PERSONAL NARRATIVE ESSAY #2-2

Revised version.
I found out that the essay was kind of long to finish it in 5mins.
I corrected some expressions, and erased some unnecessary sentences.

PERSONAL NARRATIVE ESSAY #2

 

SENDING TIME

KMLA 18TH WAVE

131031 KIM YESUEL(LILLIAN)

 

I’ve always preferred handwritten letter than e-mail. The feeling of the paper, the alphabets in all different forms fascinated me. I believe sending the handwritten letter means not only sending the news, but also sending yourself and most importantly, your time. I have the precious experience which started from sending time.

 

I joined the first camp when I was 10 years old. It was then that I made the first friend from the different city, and one of my best friends. She and I were like the magnet during the camp. She had a lot of energy, which was actually aberrant for a small girl like her. She was even smaller than me, and now you can guess how small she was. We actively participated in every single activity. Foolish songs were made, endless talks were done, and unadulterated happiness was enjoyed. After 3 days of camp, we exchanged the home address, and promised to send letter to each other.

 

Right after the camp, we started to send our time to each other. We talked about the camp, our trivia, and some issues. We waited for reply every week, and it became habit for both of us. I still have those colorful envelopes back at home. However, when we were 12 years old, she moved the Gwangju, my hometown, and the time stopped being sent. I didn’t know the new address of her, and she lost the envelope with my address. The precious 2 years slowly faded away.

 

At the end of my 1^st year in the Unri middle school, I met her again. Now, it is necessary to mention that I maintained the 1^st place at the school except the 3^rd exam of my 1^st year. Someone stole my precious title of 1^st, and immature jealousy, negative emotion burgeoned toward that unknown student in class 10. Few weeks after the exam, I got a letter in familiar handwritings. It was from that girl 2 years ago, saying that she had found the envelope. I was so happy because I encountered the part of memory. Nothing, even her handwriting or writing style, in the letter changed. And the letter said, “Hey! I got the highest score in the exam of Unri middle school! Hurray! By the way, I wonder which school you go.” As you can guess, the sender of the letter which I desperately waited for was that unknown girl.

 

I was surprised that it was her. I was surprised at how my attitude could suddenly change. When I faced the truth, my negative emotion toward that thief became positive. I’ve always believed that the human should have unchanging attitude toward everyone. I thought I was doing it better than the past, but then, I couldn’t help but find myself changing my attitude. I was really sorry about hating her for a short time. I felt my naiveness in handling my emotion and attitude. Also, I thought she ‘stole’ my place, but soon I found it embarrassing since that means I lost my first mind and was recognizing 1^st place as my own.

 

This unique experience revealed my fragility. That is why this experience is so important to me. It taught me not only the excitement of sending and receiving the time, but also the lesson that one should be unchanging. Maybe, I still have the different attitude to someone I don’t know. But I will keep this experience in mind, and gradually fix it as I grow up. Then, someday, I will be able to face people like her with no shame.

PERSONAL NARRATIVE ESSAY #2

PERSONAL NARRATIVE ESSAY #2

 

SENDING TIME

KMLA 18TH WAVE

131031 KIM YESUEL(LILLIAN)

 

I’ve always preferred handwritten letter than e-mail. The feeling of the paper, the alphabets in all different forms fascinated me. I believe sending the handwritten letter means not only sending the news, but also sending yourself and most importantly, your time. It needs a lot of time to write, and since the font is not uniform, it also represents the sender. I have the precious experience which started from sending time.

 

I joined the first camp when I was 10 years old. It was then that I made the first friend from the different city, and one of my best friends. She and I were like the magnet during the camp. She had a lot of energy, which was actually aberrant for a small girl like her. She was even smaller than me, and now you can guess how small she was. We actively participated in every single activity. Foolish songs were made, endless talks were done, and unadulterated happiness was enjoyed. After 3 days of camp, we would have exchanged the cell phone number or email address if we had one of them. However, we had neither of them, so we exchanged the home address, and promised to send letter to each other.

