Speaking my native language and the importance of my culture.

  

By Eav, Victoria

Growing up, I quickly learned how to speak Khmer fluently, so I didn’t have a problem with learning how to speak but did struggle sometimes with writing and typing it. My dad’s family was split apart and had come to the U.S because of a war, his whole family was split apart due to it, and he had struggled during that time, but they encouraged me to always ព្យាយាម​ម្តង​ទៀត. My dad had to go through a refugee; a person who has been forced to leave their country to escape war or natural disaster. He had feared conflict and generalized violence, so he had to persevere through the war even while struggling with the importance of his family being split apart. He had gotten adopted from the father of a church, that's when he quickly grew up with them, my mom at the time wasn’t born but my dad was still at a pretty young age. So, growing up my language was never a struggle since my parents had gone through it.

I know it’s different for other kids, but I have thought about learning more different and significant aspects of the culture of Cambodia. I think I was born naturally able to have the ability to speak it, especially after hearing the difficulties of what my dad had gone through, of course I felt like I needed to fit in and speak it. Honestly, it is important to speak your own language and even celebrate it, if you do, you will feel more accepted in my opinion, but I don’t think that needs to apply to everyone. I was born with a twin brother; Victor and we both follow the same traditions that our family gives us to show our respect to the cultures we were born with.

I am grateful for being able to be one of those peoples who can be born with culture. In my opinion, I think you need to focus on adapting to your culture and your native language but it shouldn’t be too much a struggle if you were born with parents who spoke it all the time, it made sense to how I was able to speak it fluently everyday with the type of parents and yes I was taught how to sometimes write and type but it hadn’t stuck in my head for too long which is why I decided to take classes in high school on how to be better at learning my native language. In order to feel appreciated in the culture of Cambodia, I had dressed up in traditional Khmer clothing to show I am proud of my culture.

To the people who don’t feel too accepted and included in embracing your culture, it isn’t too late to start but you shouldn’t feel like you need to force yourself to fit in just because you probably don’t know how to type, write, or speak it. Because eventually, it will come around if you put your mind into it and you think about including yourself into your own culture. Taking classes at my high school has changed the perspective of the language. It is honestly hard to keep up with the new words and vowels, but it makes sense given the type of words my family always spoke around me when I grew up. I already knew how to understand some things but writing it and typing it became a challenge to me. I didn’t let that get in the way of the way I studied but I did find it hard. I still managed to push myself and keep going even through the hardest times, and not មិនបោះបង់, even on some days where I cannot understand a single thing in class, I go to my parents, and they help me with it. Even though they’re hard working and busy, they still have time for me no matter what.

I really do enjoy celebrating my culture and I still do have to celebrate it even on the days I don’t want to, I’m not complaining but to the people who feel like an outlier to their culture, they should be able to say they’re proud of it and to encourage themselves to feel more included. It is significant to feel like you want to contribute to your culture, it means a lot when joining the community. It is never too late to start encountering and encouraging the ones to feel like they’re a part of it. We should always make sure that regardless of anything, we should have the cultural roots inside of us, as we grow, or រៀន, we make sure that the roots aren’t getting lost along the way, it is really important to be able to endure the challenges we are faced with but at the same time need to be able to love your own culture.

My dream is to become a radiologist and I am determined to accomplish this type of dream. I want to grow up to be successful and I want to be able to inspire others with the same advice my parents had given me, to not give up no matter how hard things get and to always do good. I believe that everyone is born with a special type of talent and a different form of effort. I believe that they are able to accomplish anything as long as they set themselves a goal and put their mind to it. When given the opportunity at this high school, I feel like there are different important aspects of adapting to a language but it all just depends on how you view your own culture. In the end, we all should be appreciative of what we are given and how we are able to show others how much it means to us.