I grew up in a diverse household, something I appreciate because it has shaped me into the individual I am today.
My mom is Mongolian. Memories of her childhood and young adult life revolve around growing up in the city Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. She’s fluent in the Mongolian language, as well as being able to speak English now.
My dad was born and raised in North Carolina, United States. His background mostly comprises of a cluster of European countries, as well as being Cherokee on his grandmother’s side.
They met through business as my dad worked for a cashmere company who branched out to Mongolia. My mom worked in the Mongolian branch of this company.
As a baby I was fluent in Mongolian, I hardly knew any English. However I lost the ability to speak Mongolian. An elementary school teacher told my mother to stop speaking Mongolian at home in order for both me and my older sister to be able to learn English better.
According to a study posted in the journal Brain and Language, individuals who are bilingual have more efficient brains when it comes to processing language and other tasks.
There went my sister and I’s chance of having a knack for language processing. Darn. Although the teacher probably meant well, not knowing the language of our other country definitely stripped me and my sister from part of our culture.
Growing up in my household was different from most of my friends in some ways and similar in others. My dad is a Baptist Christian, my mom is not. My mom is definitely very free spirited when it comes to her religious beliefs. She believes in a higher power, but doesn’t like to label herself under one set religion.
I feel as though my upbringing allowed me to develop a more tolerant and open minded perspective on different cultures and beliefs. I grew up celebrating both Mongolian and American holidays. We wore traditional Mongolian clothing on holidays, learned the custom and how to make traditional recipes.
We celebrated Christian holidays like Christmas and Easter and, despite my mom not being big on religion, she loved decorating for Christmas.
My dad had a Bible on the night stand beside his side of the bed and my mom had small sculptures of Buddha sitting throughout the house. We had baby cherubs sitting on top of our piano and small dragon statues by the front door to ward off bad spirits.
We even cheered for both countries in the Olympics. We had two sets of cultural norms blended into one household. Did my parents agree on everything? No, of course not! However, they managed to see through their differences and reach a mutual understanding.
Growing up I was very proud of my Mongolian heritage and culture. I was proud to be a part of my family.
Most of my friends thought it was so cool and different to grow up in a household with both the American and Mongolian flag up, having symbols from different religions scattered around the house and how I had a mom with a foreign accent.
However, not everyone would be so welcoming of my diverse household.
As a child I never noticed that I looked different than my mom and sister. Don’t get me wrong, I knew we weren’t all identical, but I didn’t notice the difference in skin tones or eye shape. I didn’t pay any mind to it until others brought it to my attention.
People would ask me if I were adopted, if my sister was adopted, if we were step sisters, etc. All these questions hurt me as a child because my sister and I were both born from our mother, we were raised in the same household and our dad would read us both bed time stories.
For people to imply that I all of a sudden had some sort of unseen distance or boundary from my sister and mom felt insulting and rude. I remember being infuriated as a child when other kids told me I didn’t look Asian enough or that my sister didn’t look white enough for us to be related.
It wasn’t until I got older that I realized how because I was white passing, I was able to benefit from white privilege. Something neither my mom nor sister could have. It was heart breaking to realize as a teenager.
Up until middle school I was bullied for being chubby and a couple of other immature things, but I was rarely ever personally attacked when it came to my race. Often because I was white passing and people wouldn’t know I was half Mongolian unless I told them. If anything, they were more likely to insult my family than me when it came to race, which brought me more pain than when they insulted me.
However, my sister was not as fortunate. She often got teased and picked on for her eye shape, dark hair and yellow based skin tone. Kids would leer at her, pulling at their eyes in order to mimic her monolids, call her derogatory slurs based on her race. Instilling insecurities in her because of her ethnicity.
To me, my mom and sister were and still are the two most beautiful women in the world. To see my sister suffer from so much pain due to the ignorance of others was painful. I began to wonder why were my double eye lids seen as normal and beautiful, but my sisters monolids were not deemed the same.
Even as she and I got older and finished school, we were still treated differently.
My sister would have men ogling after her because they found it arousing she was Asian. Never mind her personality, they simply just wanted her for what they perceived her to be due to their preconceived notions of Asian women, based off of untrue stereotypes.
I never encountered the issue of a person wanting to date me due to how exotic they perceived me to be. Was I occasionally objectified? Yes, of course. However my sister was not only objectified as a woman, she was also eroticized because she looked Asian.
I even noticed the differences when it came to how people treated my mom and my dad. My mom would often experience people speaking to her in a condescending manner because of her accent. Whereas, people would listen to my dad and treat him with respect. Many assumed my dad to be smarter than my mom, when my mom actually has a higher degree in education than my dad.
People in my home town tended to judge my mom’s moral character because she was very open about not being Christian. She respected the religion, it just wasn’t what she believed in. Many times people would question her moral character before getting to know her, even though my mom is the most hospitable person I know. Whenever someone is struggling or needs a place to stay, my mom is always the first to offer help.
She tried going to church as well, but often felt alienated when people would look her up and down then simply ignore her. When my dad was standing beside her, people all of a sudden became more sociable toward her. The experiences she had left a sour taste in her mouth.
Growing up in a diverse family to me felt like the norm, but I noticed how my household differed from my friends and my friends noticed as well. I am grateful for how my parents raised me.
I had many eye-opening moments when it came to realizing how much prejudice and ignorance still exists in our present world. At the same time my experiences and the experiences my sister went through, as well as our upbringing, allowed us to have a more tolerant and accepting stance when it comes to understanding other cultures and beliefs.
