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I have not read the essay yet, but could you post the prompt and the expected wordcount as well? That will help us assess.
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Best college essay I've read so far on TL. I wouldn't change much; it's well written, concise, and emotionally honest. I also really like how it emphasizes your appreciation for your culture and heritage. Colleges love that stuff.
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What college?
And "I'm asian" is the generic essay. Everyone will be submitting it. Not that its bad, but its not stellar
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Uchicago and Umichigan EA. I am doing this prompt:
Evaluate a significant experience, achievement, risk you have taken, or ethical dilemma you have faced and its impact on you.
250 words minimum. I believe I have 555 words.
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On October 29 2010 13:11 ramen247 wrote:
Uchicago and Umichigan EA. I am doing this prompt:
Evaluate a significant experience, achievement, risk you have taken, or ethical dilemma you have faced and its impact on you.
250 words minimum. I believe I have 555 words.
You should cut it down to exactly 250 words, to show them that you are efficient.
+ Show Spoiler +
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If you're so proud of your Chinese culture, then why don't you move to China, or do you plan to? Just curious.
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I'm gonna assume this is early action/decision, so here I go:
It's decent. The writing itself is very personable and casual, which can help or hurt you.
What is irking me is the message that you're trying to give out. While I find the story entertaining, by the end of the essay, all I got from the essay was: "Here's someone who realized the true nature of his heritage.....great."
People write about their heritage a lot, and at this moment in time, your story is a bit nonunique in terms of making the reader understand that you're revelation about your heritage is phenomenally different from the revelations of others. By the end of the essay, while the prose is executed well, I'm not going to remember your essay from the many other essays about heritage and realizing the importance of one's origins.
This also leads me to the second problem I see so far: disbelief. I have a hard time believing that your one experience with that Chinese lady suddenly revealed that you needed to pursue Asian Studies and reconnect with your heritage. While the read flowed so that by the end, I wasn't questioning much, admissions offices may be anticipating why this particular experience with this Chinese woman affected you so much.
Because in all honesty, there are a lot of times where I don't know words that my relatives are flinging at me in Mandarin. And I don't feel a sudden revelation to reestablish connections with my heritage....I just feel mildly embarrassed.
This is a really good paper, but I think it's missing a tad bit of believability. On top of that, it was missing some deeper issues.
Talking about being Chinese American is great....but I feel like on top of that, you need to add something else. Your message at the end, while being the most important part of the essay, is the shortest section. Some implication of your heritage maybe would do. Things to think about are (but not necessarily put in your essay, this is just something to spur some more deeper stuff at the end):
1. Have you forgotten your heritage (only briefly explained)
2. Have your parents played a role in Americanizing you?
3. Do you intend on restarting your Chinese lessons?
4. Do you feel like you're on the fringe of both nationalities?
5. Do you feel a sense of pride for your heritage?
6. Why is reconnection of your other half important? (I would argue this is the most important one to think about and write about).
7. What's your goal after pursuing Asian studies?
Hope this helps!
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First of all, you're relatively good on your punctuation, and you're relatively free of false notes wordwise ("ethnic" and "opposite sex" come to mind, though). So I would suggest that we save any actual proofreading for later.
As far as larger-scale changes to your essay go, I have a couple suggestions:
1) I don't walk away from this essay with a clear sense of your thesis. I see a topic: your relationship to your Chinese heritage, but I don't see a real comment on that topic. A couple different problems obtain. First of all, I don't know exactly what you mean by wanting to "recreate the connection" between you and your "Chinese culture." The final paragraph contains far too much cliche to really communicate anything. Second of all, I don't see how the anecdote about you and the girl (which is excellently written, by the way) illustrates a reconnection with your Chinese culture. It seems like you just connected with a specific Chinese girl. Make these things--the nature of your epiphany and the relationship of the shop-conversation to it--explicit to your reader. I'm sure they're in your head. Get them on paper.
2) You've got some paragraph issues up front. I think your first two paragraphs should be one paragraph, and your second paragraph false starts your reader thinking about how it might be ironic that you applied for Asian studies, which is especially problematic because you only return to that question perfunctorily and in the last sentence of your essay.
So yeah let's see a rewrite with a strong thesis that corresponds to the prompt. And let's see more of you, the intelligent guy with an eye for detail, rather than this college essay writer fellow, who wants to talk about reconnecting with his heritage to gain profound insights into the nature of his cultural hybridity.
