College Essays:

THE DREAM IS OVER, OR HAS JUST BEGUN:

S.M. Class EN01

The Child is Father to the Man.

1998 Vintage.

A Significant Experience In My Life That Has Special Meaning For Me:

Ever since I was born, I had not understood my father very well. I only knew that he always gave me the best things and sent me to the best private school that was much more expensive than the public one. Some people thought it was not necessary and asked him why he did all this for me; he just touched my head with a smile on his face without saying a word. I did not understand why at that time. I remember I felt he was a strict and silent father, and he cared much more about my personality than my school grade. This made me have even more doubts, because other parents were always talking about studying.

I understood that all the things my father arranged for me - for example, private classes in the evenings, and asking the teacher to look after me specially - were for my own good, but he decided everything by himself without asking my opinion, which I really felt was unfair. I wondered why he never wanted to listen to me and talk to me. Consequently I became set against any plan he made, and refused to cooperate properly; during this time our relationship became very bad, but I did not become negative, or started to ruin my life. Good school grade seemed to be what mattered to all my friends, parents, so as long as I kept my grade at a fairly high level I felt in my heart that I was in the right. This caused a lot of fighting between us.

I was an unmindful person and I always started to act before I used my brain, but I could usually get out of trouble. However once when I was playing with my friend, I felt like throwing him down on the floor, and not realizing the floor was made of stone. Everything happened in a second: a lot of blood came out from his head. I was scared and almost panicked, but my instinct told me to carry him straight to the hospital. After a few hours, the doctor told me he would be all right, and I started to cry for his safe condition and my foolishness. I knelt down in front of his parents, even though I knew nothing would be changed by this, but I could not forgive myself, I needed to do something to punish myself. This time I really regretted doing what I had done and I knew the problem would not just go away.

I went back home and felt so ashamed. I had to tell my father all about this, and I thought he would be very angry with me. When I had told him the whole story, and I was preparing to resist the blame from him. The surprise was he did not just blame me, but afterward he talked very gently and quietly to me. First he said that he knew I had many biases against him, but he asked me if I had ever thought of him. He had given me every thing I needed and had not force me to study because he loved me. I was really shocked; this was the first time since I had grown up that he had told me this, and the first time I had seen him with tears in his eyes in front of me. This time he was trying to solve the problem, not only for I hurt my friend but also for the problems between us.

Then he told me that he cared about my grade too but not as much as about my personality. Because he thought that when people had no knowledge it was sad, but it was even worse if people had bad morals. Therefore he just wanted me to build up a good and strong personality first and of course it would be better if I could do well in the school. I could see how disappointed he was, because of some of my bad characteristics. I suddenly understood how every single time I fought to him I hurt him so much, but now he was still willing to help me when I was in trouble. I said to myself that he was my father, no one could take his place, he was the one and the only one.

I came to study abroad two years after that accident. Sometimes I thought this was not only an accident but also a turning point in my life. If it had not happened, I would not have talked to my father like that and I might still have been against what he said, and then I cannot think what I might have been like. I also learned a very important thing, that was the importance of being part of a family after I sort out all the problems with my father.

I remembered I had always spent most of my time with my friends and ignored my family. At that time, I had always refused whatever my father asked me to do in order to be with them, and went out without any aim. I started to change because I noticed that home was the warmest place after I hurt my friend. I believed that wherever I went the last destination would be home; this will never change, therefore I thought I should do something for my family. I started to join in and try to understand them, and I found I got back the happiness that I had lost after I grew up, the happiness of belonging to a family.

D.C. Class 04.

SHRINKING BENEFITS:

"The Way: A Head

The thoughts that I have about future are really important to me as they are going to influence my life. They involve things that I have decided to do in the future. The things that I am doing now are the things that my future depends upon.

I am studying at the moment in a boarding school in Switzerland, called Le Rosey. I have been studying here for two years and I have one more year to do before I graduate. After graduation, I would like to go to university either in the United States or in Paris, France. As with every little child I have had a lot of professions in my mind. For example to be a doctor, a teacher, a police-women, a nurse or some similar occupation. But when I was 10 years old, I decided that I wanted to be a psychologist for several reasons. First of all I really like talking and discussing people’s problems. I like trying to give them advice, ideas and in this way help them to solve their problems.

My aunt is a psychologist in a school and she has always told me how she tries to help students and what kind of problems they usually have. She told me that the most important thing for psychologist to be patient and I have that ability. In general, I enjoy helping people with their problems so that they can solve them by themselves.

As with any profession, there are good and bad points about this kind of work. One has to be really strong in order to not become personally affected by the problems of one’s patients. One cannot let your feelings mixed up while you are trying to help others. On the other hand, there are also good points becoming a psychologist. One has to be more open to people and to new ideas. Whenever one helps someone to solve their problem, the psychologist feels comfortable becomes happy with herself and satisfied with her success.

