “Yes.” He then said something like “You stink!” and started laughing, hysterically, along with a group of other older kids who were walking behind my friends and I. My friends tried to defend me, telling the group to “Shut up” and whatnot. I was embarrassed and, somehow, managed to hold in my tears until I got home. It turned out that H had told this person to say that to me, which I found strange because I had no idea who H was at the time. I know what you’re probably thinking; “You stink” isn’t exactly the most hurtful insult, so why did I care? I was extremely intimidated and embarrassed that I had been called out like that in front of so many people. Also, I was a kid who was still new to the whole high-school experience. Surprise, surprise – I hated it, already.

Another time, I was on my way to class when two boys (one was H’s brother, the other was the brother’s friend) came running towards me and pushed me over in the school playground. The ground was concrete so, as you can imagine, it was pretty painful. My trousers were torn from the fall, I had cuts on my knees, and I was late to class because I was crying in the toilets. They later told me who had put them up to it and, lo and behold, it was H. Something that I noticed is that H never actually physically bullied me, themselves; it was always orchestrated by H and carried out by others.

When I was at school, cyber bullying was at an all-time-high. Facebook became insanely popular and opened new doors for those who thought that the 7 hours in a school day were not enough to make someone’s life a living hell. I, stupidly, would add literally anyone and everyone on Facebook and I hate myself for it. I only got around to unfriending all the people that I don’t know, personally, about 5 or 6 years ago and, yes, it took me a few hours.

I’m not sure if I added H on Facebook or if it was the other way around but its important to note that we were friends on Facebook, for whatever reason. H would often write Facebook statuses about me, slander me for my photos and would call me names – “slag” being one that I specifically remember. If you had me on Facebook back when I was 11/12 years, I am so sorry; I would take so many photos back then, which is so funny to me because I really hardly ever take selfies these days. I’d edit the photos in the weirdest ways, with song lyrics and heart stickers and other cringey shit. I was wild. You know when people would do those “LiKe fOr aN eDiT” statuses? Yeah, that was me and I hate myself every day when Facebook sends me memories notifications for them.

One time, I uploaded a photo of myself from a birds-eye kind of perspective and used some light effect that, I guess, made it look a bit odd. H wrote a status, saying something along the lines of “Imagine editing your photo to make you look like Jesus LOL.” Of course, everyone found it hilarious and praised H for being “so funny.” You never really think about how something can be hurtful to someone until it happens to you. How about “Imagine being so insecure that you struggle to scroll past something that you don’t like, even though it does not affect you in any way?!” which is something that I often think in response to seeing people criticise others on the internet. Why is it so hard to just ignore something and what do yo gain from leaving negative comments about people? I honestly hate the internet. I can’t remember what I said, if anything, in response to H but I remember feeling fed-up at that point. I couldn’t understand why people were friends with someone who was pathetic enough to bully someone, let alone someone 2 years younger than them.

Eventually, I blocked H on social media and they had left school, so I was finally free and I was honestly relieved. I have no idea why I didn’t block H on Facebook any sooner, which would’ve made things a little better. One of my worst traits is my desire to be liked by everyone, which is something that I’m slowly learning to overcome.

I got my first iPhone when I was about 15 years old. Having the ability to see how the picture is going to turn out, as I’m taking the photo, was a huge gamechanger. 15 year-old me said no more Jesus-like selfies! I stopped using those crazy editing apps and began using apps like VSCO and it was revolutionary. I stopped using Facebook and would regularly upload photos to Instagram, where my photos were being praised for creativity, editing and the sheer amount of time and effort that I had clearly put into taking my photos. Like I said before, I seek approval from others and as I was getting this approval from my followers on Instagram, I started becoming more confident and motivated to create and post. I eventually purchased my very own DSLR and other camera equipment and now I try to shoot as often as I can. As we’ve been at home, I’ve really been enjoying taking landscape photos through my bedroom windows. Oh, and about those people who joined in on the bullying? Yeah, they’re the same people who message me on Instagram to compliment me on my photography. How ironic, lol.

If you got this far, I owe you a coffee or something when we get out of lockdown! Thanks for reading and sorry for how insanely long this was. Take pride in your passion(s) and don’t let anyone take that pride away from you! If you or someone you know is a victim of bullying, please let someone know (like a friend, a teacher or a parent) and maybe they can help you out! I wish I had told someone about what I was experiencing and maybe it would’ve stopped. I still feel some sort of resentment towards H, especially because I never received an apology but writing this post has really helped me acknowledge this part of my past and, hopefully, start letting it go.

If you’re reading this, H, I forgive you. Oh, and thanks for the motivation!

Stay safe,

Love,

JK ♡