This afternoon, we went to see Hasan Minhaj’s show Homecoming King at the Cherry Lane Theater in the West Village. The show goes through his immigrant family’s path to coming to America, how he met the sister he didn’t realize he had, and the bullying he faced because of his Indian heritage in school. During the talk back session after the show, he and a film director are discussing bullying in schools in general and why they both think institutions and people in general need to acknowledge it more and do something about it.

It made me sad to remember how Ed used to be bullied. He was a pretty easy target since he wasn’t particularly athletic, was skinny and not that tall, and of course, he wasn’t confident. He was bullied by classmates, even by a teacher at his elementary school who used to hit him. He was defenseless and didn’t know that it was wrong and that it shouldn’t have happened. And even if he did tell our parents, what would they have done? Would they have even defended him and went to the school to have it addressed given that our own father bullied him?

Every day there’s something to remind me about Ed and the injustices he faced. The question now is, what can be done to change similar situations for kids who might face a life just like his?