My Family Culture

My assignment this week is to think about a scenario in which a major catastrophe destroys my country and culture forcing me to leave everything behind and move into a completely new culture. I would only be allowed to take three items with me and therefore need to carefully select items that best represent my family’s culture. 

The first item I would take is a family photo album. Family photographs are extremely important to me as they help preserve many wonderful memories. My albums include photos going back several generations including photos of my great grandparents and my grandparents, photos from my childhood and my husband’s childhood in Sri Lanka and photos of our time together as a family here in the United States. They include photos of extended family some of whom I have never met, photos of places my family has visited and photos of special moments like family weddings, birthdays and holiday celebrations. The photographs essentially tell the story of my family. 

The second item I would take with me is my grandmother’s Bible. It was given to me by my grandfather after my grandmother passed many years ago. This Bible not only represents our family’s Faith but is of sentimental value to me because it belonged to my grandmother. It contains notes handwritten by her and is a symbol of her own Faith. It is a constant source of strength. Someday, I hope to give it to my own daughter.

The third item I would take is a small jewelry box that belonged to my paternal grandmother. It contains several pieces of jewelry that are of sentimental value to me. It contains my paternal grandmother’s wedding band, my maternal grandmother’s wedding band and a gold cross given to me by my parents when I was baptized as a child. The wedding bands have the initials of both sets of grandparents engraved in them along with their wedding date. 

            If I were told that I had to choose only one item I would feel quite devastated as all three items are of great value to me. While the Bible and jewelry hold great sentimental value, if I had to choose one item I would choose the photo album as it would be the one tangible item that represents who we are as a family. It would be the only way future generations would be able to know about our family. 

            Although choice and not circumstance led me to find a new culture in the United States leaving behind my family’s culture in Sri Lanka, I can relate to wanting to hold onto items that best represent my family and my own identity. My albums have been especially meaningful to me in introducing my daughter to family members she has never met and places she has never seen. I show her the Bible and the family jewelry and talk to her about her great grandparents. I have always been a sentimental person, although I have never been one to place much value on other material items knowing that material items can be taken away or destroyed anytime. However, I realized that if faced with the possibility of losing everything that I am familiar with, I would want to hold onto some of those items of sentimental value as it would not only be a source of comfort and strength but a symbol of my identity in a place of unfamiliarity. The main insight that I gained from this assignment was that in the event that I couldn’t hold onto any tangible items, my family and I would still be able to preserve our family’s culture through our Faith and the closeness and memories we share together as a family.