Note: This story contains references to content that may be triggering for those who have experienced trauma or are sensitive to topics concerning sexual violence, self-harm or mental illness. With...

Why did I apply to 25 colleges, in spite of popular advice and appreciation for my sanity? Besides competitive admissions for my major and uncertainty about my strength among the applicant field, I disregarded...

My story started in a city North of New York City called Poughkeepsie. The concept of diversity there was so foreign that a local news reporter featured me and my friend for wearing traditional Indian...

Screeching songs about jingle bells, throwing tinsel on trees, hastily wrapping last-minute gifts and baking box double-chocolate brownies for a fat white man and his fat reindeer — while my phony Christmas-infused...

It was a question that my parents had asked and one I had asked myself countless times during the summer before high school. I had quit nearly all my extracurricular activities, so as I entered high school,...

The streets of San Jose, Calif. were deserted on a stormy night in 1997 when Seetha and Sankara Sarma arrived at the lobby of Motel 6, drenched and holding a 5-year-old child in their arms. My parents...

In a second grade classroom, as winter rain darkened the window, my 7-year-old self sat at her desk and thought about how one day, she might not be Lillian Fu anymore. She would have some other last name,...

I always remind myself, “Fake it ‘till you make it.” But I’m no actress. I’ve been fighting my introversion for years, trying to pretend that I’m an outgoing, charismatic person who is comfortable...

Five young Guatemalan girls clamored around me with sweet smiles on their faces, reaching for my hands and rushing me over to the shade under a nearby tree.  “Jugar con nosotros?” Maria asked eagerly...

It is one of life’s greatest travesties that so much of our childhoods are spent dreaming and agonizing over what adulthood will be like. As an almost-high school graduate on the cusp of turning 18,...

An Oxford comma is the comma used after the penultimate item in a list of three or more items. Some argue that it’s unnecessary. I strongly disagree. Each Oxford comma I write is inevitably accompanied...

“What’s your name?” the Starbucks employee asks. “Ann,” I say, as she hastily scribbles it onto a plastic cup.  But my name isn’t Ann, it’s Anwen. Yet I find myself assuming this identity...