 

Right after the camp, we started to send our time to each other. We talked about the camp, our trivia, and some issues. We waited for reply every week, and it became habit for both of us. I still have those colorful envelopes back at home. However, when we were 12 years old, she moved the Gwangju, my hometown, and the time stopped being sent. I didn’t know the new address of her, and she lost the envelope with my address. The precious 2 years slowly faded away.

 

At the end of my 1^st year in the Unri middle school, I met her again. Now, it is necessary to mention that I maintained the 1^st place at the school except the 3^rd exam of my 1^st year. Someone stole my precious title of 1^st, and immature jealousy, negative emotion burgeoned toward that unknown student in class 10. Few weeks after the exam, I got a letter in familiar handwritings. It was from that girl 2 years ago, saying that she had found the envelope. I was so happy because I encountered the part of memory. Nothing, even her handwriting or writing style, in the letter changed. And the letter said, “Hey! Long time no see. Are you doing well? I got the highest score in the exam of Unri middle school! Hurray! Please congratulate me.” As you can guess, the sender of the letter which I desperately waited for was that unknown girl.

 

I was surprised that it was her. I was surprised at how my attitude could suddenly change. Before I knew that she was who ‘stole’ my place, I didn’t like that hidden thief. But when I knew the truth, my emotion toward that thief became positive. I’ve always believed that the human should have unchanging attitude toward everyone. I thought I was doing it better than the past, but then, I couldn’t help but find myself changing my attitude. I haven’t told her yet that I disliked her as the person who took my place away, because I was so embarrassed, and sorry about hating her for a short time. I didn’t want to show my naiveness in handling my emotion and attitude to her. Also, I thought she ‘stole’ my place, but soon I found it embarrassing since that means I lost my first mind and was recognizing 1^st place as my own.

 

This unique experience revealed the fragility of me. That is why this experience is so important to me. It taught me not only the excitement of sending and receiving the time, but also the lesson that one should be unchanging. Maybe, I still have the different attitude to someone I don’t know. But I will keep this experience in mind, and gradually fix it as I grow up. Then, someday, I will be able to face people like her with no shame.

The Tell Tale Heart(Edgar Allan Poe) as gothic fiction

This is a piece of work in Mr. Tame's class. It is a opinion, not the truth itself.

 

The Tell-Tale Heart (Edgar Allan Poe) as gothic fiction

 

131031 Yesuel (Lillian) Kim

 

Gothic fiction originally refers to a story with dark and horrific atmosphere based on medieval background. However, its meaning expanded, and now it involves several genres such as thriller, Romanticism, mystery, science fiction, and horror. Gothic fictions also deal with human’s unreasonable, evil desire, and abnormal emotion. Edgar Allan Poe’s short novel, [The Tell Tale Heart] has the characteristics of gothic fiction.

Lack of description, or information shows this novel is gothic fiction. There are no detail background description except door, bed, and chair. The writer is mentioning the minimum furniture that is crucial to maintain the plot. Also, we don’t have sufficient information of who the madman and old man are, and what kind of relationship they’re in. Even if, the protagonist him(her)self is telling the story, he(she) only shows his emotion, not the information of himself. The readers have to imagine the background, character, and actively participate in making the story. Thus, people will get more afraid of this amorphous penetrator than when all the information is given. Also, lack of information generates the mysterious and horrific atmosphere.

We can find the emotion of the protagonist contributes to making this novel into gothic fiction. At the beginning of the novel, we can find a lot of exclamation marks and interjections such as ‘Ha!’, and ‘Oh’, which mean that he/she is excited. He actually smiled ‘gaily’ in the process. The idea of killing the old man is abnormal, but considering that he is excited, this tells that the man is mad and psychopathic. Next, he doesn’t show much emotion when telling how he dealt with corpse. He is narrating what he did in stable, nonchalant tone. Being indifferent at what he did makes the reader shiver in horror. Lastly, the reader can definitely feel the upsurge of emotion at the end of the story when he hears the heartbeat of the dead man. He acted with audacity, then, becomes impatient. At last, he bursts out, “Dissemble no more! I admit the deed!-tear up the planks!” The sense of guilt verbalized as the heartbeat throbs his mind, and the readers can lively feel that he is afraid of the sense of guilt in his own mind since the emotion which used to be hidden suddenly showed upsurge and exploded at the end of the novel, giving the strong impact to the readers. The emotion was effectively expressed, and got conveyed to the reader, which can mean that this novel has the characteristic of Romanticism.

