Personal Narrative-Culturally Divided

Many cultures, if not all, are influenced by spiritual or religious beliefs that permeate individual interactions to infrastructures. I believe that it will be a disservice for me to not immerse myself such an influential subject. Religion has been a constant in my life. I was raised Southern Baptist and attended Catholic schools for most of my life. However, I was never exposed to non-Christian regions in a non-biased environment. So, during my freshman year I sought to change that. During the spring of 2017, I attended an Asian Religious Studies class that simultaneously answered my questions and incited more of them. The realization that my beliefs of sensing something larger than me were not misplaced helped me gain the confidence to express myself freely and to know that to grow means to learn. I want to cultivate this mindset of seeing the connections and influences we have on all of earth’s beings, not only for myself, but for others as well. Many people believe that adopting new habits or ways of thinking are impossible past a certain age. Some believe what they were taught as children to be law, too afraid to go against their guardians. Be that as it may, I want people to acknowledge their intelligence and guide them into becoming healthy

I was thirteen when I moved to the United States. July 7, 2007 was the day my brothers and I packed up our belongings and left Haiti. It was a very exciting day because I got the chance to be on an extremely large white and blue airplane for the first time, and most importantly, reunite with my parents, whom I did not know because my father left Haiti when I was three years old, and my mother left a several years later. As a teenager, I had the mindset of living in a fairytale land. I did not think about the possible challenges I might encounter after leaving my homeland. The idea of adjusting to a new culture, learning a new language, and socializing with others that do not have the same tongue as me never ever crossed my mind. Little did

Throughout my life, I have struggled with accepting my cultural identity. My parents were born and raised in India, but I was born here, in the United States, and hence, born an American citizen.

What is culture? Culture is the idea of what is wrong or right, the concept of what is acceptable within our society. Culture serves us as a guide, taking us to the "right way" and helping us to make sense of things that surrounds us. There are many different cultures around the world. A lot of them are similar in specific ways and others are just completely different, this difference explains why we think that people from different backgrounds are "weird".

I was born and raised in the small but growing city of Perris, CA. This isn’t the best city out there but it tends to grow on you, and you begin to truly love it for what it is. The people, however, not so much. The community can vary from which part of the city you’re in. That’s because there’s diversity here in Perris. I’m a product of this diversity, being half Mexican and half African American. My parents fell in love after high school and later on began a family. I am the youngest of five. I have two older brothers, an older sister, and an older cousin who lives with us. The order is boy, girl, boy, boy, girl with my cousin being included in there too. We all live in the same house with my parents and are quite close with each other. They all seem to have raised me growing up due to the fact that my parents were busy trying to provide for us. This was a challenge by itself, resulting in lots of house moving and my father being unemployed for six years after losing his job. I never complained about moving because I knew that my parents were doing their absolute best and were working with all that they had and then some. This unquestionably made me adaptable to new environments and gave me a

One of the most positive things about being an American is the ability to interact in “the melting pot” of various cultures all around. While most of us obviously identify with our own specific culture, the variety within our society is extremely diverse, allowing intercultural communication and presents a learning experience for those who are able to communicate and with one another. When observing and interacting with cultures other than my own, I am able to identify some similarities, as well as the differences from their culture to mine. Throughout this semester we have learned so many things about different cultures and worldviews, I have begun to learn a lot more about myself and my personal religious views. I have never followed a religious practice on my own choice, but it is encouraging to see how it positively impacts others in my life.

2014 Fall Semester in the begining was going pretty good i was excited to began school , adapting to the new college life, and interacting with friends and new people. I was attending all my classes on time , studying , and completing the required assigments that needed to be done. I also was working a full-time at Gensis Logistics it wasnt easy trying to manage my schedule , but i tried to make it work the best i could. MTE 1 , 3 , and SDV was a breeze to me I was completing my assigments , studying , and understanding the information that was given to me. Now on the otherhand ENG wasn't hard for me i just didnt understand the content that was teached by the teacher. English was always the strongest subject for me so i couldnt understand why it was such a problem in college , maybe it was the teacher and her teaching methods. I never understood any information that was given it seemed to me like our class was always off topic one class period we would talk english, and then another class period we would talk about something else besides english. Then she assigned papers and assigments that was unfamilar to me it seem like everytime she assigned the class papers

My “outside” cultural influences I have: America is one of the most ethnically diverse countries in the world culturally. We have German-Americans speaking German, Filipino-Americans speaking Tagalog, Irish-Americans speaking Irish, Scandinavian-Americans speaking Norwegian, Swedish, Danish, etc., Welsh-Americans speaking Welsh, Japanese-Americans speaking Japanese, Iraqi-Americans speaking Arabian, Mexican-Americans speaking Spanish, and all Americans united in the common goal to create the best possible nation in accordance with our Constitution.

Anthropologists have discovered a new tribe called the BSI. I have experienced firsthand, the strange yet unique culture of BSI, which is a society that values education, politeness, and harmony. This tribe consists of what appears to be givers and receivers. Both of which are selected among many people through a ritual. The givers are knowledgeable about their specialties, which the natives called “REHCAET,” and the receivers, called “TNEDUTS” must be children over 11 and under 18 who have good fortune to be selected as a receiver. The people of BSI seems to worship a strange creature called a They spend together seven hours a day in a uniquely designed temple for education.

I’ve been trudging along for what seems like hours. I lost count of my steps sometime after my car broke down. When I look around all I see is an almost tangible grey curtain hiding everything except for a small segment of the highway. As I look forward the dark grey of the asphalt blends into the fog. I have no Idea what time it is when the fog rolled in my phone died. Without a clock, any length of time seems to go on forever, especially when the sun is hiding behind the fog. I just something I don’t understand about my situation, there has been no change in light since the fog rolled in. Same brightness the whole time. It’s almost like it’s not that I can’t tell time is passing. It’s that time isn’t passing, but that’s impossible.

When it comes to what separates me from other teenagers, there would be quite a bit to tell. I would say a major difference which separates me from my peers is my love for barbershop harmony music. I do not have a quartet of my own; however, I love to sing barbershop tags with other friends at church. I set myself apart from the world because of my beliefs: as a New Testament christian, I believe the bible gives us all instruction concerning spiritual matters.

My bucket filled with images represents my surface and deep culture unique to me. I found out where I got my passions and which people influenced my culture, and what I need to do to continue to keep my culture and faith to be something I’m proud of.

I believe I was not created equally. When I open my eyes to this strange world I feel an urge to run and hide. I am not safe there is no escape.

My background with ethnicity is limited. My paternal grandfather is from the Netherlands and my maternal grandmother’s family is from Sweden. Other than that, I have not had any other extensive experiences with different ethnic groups. Once my family from the Netherlands came to visit in 2012, I was introduced to my great Aunt Toos. It was difficult speaking with her because of the language barrier; her English was far from clear. Although there were difficulties communicating, I was nevertheless able to learn a few Dutch phrases from her.

I decided to visit a Hindu temple because the Hindu religion was the religion that I knew the least about and was interested in. This assignment gave me an opportunity to learn more about this religion and what their worship services and rituals were like. The temple that I went to was called BAPS Shri Swaminaryan Mandir and it was located in Lilburn. As soon as I walked in, I was amazed by the beautiful architectural design of this Temple. It seemed like it took a lot of hard work and dedication to make the place what it is now. While I was at the temple, I watched the Hindus perform an ancient Vedic ritual called the Abhishek, a ritual bathing to honor the murti of their God.