Sean Martin Johnson
Due Date: October 8th, 2010
Title: My Family Background Product.
Prompt: How has your family background affected the way you see the world?
I am the product of my family’s influence and background. The way I view the world has been molded and shaped by my siblings, parents, grandparents, and extended family members. My future, unlike the majority of my high school peers, includes pursuing admission to the United States Military Academy at West Point and a career as a U.S. Army officer.
I was born to a military family in 1993. What I mean by ‘military family’ is my father served in the Army for 23 years and my grandfather served in the Army for 38 years. However, my family is a little different from a typical military family; mother is a naturalized Japanese American. My mother was born and raised in Tokyo, and when she turned 25 she came to America to study at Georgetown University for a Master’s degree in linguistics. She was literally foreign to the American lifestyle let alone the “U.S. Army” lifestyle.
To be fair to each other, my parents gave my siblings and me opportunities to experience both American and Japanese cultures. For example, the children learned how to properly use chop sticks as well as knives and forks at a young age, and my mother made sure her children got used to soy sauce flavoring in addition to the typical American ‘ketchup and mustard’ flavorings. While half of my brain was raised on hotdogs and hamburgers, the other half of my brain grew on sushi.
Beside the typical American school, my siblings and I also attended Japanese schools to learn the Japanese language, math, and social studies. Unlike immersion programs found in many American schools, all classes in the Japanese schools were totally in Japanese. Classes started at 9 a.m. and lasted until 4 p.m. every Saturday. On the Japanese holiday entitled “Children’s Day,” at the Japanese school I learned “Origami” and the Japanese...