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Throughout his childhood, he was severely bullied, and even hospitalised following one incident when a group of boys threw him down a flight of stairs.
"It's pretty rough in South Africa," Musk's brother, Kimbal, told
"Kids gave Elon a very hard time, and it had a huge impact on his life. In South Africa, if you're getting bullied, you still have to go to school. You just have to get up in the morning and go. He hated it so much."
But while school was challenging, Musk found an escape in the form of computers as well as his growing desire to move to the United States, which he saw as the land of endless opportunity.