College Essay

What was the most memorable childhood moment from your life?

My most memorable childhood moment, was not a memory or a day or even an hour. It was a mere second moment realization that would forever affect how I view people, life and the world.
The summer before my freshman year of high school my mother was scheduled to spend a week in Zurich, Switzerland for work. She decided that it was a good opportunity to bring my older sister and me with her to experience the different cultures and explore Europe after her work obligations were fulfilled.
Europe was beautiful. The scenery, the art, architecture, people and food all amazed and bemused me at the same time. But the most memorable thing about the trip was the on the last day. My family and I were in a taxi, traveling to the airport in London. I remember that the traffic was heavy on the highway, and the cab had that distinct, musky London scent. I was exhausted and enjoyed just listening to my mother speak with the taxi driver.
He was young and spoke with a Middle Eastern accent, and was conversing animatedly with my mother about the upcoming presidential campaign. And then it hit me. This young man, a foreigner in a foreign country, knew more about American politics than I did! It was this exact moment that I realized how narrow minded I had been my whole life by choosing to ignore the events of the world around me. I had been told of current affairs in my Latin and social courses, and heard stories of foreign places from my mother, but didn’t care because they were so alien to me and didn’t affect me directly. It was almost as if they weren’t real. But after we returned home, I began learning about the current affairs around the world and began studying more about the different cultures and people.
I became obsessed with the idea of leaving my small hometown in the suburbs and traveling the world, experiencing the different cultures, tasting all the exotic foods, meeting the diverse people, and living in foreign places. I realized I wasn’t afraid to do new things, and wanted to be more adventurous, outgoing, and involved in current affairs.
Most of the trip details from Europe are now a vague memory to me, but the humbling experience opened my eyes to something so much bigger, that it forever changed how I lived my life and viewed the world.