Culture

"I have to go to India -- their culture is so much like ours."

My sister Melissa made this really interesting observation earlier today while watching the Indian entertainment channel that plays on regular TV every Saturday. They showcase the newest films and albums being released by Indian directors and artists.

This observation got me thinking back to a conversation I had with Aliza and some of her friends in Cairo about being brown. There, six people several countries discussed (over fava beans and Egyptian bread!) the differences between brown folks in the East and the West. In the end, we discovered that there were more similarities than you would imagine, with a couple of exceptions.

Filling Melissa in on this, I also recalled a conversation I once had with Erin, my Aussie friend, about how the US exports its culture, and the effect that it has on the globe. In US culture, independence is key. You should move out of your parents' house at 18, go on with your life, and never look back. Worry about yourself first, even if it comes at the expense of your family or your home. Anything outside of that is considered weird and ethnic. But I've come to realize that across the globe, US culture is the odd-man out. China, India, Mexico, Spain, even Egypt and Thailand, all of these countries throughout the world see nothing wrong with putting family first, with living at home until you're 30, with respecting your parents and your elders, and with upholding certain gender norms. So if the majority of countries and cultures around the world uphold similar values, why is it that we in the US see each of those countries as having archaic, antiquated mores? Really, isn't the US the one that should feel like the outsider? It's not as black-and-white as that, I realize, and obviously the US isn't the sole country to have these norms, but I'm just ranting here. And trying to make a point about right Erin was, and how powerful the export of US culture is. Basically, it's one country making an entire globe feel like everyone else is a freak for thinking differently, when really it's just blond Hollywood bimbos and writers telling the world how they should think, what they should do, and how they should look.

Many times, I've felt as though I am somehow strange for being a cultural outsider. I never went to sleepovers, my parents didn't understand Prom or Homecoming, and I have never eaten meatloaf. Growing up, there were many instances when I was angry for feeling left out, and for feeling like a misfit. But as I've gotten older, I've come to embrace living in the hyphen and I've really come to appreciate it. I came to the realization that I like the way I grew up. I like having two homelands, I love being close to my family, and I love admiring, celebrating, and sharing my Mexican culture. I'm glad that I am unique, that I'm not another Abercrombie-wearing lemming and that I have no idea what it would be like to have a date pick me up at home without fearing the wrath of my father.

Best of all, I love that I have the opportunity to examine these things with that outsider's viewpoint, and that I can travel the world and relate to other people and other cultures because I have one of my own.