Undergraduate / "A plane trip we took from Germany to London" - UF admission essay [19]

I'm not sure if this puts me in a negative light? Please help!Also, how can I connect this better with the whole UF part? I know its not good, just a rough draft. But I really do need to know if this makes me look like someone they wouldn't want at UF...

In the space provided, please write a concise narrative in which you describe a meaningful event, experience or accomplishment in your life and how it will affect your college experience or your contribution to the UF campus community. You may want to reflect on your ideas about student responsibility, academic integrity, campus citizenship or a call to service.

I thought I was going to die on that plane trip we took from Germany to London. It was me and thirty of my closest friends...or more like me and thirty other Pine View Panthers who had signed up for the travel club trip to Europe that summer. We were all ready for our first stop in England, our passports safe in the streamlined fanny packs we all carried, our location disclosed by the sea of red, white and blue "PVMS Travel Club" t-shirts we all adorned.

On the thirty minute connecting flight we took to reach London, I had to sit with a stranger, something especially terrifying for a foreign thirteen-year-old. I watched my friends walk by, dismayed that most were heading to the cabin ahead of mine; I would truly be on my own for that half hour. Oh, the horror. But the drama only unfolded when I discovered who my seat mate would be. A suited Indian man, probably in his mid-thirties, took the seat adjacent mine, and shielded me from what I thought to be my last attempt at escape from a potentially life threatening situation. I spent the entire flight clenching my stomach in what I was sure to be preparedness for some kind of violent, physical attack, while silently praying to God that I would come out of this alive (my mother always told me to look into drama classes...). Of course, I cannot say that I am in any way proud of my silent accusations against this unassuming man. I am embarrassed now to say that I only truly saw color and a difference in appearance when I saw him. As the plane began to land, I somehow got to talking to the man. As it turned out, he was British, and had a sister who lived in Indiana. He was soft-spoken and seemed shy. In my stupidity, I had carelessly judged him because of something as superficial as his physical features.

On that day, during the summer of my seventh grade year, not only did I get a figurative slap in the face as I realized my youth and foolishness, but I learned a lesson that many people do not understand today. I understand how wrong it is to judge based on appearance or the color of a person's skin. This is not always a debate between black and white, but it caries on to all the variety of beautiful color, and culture and people we see in this world. On that day, I could finally fully understand the responsibility we have, as fellow human beings, which is to love and genuinely respect each other. It is not a question of who is better, but is the knowledge that we are all people, and none of us deserve to be judged unjustly, or wrongfully accused. We all have responsibilities and I plan to carry mine into the very richly cultured and diverse University of Florida.