tt6746690
Oct 30, 2013
Undergraduate / Biology and the single child in my Chinese Family; The world I come from [2]
Hello,
I need some advice for this essay. Thank you in advance.
Describe the world you come from - for example, your family, community or school - and tell us how your world has shaped your dreams and aspirations.
I was born a single child, as almost every one of my peers under the One-child policy. My mom is one of many typical Chinese parents who put extensive attention to the wellbeing of their children and yet, unlike others, does not interfere with what I want to do in the future. My father is a man of vigilance and intellect, who, during years of exposure in the society, conformed to the status quo but fostered a strong sense of criticism toward which he disregards- with good reasons which I often found to be biased. Desire to be different and nonconforming, I learnt to question various things, including the naive dream I once had- to be an architect just because the blueprint of a construction is complex at first sight. As a result, I became reluctant to speak out my passion because nothing and everything seem to be equally interesting and boring at the same time, and because there is always a gap between dream and reality: what I aspire and what I have to do to survive in the society does not necessarily match up perfectly. Nonetheless, reluctance to speak out doesn't mean there isn't any. Deep inside, as I later found out, I am fond of the pure elegance and precision that science, particularly biology, has revealed and awed by the devotion of scientists in general. The desire to contribute to the realm of human knowledge is always in me.
Looking back, my motivation probably started as I lived my life to the fullest in junior high school. I can still remember the time when, after waking up with nausea from sleep deprivation, I left for school under the flickering street lights while reciting silently the Literary Chinese verse I had tried to memorize the last day. The next thing I realized, after eight prolonged classes and an intense weekly test, was that the sun had gone down, which gave the city sky a darker but, strangely, a more tranquil shade. I knew I would sit for another three hours before finishing all the homework and, if luck was with me, the one challenging physics question written hastily on a scratch paper that my favorite teacher, Mrs. Liang, had entrusted to those who sought a bit of excitement in the tightly fixed routine. As much as I regretted the time spent staring at the questions while imagining the abstract in my head, I was deeply engrossed in those "scratch paper questions" as soon as I got my hand on one, sometimes fighting my way into the latter half of the night with the intuition that there must be a way. I was conscious of that, in times of great pressure and burden when physically and mentally drained but fueled by just a drop of passion, solving an exceptionally difficult problem brings about contentment that is able to lighten up even the gloomiest perceptions.
My real motivation for biology was gradually manifested during the days when Mr. Henkleman, my biology teacher, lectured passionately while digressing to topics he deemed interesting. It is in his class that I got to appreciate the complexity of biochemistry at molecular level involved in maintaining homeostasis and the miraculous development of an embryo to a fully matured human body with differentiated functions. It is also in his class that I recognized Barry Marshall's courageous attempt to prove his unorthodox theory by infecting himself with H.pylori, a type of bacteria proven to be the cause of stomach ulcers. His class opened a door for me, so I took a peek inside, spending a good part of countless nights reading the Campbell textbook. More often than not, I repeatedly tried to share the marvelous discoveries and possible implications of them with my family, who were at first impressed but soon lost patience and focused instead on deciding what to eat for dinner. Nonetheless, I felt good.
All those times I have been asking myself what I am able to accomplish were I had a chance to research into nature's magnificence. Though never perfectly transparent, the answer becomes clearer as I get older. As I want to know more, I aspire to unveil the hidden truth, to expand the known knowledge, and, inevitably, to push society forward one way or the other.
Hello,
I need some advice for this essay. Thank you in advance.
Describe the world you come from - for example, your family, community or school - and tell us how your world has shaped your dreams and aspirations.
I was born a single child, as almost every one of my peers under the One-child policy. My mom is one of many typical Chinese parents who put extensive attention to the wellbeing of their children and yet, unlike others, does not interfere with what I want to do in the future. My father is a man of vigilance and intellect, who, during years of exposure in the society, conformed to the status quo but fostered a strong sense of criticism toward which he disregards- with good reasons which I often found to be biased. Desire to be different and nonconforming, I learnt to question various things, including the naive dream I once had- to be an architect just because the blueprint of a construction is complex at first sight. As a result, I became reluctant to speak out my passion because nothing and everything seem to be equally interesting and boring at the same time, and because there is always a gap between dream and reality: what I aspire and what I have to do to survive in the society does not necessarily match up perfectly. Nonetheless, reluctance to speak out doesn't mean there isn't any. Deep inside, as I later found out, I am fond of the pure elegance and precision that science, particularly biology, has revealed and awed by the devotion of scientists in general. The desire to contribute to the realm of human knowledge is always in me.
Looking back, my motivation probably started as I lived my life to the fullest in junior high school. I can still remember the time when, after waking up with nausea from sleep deprivation, I left for school under the flickering street lights while reciting silently the Literary Chinese verse I had tried to memorize the last day. The next thing I realized, after eight prolonged classes and an intense weekly test, was that the sun had gone down, which gave the city sky a darker but, strangely, a more tranquil shade. I knew I would sit for another three hours before finishing all the homework and, if luck was with me, the one challenging physics question written hastily on a scratch paper that my favorite teacher, Mrs. Liang, had entrusted to those who sought a bit of excitement in the tightly fixed routine. As much as I regretted the time spent staring at the questions while imagining the abstract in my head, I was deeply engrossed in those "scratch paper questions" as soon as I got my hand on one, sometimes fighting my way into the latter half of the night with the intuition that there must be a way. I was conscious of that, in times of great pressure and burden when physically and mentally drained but fueled by just a drop of passion, solving an exceptionally difficult problem brings about contentment that is able to lighten up even the gloomiest perceptions.
My real motivation for biology was gradually manifested during the days when Mr. Henkleman, my biology teacher, lectured passionately while digressing to topics he deemed interesting. It is in his class that I got to appreciate the complexity of biochemistry at molecular level involved in maintaining homeostasis and the miraculous development of an embryo to a fully matured human body with differentiated functions. It is also in his class that I recognized Barry Marshall's courageous attempt to prove his unorthodox theory by infecting himself with H.pylori, a type of bacteria proven to be the cause of stomach ulcers. His class opened a door for me, so I took a peek inside, spending a good part of countless nights reading the Campbell textbook. More often than not, I repeatedly tried to share the marvelous discoveries and possible implications of them with my family, who were at first impressed but soon lost patience and focused instead on deciding what to eat for dinner. Nonetheless, I felt good.
All those times I have been asking myself what I am able to accomplish were I had a chance to research into nature's magnificence. Though never perfectly transparent, the answer becomes clearer as I get older. As I want to know more, I aspire to unveil the hidden truth, to expand the known knowledge, and, inevitably, to push society forward one way or the other.