I feel that I fit my description and that I will, therefore, be well-suited for this job because I have all the abilities which I have just described. I am the kind of person who has a strong personality and I am sure I will be patient while I am talking with people and discussing their problems. In the past I have had experiences with these sorts of things. People used to come to me for advise and I used to aid them in finding the best solution.

After my education I would like to work as a psychologist in Turkey, but I know there is no guarantee that I will get a in the place I desire. If I do not find a position in Turkey, the second place I would like to go to work is Paris because I like the mentality of people. But I prefer my own country to Paris because I have lived whole life in Turkey. I know everything in Turkey and also it would be easier for me to work in Turkey because it would be easier to communicate with people because of the language.

Everybody can succeed in their job, I would like to believe, if they concentrate and work a lot on it. And also one has to like the work that one is doing because motivation is all. It determines sucess. I think everybody should choose the job, the work that they really want to do so. If they do, life will be much easier for everybody."

G. Y. Class 1.3 (1997/8)

These days the world is getting more and more competitive. Therefore, in order to be successful one needs more knowledge, more self confidence and more experience. These certainly are not all qualities which one have to obtain , as besides them person should also be lucky to certain extent, but though they are the qualities which can be given to young people by their parents. Of course almost every parent who is concerned with the future of the child, tries to do their best in order to prepare the kids for their independent adulthood. They undertake different strategies and follow different philosophies about that process. I personally see the way parents raise kids as a straight line with two extremes at the ends, which are: to be strict to the children and guide everything they do, and to be easygoing with the kids and let them do whatever they want to do. Hardly anyone takes the “extreme “ position, however almost every parent, consciously or unconsciously, tries to choose their own point of best fit. These points might change over the time, as they are directly affected by the views of the parents and the age of the child.

I personally never posed a question: “Did you follow any strategies or philosophies?” to my parents, simply because I am quit confident in my ability to analyze and to answer that question myself. If you refer back to my theory, according to me there was no permanent point of “best fit”, as it was sliding along the line , travelling from one extreme towards another as I was getting older. I think that the course which my parents undertook was a good choice, although it had its faults, but nothing is perfect. The thing which I liked about the way the whole system was set up, is that in my family my opinion was or at least was shown to be taken into account. I was always encouraged to say what I thought and that was great because it surely reduced the communication barriers between me and my parents.

Of course the way which parents will undertake when raising the child will depend on the believes of the parents , personality of the child and the external environment where the child and his parents live. Personally, I still consider that the basic strategy should be chosen before the birth of the child as raising another human being is a big responsibility and therefore should be planned in advance. If I ever going to have a child, I will probably try to copy the way my parents raised me. I will be strict to the kid while he or she is young as at that age the child doesn’t know and isn’t experienced enough to make proper decisions and therefore has to learn some basic skills. By that, I do not mean that learning something complicated will do much good, but being polite and able to look after oneself in hygienic terms seems like a good start to me. Later as the kid grows I’ll try to push less on my own ideas, as lets say at the age of seven, the child is able to analyze the surroundings and make up his own mind about the world around. And this is the age, when the kids must start to develop their own thoughts and gain experience, even though most of the understandings are likely to change later as more education and experience comes. In my opinion parental guidance is still required at that age, as still not all decisions can be taken by the child correctly. After that age, I would gradually start to reduce, my guidance and give the kid more freedom, so that more learning of his or her external environment can be done. It certainly doesn’t mean that the kid should be left all by himself, as observation by the parents is required at any age, and so is parent’s willingness to listen to the things which worry their kids and to provide any help needed at any minute. The general problem with that system is that it is often quite hard to define the point when you have to slide along the line. And it is different for every single family. Therefore this decision should lie on the shoulders of the parents and be wisely taken by them whenever the time comes.

My so called theory which I developed as I was writing this essay is certainly very generalized. I thing that raising another human being is a huge responsibility which has to be studied with great care. I also think that in order to prepare somebody for the moment when that life becomes independent the person himself has to be independent. And that could only be reached by not being too strict to kids- by giving them more freedom, so that they can learn from their own mistakes

E. O. :04/01/06/98 Class T

A Special Person

My grandfather died when he was 75 years old. For me he was the best person. 
He was a simple but really nice, with a very good character, He was thin and very 
handsome. He was born in Italy. He came to Brazil when he was 7 years old. His 
family and he had come to Brazil to try something different because they were 
really poor. The thing he liked most was his family and so he would do anything 
for them. 

