Undergraduate / I didn't have an identity ; personal information/ Common App [4]

Hello everyone, I just finished my college aplication essay, I'm trying to transfer as an international student to UTSA next spring semester. The deadline is almost here so feedback and criticism would be much appretiated (english is not my first language so I'm not sure everything is perfectly written). Many thanks in advance!

Topic C: optional
There may be personal information that you want considered as part of your admissions application. Write an essay describing that information. You might include exceptional hardships, challenges, or opportunities that have shaped or impacted your abilities or academic credentials, personal responsibilities, exceptional achievements or talents, educational goals, or ways in which you might contribute to an institution committed to creating a diverse learning environment.

If you stay in one place forever you will never get to know the real world, and more importantly, you will never get to truly know yourself.

This was something I started realizing when I was in middle school, with my first short trip as an exchange student for a week to Houston. Being born in Mexico, with my parents coming from a small town in Coahuila, a state in the north of the country, and going to a really small Montessori school where my whole generation consisted of 13 boys and girls, my view of the world was really narrow and I was very close minded due to my conservative family's religion and traditions. I was taught as a kid one way to do things, one way to behave. I learned that Catholic was the only "right" religion, what was right or wrong, what I should do or study to be successful in life according to my father, among many other things that are not entirely true to everyone in the world. And so my view of the world was based entirely from what my parents had taught me as a kid and the little I could learn from the small group of people at my school. I didn't have an identity, a personality; I just did things and thought things not being entirely sure why I was doing so.

And so I went to Houston for 10 days on the 8th grade, it was my first time traveling alone without my parents. I stayed with an American family that had a son my age going to a local Montessori school. I met so many interesting people, one of which, I can honestly say, was the first girl I ever fell in love with. Of course I was still very young and didn't fully understand what loving someone truly meant. But it was love for me.

That small trip and all the new things I learned from the people I met, their culture, traditions and things they did, was enough for me to realize meeting new places and people was a passion I would carry with me forever.

I participated on another short exchange of the same kind on the 9th grade, this time to Richmond, Virginia. But it was not until I graduated from high school, when I really had the chance to spend time traveling and expanding my knowledge and understanding of the world.

"What are you going to study? What do you plan to do with your life?" my father used to ask me these questions on a daily basis at the end of high school. I had no idea what to answer. I just didn't know what I wanted. My mother recommended I should spend a year in Europe perfecting my third language: German. My father agreed.

At first I was not sure if I actually wanted to go, I was scared. I would be leaving everything I knew behind, all my friends, my family and my home. But there was something inside of me, something that had developed way back in middle school with those short exchange trips: a love for learning, meeting different people and discovering new places.

And so I made my choice, I took the opportunity that was in front of me and went to Germany for a year after graduating from high school. Today I'm glad I did.

I took intensive German courses at the "Goethe Institut", and reached the C1 level by the end of the year. But I spent a lot of time traveling with money I had saved from previous summertime jobs, birthday and Christmas gifts, among other things. The friends I made, some of which will stay with me my whole life, and all the experiences I had while traveling around Europe contributed to the person I am today. I am not afraid of going to new places and taking up challenges. Learning is my passion, and I'm open to any knowledge I can acquire from anyone or anything around me, and likewise I like sharing my own.

My life has had many turns since then, and I am still shaping it up as I go. I have clear goals now and I know I want to create and make things that matter. The best ideas and creations come from different brilliant minds working together and sharing knowledge with each other. So what better way to be successful and be the person I love than to keep learning from other people and from myself, discovering new things and creating new things of my own?