Esther Hwang, University of California at Berkeley, Class of 2009

11/4/2009

2006 Grand Prize Winner

I woke up each Sunday to stare at a bottle.

It was not a bottle of vodka or rum, drinks which I came to learn were the favorites of college campuses. It was, however, a bottle of water I had strategically placed there before leaving for the party the night before. I had learned from experience that I inevitably woke up post-party feeling as dehydrated and miserable as a beached whale.

My friends and I were not party animals. In fact, we were stellar students in high school, and were aspiring to become surgeons and CEOs. On being accepted to UC Berkeley, we were aware of the grueling workload as well as the typical college alcohol, drugs and sex. We had been sufficiently warned by our parents, teachers, and older friends.

I considered myself prepared in the battle against corruption and sinfulness. I was ready to defend myself against anything that resembled the wild debauchery and chaotic hubbub I'd seen in rated R movies. However, as any other first-year college student will tell you, we were not prepared at all. Like all other forms of corruption, alcoholism came to me in the most unexpected form: fun.

I distinctly remember my first college party. I was hesitant and wary, turning down the beer for orange juice while others around me drunkenly guffawed happily.

What broke down my resistance and made me take my first drink? It wasn't some typical "bad kid" they like to show in instructional videos during Health class. There wasn't any popular and handsome guy nearby screaming, "Drink, you sissy, DRINK!!" There were no blatantly "cool" kids who tried to corrupt me. In fact, the friends I was with didn't pressure me to drink with them at all. However, sitting quietly while they laughed with each other made me feel left out, and I felt the pressure to drink coming from the most unexpected person: myself. I didn't want to start college off as a loner.

Thus, I had my first Pina Colada ever. And then another. And another. And another. Eventually, I too began to understand what the others found so hysterical about the word, "celery" and to appreciate the divine beauty of a lava lamp. For the first time ever, I was drunk.

It was perhaps the demure, studious image I had of myself and the black-and-white, absolutist mentality I had towards alcohol that eventually brought me to my knees before a drink. I was surprised at the change in myself when alcohol was in my body. When I drank, I no longer shook hands like an adult and chuckled politely; rather I hugged without hesitation and called people "sweetheart." More boys approached me because of my new outgoing personality. It became easy to be lovable and loving when drinking. Such positive changes brought me to the conclusion that alcohol wasn't as evil as I had been taught and undermined my entire foundation of "good" and "bad." In trying to keep this perfect version of myself and trying to meet more friendly people, I became caught in a vortex of partying and drinking.

I also distinctly remember one of my last parties. By then, my roommate always rolled her eyes whenever she saw me dressing up to go out, knowing I would come in at 4 A.M. causing an ungodly ruckus as I made an ambitious stumbling quest from the doorway to my bed. My high school friends laughed with a worried look in their eyes as they commented on how much I'd changed.

I had also recently (and grudgingly) retaken the AlcoholEdu test, having failed the first time. I paid very little attention to the actual test. However, it was the information on the last page that stayed with me, and perhaps saved my college career in the long run. The test told me what percentage of other students who took the same surveys felt the way I did about alcohol.

The next weekend, at a sorority invitational I sat on a couch and watched the others do what I had been doing for the past semester: drinking and feeling as if they were at their most charming, friendly, and uninhibited version of themselves.

I then remembered vaguely the AlcoholEdu survey- I looked across the dance floor and thought that half of them, like me, felt it was easier to express their emotion with alcohol. A large percentage of them felt more attractive now than they usually did and felt less stressed now than at any other time. Basically, they were all just like me, feeling their best only when drinking. None of them were the same people inside the sorority house as they were outside it.

Ultimately, I had an epiphany on that couch: I, like those I'd been observing, needed alcohol to complete myself. Without it, I felt I couldn't reach the ideal outgoing personality I had when I was drunk. We were all trying to achieve the perfect version of ourselves through alcohol and when drunk, we were almost there. However, we ironically always stopped short of that self-perfection because of the drink. It was not us, but the alcohol that was making us so wonderful.

It was not an overnight change, of course. It was a slow, semester-long transition weaning myself away, declining parties for a movie night with my floor mates. To this day, I still don't think that alcohol is as "bad" as I'd once thought. I still go out to an occasional party and don't make judgments on others who drink. I think it's fine when they handle what they take and not depend on it to become someone they're not, unlike I could never have.

In the end, I stopped drinking in pursuit of perfection. I wanted to be that outgoing and amiable person without the alcohol or the price of a hangover. I'm not the ideal person I want to be yet, but I'm a lot closer to being her than I ever was with alcohol.