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The “Grandma’s Kimchi” College Essay

20 August 2024

Every Saturday morning, I’d awaken to the smell of crushed garlic and piquant pepper. I would stumble into the kitchen to find my grandma squatting over a large silver bowl, mixing fat lips of fresh cabbages with garlic, salt, and red pepper. That was how the delectable Korean dish, kimchi, was born every weekend at my home.

My grandma’s specialty always dominated the dinner table as kimchi filled every plate. And like my grandma who had always been living with us, it seemed as though the luscious smell of garlic would never leave our home. But even the prided recipe was defenseless against the ravages of Alzheimer’s that inflicted my grandma’s mind.

Dementia slowly fed on her memories until she became as blank as a brand-new notebook. The ritualistic rigor of Saturday mornings came to a pause, and during dinner, the artificial taste of vacuum-packaged factory kimchi only emphasized the absence of the family tradition. I would look at her and ask, “Grandma, what’s my name?” But she would stare back at me with a clueless expression. Within a year of diagnosis, she lived with us like a total stranger.

Related: The “Figuring Out What Really Mattered Challenge” College Essay

One day, my mom brought home fresh cabbages and red pepper sauce. She brought out the old silver bowl and poured out the cabbages, smothering them with garlic and salt and pepper. The familiar tangy smell tingled my nose. Gingerly, my grandma stood up from the couch in the living room, and as if lured by the smell, sat by the silver bowl and dug her hands into the spiced cabbages. As her bony hands shredded the green lips, a look of determination grew on her face. Though her withered hands no longer displayed the swiftness and precision they once did, her face showed the aged rigor of a professional. For the first time in years, the smell of garlic filled the air and the rattling of the silver bowl resonated throughout the house.

That night, we ate kimchi. It wasn’t perfect; the cabbages were clumsily cut and the garlic was a little too strong. But kimchi had never tasted better. I still remember my grandma putting a piece in my mouth and saying, “Here, Dong Jin. Try it, my boy.”

Seeing grandma again this summer, that moment of clarity seemed ephemeral. Her disheveled hair and expressionless face told of the aggressive development of her illness.

Read also: How to write a good research paper 

But holding her hands, looking into her eyes, I could still smell that garlic. The moments of Saturday mornings remain ingrained in my mind. Grandma was an artist who painted the cabbages with strokes of red pepper. Like the sweet taste of kimchi, I hope to capture those memories in my keystrokes as I type away these words.

A piece of writing is more than just a piece of writing. It evokes. It inspires. It captures what time takes away.

My grandma used to say: “Tigers leave furs when they die, humans leave their names.” Her legacy was the smell of garlic that lingered around my house. Mine will be these words.

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515: Inside the Application Part 1: Brainstorming, Outlining, and Drafting with Cassidy, HS Senior

Today’s episode kicks off a new series, Inside the Application. Ethan is joined by Cassidy, a current high school senior who is working on her college applications for the Fall 2025 term. Ethan and Cassidy will be walking step-by-step through the college application process as it unfolds this school year. In episode 1, they get into: 

• How did Cassidy approach brainstorming and outlining for her personal statement? 
• What brainstorming activities helped Cassidy pick her topic?
• Cassidy’s first draft of her personal statement 
• Ethan’s suggestions for revision 

This series will also be different in that, normally, we share episodes-in-a-series consecutively. For these, we’re releasing them pretty much as we record them, so you’ll notice them interspersed among other topics we’ll be covering. 

Stay tuned for future episodes where Ethan and Cassidy continue the conversation! They’ll revisit her personal statement, talk about supplemental essays, go over how Cassidy developed her college list, and even talk a little bit about the activities list and the additional information section. We’ll continue to check in with Cassidy to see how things are going, and you’ll find out how it turned out a few months from now.

Cassidy is a current high school student going through the college application process. She lives in the Bay Area, loves ballet, knows a lot about Biology, and identifies as a “yapper”—more on that in our conversation. 

