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Trans Nationals 　　On a snowy day in 2013， Xiaobu told his mother that he was， in fact， her son. That was， he told NewsChina， the second time in his life that he had cried. “Boys dont cry，”he said. Xiaobus mother was driving at the time. He recalled how she was looking straight ahead. After a while， his mother broke the silence. “So， we never had a girl in our home？” 　　“Im sorry for not treating you in the way you wanted，” she went on. 　　Growing up， whenever Xiaobus younger brother called him “sis- ter，” Xiaobu would get mad. On that day， when they arrived home， Xiaobus younger brother greeted him as he usually did. Their mother corrected her younger son. “This is your older brother，” she said. 　　 Minority 　　17-year-old Xiaobu looks older than his peers. He is modest and polite. He has a habit of tugging at his newly sprouted beard when he talks. Since commencing hormone therapy， his voice has deepened， and his menstrual cycle has ceased. “It feels great，” he said. Warnings about side effects such as hair loss， osteoporosis or stunted growth dont concern Xiaobu. He feels he has waited long enough ?C 17 years?C for the body he belongs in. 　　During Xiaobus first year at middle school， the changes in his body， particularly menstruation and growing breasts， he said， made him “sick.” Initially， he thought he might be a lesbian ?C his attraction to pretty classmates with long hair seemed a key indicator. In the end， though， he realized he was trans. 　　“I just didnt feel like a girl，” he told NewsChina. “My sexual orientation was totally like that of a straight man.” 　　This notion frightened Xiaobu， he recalled. Growing up in a rigidly cisgendered society， his first encounter with the term “transgendered”was online. Stumbling across this word in his second year of middle school， he felt that the definition was “made just for me.” 　　Now， Xiaobu is saving up for sex reassignment surgery. He wants to fully surgically transition before he turns 20， and then get married