Undergraduate / Commonapp short answer, activity (I was in the pool) [13]

This is my essay for commonapp short answer.. feel free to change anything!

I was in the pool, face down, a knife embedded in my back.

"Let four captains bear Hamlet, like a soldier, to the stage!" My friend John, who was now Prince Fortinbras, finished his last line. I mopped the water off my face, and then I smiled, bowed, enjoyed the applause and the smiles I put on my special audience. I was not in a theater, nor was I a professional actress. At the backyard of the nursing home, other volunteers and I presented our thanksgiving gift, a revised version of Hamlet, to our lovely "grandmas and grandpas." Seeing their eyes illuminated with joy and their wrinkles folded with laughter, we knew that a week of hard work had paid off.

Volunteering in a nursing home was such a rewarding experience for me. By pushing wheelchairs and distributing blankets, I encountered these exceptional people who gave me remarkable advices on overcoming obstacles and setting goals for myself. I heard inspirational stories and witnessed life and death. It truly surprised me when I found out how much I gained by helping other.

Zejing Li

Undergraduate / commonapp essay, ("no a fascination with death") [3]

I dont know if I should use this one as the commonapp essay or the yale supplement...
but it's about a significant experience that changed the way you see things.
Please critique and feel free to change anything.

I do not want to waste 500 words complaining about how difficult it was for me to move from China to the U.S nor do I feel the need to showcase how many obstacles I had to overcome during the three years I have lived in this country because of my English deficiency. I believe you've read the story over and over again from other applications. Here I wish to explain why I liked jumping off the bridge.

I do not have a fascination with death, nor do I have any suicidal tendency, yet I loved throwing myself off this old brass bridge. Whoosh. As I stood, some four stories above the water, I felt a spasm of panic and excitement as my mind rushing down intricate thoughts: logic and reason simply objected this foolish plan and tried hard to stick me with the safer scenario of getting off the bridge and going home. But today I felt the need to be something, something headstrong and impetuous.

Then I did it. I hurled myself off the bridge into the lake. As I was pulled toward the water with an acceleration of 9.8 meter per second square, my world turned up side down and I felt this tingling sensation which ran through every muscle and bone. Whoosh. I love the way the fresh breeze wafted through my hair in the air, and I relish the smooth glossy feeling when the slightly cool water enveloped me. On that day I did not care what others think of me. For once I was not that docile daughter who has the perfect etiquette, or that granddaughter who sets family pride as her primary goal of life. For once I was just me, the free, unembellished me.

I swam to a rock. As I stood on it, the water oozed out of my pores into streams, cascading in glistening paths down my body. I laughed. I tucked a loose strand of wet hair behind my ears and felt my soaked shirt billowed out around my body. I felt so complete. I was proud that I had done something that I would not normally do, something impulsive, something blissfully bad. I was making amends for my life that was caged by the constrictive boundaries of logical thought. I was rebelling. I was acting without even worrying about the consequence, and it was liberating. I threw my glasses to the muddy river bank, having fun to watch it grimed by the sand. I turned my face, enjoying the now blurry world, and ironically I saw things I have never seen before, the things that were easily overlooked with a clear sight. I saw a heron glided to rest on a pebbly strand, I saw the finch's tail flicks up and down, I saw a life without the burdens. Here, I am alone. No friends interrupting me with the shrill ring of the telephone, no parents nagging me about finishing college essays, no life forcing me to be logical. I finally found what I had been looking for but too afraid to find it. I was proud that I overstepped the boundaries of limiting myself only to the banal but safe route, and I conquered my greatest fear, fear of having changes in my life.

I jumped again and again, splashing off bits of the sparkling water and feeling a great satisfaction to disturb its peace. The willows along the river bank seemed to have magical power as they muffled all the chaotic noises of the world.