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No „skibidi”, „67”, or „lowkey”. Instead, words about sadness, stigma, and poverty appeared in an alternative „youth word of the year” poll organized by the ERBUD Foundation among young people living in residential care facilities. The most common word was „ulung”, which has nothing to do with Chinese tea.

The Foundation held the poll during the annual „Players of the Year” sports olympics in Lubawa, an event that brings together more than 150 residents of children’s homes from across Poland. Each participant could submit three words. At first, it seemed like the activity would fit the light-hearted spirit of the nationwide contest. But once the ballot box was opened, it turned out many entries stood far from the fun, playful vibe and revealed a lot about the mood among young people living in institutional care.

The most frequently submitted word, „ulung”, describes someone withdrawn, insecure, not very assertive — someone who „can’t cope”. It’s often used to mock young people from residential care homes: „oh, the ulungs from the home have arrived”. Other commonly submitted words included „enpecet”. NPC, short for „non-player character”, comes from gaming but has entered everyday slang as an insult meaning someone invisible and insignificant — „don’t pay attention to her, she’s an NPC”. Another phrase that appeared in the submissions was „who asked”, a retort meant to dismiss someone’s statement as irrelevant or not worth hearing

We were planning a light and fun activity that would match the colourful atmosphere of our annual sports olympics. Out of more than 500 submitted words, most looked just like those from the nationwide contest, but the number of sad entries really worried us. They reflect the real mood among our kids — their lack of confidence, withdrawal, and constant feeling of being „the worse one”. At first we wondered why so many of them liked oolong tea, but once someone explained what the word actually meant, it stopped being funny, says Lucyna Grzeszczak, president of the foundation.

According to the study „Self-esteem and readiness for assertive behaviour” by Konrad Kawala from the Faculty of Pedagogy and Psychology at UMCS, among young people living in institutional foster care as many as 47.5% had low, unfavourable self-esteem, including 18.6% with very low self-esteem. We’ve been working on this issue for 10 years. We run dedicated support programmes, workshops, and special initiatives that strengthen mental resilience and help build a sense of self-worth among young people from residential care homes. We do have many successes — our kids pass their final exams, get into university, start their own adult lives — but we still see significant systemic and care-related gaps. This seemingly harmless contest, where we expected words like „rel” or „essa” rather than „ubóś” related to poverty or the insulting „ulung”, shows how much work still lies ahead — not only for foundations but for society as a whole, says Agnieszka Tkaczyk, psychologist at the ERBUD Foundation.