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All right. I'm echoing what Zergneeds food is saying about doing culture essays
So the big problem is all your experiance showed you is that your chinese. Although being a human is good for these colleges, you need something that sparkles. Discovering your race is comparitivly mundane
Are you seriously considering Asian Studies as what you want to be? What about Pharmacy?
Either way you can talk about how it is important not just to be able to know how to treat a patient, but to win their trust and connect to them.
Lastly, I wouldn't put as much 'faults' in your paper. You talk about how your chinese sucks (good fault you need this). But then you also mention that you didn't do anything important over the summer. Just cut that sentance, working in a pharmcy is always good. Save you wordcount and you look better.
(spelling sucks since I'm on the phone)
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HULKAMANIA to the rescue!! I believe he look over my essay before too  5 years ago...
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On October 29 2010 12:47 ramen247 wrote:Hello guys! After a month of schoolwork and the ongoing struggle between me and college apps, I have come to you guys again for advice on my college essay. EA deadline, as said in the title, is dangerously close, so I would really really appreciate if you guys shared some knowledge with me. all comments are welcome. I need all I can get. + Show Spoiler +My own thoughts on the essay:
my conclusion is kinda rough? I want to tighten it up.
lack of an "epic" aspect to my essay. too generic perhaps?
and I am not sure about this but maybe my anecdote is a little boring?
no title yet Essay: + Show Spoiler +
For a long time, I did not understand why I studied Chinese. Every Saturday for three years, I would attend Chinese School to learn my ethnic language alongside my normal schoolwork.
Through those years, I learned without purpose; I just blindly absorbed the pinyin and memorized passages but found little use for it in my life. In school I spoke English, and at home, I could speak in English as well. The knowledge was pushed aside and collected dust in a lonely corner of my head. Ironically, I decided to apply to college for Asian Studies.
Last summer, I didn't build homes for the poor in Guatemala nor do groundbreaking research with Nobel Laureates, but worked alongside a pharmacist as her technician in a Chinese pharmacy. My workday mainly consisted of scanning prescriptions or working the cash register selling merchandise, which I preferred because of interaction with Chinese customers. Because of my previous Chinese schooling, I could speak well enough to efficiently communicate with the customers. However, three years of schooling has its limits and occasionally, I had trouble following especially inquisitive customers and went to my boss for aid.
One day, the store was not busy, so my boss decided to leave me alone in the store while she ran an errand. Moments later, a young female customer walked in to inspect our beauty care section. While she was preoccupied, I mentally readied myself by preparing responses to any questions she might ask. I started to get nervous because the boss would not be here to come to my rescue, and I did not want to give a bad impression of myself, especially to the opposite sex. She finally asked a question, but it was so specific and the vocabulary was so advanced that my first instinct was to say, “Huh?” Laughing and shaking her head, the female customer turned back to the products. She had the wrong impression of me. She thought I was clueless and too Americanized to know any Chinese. To show her otherwise, I quickly replied with, “What, I did not understand.” She nodded encouragingly and asked the question again. Her attitude had completely changed just because I showed her that I could speak and would try my best to speak Chinese. She then seemed eager for my help, especially because she could not read the English labels. I struggled a lot – I could not translate specific terminology. When I had to translate “anti-wrinkle cream,” I mentally scrambled for the right words, but they never came and I resorted to physically gesticulating the word, “wrinkle.” By running my fingers down my face and pressing my cheeks to create creases, I was able to show her what I was trying to say. She confirmed this by asking, “Do I have any?” to which I quickly retorted “No, of course not!”
This experience showed me what I learned Chinese all these years for – to recreate the connection between me and my Chinese culture. I am a Chinese American and to only be suited to the American ways means I am only half of what I could be. By further pursuing Asian Studies, I can hope to reconnect with the other half of me so I can be complete with the best of both worlds.
what's the topic this essay is responding to?
There definitely lack of epicness. Maybe you should convey the importance for such connection back to your ethnicity. I think you can reword "This experience showed.." to another phrase so you don't have to explicitly state that.
BTW, do you live in NYC?
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On October 29 2010 13:42 artofmagic wrote:HULKAMANIA to the rescue!! I believe he look over my essay before too 5 years ago...
Yes, sir. I remember that. Back then I was in college writing essays. Now I'm gainfully employed teaching college students to write essays. I just can't escape essays. Must be destiny.
