Undergraduate / I can contribute to the diverse culture of the University more than other typical Korean-Americans [3]

Directions
Choose one of the following two topics and write a short essay.(Maximum length 300 words)

The University of Washington seeks to create a community of students richly diverse in cultural backgrounds, experiences, and viewpoints. How would you contribute to this community?Describe an experience of cultural difference, positive or negative, you have had or observed. What did you learn from it?

I am a Korean American. However I can contribute to the diverse culture of the University of Washington more than other typical Korean-Americans. From the moment I was born, I lived experiencing two different cultures in my life, but about 2 years ago a third party was added into the mix. My parents decided to become long-term missionaries in China. I had no choice but to follow them here. At first, I had such a hard time adjusting because everything was so different. Nobody could understand me and I could not understand others; so I studied Chinese for a year to be able to communicate and understand this culture better. I was extremely lonely and felt that I was going nowhere with my life because I was in a situation where I could not even go to school. There were a few international schools where I lived but because my parents were missionaries, they were not able to pay for the tuitions. After much discussion, my parents and I decided to have me study at an international school in Beijing that used a homeschooling program. While currently studying in Beijing, I am staying in a three-room apartment with 10 Chinese girls and sharing a room with a Korean teacher. In the beginning, living with strangers with such different backgrounds and cultures was more difficult than living apart from my parents. We all had to get used to the diverse backgrounds everyone brought into the dormitory. From the way we ate to the way we cleaned, we were completely different. Having already experienced this difficulty of getting used to a foreign environment and learning a new culture, I am sure that I can contribute more to the University of Washington than the previous or next Korean-American who has applied.

Undergraduate / What seemed like a curse at first, it was truly a blessing in disguise; personal statement for UW [4]

The Personal Statement is our best means of getting to know you and your best means of creating a context for your academic performance. When you write your personal statement, tell us about those aspects of your life that are not apparent from your academic record:

a character-defining momentthe cultural awareness you've developeda challenge faceda personal hardship or barrier overcome

Directions
Choose either Topic 1 or 2. (Maximum length 600 words)

Discuss how your family's experience or cultural history enriched you or presented you with opportunities or challenges in pursuing your educational goals.

- OR -

Tell us a story from your life, describing an experience that either demonstrates your character or helped to shape it.

The limit is 600 words.

A little less than two years ago, I moved to China. Even before I came here, I made up my mind not to create new relationships here because I knew they would come to an end when I left this place. It would leave me with more scars than I had from having to leave the people and environment I grew up in. I came to China with only a year and a half left of high school. I thought all my hard work participating in my church leadership praise team and school dance/drill team had gone to waste because of just one decision made by my parents. What I didn't know was that I would be learning so much more than what senior year at Redmond High School would ever teach me. I was given a chance and an opportunity that only a few people would ever be privileged enough to have.

Being a Korean American with many Chinese friends, I thought I had more than enough knowledge about the Chinese culture to be able to "fit in." I soon realized that I was wrong. For the first time in my life, I felt like a foreigner, completely alienated from this new society I was immersed in. I learned the importance and power of language when trying to learn a culture. Only through an experience like mine was I able to truly get to know and understand so many new cultures. Each day I spend here, each new person I meet, and every new word I learn, I find out that the "knowledge" I had of different cultures was based on factless rumors and stereotypes. I learned that generalizations and stereotypes could not and should not be made for such a large group of people. Each person has a "culture" of their own.

Being the socially outgoing person I am, after spending 3 months in solitude, I broke my promise of not making new friends and meeting new people. At the time, I was in a city called Suzhou attending a college in the Oversees Department learning Chinese. This gave me the opportunity to meet people from all over the world. At first, I had a hard time approaching them because there was nobody my age. Everyone was older than me and had already graduated high school. Luckily enough, my classmates approached me first and made it easier for me to open up to them. Because of these people, I was able to overcome my depression and learn about cultures from all over the world.

The reason why I came to China was because my parents didn't want me to live on my own. However, I have been living in a dormitory in Beijing approximately 641 miles away from my parents for nine months. Here, I must act as my own teacher because I attend a school that follows a homeschooling curriculum. At first, I had a very difficult time adjusting to this program because I was so used to public education, but now I have learned to become independent in my studies and go the extra mile to find the information that I need. More often than not, I regret coming to China because I ended up living apart from my parents, took a year off from high school to learn Chinese, and have to teach myself things that typical high-schoolers would have taught to them, so I constantly have to remind myself that I am blessed to have this chance to experience the world.

What seemed like a curse at first, I know realize was truly a blessing in disguise. Because I had to start all over from the very bottom to learn the way of life in China, not only was I able to learn more about the world, I also learned more about myself.