My life in America started when I was about nine years old. I was born in Korea with a brother who is about four years older than me. My brother had always dreamed of living in America, and since my uncle was already there, my parents made the decision to send my brother to live with him for about four years. When the time had come for him to move back to Korea, he refused. He wanted to live here. My parents had thought about it for a long time and decided to move the whole family to America for better opportunities and education.

One of the first things I noticed after moving was how my height has changed overnight. Back in Korea, I was one of the tallest kids in my third grade classes being almost 5 ft tall. But here in America, I was just an average. I was just learning Korean and weren't very fluent with it, and now that I had to learn an entirely new language, it made me go insane. Still, elementary school was a fun time. Students were very friendly and kind even when I barely spoke English and said things that didn't make sense. They just treated me like I am one of them.

Middle school is really where things changed very quickly. I joined Orchestra and picked up the cello in sixth grade. I auditioned for as many advanced Orchestra groups as possible so that this could be part of my resume in the future.

This passion carried into high school, where I kept playing even thought I never planned to major in music. Until the end of sophomore year, Orchestra and school was basically my entire life. But by junior, right when everyone else was preparing for SAT and beginning to write their common app, I had a burn out. I quit most of my extracurriculars and lived through my junior year very tediously.

Then suddenly, reality caught up with me. I realized I needed to lock in, so I started studying for the SAT and pushed to finish my Common App by the end of the first semester of senior year. And as a result, I got into the college that I've always wanted.