We hope you enjoy! 

Play-by-play:

• 3:27 - Cassidy’s social identities
• 4:29 - Cassidy’s values
• 7:05 - Cassidy’s superpower
• 8:12 - Cassidy’s islands of personality
• 8:40 - What were some of the topics Cassidy considered for her essay?
• 13:51 - Cassidy walks through her essay outline and examples
• 16:01 - How did outlining make things easier for Cassidy? 
• 18:48 - Cassidy reads the first draft of her personal statement 
• 22:42 - Cassidy shares her thoughts on her draft
• 26:04 - Ethan gives feedback 
• 39:18 - Ethan shares suggestions for the next draft 
• 41:52 - Closing thoughts  
• Cassidy’s brainstorming and first draft
• College Essay Guy’s Personal Statement Resources
• College Essay Guy’s College Application Hub

Information

• Show The College Essay Guy Podcast: A Practical Guide to College Admissions
• Frequency Updated Biweekly
• Published August 20, 2024 at 4:00 PM UTC
• Length 44 min
• Rating Clean

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The College Essay Guy Podcast: A Practical Guide to College Admissions

515: inside the application part 1: brainstorming, outlining, and drafting with cassidy, hs senior.

• All Episodes

Aug 20, 2024

Today’s episode kicks off a new series, Inside the Application. Ethan is joined by Cassidy, a current high school senior who is working on her college applications for the Fall 2025 term. Ethan and Cassidy will be walking step-by-step through the college application process as it unfolds this school year. In episode 1, they get into: 

• How did Cassidy approach brainstorming and outlining for her personal statement? 
• What brainstorming activities helped Cassidy pick her topic?
• Cassidy’s first draft of her personal statement 
• Ethan’s suggestions for revision 

This series will also be different in that, normally, we share episodes-in-a-series consecutively. For these, we’re releasing them pretty much as we record them, so you’ll notice them interspersed among other topics we’ll be covering. 

Stay tuned for future episodes where Ethan and Cassidy continue the conversation! They’ll revisit her personal statement, talk about supplemental essays, go over how Cassidy developed her college list, and even talk a little bit about the activities list and the additional information section. We’ll continue to check in with Cassidy to see how things are going, and you’ll find out how it turned out a few months from now.

Cassidy is a current high school student going through the college application process. She lives in the Bay Area, loves ballet, knows a lot about Biology, and identifies as a “yapper”—more on that in our conversation. 

We hope you enjoy! 

Play-by-play: 

• 3:27 - Cassidy’s social identities
• 4:29 - Cassidy’s values
• 7:05 - Cassidy’s superpower
• 8:12 - Cassidy’s islands of personality
• 8:40 - What were some of the topics Cassidy considered for her essay?
• 13:51 - Cassidy walks through her essay outline and examples
• 16:01 - How did outlining make things easier for Cassidy? 
• 18:48 - Cassidy reads the first draft of her personal statement 
• 22:42 - Cassidy shares her thoughts on her draft
• 26:04 - Ethan gives feedback 
• 39:18 - Ethan shares suggestions for the next draft 
• 41:52 - Closing thoughts  
• Cassidy’s brainstorming and first draft
• College Essay Guy’s Personal Statement Resources
• College Essay Guy’s College Application Hub

About the Podcast

Practical, up-to-date interviews with experts in college admissions, financial aid, personal statements, test prep and more. Ethan Sawyer (aka College Essay Guy), interviews deans of admission, financial aid experts, and veterans of the admissions field to extract, then distill their advice into practical steps for students and those guiding them through the process. From creating an awesome college list to appealing a financial aid letter, Ethan skips the general advice and gets right to the action items, all in an effort to bring more ease, joy and purpose into the college admissions process.

Calculate for all schools

Your chance of acceptance, your chancing factors, extracurriculars, standout common app essay examples.

Hi everyone! Can you recommend some sample college essays from students who got into top schools using the Common App? I want to see what worked for others, so I can get a better idea of how to approach my own essays.

