Personal Statement
Connecting the dots
It started before the death of our father. My brother was a graduating student and had been planning to go to university abroad. However, it wasn't all romantic. My brother lost his dream of studying abroad when our father passed away. He felt very strongly that he should give me a father figure to teach me things a father could, he became like a father to a 2-year-old me.
Despite a tight schedule and difficulties with money, my mother and brother did everything to make sure I didn't feel like an orphan. They thought extracurriculars and sports were something good to take my mind off.
While swimming, as the water got in my nose, I felt that water didn't hold me and I'd drown. I huddled gripping by the pool. My swimming practice turned into fighting the coach's stick that was effortlessly trying to put me in the water. In further quest of activities, I naively chose soccer. Broke my arm on the first day. Was it a coincidence? Not so sure.
Nothing appealed to me until the day I saw a tall basketball player in my yard. He was elevating in the air gracefully, almost as if he could fly. Since the first time I took the ball in my hands I knew it was meant to be my thing. Basketball court lit up a fire within me that later on would become indelible from my truest self. When I played my head was empty. I didn't think about anything: there was only me and the court. I listened to my heart and desire, trusting that it would all work out OK. I didn't even notice how I became champion of the city, Kazakhstan, and later EuroLeague. At the medal podium, when the microphone started trying to spell my name with difficulty, I didn't expect that my name would be pronounced, my heart beat faster at the thought it was calling me, my name, not somebody else’s name. This was one of the best moments - I got my first award, the award of the best defender. From a whining and complaining weak boy in a second roster, I became a proactive captain chosen and acknowledged by the team.
I loved it. And much of what I stumbled into by following my curiosity and passion turned out to be priceless.
None of this had even a hope of any practical application in my life. I was told basketball is not a “true career”, but as dull as it might sound, luck and destiny had decided otherwise. I stumbled upon a just-released documentary about the first Kazakh NCAA player. It gave me hope to study in the USA and keep playing basketball. It was a sign on the road saying to keep going. When everyone told me that my passion for basketball was dragging me nowhere, now it helps me get into college.
It was luck. But I believe in luck. And I believe in gut, destiny, life, karma, and most importantly in myself, who brought it all to reality. I just had to believe that the dots would somehow connect in the future, and they did. Fulfilling my dream, I realize that I also fulfilled my brother's dream yet in my way: resisting all of the noise around and listening to my heart. Having accidentally passed the torch of lost hope, I want to be a bridge that connects the threads of dreams just like my brother subconsciously did for me.
