A Personal Narrative of My Educational Journey to Higher Forms of Education

Common App Prompt #1: Some students have a background, identity, interest, or talent that is so meaningful they believe their application would be incomplete without it. If this sounds like you, then please share your story.

My throat was parched with trepidation. "What is your name?" The words could barely trickle off my tongue. I couldn`t find the words to respond.

Starting preschool in the US without knowing how to spell my name in English, and moving between China and New York in the p of a few years left me in an awkward predicament. My tongue couldn`t wrap around the foreign syllables of the American alphabet. Hours once spent copying calligraphy from local Chinese papers while Ma went to work, became replaced by agonizing periods of reciting vowels and stammering at enigmatic grammar worksheets. I envied the perfect, clear-cut pronunciation of my peers in school. Gradually my fear of speaking aloud amplified, and a shell gradually enveloped me, comforting my anxiety with solidarity. Isolating myself, my unexpressed thoughts became stockpiled crimson leaves outside as I watched my middle school years drip past quietly by the windowsill.