Undergraduate / 'Diving on the Great Barrier Reef' - Common App Essay [3]

This is my common app essay that I have been working on for quite a while now. With deadlines fast approaching, Nov. 1, I was wondering if anyone could give me some final feedback on phrases that need editing or any other errors. Thanks a ton! It's at about 474 words.

The salt stings my nostrils. I press down on my BCD and descend into the vivid depths of the Coral Sea. Around me fish of all sizes swim in what is one of the liveliest and most diverse areas of sea life in the world: the Great Barrier Reef. The floor is littered with brilliant coral jutting up from amongst countless brightly colored sea slugs and urchins, their stony fingers stretching toward the surface. The water teems with the life of an ecosystem I have never before witnessed. Rounding the side of an outcropping of rock, my group comes upon a clearing covered in what must be a dozen green sea turtles, each more than three feet across, all grazing placidly on the vegetation rising from the rocky faces of the coral. Not content to observe these beautiful creatures from afar, I slowly drift in toward them, expecting them to scatter as I encroach on their territory. To my surprise, they do nothing of the sort. I swim directly into their midst; they remain unfazed. Encircled by these amazing, majestic animals, I can't help but feel an unshakable sense of symbiosis unlike anything I have ever experienced, even among other human cultures. It is a feeling that will continue to linger within me for years to come.

Upon returning to Canberra, Australia, where I have been living as an exchange student, I am invited to dinner as a guest of the Israeli embassy, a place I had visited since befriending the daughter of the Ambassador Rotem. During my introduction to the ambassador, he inquires about what areas I am interested in academically, to which I quickly respond, "Psychology with a concentration on the social-cultural branch." Satisfied with my answer, his wife asks what my favorite experience in Australia thus far has been. Again, my answer takes very little deliberation. I respond by relaying my story of the sea turtle encounter, but as I near the end of my adventure I remember being struck by the acceptance the creatures had so readily bestowed upon me. I begin to muse on the way in which humans constantly push against the organic stability that the animal kingdom has proven can be maintained by marking its territory and consuming only what is needed for survival. While following the ambassador to dinner, I am unable to relieve my mind of one question: What is it about human nature that causes us to so powerfully resist the natural balance that results from the survival-of-the-fittest ethic that pervades the animal world? As we sit down at the dinner table and begin to pass around the ptitm and stuffed pita, we enter into an in-depth discussion on the cultural skirmishes raging around the world, naturally turning to the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict. Again, my mind returns to the world of the sea turtles.