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On October 29 2010 13:50 artofmagic wrote:Show nested quote +On October 29 2010 12:47 ramen247 wrote:Hello guys! After a month of schoolwork and the ongoing struggle between me and college apps, I have come to you guys again for advice on my college essay. EA deadline, as said in the title, is dangerously close, so I would really really appreciate if you guys shared some knowledge with me. all comments are welcome. I need all I can get. + Show Spoiler +My own thoughts on the essay:
my conclusion is kinda rough? I want to tighten it up.
lack of an "epic" aspect to my essay. too generic perhaps?
and I am not sure about this but maybe my anecdote is a little boring?
no title yet Essay: + Show Spoiler +
For a long time, I did not understand why I studied Chinese. Every Saturday for three years, I would attend Chinese School to learn my ethnic language alongside my normal schoolwork.
Through those years, I learned without purpose; I just blindly absorbed the pinyin and memorized passages but found little use for it in my life. In school I spoke English, and at home, I could speak in English as well. The knowledge was pushed aside and collected dust in a lonely corner of my head. Ironically, I decided to apply to college for Asian Studies.
Last summer, I didn't build homes for the poor in Guatemala nor do groundbreaking research with Nobel Laureates, but worked alongside a pharmacist as her technician in a Chinese pharmacy. My workday mainly consisted of scanning prescriptions or working the cash register selling merchandise, which I preferred because of interaction with Chinese customers. Because of my previous Chinese schooling, I could speak well enough to efficiently communicate with the customers. However, three years of schooling has its limits and occasionally, I had trouble following especially inquisitive customers and went to my boss for aid.
One day, the store was not busy, so my boss decided to leave me alone in the store while she ran an errand. Moments later, a young female customer walked in to inspect our beauty care section. While she was preoccupied, I mentally readied myself by preparing responses to any questions she might ask. I started to get nervous because the boss would not be here to come to my rescue, and I did not want to give a bad impression of myself, especially to the opposite sex. She finally asked a question, but it was so specific and the vocabulary was so advanced that my first instinct was to say, “Huh?” Laughing and shaking her head, the female customer turned back to the products. She had the wrong impression of me. She thought I was clueless and too Americanized to know any Chinese. To show her otherwise, I quickly replied with, “What, I did not understand.” She nodded encouragingly and asked the question again. Her attitude had completely changed just because I showed her that I could speak and would try my best to speak Chinese. She then seemed eager for my help, especially because she could not read the English labels. I struggled a lot – I could not translate specific terminology. When I had to translate “anti-wrinkle cream,” I mentally scrambled for the right words, but they never came and I resorted to physically gesticulating the word, “wrinkle.” By running my fingers down my face and pressing my cheeks to create creases, I was able to show her what I was trying to say. She confirmed this by asking, “Do I have any?” to which I quickly retorted “No, of course not!”
This experience showed me what I learned Chinese all these years for – to recreate the connection between me and my Chinese culture. I am a Chinese American and to only be suited to the American ways means I am only half of what I could be. By further pursuing Asian Studies, I can hope to reconnect with the other half of me so I can be complete with the best of both worlds. what's the topic this essay is responding to? There definitely lack of epicness. Maybe you should convey the importance for such connection back to your ethnicity. I think you can reword "This experience showed.." to another phrase so you don't have to explicitly state that. BTW, do you live in NYC?
yes i do. Thank you everyone for your comments.
I will look them over many times.
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PARTY PARTY WOOHOO. SENDING IN MY UPENN ED TOMORROW TOO WOOOHOOO.
Anyway. I promise to edit this post with actual help ><.
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I think you need to restructure as well as clarify your main theme. What the incident you describe shows is merely that language is helpful for communication. But your essay is about how the incident rekindled a desire to connect with your heritage. Your example does not support your conclusion. Your story somewhat implies you want to learn Chinese so that you don't give off the impression of being too Americanized again. In that case your motivation is not very inspiring, and still needs to be clarified further. If you use a few more adjectives to describe the woman, for example if you write she was attractive, and that you were drawn to her, then your conclusion would make slightly more sense. Better yet if you elaborate on how good you felt from helping someone using Chinese, then your conclusion would finally seem logical, but horribly cliched.
