<p>Is anybody writing the essay about personal experience and its effect on your from the common application? If yes, what experience are you writing about? If not, evaluate a significant experience you have faced and its impact on you.</p>
<p>I'm only doing this just to be nosy, I guess</p>
<p>Well I guess I'll put in my two cents, though I already went through the app process, but anyway. I did when I saw Bizet's Carmen and reading Siddartha and how I explored a world of meditation as a result of both [the first because of the classical music [it's a little strange, you sort of have to read it to really get the effect] and the second for obvious reasons]. Though this was a tough choice because it was either this or when I saw a man drown, but I thought that would be too heavy, so I chose the first.</p>
<p>I'm originally from Africa so I plan on writing about a time I was caught in the middle of a riot. I plan on elaborating on how frightening the experience was for me, the amount of bloodshed I encountered and how it has made me value a human life more. I would then explain how I currently volunteer for an organization that raises AIDs awareness in Africa, I also volunteer for another organization that helps better the lives of poverty stricken, AIDs suffering Ugandans. What do you think about that? Is it too heavy?</p>
<p>I think it's heavy, but I think your story is captivating, intriguing, and enlightening and if done well can definitely be an effective essay.</p>
<p>I can't speak for certain for my s, but he wrote about this topic in a school essay and I bet he will use it for a college app essay: How his dad lost his finger during halftime of the homecoming game, how he found out about it, how the experience made him reevaluate life and the changes he has made. He wrote it in a humorous way where it didn't come out as morbid as it sounds. It should certainly be different and grab the attention of the reader.</p>
<p>I wrote about my violin recital.</p>
<p>I had cancer. Writing about that.</p>
<p>Writing about my medical condition at birth - how it has affected me and influenced my attitude towards life...</p>
<p>writing about my first day in 1st grade in a foreign country, whose language i didn't speak and just arrived 2 or 3 weeks earlier</p>
<p>BingCold, how did you manage?</p>
<p>OMG BingCold!!! I'm writing about the exact same thing!!!!!!!</p>
<p>Uh oh, I see a rumble forming ;) :D</p>
<p>bing, i say we let eachother read our essays, AFTER we send them in</p>
<p>jai6638, after a while i just got used to it i guess. you learn the language fast and adapt better when you're 7 years old.</p>
<p>anagarcia, so whats your story (briefly)?</p>
<p>i wrote about the summer of the 17 year cicadas when i was nine, and fear, and writing.</p>
<p>i would write about my first (and hopefully last) 0 on my science test, because i didn't understand the science teacher (just immigrated from korea a few weeks ago...the extent of my english was "hello", "bye", "yes/no" and "duH!(..don't ask))</p>
<p>been through many changes (korea-canada-us) and talk about how i overcame them</p>
<p>i was born in the US, and i had to move to the dominican republic b4 3rd grade started b/c my mother's visa expired...what's yours?
and of course, it's more invloved, but that's basically the short story</p>
<p>i moved from china to israel and started school 3 weeks later. parents didn't speak hebrew either, and i was the first international student ever at my school and there was no ESL program or anything like that...</p>
<p>that's so cool, do you speak 3+ languages?</p>
<p>yes, becoming fluent in my 4th right now</p>