Another Page by Leyla

Another Page by Leyla - November 2017 Scholarship Essay

I do not know who I would be if I had not been raised with the spirit of a traveler. I grew up in a family that playfully nicknamed themselves “the traveling DeMolinas”, after The Traveling Wilburys, due to our reputation as being constantly on the go, always a packed car or packed suitcase. We mostly traveled for my father’s job. I remember being wheeled across a cobblestone street in Spain, crowded with carriage horses as fireworks exploded overhead. I turned three in Australia and fell off the monkey bars for the first time. I got to visit Beijing, walk the Great Wall, and enter the Forbidden City. I was maybe seven or eight when I met the old man on the train. We were winding up the mountains in Italy, on our way to a village called Sestriere. I have never been able to forget this man and what he said. He was reading by himself in the seat across the row from my family; then, just before we got off, he picked up his head and looked at us with these old eyes. He said, “Life is like a book”, and gestured to the one in his hands, “Those who do not travel have not even turned the first page.” As a little girl tangled in a passionate love affair with reading, no analogy could have charmed me more. And as I have grown older, the truth of his words continues to strike me. I cannot imagine staying in one place, staying put is not in my nature. I think there is far too much to be gained from pushing oneself out the door, over the bridge, on the plane, across the sea. What I have learned from all the traveling when I was younger is how to see life as a constant adventure, how to never forget how large and wonder filled the world is, and what a privilege it is to have opportunities to see as much of it as I can. But also, that there is more to travelling outside your home country than seeing the sights and buying souvenirs. There are so many people to meet and to learn from, new things to understand, world issues that must be witnessed, and new selves to find and explore. And this time, for the first time, entirely on my own. It is very easy in college, wherever you are, to forget the world outside. The microcosm of the world that is Brown University is so consuming at times that all one can see or think about is what goes on within the campus. You begin to get used to the version of yourself that you become during the semester, you get used to the routine, to the concerns that are very specific to being a college student.
For the longest time, before even beginning high school, I knew that given the opportunity I needed to study abroad. It would be too much of a chance at something unforgettable to pass up and I loved the idea of getting to study somewhere I had never been before. That sounded like a better story than I could ever write for myself. This dream made it all the more difficult when I found myself questioning whether or not I should actually apply to study abroad. I surprised myself with my doubt. But I couldn’t help wondering if I should leave Brown for a semester, after working so hard to get there. Would I regret it? What would I be missing out on? Was it worth the risk? But then I reached back to my rolling stone roots and the conviction that still lived there that to go out and explore, to take a risk on learning something and someplace new, is the most worthwhile leap. I know that what I gain from an experience like studying abroad will far outweigh anything else. I know that I am my best self when I am challenged to reach farther. I want to continue to learn how to live my life in a way that challenges me and allows me to keep questioning myself. I want to keep surprising myself with the things I accomplish and the places I can go. And I want to keep learning what it means to be a part of this world.
I am studying theater and English because I have the itch, the need to tell stories, to connect, to shout the things that are felt but unsaid. I think to study the arts and literature is to study the world---to study people, as well as to study alternative methods for making ideas be heard. And I honestly believe this is a necessary step in any journey to changing the world or building a new future, as idealistic as that may sound. A small part of everyone has that desire, I think: to change the world. So do I. But like most people, I have no idea how I will do that yet. But I do know that before we change the world, we have to know it first. We have to see it and understand it and listen to what it needs. Right now, the best way I can think of pressing my ear to the heart beat of the world is by packing up what I think I already know and studying abroad.