One Thing We Should Hold Onto
After reading Annie Dillard, Living Like Weasels. Reading about the powerful will of the weasel to hold on to its prey for instance the guy’s hand for half a mile and the eagle as well it shows how strong minded in a sense the weasel can be. One thing I would like to be able to hold on to is my cultural identity.
Being that I am west Indian and spent the more early part of my life in the Caribbean, that is what I know as my heritage, that is essentially is my culture. Now that I have been in a new environment for several years I am starting to adapt some of the tendencies and mannerism of this culture. In many ways in essence I am somewhat starting to forget who I REALLY am. I’m starting to speak differently, eat differently, look at things differently.
Even though I can point out what things are changing in myself, knowing that I want to hold on to myself and my true heritage subconsciously they still happen, it has become a part of me. I try to speak English with a dialect like I grew up doing, eat certain things, participate in certain events, listen to certain music but for some reason when I get around people of this culture I tend to conform to what they expect and they want from me. Thus the reason I am now conflicted by my two cultures and in many ways I will always be.