Of course! It's always helpful to read successful essays to get a better sense of what colleges are looking for. Here are a few examples of standout Common App essays that worked for students who got into top schools:

1. "The Costco Essay": This essay, written by Brittany Stinson, went viral after she was accepted to five Ivy League schools. The essay talks about her experiences wandering through Costco with her mother. The unique angle she takes and the engaging narrative she creates not only entertains the reader, but also demonstrates her thoughtfulness, curiosity, and ability to make connections between seemingly unrelated experiences.

Link: https://www.businessinsider.com/high-school-senior-who-got-into-5-ivy-league-schools-shares-her-admissions-essay-2016-4

2. "Grandma's Kimchi": This essay, by an anonymous student, was published by The New York Times and showcases how food, specifically kimchi, played a significant role in the author's personal and cultural identity. The vivid descriptions and the connections made between food and family provide a unique perspective on the author's background and values.

Link: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/04/your-money/writing-college-application-essays.html

3. "Learning to Play the Piano": This essay tells the story of a student (Ethan Sawyer) who, despite his lack of natural talent for playing the piano, perseveres through countless hours of practice, ultimately proving that dedication and hard work pay off. The essay is filled with humor and charm while masterfully conveying the importance of perseverance and consistent effort.

Link: https://www.collegeessayguy.com/blog/college-essay-examples

Remember that while these essays worked for their respective authors, you should use them as inspiration, not imitation. Your own essay should still reflect your unique experiences, voice, and perspective. Read through these samples, analyze the storytelling techniques used, and think about how you can showcase your individuality in your own essay.

4. Additionally, CollegeVine has an entire section of their blog dedicated to college essay guides and this post has 21 essays you can read for inspiration that answer each of the 7 Common App prompts.

https://blog.collegevine.com/common-app-essay-examples

About CollegeVine’s Expert FAQ

CollegeVine’s Q&A seeks to offer informed perspectives on commonly asked admissions questions. Every answer is refined and validated by our team of admissions experts to ensure it resonates with trusted knowledge in the field.

Example Personal Statement: “Grandma’s Kimchi”

The following is a real college application essay. We are using it with the writer’s permission.

Every Saturday morning, I’d awaken to the smell of crushed garlic and piquant pepper. I would stumble into the kitchen to find my grandma squatting over a large silver bowl, mixing fat lips of fresh cabbages with garlic, salt, and red pepper. That was how the delectable Korean dish, kimchi, was born every weekend at my home.

My grandma’s specialty always dominated the dinner table as kimchi filled every plate. And like my grandma who had always been living with us, it seemed as though the luscious smell of garlic would never leave our home. But even the prided recipe was defenseless against the ravages of Alzheimer’s that inflicted my grandma’s mind.

Dementia slowly fed on her memories until she became as blank as a brand-new notebook. The ritualistic rigor of Saturday mornings came to a pause, and during dinner, the artificial taste of vacuum-packaged factory kimchi only emphasized the absence of the family tradition. I would look at her and ask, “Grandma, what’s my name?” But she would stare back at me with a clueless expression. Within a year of diagnosis, she lived with us like a total stranger.

One day, my mom brought home fresh cabbages and red pepper sauce. She brought out the old silver bowl and poured out the cabbages, smothering them with garlic and salt and pepper. The familiar tangy smell tingled my nose. Gingerly, my grandma stood up from the couch in the living room, and as if lured by the smell, sat by the silver bowl and dug her hands into the spiced cabbages. As her bony hands shredded the green lips, a look of determination grew on her face. Though her withered hands no longer displayed the swiftness and precision they once did, her face showed the aged rigor of a professional. For the first time in years, the smell of garlic filled the air and the rattling of the silver bowl resonated throughout the house.

That night, we ate kimchi. It wasn’t perfect; the cabbages were clumsily cut and the garlic was a little too strong. But kimchi had never tasted better. I still remember my grandma putting a piece in my mouth and saying, “Here, Dong Jin. Try it, my boy.”

