how I got into college

This is the beginning of a very long story (believe me it really is a VERY long one.) So, way way back in the beginning of senior year, I applied to QuestBridge, this thing that lets you apply to universities for free, and gives you money if you get in, which (obviously) is great. I wrote 5 essays, filled out countless pages of various information and pestered many teachers for recommendations.
Result: got the QuestBridge scholarship, but didn't get into any of the schools.
Meaning: waste of time.

A few months later, I went onto our dearest friend: CommonApp, just like everyone else, and applied to 7 Universities, which included writing about 7 essays (about one per) and countless short answer forms, etc. you know the deal. then there were, of course 2 colleges that hate their students, and won't use CommonApp: PSU & Schreyers. So that adds another 3 (really hard, since you usually can't recycle things) essays to the tally.
Result: I only got into PSU.
Meaning: HUGE-ASS waste of time!!!

A few months after that ordeal, I found out we're going to Russia
Meaning: WHY THE HELL DID I DO ALL THAT WORK?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!

And, of course, once in Russia I have to apply to the university there.
good news: no essays
bad news: lots of running around

here's the story:

We went to the university, which is pretty close to our house (1.5 hours by metro & local train thinghy), and there we went to the Dean's office, but he wasn't there, instead his replacement (a guy with a rather disturbing mustache) took us to talk to the Secretary of the Admissions Committee, and we talked, for quite a while. Turned out that I'm essentially an outlaw, as in - I'm outside of the law, as in they have no idea what to do with a Russian citizen who graduated in the US. For Russians to be admitted they need to have really good ЕГЭ (the Russian equivalent of the SATs) results in Math & Physics, but I obviously don't have that.
Anyways... after that we went around and talked to 4-5 of my dad's various friends who are still at the institute and went home with the promise that if we call on the 20th we will have an answer as to whether or not they will allow me to apply. Great...
We call on the 20, and the secretary man tells us the decision will be made on the committee meeting on the 21st since I'm particularly weird. OK.
We go there on the 21, wait for the comittee meeting to end (it should have supposedly been at 12pm, but ended up being somewhere around 1:30.) We talk to person #1, they say they didn't talk about it. Then go to person #2, they don't know anything either. Person #3 - bla bla bla. You get the idea.
In the end, they figured it out: my SATs & ACTs become the ЕГЭ for math & physics with a score of 95, which is ABSURDLY good (and by absurdly I mean 85 is already OMG-YOU'RE-A-GENIOUS-level), and I'll have to take a test on Russian language for the Russian-language-ЕГЭ. Have I ever mentioned that i can't actually write Russian, I forget letters when I do, and they expect me to take a TEST on it??? Really people, it's not that funny of a joke. But no. They were Actually serious... great... just great... oh yeah, and the punch line: the test was the day after tomorrow at 10 am. peachy...
Well, we went and bought 3 books on Russian grammar and I completely finished one of them in a day. That was the most fun I've ever had... except not. I'm pretty sure I was sleeping half the time...
get up at 7 leave at 8 arrive at the institute at 10, take the exam, wait till 12. a miracle occurs: I get a 69%... WHAT????? How in the world did I not completely fail that? I blame the good-luck charm Liz gave me...
Next step(happened today btw.): something they call собеседованя (sobesedovanya), which is a kind of interview type thing. The interviewers are the Dean of the faculty you're applying to, and various other hellishly important people. They can ask you pretty much anything they feel like, and they have however much time they need to do it. So basically... I'm DOOMED!
I dug out all AP books I could find and read through ALL of them. My dad and I went through all possible questions we could think of etc. etc. etc.
So today we get up at 7, leave at 8 arrive at 10 (it's really bothersome... although it's so 'close'). And we're called in one by one to talk to the peoples. For whatever gosh darn idiotic reason they put 3 faculties into the same auditorium. First up was ФУПМ (it's something mathy, I believe...) and first up they read a list of those people who have absolutely no chance of getting in whatsoever and ask them to leave... peachy...
Since no one left, it seemed that those people hadn't even bothered showing up... peachyER...
Well we all wait for about one and a half hours for those people (including a girl who looked like a 30 year old) to pass the committee. Then: HALELUYA! The other two faculties are split and each gets their own room. We assemble in front of our door that was proclaimed to be room 112, but was actually room 113, joined by a guy who looked like he should be in his mid-life-crisis (he was starting to go bald... poor boy). First person called: wasn’t present/ second person called: ME! Yay! No more standing!!!
I walk in, see that I know each one of those old guys present (which is kinda sad if you think about it for more than half a second.) The conversation lasted about 30 seconds, and consisted mainly of the dean saying this: "We all know about your case. There's nothing really left to talk about. You're in."

And that's the long long story of how I got into college. (Oh yeah, and it's MIPT btw, or МФТИ if you prefer... WHICH IS EPIC!)