I have been picturing this house ever since I was a kid. It has four floors, huge windows, and many rooms I sometimes would get lost . This house has to be mine, I tell myself.
When I opened my eyes in the morning, yesterday is gone, taking with it something I was familiar with. My home country:Mongolia. It has been three years since I moved to United States. Three life changing years

When I was in Mongolia, I used to watch Mongolian Tv show called, “American Color” where Mongolian students who got into American top colleges were interviewed. They inspired and encouraged me, but at the same time, they also made me jealous. Anger, envy, dissapointment flew through my blood. I remember thinking, Why can’t I be the one in the show ? What is so special about them?

Most of the time I ended up in tears, hating being born into a average family in a poor country where extent of my success would be determined by my wealth.

On November first of 2010 , I landed in America- the great country that made me want to believe if I try hard, I can build my dream house.

The Language barrier was my first problem to overcome. It is hard to be an straight A student like I used to be when I don’t know English well.


I started to read books and write translation down to the words. Soon after my room was full of vocabulary words hanging everywhere -on my table, on my my mirror, on my closet. My writings in books began to decrease as I passed on to the next one.

Over the years in living in land of opportunity, I’ve come to love one thing the most: Feeling sick and tired. Waking up in the morning, I feeling tired from the tip of feet through my head. It gives me an undescribable, unpleasant happiness. The pain reminds me how much I’ve tried to get closer to my dream, and how much I still have to go through.

America has changed me. It has made me greedy -greedy for happiness, greedy for new adventures, and greedy for its abundant opportunities.

Participating in school activities is not common in Mongolia. People think sports or clubs are not important. I grew up in that society. Doing club or activities didn't attract me as much as academics did. But now I want to try new things. I want to find out what I like and what I don't like. I want to experience what Madison has to offer me as begin exchanging my unique perspectives and experiences with my classmates.

I am bringing my experiences: the experience of poor, unfair society, the experience of waiting an hour for public transportation at -50F, the experience of seeing five- and six-year-old kids digging through trash for food, the experience of seeing sick people dying because they don’t have the money, the experience of drunk teacher beating up my classmates, and the experience of a governor selling part of my country for his selfish reason. These are my experiences--and I’ll bring them all to Madison.


I believe that Madison, ranking 19th on the world, will definitely help me to build the strongest base of my dream house I could.