Seeing grandma again this summer, that moment of clarity seemed ephemeral. Her disheveled hair and expressionless face told of the aggressive development of her illness.

But holding her hands, looking into her eyes, I could still smell that garlic. The moments of Saturday mornings remain ingrained in my mind. Grandma was an artist who painted the cabbages with strokes of red pepper. Like the sweet taste of kimchi, I hope to capture those memories in my keystrokes as I type away these words.

A piece of writing is more than just a piece of writing. It evokes. It inspires. It captures what time takes away.

My grandma used to say: “Tigers leave furs when they die, humans leave their names.” Her legacy was the smell of garlic that lingered around my house. Mine will be these words.

- via collegeessayguy

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Yale Daily News

PERSONAL ESSAY: Kimchi

Guest Columnist

Victor Serapiglia Cioffi

2019 was the year that I lost myself in an avalanche of intimacy. I didn’t know a heart was capable of expanding so much, of displacing ribs and lungs as it inflated, of taking up so much space that my breath caught in my throat and my chest ached with joys previously unknown. The feeling of falling in love is such a terrifyingly beautiful experience because it is quite literally “falling” — your heart is radiating with so much warmth that you feel astral, a celestial body hurtling, falling through space as it is bursting with joy. It is a feeling of losing control, of giving yourself wholly to another, of cracking open at the core like Dora Maar in a cubist painting to reveal all of your inner secrets and insecurities. You relish in your power, bask in your vulnerability, cherish being a muse fueling someone else’s desire. You levitate, and you recognize for a moment that love is that gravitational force that is keeping you in free fall, flying, holding your pieces suspended. 2019 was also the year when we fell apart — lost love always leaves a mark. ///

In April of last year, my heart contracted so forcefully that I was sure its rhythmic tambourine must have been audible in California reverberating off the gray bricks in New Haven, a seismic vibration, a sound that reminded me of my vitality and how necessary love is to being alive and connected to the rhythms of the earth, an earthquake that magnified the echoes of my desire buried deep in my soul and hidden in the recesses of my spine. My toes barely touched the ground in May as I folded myself in our quiet pretzel of an embrace, two celestial bodies that had the luck to gravitate together long enough to share an orbit. I finally understood what e.e. cummings meant when he wrote, “i want / no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true) / and it’s you are whatever a moon has always meant / and whatever a sun will always sing is you … this is the wonder that’s keeping the stars apart / i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart).” The weight of carrying another’s heart in yours is not burdensome, but beautiful; not heavy but light. It is not an assignment, but a privilege. Every date was a revelation of intimacy, every touch a million years of joy condensed in two clasped hands, stress and fears forgotten in a kiss, almost a year of museum visits and Korean fried chicken, of walking together in the rain and getting ice cream, of simple gifts and gentle joys, of waking up in each other’s arms, of laughter and losing track of time falling together at once. I remember the gray scarf you wore the night we met, our first kiss across from Rudy’s — do you remember that night? — the faint pine scent of your cologne that reminded me of forests, of making pizzas in your oven, the burrata cheese charred, stuck to the bottom of the pan. I wrote “I love you” in Hangul again and again, trying to copy the curled Korean script that would bring me closer to you, bring me closer to being understood, to understanding. “I love you, I love you, 사랑해.” /// 

For a moment, I allowed myself to think, “This might be the one,” a thought that passed fleetingly but just long enough to give me a glimpse of a future that looked so inviting, so comfortable, filled with laughter and children, gallery openings, parades of memories not yet made, full of promise. Just a smile was enough to make my knees tremble — I would have built a ladder to the moon with seashells just to see that smile looking back at me every day. I would have lassoed the sun just to have you. Love is all-consuming. Love is foolish, violent sometimes. Love is the best thing to happen to any of us. ///

