Olivia Good Rider- Things I Saw in the Girls’ Playroom
That one time the whistle had blown, I think we were going to eat or going to the classroom, I can’t remember. But anyways, a bunch of the girls who were my friends, when I did something they would follow me. They had to do what I was doing. I quickly went to drink water and they followed me. I was just going out the door and the supervisor just grabbed me by jumper with both hands and started to shake me. She told me, “so you are the leader!” I was getting older then and I was starting to understand more English by then. She was shaking me and told me, “so you are the instigator, so you are the ringleader.” I didn’t even know what that meant. You know we all stood back in line, and I was telling the girls “don’t follow me”, now I’m the one who gets into trouble. And sometimes, I can’t remember what it is called, but in the playroom there was a storeroom where they put our play items, like balls. Sometimes girls would be locked in there and it wasn’t a pleasant place for me.
Even to this day when I enter this building all these memories come back to me, you know what had happened there. I would say I was treated bad down there in the playroom too.
They used to make fun of me, they would hit me sometimes. The supervisors used to always pull my braids and shake me by my head. I used to think “I can’t do this because I will get hit or get punished.” I didn’t want to get involved in some of the activities, you know, if the other girls were doing something. It’s always, all of the time that we were afraid. You know you do not talk back, and not listen. Because you are going to get it somehow, if you did not do something properly or if you refuse. You couldn’t refuse, you have to follow what they told us.
– Olivia Good Rider
Notes:
Oral interview with Olivia Good Rider. Conducted, translated, and transcribed by Angeline Ayoungman. Old Sun Community College, March 11, 2022.
