I have an overseas friend with whom I have been regularly communicating for the past six years, unbeknownst to my parents, friends, or teachers. That probably sounded a bit suspicious, but I’ve been itching to tell someone, anyone! Perhaps some more background information: like many introductory foreign language courses, my sixth grade class had pen pals with fellow students in France. This was dropped after a few months due to slow postage services and a few dessins vulgaires, shall we say, but not before I dropped in my email address, admittedly more to fill up page space than anything else...
I started sailing when I was about 5 years old. I’d get nervous about going on the water if it was even slightly windy, which with hindsight wasn’t a great quality for a sailor to have. Nonetheless, some of the old hands of the sailing club would talk me into going on the water, and at the end of the day I would come back in happy and smiling...
The Varsity race at the Annual Regatta is the pinnacle of schoolboy rowing in my area, encompassing a group of schools that produce some of the fastest schoolboy rowing crews in the country. It was first contested in the 1874 and has run every year since, other than during the Second World War, usually attracting around 15,000 spectators. After a lean period my school has recently been experiencing a patch of good form, placing in the top 3 in four of the last seven years, and winning the Varsity event in 2010, for the first time since 1974...
Every morning before school since the sixth grade, I have read the New York Times. Having progressed from the sports section all the way to the front page, this tradition has regularly provided me with a moment of peace, wonder and deliberation in a world of ordered chaos. Not only is it relaxing and educational, but also amusing since I occasionally manage to complete their grueling crossword...
Born in an Ethiopian family, I grew up listening to the melodious sounds of Amharic. The many divergent sounds string together to make beautiful words that flow off the tongue like slowly swaying trees. I learned to speak my mother’s native language as a child, but as time passed, my abilities deteriorated from lack of exposure. However, the opportunity to regain the language presented itself this summer when I was providing healthcare recommendations to the people of my neighborhood in Addis Ababa, based on the knowledge I have accumulated as a student specializing in biology, and a worker in hospitals for the previous four summers...
The night was still dark, illuminated only by the dim twinkle of stars and the hazy light of a few distant streetlights. The bitter autumn air stung my face as I stepped out of the car onto the parking lot pavement. I grabbed my ball and sneakers, slung my bag over my shoulder, and marched towards the gym alongside my two friends. I pounded on the imposing black door three times, and we waited. Like always, the door swung open, revealing a heavyset man with a thick beard and a jolly smile. “Mornin’ fellas. How we doin’ today?”..
Everybody wants to leave a legacy. We all want to leave the world thinking we have left on it some indelible mark that has changed it for the better. But there isn’t a guidebook on how to do this, nor is there only one right way. Some of the most powerful people in history have left a legacy of violence and instability while millions of people whose names will never be mentioned in history books found small ways to leave the world a better place than they found it...
Historically, the American high school has developed the intellect of the citizens of the most powerful nation on Earth. As a society we idealistically believe that any person who receives and education and works hard will find success. Unfortunately, the American high school system fails not only to properly educate students, it fails to motivate them...
“You should respect each other and refrain from disputes; you should not, like water and oil, repel each other, but should, like milk and water, mingle together.” – Buddha
“*!&# you!” The teenaged driver yelled at our car as she rolled down the window of her Toyota and swung into the parking spot that we had been about to pull into. What had been a family outing to the mall quickly turned into a shouting match between my mother and the teenager...
I have always been fascinated with biology: from third grade when I looked at bugs under my first microscope, to discussing the mysteries of genetics and DNA with my aunt, to this past year in my AP Biology class when I harvested Drosophila fruit flies and examined patterns of Mendelian inheritance. My interest in science has grown and evolved through the years...
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