2019 was also the year that this relationship ended, unexpectedly and without warning; no cracks appeared before it ruptured. But perhaps the warning signs were there, perhaps I hadn’t noticed because I made excuses for all of the red flags: a forgotten date, unanswered texts, a coldness that I couldn’t quite place. He’d said he was depressed, busy — but only too busy for me. Once when we were walking I’d asked him if he was depressed about our relationship and he paused, sighing deeply. His silence said so much, and not enough. Little insecurities snowballed: We fought and he left, leaving everything unresolved. With its end, my heart imploded. A grenade splintered my chest into tiny pieces of shrapnel that I am still searching for beneath the couch cushions, sweeping up in the corners of the room, finding buried under piles of laundry. Some pieces I haven’t found yet, and some I think I might never find; but I have improvised. Just like kintsugi, the centuries-old art of repairing broken pottery with gold in Japan, I have begun reassembling my self-esteem and my broken heart piece by piece. Instead of with gold, I have been repairing my heart with hope for the future, filling it with other things that bring me joy. I bought myself flowers and used some of the petals to shore up the holes. I baked a cake and used some of the dough to smooth over the ridges of the open wound. I lit candles and poured the hot wax into the open grooves, letting it gently seep into the emptiness. I adopted an abandoned sock I found behind the dryer, thinking to myself that it probably felt just as orphaned and lonely as I did. It has been eight months, and still the holes remain. I will fill these holes completely someday, but I know the silhouette of the scar will always remain. I am comforted by this, knowing that while the soul will heal, lost love always leaves its mark. At least I am tattooed with a reminder of what was, of us. Loss is never forgotten, and while people might never move on, they certainly move forward. ///

Carousels of uncertainty cycle through my mind with all of the possible outcomes that could have caused things to go differently. Did I listen closely enough? Was I supportive enough? Did cultural differences get in the way? Why did you say those hurtful things and not apologize for them? Why didn’t you prioritize me more? Why did you ask for a break? Did I overreact? Sometimes I imagine myself in another dimension in which the plot had gone differently — where would we be now? More importantly, who would we be now? I still have so many questions left unanswered. I tried to apologize, to make things right. Love is the opposite of cowardice. It takes courage, intention. It takes grit and patience. Love is the most radical thing you can do. ///

September was a month that I remember only vaguely. I spent most of it in bed, skipped most of my classes, wore the same shirt for a week (a shirt that you wore once), wrote so many journal pages and used so many tissues to dry my eyes that I’m sure I was singularly responsible for deforesting a 10,000-acre swath of trees in the Peruvian Amazon. September was a month of hot showers and scalding broths, of shots of whiskey, of fried comfort foods dripping with grease, and anxiety meds. There is a permanent U-shaped imprint in the couch from how often I sat there, curled up, immobilized by grief, an indent like those made in Pompei after Vesuvius erupted and froze everything in ash, like the you-shaped imprint in my heart that still has not been filled. I went to church, then I stopped. I bought new clothes to disguise myself from myself. I took up odd hobbies: learning Portuguese, reading about breeding cats, looking up the capital cities of countries that I would never visit. I bought a piano and sent it back because the pedals stuck and made everything legato and sad. I read Anaïs Nin, Abdellah Taïa, Matthew Lopez, Eileen Myles. I joined a gamelan ensemble so that I could take time out of my week to wield a heavy wooden mallet, venting my stress by pounding out loud chaotic melodies that — at least for a moment — broke the serpentine, cyclical thoughts of grief and regret that consumed me. I took up running, trying to outrace my insecurities and my racing thoughts. ///

