Email on Identity... Future Book?

Ok Ok, so Tsonga lost. It was a weird game. Closer than the score indicated and although Verdasco was solid, I'm not quite sure how Tsonga lost.

Anyways, big matchup tonight with Roddick vs Federer. I still pick Federer to win in the finals over Nadal.

Moving right along, got a volleyball match tonight (joined a competitive volleyball league at the Y two weeks ago, had tryouts and everything!) so looking forward to that.

While writing my London School of Economics and Political Science financial aid personal statement, I came a cross a mass email on identity I sent out to close family and friends a couple of weeks ago. Given that it expresses some pretty coherent thoughts on identity formation, I think I'll post it up here, so as not to lose it (and to make it open to the comments of all (although I think Dean is the only one who reads this regularly) (I love you Dean! (see below)).



Dean Medeiros, Portugese studmuffin and Environmentalist extraordinaire...

Anyways now that I've give a shoutout to perhaps my only reader, below, italicized is the email and the excellent response by my good friend Zeke:

"Hey Family et al,

I just thought I would share with you a passage from Obama's book Audacity of Hope that I read today. He is discussing his experience working as a community organizer for religious organizations in Chicago immediately after graduating from his undergraduate degree.

He does a pretty good job of expressing, in this passage, precisely the angst and struggle of "third culture" kids. His example is religion, but I can say that I (and many of my classmates from highschool too) have pretty much felt this way (as an "observer") with every social movement/ideological/philosophical/spiritual/national type of group or situation that I have found myself in. Coincidentally, I find that his mother was a very similar woman in character to both of my parents, in terms of her anthropological openness and, hippie, restless, optimistic, view of the world.

"My experiences in Chicago forced me to confront a dilemma that my mother never fully resolved in her own life: the fact that I had no community or shared traditions in which to ground my most deeply held beliefs. The Christians with whom I worked recognized themselves in me; they saw that I knew their Book and shared their values and sang their songs. But they sensed that a part of me remained removed, detached, an observer among them. I came to realize that without a vessel for my beliefs, without an unequivocal commitment to a particular community of faith, I would be consigned at some level to always remain apart, free in the way that my mother was free, but also alone in the ways that she was ultimately alone." (Excerpt from Obama book: Dreams from my father)

I think that third culture kids, and especially mixed racial ones, feel that "aloneness" more sharply becuase we don't see ourselves as part of any particular group whether it be tribal, nation-state, religious or whatever.

A personal example, I would say that the most passionnately identifying thing that I have experienced recently is my love of the Montreal Canadiens. It might seem trivial but I think that just reinforces my general feeling about the simultaneously passionate and yet superfluous nature of identity.

In my new found home, I don't feel like a Western Canadian, or a Maritimer and certainly not like a Quebecker.

I feel different from the ever forgotten and ever neglected Anglophone Montrealers in the sense that I don't know any of the pop culture that they do as I didnt go through my teenage angst here. Morever, most of my "coming of age" experiences were in Russia and Hungary, quite a different experience from those who grew up here.

The one thing I DO know, and CAN relate to is the history of the Canadiens, and the passionnate feelings about the team. Hence, that has become a critical means through which I connect with the community around me.

I think that just shows how much humans desire to feel a part of something, anything, larger than themselves.

Unfortunately, outside of international school cafeterias, the world hasn't quite become the "global community" that us third culture kids were brought up to believe in and feel a part of. Returning home therefore brings with it a rude awakening.

Anyways, this passage by Obama pretty much hit the nail on the head I thought, so I wanted to share it with you. In the meantime, I, like other third culture kids, (which I have admittedly made generalizations about), will in our hearts attempt to identify with something in the world around us while attempting with our heads, to maintain our belief in the universality of man, and the idealism of global citizenship.

Feel free to share your thoughts, love you all,

Chris"

RESPONSE:

"Good stuff. Something that always frustrates me is how fleeting our holds on a culture can be. Could I ever go back to Hungary and insert myself into that environment again? Would it be the same? I realize that is probably a common feeling for people harking back to their high school or college days, but that I seem to have lost a space not just in time, but in an entire country that influenced who I am/was is frustrating. I recently saw a trailer for a film called "Mustafa" about the life of Ataturk and felt the distance of an outsider looking in, not what I might have felt six years ago comfortably conversing in Turkish with an Istanbul cabbie about the film. Not only have friendships faded, but an entire language has been lost to time and exile.
I buy into your analogy about Les Canadiens because I often used the same method of sustaining a sense of stability, Los Bravos. Italy, Turkey, Hungary, France, China, wherever I was I could always study the box score. For all that time, my Mom, Dad, Kinsey, and John Smoltz were the only constants, the only people I had everywhere. I think that probably explains my die hard love of a sport that seems so slow compared with the modern day giants of the grid iron and hardwood.
I don't think my baseball is Barrack's religion though. I don't think it is what grounds me. I don't know what does. I don't have a solid grasps on my own beliefs. Sara? Going back to school? Who knows? Obama is one of those lucky ones who saw their path early on, maybe when I find mine I will also find my community. I am interested in helping people, helping the environment, but I don't think I've found my pursuit yet. Or at least I hope not, because I don't have that determination that is so clear in him. I will never be President, but I hope when I find what I want it spurs in me half the ambition that leadership spurs in Obama.

Zeke"