My Triumphant Emerge

October 14, 2004 12.57 AM ¡°Dear Haemi, It is my pleasure to inform you that we have received your application and that you have been granted provisional admission to Cal State L.A. for the Winter Quarter 2005!¡± I am normally a very verbal person. I talk a lot. I write a lot. I¡¯m not stingy when it comes to words. So it is very hard for me, right now, to work with this moment. I need to use some sorts of words to describe what exactly is happening and report how I am feeling, but no words. Absolutely no words. Allow me to regain my composure. The above, quoted lines, are the actual line from a letter I received this evening. It outlines the requirements of this ¡°provisional¡± admission, and to comply isn¡¯t difficult at all ? piece of cake! And it has sent me the instructions on how to register for my Winter classes. I read it over and over and over and over. They couldn¡¯t be sending me instructions on how to register for classes if they weren¡¯t serious? I kept reading it over and over, to find some detail that would be the usual ¡°let down¡± such as, ¡°April Fools!¡± or ¡°you must be a U.S. resident to apply¡± or ¡°we thought your GPA sucked.¡± There was no buts. It wasn¡¯t one of those, ¡°close but no cigars¡± moment. It was a full on, smoke your cigars until your lungs turn black sort of a thing! (So to speak) My attempts to get into a nursing program starts, coincidentally, with the birth of this blog. This blog was started about the same time I had started the application process for nursing programs, after I had finished the prerequisites. So you know, if you¡¯ve been reading all this time, or even just a month or two, that I have been living with frustration and turmoil every step of the way, with every rejection. Although I am not a professional writer, I understand when some of the writer bloggers (Tinka, Zarina) write about the rejections of their manuscripts. Because I, too, was rejected. Multiple times. And now my day has come. I have been accepted. I am approved. I am wanted. Some of you who are new to my blog may think, ¡°what¡¯s the big deal about CSULA? It¡¯s not Harvard, and most certainly nothing close to UCLA ? the standard for accepting students are minimal.¡± Lemme ¡®splain. It took me TWO FRIGGIN¡¯ YEARS to get into one single nursing program in the LA County area. All the Cal State Universities I had applied to, other than CSULA, has sent back my apps because their nursing program is impacted and currently not accepting international students. Because I am a foreign national, an international student, admissions offices have slammed the door in my face without even glancing at my application. So after TWO FRIGGIN¡¯ YEARS, I am finally here. It means a lot to be here. Nursing programs are generally two years, two and half at most. Since CSULA is a 4-year institution, it means I will not only finish the nursing program and be eligible for a RN license (upon passing the NCLEX-RN, of course), I will be a college graduate. With a Bachelor of Science degree in hand. Getting in, it seems, is the hardest part. I have no doubt that I still have many hours of studying and toiling to do, but I have won HALF THE BATTLE. As soon as those two years are up, I will have graduated, with jobs lined up, and I will most certainly find a sponsor, and I will start my process to becoming a U.S. Resident. A Permanent Resident. Not Temporary Alien. Perhaps I can even vote in the 2012 election. At least, the 2016 definitely! How grand! Tonight the internet is not working again, so I am typing this into a word processor. I will have to publish it tomorrow or whenever this DSL crap decides to work again -- but no worries. Nothing can ruin this moment for me. N-O-T-H-I-N-G. Not a single damned thing.