I cried in libraries, the back of taxis, in bathroom stalls, at movie theaters. I cried in parks in front of children on swings, at choir rehearsals as we sang about God, in front of therapists, into chai tea lattes. The wet trails I left behind formed streams that united me with rivers of the most basic human emotion: loss. I talked to strangers about my ex who nodded knowingly. “Do you know the American graphic designer David Reinfurt?” I would say. “No,” they’d say, uninterested. “I don’t either,” I’d say, telling them that I couldn’t make myself read about him because it reminded me too much of my ex, one of the most talented graphic designers I’d ever met. I deleted podcasts about design, removed photos of Chandigarh chairs from my wall, threw away a book of photographs of us you’d made me for my birthday — a monument of intimacy — but then quickly retrieved it because I couldn’t bear to part with it, tried not to think about things that made me think of us or that made me think at all. Thinking was the enemy of progress. Thinking was progress. But progress was grieving. And grieving was pain. ///

I cried when I saw people laughing, or hugging; I felt personally attacked seeing people kissing. “Get a life!” I’d think, bitter that it wasn’t us, but then ashamed that I’d thought something so angry about something so pure. I cried once when I saw a dog shitting because it was making a face that I’m sure looked just as vulnerable and desperate as I thought mine did, just as ashamed as the world watched, its legs shaking just like mine did when I saw my ex in public. I laughed, tears streaming down my face, realizing how pathetic it looked, and how pathetic I felt. I blamed myself. I blamed you. I blamed no one. I cried when I heard K-pop songs, or passed places we used to go out together to eat, when Facebook recommended mutual friends, when I went to the Whitney in New York because that’s what we would have done together if we had lasted. I thought of the trips we would have made to the Glass House and Fallingwater, the hikes in Vermont, all of the things I wanted to say but didn’t or couldn’t. I couldn’t walk past certain roads. And when I did, I walked quickly, pretending to talk on the phone; I tried to distract myself, but my eyes would invariably wander hungrily up the marble stairs to the place where I once waited outside the art school, the place where you once stood waiting for me. ///

I gained 10 pounds, then lost 5, then gained 10 more pounds. Then I stopped counting. I would wake up at 4:00 a.m. and think about the time I shoved half an orange in my mouth, juice dripping down my chin, just to make you laugh, or your gentle rising and falling breaths as you slept, or the gentle plucking of your guitar’s strings distorted by distance as you serenaded me over video call 10,000 miles away. Or the time we rented a villa in Bali and sat by the pool, listening to the cicadas and looking up at the stars. I cried in front of my roommate once because I forgot my ex’s favorite color. “How could I have forgotten?” I yelled as tears rolled down my cheeks, blaming myself for everything and anything, thinking that this one forgotten detail was responsible for the downfall of my world. You remembered mine: teal like the ocean, a color of violence and tranquility, a contradiction. My roommate offered me a tissue, holding me as I howled, his arms keeping me from spilling out entirely. Sometimes I stared at myself in the mirror and belted Survivor’s “Eye of the Tiger,” roaring and clawing desperately in the air, taking pleasure in how ridiculous I was; other times I would just stand there staring at myself quietly, naked, telling myself that I was enough even when I wasn’t sure. Sometimes I would call friends just to listen to them eat, having nothing to say but enjoying the simple fact that although the hole in my chest that formerly held my heart was empty, at least their bellies were full. “Are those Cheetos?” I asked once, fascinated by the sound teeth made through those cheesy, crunchy clouds. But fullness of any sort made my emptiness seem all the more chasmic. Sometimes I talked about emptiness, too. Often I said the same things over and over again, cyclically, and tried to rationalize an ending that seemed to have taken place far too soon, that seemed impossible and unfair, an ending that was avoidable if we had only talked. I read through old texts, looked at old photos, then texted my ex, then tried to stop. Then texted again. Your silence told me everything I needed to know. But love is impulsive and irrational, and it is slow to forget. ///

There are places I can no longer go, concerts I can no longer attend, people I can no longer see, foods I can no longer eat. Not yet at least. Kimchi is one of the foods I can’t eat. It smells of the past, pungent. It smells of a past that I can no longer return to no matter how hard I try. Perhaps just like kimchi, the past should be buried, at least for now. Unearthed later, fermented, only when it is ready to be eaten. ///