My Family Culture

A major catastrophe has almost completely devastated the infrastructure of your country. The emergency government has decided that the surviving citizens will be best served if they are evacuated to other countries willing to take refugees. You and your immediate family are among the survivors of this catastrophic event. However, you have absolutely no input into the final destination or in any other evacuation details. You are told that your host country’s culture is completely different from your own, and that you might have to stay there permanently. You are further told that, in addition to one change of clothes, you can only take 3 small items with you. You decide to take three items that you hold dear and that represent your family culture.

• A description of the three items you would choose

The three items I would take with me will be identification documents, valuable family heirlooms, and pictures. 

• How you would explain to others what each of these items means to you

The legal documents may be useful in the new country and if I'm ever to return to my previous country, I will have them to help me transition. Having anything of value will help me to survive in the new country. I can use things of value to barter with. Taking pictures with me will help me remember and express our family history. It will remind us of what life was like before the catastrophe and help gives us hope for what we will return to one day. 

• Your feelings if, upon arrival, you were told that you could only keep one personal item and have to give up the other two items you brought with you

It would sadden me even more to have to give up the little I have left. I probably would give up the legal documents that identify me since now that I'm in a new country, they will want to recreate that information for me based on their classification system. I would hold on to what is valuable and as many keepsake items I have. 

•       Any insights you gained about yourself, your family culture, diversity, and/or cultural differences in general, as a result of this exercise.

I am closer with my immediate family versus my entire family. I rarely see and interact with them unless its holiday functions, graduations, wedding or funeral ceremonies, etc. Losing my immediate family will be more devastating and have a greater impact on me than losing a distant relative. So, it definitely makes a difference not having a relationship with someone but being related to them. Even within your family their can be a culture diversity.