Ideas for Writing: Turtle Soup by Marilyn Chin

        There are lots of pros and cons that will gain by a family that moving to the new land or a new country. It takes lots of courage for a family to move to a new land because it will give them lots of challenges that will affect their everyday life. They need to adapt themselves in a new culture, way of life, learning new language and work ethics. It will take lots of time to adapt ourselves with a new way of life or a new culture because we had used with our ancestry land way of life and cultures.

        “Sometimes you’re the life, but sometimes the sacrifice”. The quote represent that sometimes we will have a good time but sometimes we need to face hardness when we live in a new land. Based on the “Turtle Soup” poem that written by Marilyn Chin, we could see that the speaker is an immigrant in a place in America called Pasadena. Her family faced the hardness to maintain their ancestor belief and cultures. We could see her family face the loss of their true identity as a Chinese family. Her mother no longer believe in their ancestry cultures and sacred. In Chinese tradition context, the turtle soup represents a revered Chinese mythological symbol that the Chinese belief it is the symbol of longevity, patience, grandeur and antiquity but her mother had poached and boiled the turtle without any hesitation because for her it just a type of food that they need to consume.

        In contrary, they could learn a new culture when they move a new land. It is really important for us to adapt with our new cultures in our new place because we could avoid any misunderstanding that will arise. We could not just simply act like the way in our own land. For example, talking loudly is considered boorish in Japan, entering a mosque wearing shorts is disrespectful in Saudi Arabia and holding hands with your opposite-sex sweetheart in India is provocatively rude. Instead of to avoid the misunderstanding, we can also broaden our knowledge about other countries culture. It might be hard for the Asian immigrants to blends with their new cultures in the West countries because Asian had known as one of the most polite and good behave people, while the Western are more open in their cultures.

        The language practice could be one of the difficulties that will face by the immigrants. It is very difficult to live on a day-to-day basis where your communication skills are limited by language that foreign to you. There will be lots of misunderstanding between immigrants and native residents. For example, you may speak American English and move to the U.K. or Australia. Although the language is technically the same, you will find that many words have different meanings in British English and Australian English. Your accent in your first language might influence your second language that makes what you have said hard to understand. But you could take this opportunity to learn a new language and widen your knowledge about your new land or place language. Language means everything when you move to a new land because through language you could learn their cultures, getting a new job, socialize with native residents and so on.