How well does your non-Asian parent

[kimpossible]

understand your Asian ancestral culture? And what effect(s) on your family dynamics has that had - if any?

[rice cracker]

My non-Asian parent is dead racist and if it ain't white it ain't right. He's lived in Korea, but I'm pretty sure he experienced everything there through a tourist lense because every word he says about "them gooks" is so loaded with ignorance and misconception it's actually gotten funny at this point.

We don't talk much.

[AliBabaIncorporated]

My non-Asian parent understands our ancestral culture(s) (either geographic or ethnic) about as much as my Asian parent does--- i.e. close to nil.

[LaiSteve66]

My mom doesn't know anything about my dad's culture and she went out of her way to ensure that I would be just as ignorant. (failed though, nice try mom)

[Chad]

My mother doesn't understand very well.. she lived in Malaysia for a while with him when they had just married. That was a long time ago. She couldn't adjust and always felt like an outsider so they went to Texas where they can both feel like outsiders.
There were definitely times that it caused problems because they couldn't understand each other very well. But most of all there were problems of the influence of the local community vs. the influence of parents. And when the parents are at work for 60+ hours per week, guess which one has more influence?

[jongeh]

my non asian parent doesn't understand it. he lived there for a little while, learned a couple words, and a thing or two about the culture. he doesn't consider me to be asian at all though. he doesn't discourage me doing things to further understand my heritage, but he doesn't really encourage them either because he forgets that i am my mother's daughter.

[hannle]

I'm not a happa. my brother married a white woman in early 80s before my parents knew it when they were back then in Vietnam. once they came over to the u.s and live with her in texas, the deed was done and a kid was born. my dad was having dispute with her, due to the reason she didn't allowed him to smoke inside the house (which i understand), and that he was not allowed to put up a vegetable garden in her yard. yep, my dad is a typical chinese man =) so my parents move to california. she did not let them, because she thinks all new immigrants all want to go to california so they can have a better welfare money, which in texas was only half. my parents move out anyway. since then, she didn't want to have anything to do with us, and don't let her kids talk to us. this get me mad. this is not fair to the kids. they don't know anything about us or their chinese culture heritage. and to make their marriage works, my brother seldom come to see us. if he does he will come by himself and only when his company send him over for business in socal.
i'm glad you guys are not denying who the other half of you are.

[Filiprish]

Great thread. My dad is respectful of non-US culture, he even watches Discovery Channel religiously. Anyhoo, he understands a lot about Filipino culture, but it probably helps that the Philippines is christian. He's even adopted some Tagalog slang into his normal speak and eats Filipino food regularly. Being the engineer he is, he even designed and built a coconut scraper for my mom, and scrapes coconut for her when she makes suman. Filipinos, know scraping coconut breaks your back. Now that's cultural appreciation!

[Emperor_Mike]

Both my parents are mixed and the situation is somewhat backwards for me. I'm more familiar with my Asian than my Caucasian roots.

I haven't taken the initiative to correct the imbalance either. I'd like to eventually though.