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My Cultural Identity To Me

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Cultural Identity to me is what I identify myself with. My Christian upbringing, and the environment I grew up in are the two components that I identify with the most and they are what made me who I am today. My Cultural identity is not as ethnic based as one would think. Yes I am a Singaporean born Chinese, but growing up, I never took part in any Chinese festivals such as Mid-Autumn Festival, Hungry Ghost Festival, or religious holidays such as Vesak Day. I always sheered away from those celebratory functions because I was born in a Christian home, and brought up not believing in ghosts roaming free or burning incense to pay respect to the dead. (Your Singapore, n.d.). Instead, I was raised believing in heaven and hell, and that the only …show more content…

Becoming very active in my church, as a youth leader, musician and a regular participant in church events, not only helped me grow as a person but also kept me out of trouble. However, after graduating from both the primary and secondary school systems of Anglo-Chinese School (ACS), I realized that the world I lived in was very different from the actual world, and that many individuals were not as accepting about Christianity as I thought. My Polytechnic days would entail conflicts with different people about my faith. One prominent example was with when my Polytechnic bowling team captain and coach questioned my commitment to the team (personal communication, 2008), because I would miss training and team meetings due to Church commitments. These commitments not only affected my attendance and participation for training, but it removed my chances of representing the school in competitions. The conflict was hard to swallow, as I loved to bowl and was good at the sport, plus I attended training whenever I was able to. Not being present, affected social interactions with my teammates. Even though I never had a problem with any of them and could hold conversations, I felt disconnected from them and never really had a sense of belonging to the

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