107-21 78^th St 

Queens, NY 11417

631-428-4498

[email protected]

September 10, 2023

Ms. Julianne Davidow

Adjunct Lecturer, English Department

City College of New York

160 Convent Avenue

New York, NY 10031

Dear Ms. Davidow,

I’m writing to introduce myself and give you an idea of my background and interests. This is my second year at City College of New York. I’m looking forward to learning as much as possible about technical writing and how writing for engineering differs from previous writing classes. 

I was born in Bangladesh but grew up in Doha, Qatar until I was 8. Then, my family and I moved to New York in December 2011. At first, I had trouble living without my uncle, aunt, and cousins. I was close to my extended family in Qatar. I was practically a daughter to my uncle since he had three sons but no daughter. I also often went to Bangladesh since Qatar and Bangladesh are pretty close. But things changed when I moved to the US. I also had family here, but I missed my family back home. 

I speak Bengali, Hindi, English, and a bit of Urdu. My first language is Bengali, but I picked up Hindi very young. My parents mostly watched Hindi movies and shows, so I used to watch along and naturally learned Hindi. Similarly to English, I watched cartoons as a child and spoke with my cousins in English. Urdu was easy to pick up as it is very similar to Hindi, so I understand most of it and talk about a bit of it. So, I’ve been fluent in Bengali, Hindi, and English since I was little. I have learned basic Spanish to pass the regents. But I cannot speak it. 

My favorite subjects in school were science and social studies. I also enjoyed math, which frustrates me, so it’s a love-and-hate relationship. Science has always been my favorite since elementary. I started to enjoy social studies/history in middle school. My extracurricular activities included clubs, occasionally reading, watching shows, drawing, painting, and crocheting. I’ve always loved to take things apart and put them back together to fix them. 

I chose to study at City College of New York because of its engineering school. My intended major is Computer Science, and City College of New York has a good program.Not only that, but I can also commute to City College since it is just one train and an hour from my house. 

A meaningful experience I had was watching my dad at work the day of his new store opening. He was so happy that day that he even got the mayor of Buffalo to come to the opening. It made me realize how far my dad has come with his hard work. It was amusing how he had moved here with a whole family to care for but never gave up. Watching him work so hard with such a vast smile encourages me. The way he interacts with people with such friendliness and joy sometimes makes his work seem effortless. This was a whole new country for him with new people, but he worked hard and made it his own. 

My dream for the future is to work in cybersecurity and have a stable career. I am still exploring the different areas of computer science, so I’m still exploring. My main areas of interest are design and code.My concern is being able to handle assignments from multiple classes together without work piling up.

Sincerely,

Amrin Ahmed