Undergraduate / When you meet someone for the first time, what you want them to know about you? Dartmouth Supplement [6]

I had to make a couple modifications to post this up since I included many personal details, I'm sorry if this caused any difficulty in reading. Please give me some feedback! My problem is I'm trying to include too many info at once--since this is their only supplement--and I don't know how to cut this, unless I only focus on only 1 of the 3 aspects I have. The word count is around 640 now, and they don't have a word limit but "paragraph to a full page is ideal"... Thank you!

We'd like to know a little more about you. To that end, please choose one of the following questions and write a response in the space below.

Prompt: When you meet someone for the first time, what do you want them to know about you, but generally don't tell them.

Four, cuatro, sě: the number of nucleobases essential to our being, the number of ballades Chopin composed, Aristotle's causes in nature, and the number of cities I call home. It is the number of platy fish I used to own (sorry authors of "10 Easiest Fish for Beginners") and is notoriously known as congruent to "death" in my culture's superstitions. It also happens to be my lucky number since I could remember-a childhood rebellion of some kind.

My defiance started from the very beginning-because of a second coding allele-when I was born wrong-handed. Early memories were of my father slapping my hand away from reaching for toys and my grandma jokingly branding me as a "left-handed freak". At school, in the learning of flowing script and free response I was chained to the awkwardness and frustration of using the "correct" hand. Back then, I conformed, but now I stand firm in writing with both my left and my later acquired right. I enjoy the ridiculously elaborate tradition of tomb-sweeping while waist-deep in research of the French Revolution continents away; I've only allowed the push and pulls of my traditional culture mold my individuality and respect.

"Judy? Mary? Kate? Kate!" When I was three-years-old, my English name was chosen from the back of my family's first English dictionary-which was left in dust until I was ten and had started learning English from school. If it was any indication, my love for the language began and still is, rather "old-fashioned". Classics that stumbled me with their difficulty were my initiation to English literature.

Now, I've expanded my pleasure reading collection, attempting to satisfy all my curiosities from history to ethics, fiction to sociology (recent reads include authors Vaclav Havel, Rachel Carson, Gillian Flynn, and Louise Erdrich) but still staying true to my early fascination with the classics (just started This Side of Paradise and La Dame aux Camelias). I share the joy of reading by tutoring children English--from my ten-year-old brother to the children in the community. Through reading, they can peer into the authors' thought processes, their souls, and their way of perceiving the world-things that I am figuring out too.

I owned a xxx-an passport even before I lived in the country and had no idea what to expect when I first set foot in x-city as a 15-year-old. Aside from being bewildered at the mention of "x-local food" and terrified of small talk in a second language, one of the biggest shocks was realizing my own ignorance. I started volunteering on a reserve with no knowledge of indigenous history or issues, and questions of race, sexuality, and politics have rarely brushed my mind before then.

It is also ironic how I came to know more about x-country's history and contemporary issues only after I've left the country. Looking back on my extended family, the migrant workers I've lived alongside with, and the threatening pollution, I begin to put them in a global context. I am starting to make sense of my experience in the rapid urbanization (having lived both in the country and a megacity); I am becoming well versed in Native American issues, and I am dedicated to housing and environmental solutions in local x-city, x-state. I am learning to seize the opportunity of where I am right now, add to my knowledge and awareness, and hopefully make an impact on each community while I'm there.

When I meet someone for the first time, I would tell them that my lucky number is one of the unluckiest, my name was chosen out of a dictionary, I need to leave my country every three months to renew my visa...and all the stories and lessons that have blossomed from them: the academic curiosity, the cultural, language, and social awareness. Afterwards, and most importantly, I want to smile and look into their eyes:

"What are your stories?"