my oxford origin story
Yesterday, my family dropped me off for my flight to London. In a few weeks, I’ll start my MBA at the University of Oxford!
When I lived at home during the pandemic last year, I spent the evenings studying for the GMAT, devouring MBA brochures, struggling through essays, and doubting any possibility of getting in anywhere. On GMAT test day, my parents hugged me and told me to do my best. As I pulled out of the driveway, I spotted them in the window. My throat caught as I watched them smile and wave until I drove out of sight.
One Saturday, we took a day trip to the town we lived in when I was a baby. I brought my GMAT book and studied the geometry of triangles on the drive. After two hours, we arrived at the sign that read “Welcome to Trappe.” My mom laughed and said: “This place really was a trap.”
My parents met in China at 21. My dad stole my mom from her college boyfriend. At 23, my dad came to Florida on a student visa, and after a year of exchanging love letters, my mom joined him. After school, they moved to this tiny town in Maryland of just over 900, where they’d have to drive two hours for any Chinese food that reminded them of home. My dad worked all the time. My mom had no friends, only two needy babies.
We drove by our old townhouse, a simple yellow structure with a patch of lawn. Then onto the nearby town of Oxford, Maryland, where we stopped to walk through the park. The short path led to a coastline of sand, rock and grass. Two baby swings faced out to the bay. I learned that they took me to this little park in Oxford when I was 3 months old.
27 years later, I landed in Heathrow to attend the University of Oxford. As I hauled my suitcases and called my Uber, I thought of my parents coming to America. I took in the gray skies on the ride into London and tried to grasp the enormity of building a life in a new country. It struck me that I have the privilege of their sacrifices. How their bravery in an unknown place made the world a little less scary, so I can follow my own dreams — wherever they take me.
