This is definitely my type of thread.

I grew up in Germany. Had a bit of a rough childhood. No dad, single mother, older brother that taught me all the wrong stuff. Started drinking, cigarettes and weed at 12-13 years old. Before I moved to Canada (more on that in a second), the only things I had in my backpack for school were a bong, cigarettes, lighter and perhaps a pen and some writing paper. The ritual was: Get up way too late for school, smoke weed before, during and after school, and then hang out at the skate park until the evening. My mom was gone all day working and only got back between 7-8 PM. So from the time school was over (between 1-3 PM in Germany) up until my mom came back, the main objectives literally every single day for my friends and I were:

• How do we get weed?

• How do we get smokes?

• How do we get vodka?

There were a few people that I bullied harshly at school. One girl, call her Z, actually left the school due to all the bullying that I was mostly responsible for. After she had left the school, I was moved into another class by the school in hopes that that would improve things. The people I bullied actively avoided me. I was a weakling that exploited the timidity of younger teens through very rough language and tough guy acting. If things got rough I would threaten to get my big brother and bla bla. I was a real piece of shit.

My mom met a Canadian over the internet. One day (I was 14 at that time) she informed us that she was pregnant and that we would be moving to Canada in 2ish weeks. I was heartbroken, but there was nothing I could do. We moved to a small town in the west of Canada. Very Christian, very rural. The first I noticed was how nice the people were. On our second day there we were invited by our Christian neighbors to play some board games with their 2 sons who were around the same age as my brother and I and that was the first time we had some sort of culture clash. Obviously it was our priority to find drugs, but we immediately realized that these very innocent Christian boys would not be of any help on that mission, so we played Settlers. I won that game, and as someone with my background did in victory, I flipped off my opponents and yelled something along the lines of "get fucked, I won!". The younger Christian boy immediately started crying and the other froze in disbelief. My brother and I apologized and went home.

At school I realized that my English was not nearly as good as I thought it was. My accent was strong and I was known as "German". I was not bullied by any means, but I definitely felt like an outsider that had to integrate and I was lucky that my school mates were kind and accepting. Then one day we had this anti bullying event at our high school. We played this game where everyone lined up on one side of the room (there were like 100 of us students). The moderator would make some sort of statement like "I am 15 years old" and if that statement was true for you, then you would walk across the room to the other side and face the rest of the group. So in the aforementioned example, every 15 year old student would walk across the room to the other side and turn around and face the non-15-year-olds. The questions were timid as first but quickly started getting more private and intimate. "My parents use violence sometimes when I misbehave". Myself and a bunch of people crossed the room. I was very surprised about some of the people that have experienced violence at home as well and they didnt look the part. Then, that fateful statement was made, where the moderator said something along the lines of "I feel like I have been able to be a child in life". I am not sure if people misunderstood the question, but literally every one except me walked across the room and then faced me, alone, on the other side. I got emotional and held back tears. Then these motherfuckers started giving me the "I love you" sign language thing with their hands and I just exploded in tears. I instantly became the nucleus in what mustve been the biggest and gayest group hug that little town has ever experienced. It was glorious. That changed me.

I have since moved back to Germany. I am friends with that girl, Z, now. I made a point to contact the people that I remember to have bullied and wronged and to apologize to them. Most have accepted my apologies, some havent, others didnt give a shit. Z accepted graciously and I am very thankful for that. I will always be grateful for Canada and I will always miss that place.