As it stands your story is very vague and difficult to interpret. I'm guessing you felt good from interacting with the woman. But what made you feel good, and how did that feeling inspire you to take up Asian studies? There's a huge gap between your body and your conclusion. Think back to the encounter and actually write down your thoughts. I know HS English teachers probably tell you everyday to "show, don't tell". That advice often leads to very muddled and detached writing. You want to convey your thoughts accurately and in a concise manner when making a point. If your story is true, you should have little trouble talking about what really inspired you. Just remember to be clear. GL
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I'm guessing college essays only make a difference if you're borderline markswise? Glad you don't have to do them in australia.
Your essay seems well enough written. The conclusion is kinda, 'wow my passion is engrained below my level of consciousness". Fairly persuasive and puts you across as a good person.
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On October 29 2010 13:50 HULKAMANIA wrote:Show nested quote +On October 29 2010 13:42 artofmagic wrote:HULKAMANIA to the rescue!! I believe he look over my essay before too 5 years ago... Yes, sir. I remember that. Back then I was in college writing essays. Now I'm gainfully employed teaching college students to write essays. I just can't escape essays. Must be destiny.
Nice we have an essay instructor in these parts. I'll yell at you next year when it's my turn.
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On October 29 2010 14:13 Ludrik wrote:
I'm guessing college essays only make a difference if you're borderline markswise? Glad you don't have to do them in australia.
Your essay seems well enough written. The conclusion is kinda, 'wow my passion is engrained below my level of consciousness". Fairly persuasive and puts you across as a good person.
Depends on the uni. I know these two schools really care.
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United States10328 Posts
On October 29 2010 13:29 KrAzYfoOL wrote:
If you're so proud of your Chinese culture, then why don't you move to China, or do you plan to? Just curious.
Lots of people are proud of their culture (especially on college essays ;o ;o), but that doesn't mean they will (or even want to?) move to their fatherland, especially if they've grown up elsewhere.
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Evaluate a significant experience, achievement, risk you have taken, or ethical dilemma you have faced and its impact on you.
I don't think you addressed the question very well. I'm assuming you are targeting "experience", but I don't feel that it was particularly significant from reading your story. I think you need to focus more on why it was a turning point in your life, rather than simply narrating a past event.
It might help to add an introduction and a conclusion to help you narrowing the focus.
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Hey why don't you use this as your college essay. I hear dialogue makes you stand out.
----
"Let's see, middle class asian kid from a pressure cooker public high school, wants in on an easy major to stand out. Probably going to flip into one of those crazed banker-psycho-clones like the rest of them as soon as he gets in. Should we admit him or not?"
"Sir, I suggest you do. Think about all the donations he can give us as a rich, miserable alum! While he's working 100+ hours a week on Wall Street, unable to spend his money, we can manipulate his emotions to make donations to us with his bonus money, and if he really makes it big by going back to his home country and starting a PE fund raping the shit out of it in the name of Yankee capitalism, he can even donate us a couple hundred million to get the honor of a house named after him."
"Mmmmmm. Big Wang's house, I do like the humor value in that."
"Sir, I see an expected value of around 155,000 dollars in donations from Ramen247. With a left-skewed distribution, of course. The 5% high end of the tail should reach well into the millions."
"Good, good. I love the smell of money in the morning. Just think of how much money his parents can give us."
"Sir--it says here that his parents make 180,000 dollars a year."
"Great--this means his folks are probably underwater on their mortgage, and as soon as we start slapping them with hefty tuition bills, they'll have to resort to Ramen247 just to make ends meet."
"Sir--and remember our study a while back..."
"Oh yes, Jeeves. Most definitely. We know that by making all these Asian kids understand how much their parents are sacrificing for them, we subconsciously shift them onto these careers where they make tons of money but are miserable, because somehow, somehow they want to make thier parents investment in them worthwhile."
"Yes sir--and that boosts our alumni giving, no doubt, because then they wind up miserable, insecure financial professionals. Marvelous."
"A most marvelous plan indeed, Jeeves. I say we admit this fine young fellow."
"What was his name again, sir?"
"Chen? Wang? Zhang? I don't know, they're all the same to me."
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On October 29 2010 14:27 ]343[ wrote:Show nested quote +On October 29 2010 13:29 KrAzYfoOL wrote:
If you're so proud of your Chinese culture, then why don't you move to China, or do you plan to? Just curious. Lots of people are proud of their culture (especially on college essays ;o ;o), but that doesn't mean they will (or even want to?) move to their fatherland, especially if they've grown up elsewhere.
Translation: lots of Asians feel alienated by white culture and want to become more Asian to compensate, but that doesn't mean they'll give up the milk teat of Wall St/BigLaw/Med School for a third world country, especially if they grew up in a nice suburban house.
