<p>Alright, I have a dilemma. I have always thought I would write my college essay on my unique family circumstances (mom= waitrees, dad= convict) and my family agreed. I wrote this essay and worked quite hard on it, had many people read it, and I thought I perfected it. Today I met with a woman who is helping me to get into Harvard and said to scrap it and focus on my recent humanitarian aid trip to Guatemala. I really thought being low-income/ turbulent family history would be the best way to go as it is most unique, and although my volunteer trip to rural Guatemala was very nice...it seems like every kid and his mother has done the same sort of charity work. Should I listen to this lady or stick to my guns?</p>
<p>For Harvard, don't you have the option to write an extra essay? Send them both!</p>
<p>yes, but I already have my second essay which I love, as does the woman. Everyone agrees to include this one, it is humorous and very light, but a lot of me comes out of it. I am too attached to this particular essay to forgo it for one of my other options.
Just for the hell of it this is my secodn essay:
My asthma was rarely a problem, I wasnt really a sports person anyway. I honestly only had an issue with it when it involved Physical Education or running to class when I was late. Its not that I didnt try to overcome my breathing problems and give exercise a shot, its just that whenever I did, I came out a little worse for wear. Imagine my surprise when a stranger advised me to take my inhaler before exercise to keep my airways from constricting. Sixteen years. It took me sixteen years to discover this; I had to be the only kid my age who had never run for more than a minute. Newly enlightened and armed with my inhaler and tennis shoes, I gave running its first shot. Little more than a minute passed before I realized that running is hard. How could people think this primitive practice of upping their comfortably low heart rates is fun? After all, what are cars for? But my curiosity overpowered my initial distaste for jogging and I resolved to uncover this mystery.
The first chance I had, I entered a race. I lost. I lost so badly that I came in dead last. I lost so badly that the girl missing a shoe finished before me. Worse yet, my humiliating defeat was caught on video tape, magnifying my embarrassment tenfold.
So three days later I entered another road race. This one was longer, with more participants, and a large audience. The butterflies in my stomach felt like they were having seizures. I signed up for my race and nervously donned my official tee shirt and number. I had no idea where the race ended or where I was going but I followed the massive swarm of Nike sneakers to the top of the hill. Here, I secured the advantage of a place in front of the crowd and then we were off. I sprinted ahead for about 45 seconds and then lost myself in the mayhem surrounding me. After what seemed like an eternity, I saw no finish line in sight and felt I couldnt run a step further. Just as I proceeded to come to a halt and walk, a fellow runner came up from behind me and shouted, Keep going, only a little bit longer! I knew he was lying, and I knew I had no chance of winning, but I also knew that if I could only cross that finish line running, I would succeed. Leg by leg, painful step by painful step, my feet pounded the tar. I am not sure if I would have gone quicker if I were walking but I devoted every ounce of my spirit into finishing that race running. I didnt come in last or even second to last; I finished right in the middle and I could not have been happier if I had come in first place. Im not considering a career in Olympic running or even more road races, but for a brief time, I was a champion.</p>
<p>i love your essay,</p>
<p>it's great. Most people applying to Harvard are perfectionists. we are all obssesed of being number one, second to none. It just shows a lot about your personality..........</p>
<p>I think you should use your family essay. Honestly, this essay on running is little ordinary. It sounds rather like a cliche.</p>
<p>i thought you could send in as many supplemental essays as you wanted...</p>
<p>you got my hopes up, nope just one is allowed.
I met with the woman for dinner last night with a new essay I wrote about my humanitarian aid organization trip to Guatemala, she loved it as well as that running essay (which I too agree its a little trite thus why a wanted my unique family essay to go with it). She says to send my running essay in conjuntion with this new essay
Since you were so kind as to read my whole essay last time what are the chances you'd give this a shot too?</p>
<pre><code>Be the change you wish to see in the world, Gandhi once said. I thought that I was too young, too inexperienced, or had too little to offer to be that change. I was proven wrong.
I first met Eileen Weisslinger at the Missionaries of Charity Women and Childrens shelter in Dorchester. A few years before, she had bravely quit her job to be her own change and begin a humanitarian aid organization for high school students. International High School Mission (IHSM) targets this impressionable age group to open young minds to their potential and their world. She invited me to join her volunteers on their first official trip to Guatemala in April 2005. Though I enthusiastically raised $1600 to pay for my flight and to donate to the town we would be visiting, I wondered if my $500 ticket would be better spent as a direct donation. I am thankful that I was wrong.
I arrived in Tamahú under the dark, firefly lit sky, and cooling rainfall. The children clamored to have their pictures taken and the mothers smiled shyly from behind their babies. Along the narrow streets of Tamahú a greeting is requisite to nearly every passerby. Within the first 24 hours of our stay, Tamahú had already connected with me in a way I could never forget.
Our intention was to work, and so we set out the first morning to begin on the cinder-block house we would be building for a family of ten. In the village, I was handed a large flour sack that I carried to the foot of a mountain. I soon found the bag was meant to be filled with cement gravel. After one minute of carrying a too-heavy pack up the steep path, I discovered what it meant to work. The labor was uncompromisingly grueling but I was inspired by the village men who could carry ten times my load without rest. I pushed myself to my limit and realized that I had more to give.
The gratitude of the Guatemalan people was simply overwhelming. One of the most touching experiences was after our distribution of shoes to the families. An aged woman received a pair of simple mary-janes, and as she stood amidst the whole village and our group, her wrinkled face fought back tears of joy. As I raised a camera to take her picture, she straightened her face to a somber stare befitting a woman of her age. I watched as tears, streaming down her face, belied her serious expression. In that moment I could see the change that I had made, I could feel it, I could almost touch it. Every hug and every smile and every bag of cement had made a difference to someone. I was changing the world by becoming a part of something bigger than myself. This weekend it will be the shelter, this summer it will be Tanzania, and one day it will be the Peace Corps, but now I know that I am capable of making a difference. I am the change I wish to see in the world.
</code></pre>
<p>just curious, where do you plan on applying</p>
<p>harvard of course</p>
<p>lol, sorry, completely forgot what forum i'm in.</p>