He was a really intelligent person. He became an important lawyer. He had a
well structured  family and everything he wanted to do he did it. I short, he
was a sucess.  That sucess was all thanks to  his strong  character. 

His life was hard. He started without money and he wanted to go to university, 
so he stated to play the violin at silent movies. After a lot of work he was able 
to take his degree in law.
At  university he met a woman in the same conditions as  he. She did not have 
money but she went to university just because she had worked for it. They 
married and they had three daughters and one son. They had a really respectable
family.
He started working in an office. After he got the degree, he became a very 
important lawyer. Them he started to involve himself in politics, and became 
a minister.
I used to talk to him a lot. He was the only person who advised me. I used to
 spend most of my time with him. He taught me a lot of things. We used to go 
to the farm every weekend and with him I learnt how to fish, hunt, about plants 
and animals. 

When he was 75 years old he had to have an operation. He went to the hospital 
and had it. After one day he had a problem in his heart and he died. All his four 
children now have a degree and a  well structured family, that is they are all 
balanced and happy. He dedicated his life to his wife, children and  his grandchild. 
I will remember him always.

D. De G. 

During the last academic year (97/98) class 0.3 read a number of texts some of which -- "Turned" 
by Charlotte Perkins Gilman and PARVEEN, by Anne Mehdevi, -- provide strong
impressions of the 'place' of women in western and non-western societies.
The latter extract. is from a fictionalized account based on fact of a sixteen-year-old girl 
who has lived most of her life with her North-American mother. She has returned to visit
her father in Persia (now Iran).  He is a judge in a village and she witnesses the 'trial' of a
woman who was beaten and blinded byher husband for having refused to be treated like 
a slave by the sons of his second wife.

Dear Mr. G,

Here is the homework :

Questions on 'the village court'  an extract  from the novel Parveen,  by  Anne Madhavi. 

1. What were the customary attitudes towards wives in Persia? 

1. In Persia wives were treated very bad and unfair. They had to obey to 
everything that the husband would tell them, otherwise they would be 
beaten up. They were also considered inferior and treated like as if they 
were not human beings. From the story we can see that they were treated 
in this way because of Ali-akbar when he says " Get up. Obey or be 
beaten."

2. What happened to the dowry? What was it's usual purpose?

2. The dowry which is the money that a women brings to her husband was 
all spent by Ashraf's brother because he said that he was poor and he 
needed money in order to do not starve and to give food to his nine 
children. The usual purpose of the dowry is to make sure that the 
husband would pay his wife in case of divorce or sorrow.

3. What are the feelings of Parveen's father towards what has happened?

3.Parveen's father was very angry and impatient to what had happened, 
therefore he did not know what to do, but as he was the judge he had to 
follow the laws and put his feelings apart.

4.  What are Ashraf's feelings about what her husband did?

4. Ashraf's feelings were really strong towards her ex husband, she said 
"I love him more than I love life", therefore she suffered a lot for 
what he did to her. She said that she was ashamed to look up to the two 
boys and she could not stand to listen to what the other wife use to 
tell her.

5. What do you think of Parveen's decision?

5. Parveen's decision was that he would put every man who beats his wife 
in jail and demand that every women keep her own dowry money. From my 
point of view I are really agree with Perveen's decision, because it is 
really unfair to treat girls in that way. I think that who ever would do 
it should pay for it, not only by going to jail, but stay there for the 
rest of their life. I also think that women should keep their own dowry 
because they are responsible enough to do that. If they do not  it is a 
sign of inferiority which I do not  think that they are inferior to men.

6. What do you learn about the position of women in Persia at the time of 
this account? What do you think about it?
 
6. In this period of time women in certain parts of the world were 
treated really badly, they were used almost as slaves.  Man thought that 
(it was/ they were) right to treat women with this inferiority manners. Women had 
to obey to their husband s not because they wanted to or because (out of) of 
respect, but only because otherwise they would be beaten up.

From my point of view I really do not agree with the way they used to 
treat women. This shows that some people in certain countries are really 
close - minded. I think someone should do something about it because 
women's life is as important as men' life, therefore no one has the 
right to interfere in their lives and some cases in their private lives.

7. Write Ashraf's story.

7. Ashraf was a Persian woman married to a man called Ali-akbar. She was 
really in love with her husband, until one day when he came back home with 
two kids and a wife older than her. As soon as she saw them arriving, she 
got really upset and jealous. Her husband being much more superior than 
her, ordered her to obey his second wife and her two boys by doing 
everything they would ask. As she was jealous she refused to do it so the 
husband beat her up until she became blind. At this point she took him to 
court and at the end she went to live by herself in a small apartment 
and the husband had to pay for her doctor and the brother had to give 
her back the money in a period of ten years time.

U.L.