The expression in the [The Tale Tell Heart] makes this novel more of thriller. Poe describes the sound of heartbeat heard by the protagonist as a sound of ‘watch enveloped in cotton.’ More than description itself, each word is a symbol. A Watch shows time. Thus, the watch enveloped in cotton means killing the time, which leads to an idea of killing the old man who has been living for a long time. Furthermore, the cotton reminds the readers of a bed. Therefore, the watch enveloped, covered in cotton actually means the old man dying under the bed. On top of that, ‘crevice’, used when describing the crack where the dim light comes out of the lantern through is another expression putting an emphasis on desire. The word, ‘Crevice’ is a trigger for the madman to show the evil desire to kill him. Right before the dim light comes out, there’s a silence and no movement in the scene. It is an oppressed situation. However, as soon as the dim string of light appears, the mad man faces the blue vulture-like eye of the old man, starting off the extreme tension which leads to a terrible crime at the end. When the dim light comes out of the lantern through crevice, the abnormal desire to kill the old man shows itself in earnest. This plot’s development maximizes the impact of evil desire. These kinds of expression make the readers feel more thrill while reading the novel.

[The Tell Tale Heart] has certain characteristics of gothic novel in its plot, emotion, and expression. I actually felt shiver and horror reading this novel. There may be more factors of gothic novel in this story, but still [The Tell Tale Heart] is superb piece of gothic fiction dragging the readers into the abyss of horror, thriller, and mysterious story.

Monthly TOEFL essay #1-2 (Bonds and Break)

Nowadays, many people know the custom of other countries due to the development of internet. When I compare well-known customs of other countries, I sometimes feel proud of our own culture. Among them, I believe visiting parents regularly on traditional holidays such as Chuseok, and new year’s day is a custom from my country that I would like the people from other countries to adopt for two reasons. By visiting them, Koreans can meet and develop the stronger bond between their family members, and can have a comforting break time with their family.

To start with, visiting parents regularly on traditional holiday enables us to meet our family members, which is hard in weekdays. These days, Koreans can hardly live with their family members because most of the adults leave their childhood home and live on their own. I know that people from other countries also visit their parents, but it is not an extent that we can call as a ‘custom.’ However, in Korea, visiting parents at least twice a year on traditional holiday is such a strong custom that it is considered as an obligation being a Korean and it causes heavy traffic. Thanks to this custom, Koreans can see their family members whom are usually hard to be seen. It is a boundary which binds the family members including cousins, uncles, aunt under the name of family. Also, we can take care of our parents because we get to see them more often than the people from other countries.

Furthermore, we can have a comforting time with our family members when we visit our parents  regularly on traditional holidays. It is hard to take a break and look back at myself in the busy city life. I think family is the best solution for exhausted mind.  Especially, Korean students in the fierce, intense competition always look forward to Chuseok or new year’s day. In my case, even within 3 weeks in KMLA, I once have wanted my family to comfort me and listen to me. When I met my parents last weekend and talked about the life in KMLA or personal problem, even two days with them were enough to refresh myself and find a way to go. Like this, family members, especially parents, become a comfort by just silently sitting with. Also, they can give us useful piece of advice. When we visit parents on traditional holidays, we talk, eat, and take a nice nap. A student like me can also have a sweet break amid the zealous competition. Although we have to endure heavy traffic if we are to visit our parents on holiday, I believe visiting them will be a fresh energy to everyone who is tired of mundane life.

