San Francisco: a cultural mecca where religions coincide and ideas explode into being. Most of my friends and I are fortunate to have lived our entire lives here. But whereas many of my peers only experienced other cultures through the eyes of those with different backgrounds, my six-year-old self was lucky enough to have been immersed in two vastly different religions. By day, I was a diligent student at a Presbyterian Chinese school. At home, I was a Buddhist child, influenced by the Confucianism that tinged my parents' beliefs.
I can vividly recall the afternoons spent in the chapel at school. A lanky preacher stood on the dais, urging us to pray regularly and assuring us that God loved every child he had created. I sat in the pews, my face hidden among the hundreds. By no means did I feel special, but I absorbed the preacher's message all the same.
My parents had wanted me learn Cantonese, but never liked that I was subject to weekly sermons. A devout Buddhist, my mother continues to keep a calendar on the living room wall. The inauspicious days are circled with a bold red crayon; the days on which we light incense for ancestors are marked with pencil. Not a single April has passed without my family's observance of Qing Ming, a Chinese Buddhist tradition of honoring ancestors by visiting the cemetery.
At six, I prayed nightly, but I also remembered not to wash my hair on the days encircled in red. I sometimes wonder how two religions could have had equal influence on me, without causing me great confusion and frustration. What I've come to realize is that my exposure to both Presbyterianism and Buddhism has only had a positive impact.
At seventeen, it seems that the two religions have canceled each other out, as I practice neither today. But what remains of my religious experience is a readiness to embrace all ideas. In the San Franciscan tradition, I only see people- I see neither religion nor race. The light that illuminates each person is colored only by personal qualities. My favorite people are the kindest and quirkiest people I have ever met; they are Catholic, atheist, white, Syrian, Asian. Even as the Chinese characters I learned escape my memory one by one, I remain infinitely grateful for my early immersion in two completely different religions.
I'm 300 characters over (about 30-50 words). Any help on trimming would be much appreciated!
