“Negotiating Identities and Mediating Community in Berlin, Germany”
Personal Incentives
I first knew Berlin through a pile of old photos taken during my father’s college year. He went to … and studied there. As a small kid, I had no idea of academic excellence or research-centered world ranking, what simply attracted me was the beautiful castles and fairy-tale-like story my father told me about his study abroad experience.
Short Bio About Me
My name is Ying Wang and I am a sophomore at University of Washington Honors Program with double majors in Computer Science and Applied Mathematics. Growing up in Beijing, China, an ancient city full of history, I have developed deep interests in different customs and cultures. I am particularly attracted to big data and other data science analysis. My career goal is to be a data analyst working for some consulting companies or non-profit organizations. I believe that by digging into the data, people may be able to unreveal the underlying trends under many current social situations and dilemmas and may even be one step closer to resolving them. I have done research on the homeless people seeking shelters in the city of Beijing during High School and discussed the irreconcilable struggle between Beijing citizens and the people coming for better living conditions. I am also interested in community engagement by mentoring at Rainier Beach High School in Dream Project.
Language Acquisition
My first interaction with German history was when I studied world history in middle school. We were lectured about the brutal wars and the totalitarian control of Germany under Adolf Hitler’s region. Racism, especially anti-Semitism really pained me. That time I felt purely disgusting when hearing the things. A friend of mine was a big fan of World War Two and he always talked to me about how the high-tech armories German possessed. The dreadful German U-Boat submarine scourge, the biochemical weapon they experimented and the inflating movements they initiated… none of those was of my particular interest. Instead, I found many books telling the story “behind the scene”. One of my favorites, The Book Thief, centers on the friendship between a German girl Liesel whose family suffered a lot from the World War II and Max, a Jewish man persecuted by the controlling government. Narrated by Death, this special angle fully unfolded the conflicting beauty and destruction of life during that time era. How Liesel supported a group of desperate people hidden inside an air-raid shelter with the power of books and words, how she protected her friend regardless of religion and belief, how the warmth of humanities was never beaten by the coldness under warfare era.