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Just like last time, I read the post and realized "this sounds like Tho-". Then I looked up.
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On October 29 2010 13:30 Zergneedsfood wrote:
I'm gonna assume this is early action/decision, so here I go:
It's decent. The writing itself is very personable and casual, which can help or hurt you.
What is irking me is the message that you're trying to give out. While I find the story entertaining, by the end of the essay, all I got from the essay was: "Here's someone who realized the true nature of his heritage.....great."
People write about their heritage a lot, and at this moment in time, your story is a bit nonunique in terms of making the reader understand that you're revelation about your heritage is phenomenally different from the revelations of others. By the end of the essay, while the prose is executed well, I'm not going to remember your essay from the many other essays about heritage and realizing the importance of one's origins.
This also leads me to the second problem I see so far: disbelief. I have a hard time believing that your one experience with that Chinese lady suddenly revealed that you needed to pursue Asian Studies and reconnect with your heritage. While the read flowed so that by the end, I wasn't questioning much, admissions offices may be anticipating why this particular experience with this Chinese woman affected you so much.
Because in all honesty, there are a lot of times where I don't know words that my relatives are flinging at me in Mandarin. And I don't feel a sudden revelation to reestablish connections with my heritage....I just feel mildly embarrassed.
This is a really good paper, but I think it's missing a tad bit of believability. On top of that, it was missing some deeper issues.
Talking about being Chinese American is great....but I feel like on top of that, you need to add something else. Your message at the end, while being the most important part of the essay, is the shortest section. Some implication of your heritage maybe would do. Things to think about are (but not necessarily put in your essay, this is just something to spur some more deeper stuff at the end):
1. Have you forgotten your heritage (only briefly explained)
2. Have your parents played a role in Americanizing you?
3. Do you intend on restarting your Chinese lessons?
4. Do you feel like you're on the fringe of both nationalities?
5. Do you feel a sense of pride for your heritage?
6. Why is reconnection of your other half important? (I would argue this is the most important one to think about and write about).
7. What's your goal after pursuing Asian studies?
Hope this helps!
Seriously though--
Why don't you just write about something NEAR to you. Not fucking far away like "Chinese culture"; that which you have learned is probalby about as chinese as General Tso's Chicken is a Chinese dish. You grew up in a comfortable, middle class existence as the son of asian parents who wanted you to work hard and make it. The marker of maturity in this situation is to see what has been handed to you and why you want what you want.
Only by displaying some sort of fresh genuineness in your essay can you really stand out from, and I hate to be racist here, all your other Asian male peers.
It took me ages to actually realize why I wanted so badly to make money and succeed, and as soon as I learned to unshackle the shadows haunting me to make me do that, ironically, success became much easier.
Seriously, there are a lot of honest experiences you can write about that don't involve some sort of contrived discovery of asianness. You can write about, for example, realizing how the college to which you are attending is NOT the answer to all your problems, but rather merely the way to tell you which questions do not have answers, and more importantly, which answers don't have questions, for example. (Here's a hint: money is not an answer to anything, and the only thing success "answers" or "solves" is inadequacy.)
So I guess you could write about how you could "plan" for success, and strive for it, but never, ever think that it will be the answer to your problems, because it won't be. Nor will learning some contrived bullshit culture. Really, it is more about realizing shit about yourself, and slowly discovering your own passions.
Don't give in, don't put out. Fight the machine, man.
Probe your heart man. Open up and THINK about
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I'm always scared that any essay I post will be immediately STOLEN. 
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On October 29 2010 15:41 Karliath wrote:I'm always scared that any essay I post will be immediately STOLEN.
lol what are you trying to say. you made me kinda scared.
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If I had to re-do my college apps, I would pull a near-death experience out of my ass.
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On October 29 2010 15:52 ramen247 wrote:Show nested quote +On October 29 2010 15:41 Karliath wrote:I'm always scared that any essay I post will be immediately STOLEN. lol what are you trying to say. you made me kinda scared.
nah nothing. It's just that I want to post my own essay up on TL too, but I don't dare.
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On October 29 2010 16:01 Karliath wrote:Show nested quote +On October 29 2010 15:52 ramen247 wrote:On October 29 2010 15:41 Karliath wrote:I'm always scared that any essay I post will be immediately STOLEN. lol what are you trying to say. you made me kinda scared. nah nothing. It's just that I want to post my own essay up on TL too, but I don't dare.
its a legit threat.....
thanks guys for all the comments.
