Heritage
A lot of people(at least in Australia) have a great deal of pride in their heritage. This applies most of all, in my experience, to Lebanese. Some of them are so damn proud of it they can bang on about it all day. When I was working in Sydney, I had a workmate who was just like that. Don’t get me wrong – hearing all his stories and stuff made the day go by quickly. But towards the end, he was starting to repeat himself. Whatever the subject was, he could apply it to his heritage.
Such pride is admirable, you know? I found it got annoying in this case, but I can’t begrudge someone who takes pride in who they are and where they hail from. It’s not just Australia, too. I know a fellow in the US who pretty proud of his country and his heritage.
It reminded me of one of Lovecraft’s stories, ‘The Shadow Over Innsmouth’. In this story, the protagonist discovers his less than wholesome relation to dark powers and his own sinister heritage. By the end, however, he takes great pride in this.
December 16, 2008 at 12:06 pm
I have no idea how you managed to tie that into Lovecraft, but I’m impressed. I know what you mean about “over priding”, which really is pretty annoying when someone just constantly prattles on about how great their origins are.
Funny story, I was helping my Korean friends pack up a store once and we started talking about history for one reason or another. My friend asked me why black people were slaves, and I spat back at him that Koreans were as well (even gave the dates and occupational/colonial status), to which he quickly denied. Luckily, there was a nuna (older female) there who pointed out that I was in fact correct, and I got the last laugh.
So the most important thing about heritage I think is knowing it.
This is all to say…
Land rights.
December 17, 2008 at 4:59 am
HA
LAND RIGHTS INDEED, MY DUSKY FRIEND