Two Personal Essays

I should perhaps say something about my background and long-term personal goals, and how they relate to the Getty Internship opportunity. "Cultural diversity" has become a popular catch-phrase in the past few years. Growing up, I seldom thought about cultural diversity, any more than a fish thinks about water, because of my background. My father is Bahamian, and my mother is part Latina and part African-American; consequently, I could scarcely escape cultural diversity in my home and family. I regard myself as exceptionally fortunate in having had such a varied background, and in having been exposed to so wide a range of experiences from childhood on. My family lived in the Bahamas for a number of years while I was growing up, and I enjoyed the unusual experience of representing the Bahamas in the Miss Islands of the World contest.

Since moving to Southern California, I have had the opportunity to be exposed to much of the life of the region. I have done clerical work for the First A.M.E. Church in Los Angeles, and worked for Operation Hope, part of RLA (Rebuild Los Angeles) during 1992-93. I

. . .
ar from the arrival gate. The cross-fertilization of cultures that is greater Los Angeles holds forth the potential of a Renaissance far richer than any in the past. Yet all who live there, or who even watch television news, know that Los Angeles is also a troubled city. In the past two years it has seemingly been visited by all four horsemen of the modern Apocalypse: Catastrophic fires, floods, earthquake, and above all the urban uprising of 1992. If diversity can breed opportunity and the cross-fertilization of cultures, it can also breed fear and hatred. New racial and cultural tensions have arisen in Los Angeles--for example, between African-Americans and Korean immigrants--that no one would have imagined a few years ago. According to media reports, hate crimes have increased sharply in the past couple of years, from racial incidents among dozens of ethnic groups to neo-Nazi slogans sprayed on synagogues. Gun sales (and gun thefts) are booming. The movies, which formerly portrayed Los Angeles as a sunny Shangra-La, now portray a decaying, tense city stumbling toward ruin. Even peace has exacted a price from the Los Angeles area; the "build-down" of the defense industry has eliminated thousands of good jobs, and the
. . .

Some common words found in the essay are:
Los Angeles, Getty Intern, Getty Internship, Islands World, African-Americans Korean, Hasidic Jewish, Latina African-American, Monica College, Apocalypse Catastrophic, los angeles, Southern California, cultural diversity, getty internship, southern california, internship program, operation hope, getty internship program, southern california opportunity, bahamas miss, bahamas growing, miss islands, islands world, bahamas miss islands, moving southern california, father bahamian mother,
Approximate Word count = 1606
Approximate Pages = 6 (250 words per page)