@romantic that sounds insanely difficult to do. I am actually drawn to Asian studies, and am not just looking for an easy major. I 100 percent intend on double majoring it with something else.
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I thought most of the essay was well written and very engaging. It seems to fall apart with the last paragraph, however.
I agree with most of what zulu_nation8 posted.
The whole re-connecting with your culture thing as demonstrated by a story about anti-wrinkle cream... Seems a bit odd.
And worrying about being "Americanized" while speaking to someone in the USA that doesn't speak English at all - it almost seems offensive.
Overall I think it's a great essay. It just needs some fine-tuning.
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On October 29 2010 14:13 Ludrik wrote:
I'm guessing college essays only make a difference if you're borderline markswise? Glad you don't have to do them in australia.
Your essay seems well enough written. The conclusion is kinda, 'wow my passion is engrained below my level of consciousness". Fairly persuasive and puts you across as a good person.
Depends totally on the school. Some schools will let you in if you have a kickass essay even if you don't have such great grades, while some will scan through the essay to look for mistakes before moving on to your exam scores.
Your essay seemed pretty okay, I guess. Didn't quite blow me away, but it was well written and I felt what you were trying to convey.
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May I ask what your grades/extracurriculars are like?
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Normally I would say this essay topic is retarded, (nobody wants to hear how you reconnected with your asian roots, considering half the students at the colleges you're applying to are asian) but given that your intended major is asian studies, that's probably okay.
Good luck, bro.
Also, if you do end up submitting this essay, take it down from TL. The admissions office will probably to a brief search as a baseline check against plagiarism.
They'll end up seeing this site, and then they'll know way more secrets about your gamer lifestyle than you'd like.
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Pretty good essay! I'm not sure if I'm doing anything right but you may consider what I have done. Maybe its right or helpful? I unno lolXD
+ Show Spoiler +
For a long time, I did not understand why I studied Chinese. Every Saturday for three years, I ATTENDED Chinese School to learn my ethnic language alongside my normal schoolwork.
Through those years, I learned without purpose; I just blindly absorbed the pinyin and memorized passages but found little use for it in my life. AT school, I spoke English, and at home, I SPOKE English as well. The knowledge was pushed aside and collected dust in a lonely corner IN my head. Ironically, I decided to apply to college IN Asian Studies.
Last summer, I didn't build homes for the poor in Guatemala nor DID I do groundbreaking research with Nobel Laureates REMOVE COMMA HERE but INSTEAD worked alongside a pharmacist as her technician in a Chinese pharmacy. My workday mainly consisted of scanning prescriptions or working the cash register selling merchandise, which I preferred because of interaction with Chinese customers. <- THIS SENTENCE IS WEIRD. FIX Because of my previous Chinese schooling, I could speak well enough to efficiently communicate with the customers. However, three years of schooling has its limits and occasionally, YOU HAVE EXTRA SPACE HERE I had trouble following especially inquisitive customers and went to my boss for aid.
One day, the store was VACANT? USE SOME HIGH VOCAB WORD HERE, so my boss decided to leave me alone in the store while she ran an errand. Moments later, a young female customer walked in to inspect our beauty care section. While she was preoccupied, I mentally readied myself by preparing responses to any questions she might ask. I started to get nervous because the boss would not be here to come to my rescue, and I did not want to give a bad impression of myself, especially to the opposite sex. She finally asked a question, but it was so specific and the vocabulary was so advanced that my first instinct was to say, “Huh?” Laughing and shaking her head, the female customer turned back to the products. She had the wrong impression of me. She thought I was clueless and too Americanized to know any Chinese. To show her otherwise, I quickly replied with, “What, I did not understand.” She nodded encouragingly and asked the question again. Her attitude had completely changed just because I showed her that I could speak and would try my best to speak Chinese. She then seemed eager for my help, especially because she could not read the English labels. I struggled a lot ; I could not translate specific terminology. When I had to translate “anti-wrinkle cream,” I mentally scrambled for the right words, but they never came and I resorted to physically gesticulating the word, “wrinkle.” By running my fingers down my face and pressing my cheeks to create creases, I was able to show her what I was trying to say. She confirmed this by asking, “Do I have any?” to which I quickly retorted “No, of course not!”
