Ethnic Hash Analysis

Cultural Identity is very tricky to understand. As a matter of fact, you may not even know your cultural identity, you probably weren’t thinking about it until now. Culture is essentially what makes you, well, you. It is a mix of family, religion, interests and even cuisine, as the personal essay “Ethnic Hash” demonstrates, “What were the flavors, accents, and linguistic trills that were passed down to me over the ages? What are the habits, customs, and common traits of the social group by which I have been guided in life-” Food can define you. It very well defines me. I am what I eat, as they say. Food is a very important part of any culture. Food tells stories. They have history behind them. Food is a form of tradition, of your culture.
Tacos have a tortilla on the outside and meat, cilantro, and onion on the inside. In a way I am like a taco. I am Mexican, I fit the part, almost in the same way someone looks at a tortilla and assumes it is Mexican. However, I am a lot of different things on the inside, like a taco has many different ingredients inside. I compare myself to food the same way Kristen Lee compares herself to rice pudding, “Just as the white rice is baked into the yellow pudding, I, too, am mixed into the U.S. melting pot. “ Kristen Lee is Swedish and Asian. The white rice is her white side, and the yellow pudding is her Asian side, and it is all mixed together in the melting pot that is America. The tortilla is my Mexican side and everything else inside is everything else I am. It represents my Americanism, Catholicism, musicianship, and intelligent (at least I think). I choose to describe myself as a taco because a Taco is a traditional Mexican food. It is something I eat a lot and I am what I eat. It lets me be in touch with my roots, coming into contact with the different types of tacos I eat, hinting me at what life is like where my parents lived, and where their parents
We attend church every Sunday, but we are a bit different. I attend Spanish mass every week on Sunday. Not only do I attend a Spanish mass because my parents only speak Spanish; I also do it because it is another way for me to exercise the use of my first language. Growing up, my parents assumed I only spoke Spanish, they had no idea that watching all those cartoons everyday made me learn English. So on the first day of preschool in New York, I whipped out my hidden language and spoke with all the kids very well, to my parents and even my teacher's surprise. Growing up in New York didn’t affect the way I speak English; I speak English like how people on the television, no New Yorker's accent. My Spanish is just as good as my English, I speak it well. I read, write, and speak it just like I do English, and I can thank my pre-school teacher and my parents in developing the system I have today. I am Mexican at home, 100%. Everything I read and said was in Spanish at home, everything at school was in English. However this system is flawed. I end up ultimately speaking more Spanish than English, so all the little things like Spanish mass and helping people with Spanish always makes me feel more complete. It makes me feel at home, even though I was never born in Mexico. I also volunteer after church. In Mexico the church is the center of the whole town. It is always right next to the plaza. The plaza booms with food vendors and after church