At 17, I had no idea where I would spend the next four years of my life. My mother was certain that it would be Penn. As I sat at our dining table, attempting to construct a college list that felt true to me, she spun tales of ivy-covered — and colored — buildings. The thought was uncomfortable and even mildly revolting. I often joke that my mother knows me better than I know myself. Nine months later, I was stepping into Hill College House with a purple suitcase and her promise echoing in my head that college would change me for the better.
My first couple of months at Penn felt like a series of cascading failures. The homesickness was debilitating, and I constantly wondered if I had made the right decision to travel over 23 hours for college. I was drowning in dense readings, late-night fire alarms, and a deep awareness of my own incompetence. When every person living on my floor left for Thanksgiving and I stayed sitting in my shoebox-sized dorm with nothing but my own thoughts, the distance was most palpable. I had become complacent with loneliness. My grandmother used to say, “This too shall pass,” and it was my internal repetition of this mantra that made life bearable.
By sophomore year, it had. I joined a sorority and forged a community of compassionate, intelligent women who reminded me who I was and where I’d come from. The sense of comfort that this group afforded me felt emblematic of what I was missing most from Singapore. Touching down in Philadelphia for my third semester felt like a homecoming, albeit one with its fair share of odd-hour Slack messages, Gradescope autograder failures, and Van Pelt-Dietrich Library all-nighters. Nothing was easy, but everything was rewarding.
Writing for The Daily Pennsylvanian taught me that I had a voice worth using — a revelation that was terrifying and liberating all at once. I grew accustomed to my professors stopping me to say that they’d read my articles and strangers recognizing me from pieces that I’d written. I learned to stomach nasty emails and my full name plastered on Sidechat. Each response, both positive and negative, helped me discover that there was little I loved more than speaking with the knowledge that someone was listening.
For that reason, I became a tour guide. Before I applied to Kite and Key, a friend joked that regularly giving tours had brainwashed her into loving Penn; almost three years later, I, too, have taken a sip of the red and blue Kool-Aid. Verbalizing my gratitude for the University to starry-eyed high schoolers each week has made the monotony and occasional gloom of college life feel insignificant. With each round of applause after a tour or declaration that a student has chosen Penn because of me, I was reminded of what my mother saw in both me and the University all those years ago.
Penn exposed me to paradoxes that have come to define my college experience. Writing Opinion pieces for the DP and being a tour guide, I regularly criticize the University in one breath and praise it in the next. Traveling from Singapore to college, I have found home at 40th and Walnut streets and on the other side of a phone. I came to Penn unsure of who I was, and now I leave unsure of who I will be without it.
Here, I have known loneliness and hostility and every other negative emotion out there. This campus has borne witness to my lowest lows and, in many ways, has contributed to them. It has seen my sleepless nights and relentless fear of inadequacy. It has watched me walk home in tears from CIS office hours, develop a grueling caffeine addiction, and discover firsthand that rock bottom has a basement.
But because of Penn, I have encountered people who have indeed changed me for the better. As I reflect on my four years, I am most grateful for them: my random first-year roommate who feels like home even when I am 10,000 miles away; the teaching assistants who sat patiently beside me, teaching me Java in my first CIS class; the Claudia Cohen Hall custodian who still remembers my name and asks about my day each time I see him; my senior thesis advisor who has openly shared his passions for cognitive science and in doing so, renewed mine; and my housemates who knock on my bedroom door at odd hours to sit on my floor and chat. At 17, I had not yet met all of the people that I would befriend, learn from, teach, laugh, cry, and argue with. That rings true even today.
In a few weeks, this too shall pass. The privilege of being surrounded by bright minds and charming Philadelphia. A whirlwind and a dream of a college experience. Four years ago, I arrived on campus with nothing but someone else’s certainty. Now, I leave with the confidence to embrace the many unknowns ahead. My mother was right to believe in Penn. I’m beginning to believe in the person it made me become.
SANGITHA AIYER is a College senior studying cognitive science from Singapore. She served as Editorial Board chair on the 140th Internal Board of The Daily Pennsylvanian. Previously, she served as a deputy Opinion editor. Her email is saiyer@sas.upenn.edu.