This experience showed me what I learned Chinese all these years for – to recreate the connection between me and my Chinese culture. I am a Chinese American and to only be suited to the American ways means I am only half of what I could be. By further pursuing Asian Studies, I can hope to reconnect with the other half of me so I can be complete with the best of both worlds.
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So I've been lurking on TL for... basically ever, but I've never made an account. And today I did. Because I love helping people write. It's like my favorite thing in the entire world. So sorry if this seems a bit harsh, but I really mean the best. And I totally relate to you. Because I wrote basically the same essay when I applied to college.
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In my experience, the hardest part about being Chinese American is coming to terms with your nothingness– because you are not white, you cannot be American, and because you live in America, you cannot be Chinese.
I, and plenty other people I've talked to, have felt that to be Chinese is the worst thing in the world. The whole "why do Asian girls get white guys but we can't get white girls?" thing. To be Chinese-American is not to be Chinese, nor is it to be American, nor is it to be both at the same time. It is something entirely different that has nothing to do with being Chinese and nothing to do with being American.
And if you haven't gotten over this fact, if you haven't come to the brink of despair over your identity, if you haven't recognized the fact that you are stuck in this grey area of nothingness, then I think it hurts your chances at getting into school rather than helping.
What college essay readers want to read is a person who has this ability of self-reflection, who can show that they have done the work to become a person. Nobody cares how hard you advertise yourself with your work ethic and your knowledge of language and your working in a pharmacy. That doesn't matter.
What does matter is this idea of you doing the work to become self-aware, to become conscious of your self, to grow. That's what they want to see. Growth.
Asian Studies is not about language, not about culture. It's about understanding the difficulties in translation, in alienation, in the fragmentation of that culture and of that language. Appreciation in and of itself is almost dangerous– almost like a fetishization of some shallow.... purely aesthetic infatuation (ie Japanese culture is manga! yay!).
How can you talk about being Chinese American without taking the easy way out? You are not Chinese and you are not American. You do not have two halves, nor do you have two worlds.
I'm sure you've thought about this sort of thing time and again. It's annoying as hell to have some white person come up to you and start asking you to speak Chinese as if you're some sort of entertainment for them. It's annoying to think in terms of one language and be unable to communication what the hell you really want to say.
And even beyond language, you will always be seen as an outsider in mainstream (white) American society. How do you deal with this?
I've become a firm believer that culture, that identity, is performative: that is, you make your own identity by doing that which you believe you are. By finally creating an account on TL, I've established Starcraft as a big part of myself. That sort of thing.
And for me that is how you break out of this idea of being two things. You are nothing. But the great thing about being nothing is you get to figure out what you are on your own terms, without having to rely on such abstract ideas as "Chinese culture," or "American culture."
Basically, your essay at this point leads me to believe that you can make no claims as to understanding what it means to be Chinese American, because you haven't done the work in real life to explore this, to challenge your own formation of identity.
Things to think about:
You learned Chinese at Chinese school and did not question why you were learning Chinese. Your thesis is that you learned Chinese so that you could speak Chinese... and that speaking Chinese makes you feel Chinese American.
But you still haven't questioned why you learned Chinese in the first place, or why say, a Polish-American doesn't feel the need to speak Polish in the same way that you feel like being Chinese American means speaking Chinese (he's white).
Your line about not building homes for the poor makes you sound like an ass. Like- I don't know. Don't talk about poverty if you can avoid it. You're already trying to talk about identity. And poverty doesn't seem to be part of your identity, and that's fine, but the way you talk about it makes it seem as if you are of the middle class and unaware of the privilege you have. Like having a house is somehow not important.
You throw around this term "Americanized" like it's a bad thing. You can't help being Americanized. You're American. Here we come again to the impenetrable duality– you can't be both Chinese and American. And you don't get to choose how much of either you are. It's not a percent this, percent that, sort of thing. You will never be Chinese enough to Chinese people, nor American enough to white people.
I think mostly I want to know how you FEEL and THINK through all of this. What does it feel like to have your Chinese-ness challenged? What was going through your head at this point? What do you think about it now? Why was it so important to speak Chinese? When did you become thankful that you'd learned Chinese? Have you thought about learning English? Do you think that your knowing English is important? How did it feel to communicate without words? That's neither Chinese nor English. So, how important is language in communication in general? Why did you so quickly answer that she had no wrinkles? Were you afraid of offending her? Is that part of your culture? Is that your own insecurities in speaking to women? Why would you have these insecurities?
