By Hoda Emam
Neha Tara Mehta enjoying the bus ride to San Giovanni. | Photo by Nathan Vickers.
One hour into our trip from Naples to San Giovanni the bus pulled over behind a gas station for a small surprise celebration. With hills of deep-green sprawled out behind and a cool breeze, we all gathered in a circle. Professor Goldman glowed as he told us that Francesca Trianni, our wonderful teaching assistant, had been accepted into the Columbia School Graduate School of Journalism for the 2012-2013 school year. Professor Goldman popped the cork off a bottle of champagne and we gave a toast to Francesca and to an upcoming year as a sleepless-workaholic journalism student.
Francesca, who is from the north of Italy and graduated from Columbia College a year ago, got the news when we woke up earlier that morning in Naples. She recalled that she immediately called her parents and grandparents. “My mom was really proud and started crying, my dad was totally different and said he had no doubt about me getting in.” Francesca added that she has never been this excited to learn and challenge herself.
As we set off back on our route to San Giovanni, the bus drove by hills with wind turbines perched on top, grapevine farms and ranch style estates. Through the bumpy and winding roads, each student had a little bit of advice to offer Francesca. I too found myself giving recommendations on how to manage the program. This made me think, how did everyone else find out about his or her admittance? Who accompanied them? Where were they?
Andrea Palatnik and Hoda Emam on one of our many bus rides across Italy. | Photo by Trinna Leong.
I first asked Sarah Laing about her Columbia acceptance moment. Laing recalled being in Australia and a student at the University of Melbourne when she received the email from Columbia with the decision. “I was with two friends and we had just had a delicious breakfast,” Laing said. “We were working on our honors thesis and while they were talking, I opened my email and saw a subject line of ‘Your decision is ready’,” Laing said. As Laing’s schooling in Melbourne was coming to an end, she was looking for the next step in her life. “I opened the letter and see that it says congratulations,” Laing said, “and I turn to my friend said can you please read this because I think I just got into Columbia!” “I figured if I come out with a degree from an Ivy League school, it wouldn’t be a bad thing,” Laing said.
We were now in the Puglia region, about 20 minutes from San Giovanni and I asked Anam Siddiq her story. “I was just checking my email randomly and then I saw the email and I started freaking out, I asked my mom to come next to me,” Siddiq recalled. “I went and prayed before I opened up the email and my mom sat there and waiting for me, so I finally open it and I whisper under my breath and say, ‘I got in!’” Siddiq laughed as she said her mother became excited for her acceptance only after learning that Columbia is an Ivy League school. “I called my dad in China and told him, he started crying and said you have made me so proud,” Siddiq said.
At this point in our trip, ears popping, we were ascending the mountain San Giovanni. Teresa Mahoney recalled that just a year ago she was working at a startup biotech company in her native Portland, Ore. “My boss secretly didn’t want me to get in [to Columbia] because she wanted me to work for them,” said Mahoney. Columbia was the only school Mahoney had applied to. “I was checking my email at work when I got the email, I knew the response would make or break my future in journalism,” said Mahoney. “It’s funny how it’s a such a big deal at the beginning,” Mahoney said, “during the application process it’s like winning the lottery, like my whole life problems would be solved but then there is a lot of work ahead.”
As for me, well the day I found out, my parents were both in the living room in our home in Texas, watching TV. After opening the acceptance letter, I sat staring at the computer repeatedly saying, ‘oh my goodness.’ At this point my parents had run up next to me expecting the worst since they had no idea what I was staring at on the computer screen. When I showed them the letter, my dad began to clap and my mom’s eyes filled with tears, she said: “I told you, all you had to do was believe and you would get in.”
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