"Nicholasy, Nicholasy!"

Noia sitting on the class desk (aka my guitar case)

I like playing games. I like working on the farm as well, but when I’m lucky, my job is to play games. Every Friday I walk out to the middle of a field, start playing my guitar, and as if I was the Pied Piper, 20–30 of the farm workers’ children come running towards me from every direction because they know it is time to play games... um… I mean, English language class.

Even though the ages of my students range from 2 to 14, we all learn together in a seemingly chaotic clump. A typical 3-hour lesson consists of three essential parts: prayer, games, and music, all while learning a little bit of English vocabulary along the way. It was a great system and everything worked as planned, until the fateful day that I met Noia (noo-ee-ah).

I remember it vividly. Noia (pictured above) shuffled her little 2-year-old body around the corner of the field, nearly tripped over a fallen coconut, and then let out the ear-piercing cry of, “Nicholasy! Nicholasy!” The name (pronounced nee-koh-lah-see) she seemed to pull out of thin air latched on to the mind of every last of my students. From that moment on I was only referred to as Nicholasy.

Music is always the closing element of each lesson

I don’t think that I could tell you how many times I have heard my dear mother say, “Your name is Nicholas, NOT Nick.” This proclamation is likely where my aversion towards nicknames began as a child. It is not that I dislike the concept of shortening others’ names. I just prefer “Nicholas.” I’m sure that my mother is glad to hear that, even to this day, when someone calls me “Nick,” “Nikko,” “Nickelodeon,” or any other variation of my first name, I can hear her mantra echoing through my head as clear as ever.

As if Noia couldn’t sense my inner distaste for nicknames, she permanently changed my name in the minds of 30 children with a simple shout of excitement. In this infamous moment, I came to the shocking realization that, not only do I not dislike my new name, but that I thoroughly approved of it! I was fully prepared to take on the name of Nicholasy and to wear it with pride.

In that moment I became more than just another volunteer teaching English. I became Nicholasy. More so, I became their Nicholasy. I was a part of their loving, energetic, laughter-filled community, and I didn’t want to be anywhere else.

I’ve never been one for nicknames, but I think that I can get behind this one. From now on, every time that I hear the shout of, “Nicholasy!” I know that I am about to be surrounded by a community that I love.