In short, I recommend other countries to adopt Korean custom of visiting parents on traditional holidays so that we can meet our family members, and have a break time with our parents. No one would deny the significance of family members, especially parents. I believe that there’s nothing time-wasting in visiting parents, and that it is a custom wonderful enough to be adopted to foreign countries if one of our customs are to be. The older we get, the harder we get to visit our parents. I hope less people avoid going to visit their parents on traditional holidays

Weekend in KMLA

My house is really far from KMLA. It's 4 hours from here by car, and all I spend at home is just 24 hours or little more. That's why I don't go home often. There are friends who go to their home every weekend because Seoul is much more closer than Gwangju. But I guess remaining in the dorm is not that bad. Everytime I spend my weekend in KMLA, I feel like being in the heaven. Bright sun, definitely warmer breeze showing that the spring is soon to come, and fresh air coming through the window. Every single moment, I feel KMLA's location is perfect! The problem is all these things drags me away from the books, and make me want to walk along the school or listen to the music. With this headphone, it is a heaven for me. Knowing that I can't is what makes me sad :( Anyway, not bad. Actually GOOD.

PERSONAL NARRATIVE ESSAY #1

PERSONAL NARRATIVE ESSAY #1

 

GLASSES TAUGHT ME

KMLA 18TH WAVE

131031 KIM YESUEL(LILLIAN)

 

It was cloudy. A skinny girl with a long brown hair seemed excited. She was talking to everyone she could get a reach of. Next to her, a relatively small girl was listening to the music with earphones on. Two opposite girls used to be the best friends. At the start of the journey, they still were. But the change we didn’t recognize changed everything.

She and I were the best friends when we were young. In that cloudy day, we were going on a camp to Europe, and were waiting for the Bus to Incheon airport. She and I haven’t seen each other for 3 years since the elementary school, but I couldn’t express the happiness of meeting her properly because she was talking so actively that I didn’t have the space to peak in. She had become more active and extroverted than I remember, and I had grown to be a quiet person, which is different from what she had in her memories. Eventually, when I, with earphones on, and she sat together on the bus, there formed a quiet island around us until 3 hours passed. Then she said, “Umm..Hi! Good to see you again after 3 years,” she checked her watch, “and 3 hour passed.” I just laughed at her humorous comment and started talking.

I thought the camp would be successful and exciting if I had her as a friend. However, she made other friends, and we rarely talked for 5 days of sharing the hotel room. After that, the roommate suddenly changed, and we didn’t have any more conversation until the camp ended. I was angry at her for changing the roommate without asking my opinion. Or perhaps, it was just immature jealousy of her being closer to other friends than me.

It was last year that we met again at the school as classmate. She and I managed to be friends to chat with, but neither she nor I reproached the ‘camp story.’ One year passed, and it was last December when everything was over and we sat together in class. During a P.E class, studying math in classroom instead of going to the cold gym, that ‘camp matter’ popped out of my memory. “Hey, you remember that camp 2 years ago, right?” I asked her indifferently, keep writing math formula. Her reaction was different from what I expected. She showed a disturbed look as if she was stabbed in the almost-healed scar. She said, “You didn’t say sorry after breaking my glasses! I was disappointed at you.” Astonished at the story I first heard, I went through the memory 2 years ago, and remembered that she was wearing contact lenses from the 6th day of the camp. She was thinking that it was me who broke her glasses, and it triggered her to be farther from me.

She and I were feeling the gap of the memory and the reality when we met at the camp. I still think that gap was the problem. But, if I had not been afraid of being closer with people, if I had expressed my emotion more, and talked about the certain changes more, I could have been closer with people, and had more exciting journey. Sometimes I feel so desperate to make friends or talk to somebody, or annoyed at myself because of introverted personality. But I think I can overcome it because of the experience at camp. I realized that the way I face people were wrong, and now I know that I have to change the way. Now, I thank that ‘camp matter’ which taught me important lesson. Express yourself.