Basically I can go on and on about this sort of thing, but it's this interiority that makes a person come alive. Talk about thoughts and feelings. And you only get like a few words. So like, one scene. And then a bunch of stuff to explain what it means to be YOU. Everyone will talk about being Chinese. But nobody else can talk about being YOU. And since you are Chinese, you can't just NOT talk about it. But it's the combination of knowing that you are Chinese, and being able to think about it.
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I feel that even though the story is cliche, it's a decent story... but the conclusion doesn't make much sense. mookaboom's 2nd to last paragraph captures it succinctly.
If you answer more of those questions, then you can probably get that catharsis that makes it feel like it was a significant, inspirational moment rather than the forced importance that it feels you're giving it.
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do you guys think i should change "young female" to young woman?
and change opposite sex to attractive woman?
a teacher commented that it sounded like I was referring to lab specimens.
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On October 30 2010 08:07 ramen247 wrote:
do you guys think i should change "young female" to young woman?
and change opposite sex to attractive woman?
a teacher commented that it sounded like I was referring to lab specimens.
Young female change, opposite sex should be fine in context, if not overused.
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That's a very nice (and heartfelt) first post, mookaboom.
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im thinking of changing my prompt from
Evaluate a significant experience, achievement, risk you have taken, or ethical dilemma you have faced and its impact on you.
to
Topic of your choice.
i feel my anecdote is not significant enough to fit under the first prompt.
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Hi,
I read the essay before it was taken down but was a bit busy to write up a response.
I'm going to disagree with the rest and say that there's nothing more you can do than be resigned to generic Asian-ness. Specifically, the risk of writing some contrived meaningful piece (and the contrived-ness of it being noticed) far outweighs potential benefits.
If you choose to skip the rest of my post (which I apologize for being rambling), just remember this: the chance of writing a failure of an essay scales proportionally to the grandiosity of the subject. Therefore, forget about linking yourself to some greater arc of Chinese culture or whatever. Focus on a small part of yourself.
Thus, I think that your writing flows well (no rough transitions, which is a tricky thing to do, but it worked for me). That said, regarding the whole "ignorant American" sentence: maybe the left-leaning academic establishment types would like it, but I find invoking "common stereotype" as a lazy way to describe your development as a person (see Michelle Obama's senior thesis as an example of this, its just bad). This may partly because your assumption that the other person is stereotyping you is just that, an assumption, unless you're an FBI profiler.
Story as a whole is decent. Thesis is a bit general--unfortunately you can't namedrop faculty to remedy this. Thus
Good luck on your application.
PS Knowing the quality of reports/essays at my school, its hard (for me, a semi-jaded grad student) to see how writing ability impacts admission in any way. Relax, or not: more likely than not your admission chances are already set, and by writing an essay that is technically good (no rdiculous spelling grammar errors,) you should be fine.
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On October 30 2010 10:55 bbq ftw wrote:
Hi,
I read the essay before it was taken down but was a bit busy to write up a response.
I'm going to disagree with the rest and say that there's nothing more you can do than be resigned to generic Asian-ness. Specifically, the risk of writing some contrived meaningful piece (and the contrived-ness of it being noticed) far outweighs potential benefits.
If you choose to skip the rest of my post (which I apologize for being rambling), just remember this: the chance of writing a failure of an essay scales proportionally to the grandiosity of the subject. Therefore, forget about linking yourself to some greater arc of Chinese culture or whatever. Focus on a small part of yourself.
Thus, I think that your writing flows well (no rough transitions, which is a tricky thing to do, but it worked for me). That said, regarding the whole "ignorant American" sentence: maybe the left-leaning academic establishment types would like it, but I find invoking "common stereotype" as a lazy way to describe your development as a person (see Michelle Obama's senior thesis as an example of this, its just bad). This may partly because your assumption that the other person is stereotyping you is just that, an assumption, unless you're an FBI profiler.
Story as a whole is decent. Thesis is a bit general--unfortunately you can't namedrop faculty to remedy this. Thus
Good luck on your application.
PS Knowing the quality of reports/essays at my school, its hard (for me, a semi-jaded grad student) to see how writing ability impacts admission in any way. Relax, or not: more likely than not your admission chances are already set, and by writing an essay that is technically good (no rdiculous spelling grammar errors,) you should be fine.
so my essay can not boost my admission chances further? only stabilize them?
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EPT
