Million dollars or Knighthood

Lemme tell you one thing, no matter how early you start, you'll always face a time crunch for essays and applications. I have been writing essays for ISB these days and boy, its one hell of a task. For the first essay about diverse ISB culture, I wrote some 4-5 drafts before arriving at first rough draft. The word limit of 300 words is too crippling. Anyways I found the third essay about manager's feedback easy. The second essay is still my concern. I wrote one draft for it which was rejected by my friends (I am sending essays to friends for review). I sat yesterday to write it again and wrote a modified draft. I don't think I myself am convinced by it. So let me put my thoughts in here.

A million dollars mean independence from constraints. Its about freeing myself from the biggest need of life. So what would I do if I have million dollars. Now ISB won't have any interest in my dream about spending my life on hawaii beaches. The decision should be reflective of my character. Well, the character which I have shown in my other essays. It can be related to a passion of life. For example, I am from Bihar, a state in India. Whenever I go outside for lunch or dinner, I see restaurants on rajasthani theme, punjabi theme, bengali theme, gujrati theme etc. I have never ever seen any restaurant on bihari theme. There are lots of food preparations specific to Bihar which are very tasty but unknown to people outside. Maybe I would like to open a chain of restaurants which showcase the food of Bihar, the festivals we celebrate and the food specific to those festivals. It would also show the positive side of the state which is already infamous for a lot other wrong things.

Knighthood. Knighthood is also about a passion. But this passion is about a much larger impact. Its about impact on society. Maybe its about setting an example for the world. All of us dream of some ways we can improve the world. Recieving a national honor for the same would mean setting a path for the next generations. Its about bringing that passion out and showing it to the world.

I am not sure if I am right about the interpretations. Please comment if you think it should be something else. Now when it comes to writing about this, it is difficult to take things out of heart into the mind, translate in english and write. I felt the need for a structural approach for the same. To avoid bias, I am not posting any sample structure.

Now the way I look at it is, its about discovering ourselves. Lets do it.

Updated on 18th August 2007

Thanks a lot guys for your inputs. finally i could successfully write the first draft for the essay. Bihar restaurant was just a time pass example I had taken to understand things, perhaps anon2 took it by words. But in the course I have learnt that the essay demands for things about me and my character. The million dollar approach or Knighthood approach what would I prefer to take in a situation. Any example in this essay dilutes the context and limits it to the example which is highly undesirable.

I got my first draft reviewed by few friends who gave some valuable inputs. Things look better now as far as this essay is concerned.

Thanks to all for their inputs. If someone still has some inputs please comment. It might just be useful for those hitting this page.

ISB's Million Dollar Baby

So I started my essay journey with ISB. And I must say this 300 words limit is the biggest problem one will face in ISB essays. I mean when I wrote the first draft of first essay, it was 650 words long with half of the content. I did it 5 times either by trimming off or by writing fresh to arrive at an exact 300 words essay.

I mailed my first essay to three of my close friends (including my brother) for review. And one wrote back suggesting one more instance to add. Boy I still have to understand where to fit that extra sentence.

The 3rd one was smoother. I just had to become my own manager, readout my appraisal form and form it into a paragraph.

The problem is with second essay. Here's what it reads:

A million dollars or knighthood: what would you choose and why? (300 words max)

I want to write about million dollars although all my friends chose Knighthood. I feel more truthful when I think about million dollars. But what to write is my concern. I asked my friends they say what the essay analysts say. Hey btw I found the analysis to this and other essays at these places:
Vibranture
EssayLever
Pulyanithinks

But I am still not able to start off. Chaos gave me lots of suggestions regarding the same. And I understand them all, but its like writing a love letter, you've always known what to write the problem which remains is.... where to start from??? (and this love letter has a word limit too )

Any suggestions...