Globalization through Cultures

I never really gave an importance to globalization until I realized that it is all around us. Globalization does not only mean business and trade, but it also means different cultures from all around the world. I grew up in a Mexican family home. The stereotypical comments I would hear would be that were dirty, we do not know English, and were most likely immigrants. As I was growing up that is what I thought ourselves to be, everybody saw us as the lower social community.

I started noticing globalization in my life when I attended a program called SOAR, here at BYU. SOAR brought together many individuals from various states and countries with different cultures to share. I met people who come from different ethnic backgrounds. For example, Japanese, Korean, Polynesian, Salvadorian, Native American, and many others. When I attended this program it made me think about the whole world around me and not only the place I lived in. Back home, I would be surrounded by mostly Latinos and I thought everywhere I went there would be Mexican food or pupusas. Coming to this program I noticed that that was not the case, there was no authentic Mexican food and it seemed that everywhere I looked I would see Caucasians.

Knowing that BYU is an LDS community made it feel more comforting, but I still felt culture shocked. As the week went by and I met all these new people at this program I could see the diversity and the cultures that we might not see on a daily basis. This program made me appreciate the different people there is all around the world and when we come together we come together as one. We might be different from the outside, but in the end we turn out to be the same in the inside. This program expanded my view of the world and how I can learn so much from other people and it changed my perspective on how I see other people as well. It encouraged me to learn more about other cultures and it gave me the desire to learn more about their style of living.

From this experience I learned that we are all special in our own way and we all have our own purpose here on earth. I also learned that being Mexican is not something I should be ashamed of, but something I should be proud of.