Undergraduate / "My father" - essay topic #3-an important person and the impact on you [4]

Please proof read it. Any feedback or critcism is greatly appreciated.
I am concerned about the length of this essay(about 850 words). Do you think it lacks readability because of its length. Do you think some detail needs to be removed or added.

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Prompt:Indicate a person who has had a significant influence on you, and describe that influence.

"I did it! I was admitted by that high school" After knowing the news, I rejoiced with happy tears. Having conquered the toughest barrier this time, I was one step closer to my dream held for five years. Yes, it was a dream having occupied me for five years, a dream that would never be proposed without the help of my father.

My father is my first and most significant mentor in my life, who, in my mind, symbolizes wisdom, charm and experience. Although he is just an unknown middle school teacher, he has exerted the most positive influence on me with his unbelievably broad and distinctive perspective.

Seven years ago, when I was watching the documentary film of Famous Universities around the World, my father asked me "which university would you like to go". I replied, "Well, as long as I am admitted into a university, I will be satisfied. I have thought of the most prestigious universities such as Tsinghua and Peking University in China, but you know these universities are impossible for me to get in. They are even not real in my world since they are all in big cities thousands of miles away from my isolated small village." My father moved his lips but uttered no word. The conversation gradually faded away from my memory since I was soon preoccupied with planning my summer vacation three months later.

To my great surprise, my father intended to take me to Beijing during my holiday. It was marvelous for me! Never had I ever been to anywhere 100 miles away from my small town, not to say the capital city 1000 miles away, I was eager to explore the outside world. "It would be my first time to live in a luxurious hotel." I imagined with great joy on the train to Beijing. However, I was shocked to see a shabby basement lodging room inside the well-known Tsinghua University. The moldy taste spreading over the dark room was a great contrast to the freshly mown grass on campus. "What a hell it is! How could you arrange such a room for me?" I shouted. Hearing my complaint, he calmly began his "preaching", "You need to know that in order to arrange this travel for you, the whole family is suffering from financial burden. So it is gratitude rather than complaint that you ought to express for this invaluable experience. Think about your cousin, who might still be grazing the sheep or helping cultivate the land for your uncle. Actually, just like George Bernard Shaw said before, 'The people who get on in this world are the people who get up and look for circumstances they want, and if they cannot find them, they make them. ' " Hearing what he said, I stood still near the door for a long time, lost in meditation. Indeed, I need to be thankful. Anyway, the better life of one person is not created by others but by one's own hands.

In the next few days, I wandered around in picture-like campus of Tsinghua with my father. Each part of the campus came into my eyes, frame by frame, like a scroll of film being pulled open slowly. One frame was two people playing badminton, my favorite sport, in a modern gymnasium. Another one was a woman reading a book in concentration between a mirror-like lake and a poetic hill. These frames depicted my ideal life exactly. "I have a hunch that I am supposed to study here." I blurted out these words as my father was taking pictures around campus. "Great, then follow your heart. Set it as your goal if you really like Tsinghua. You said Tsinghua was not real in your world before but now you are here and you see, something that seemed impossible is not necessarily so."

Back from the trip, the dream of learning in Tsinghua University got rooted in my heart. With the guidance of the goal, I kept making progress. From an isolated village's kindergarten to a town's elementary school, from a small city's middle school to an international city's well-known high school, all steps forward, inconceivable in others' eyes, were natural for me since they are the integral components of my dream.

Finally, I managed to get into one of the most prestigious high schools in China. Becoming more sophisticated and experienced, I have gradually found that Tsinghua University is not what I really want and universities in the United States suit me more. I like universities that offer exciting broad range of courses. I like universities where philosophies and the ways of thinking of different people from around the world work upon and depend on one another. These are what is emphasized in the universities of the United States but what lacks in those of China. Though it seems that my five-year dream might never come true if I study abroad, it does not matter as I still stick to the principle behind my goal, a principle that was formed under the influence of my father: never giving up your dream.