Tell our readers about yourself and your family.
Rachel: I am living a life I never imagined for myself when growing up near Boston. I live in Hoboken, NJ; I’ve recently started a business; I have two daughters (ages 5 and 2); and I am married to an Indian man who roots for the NY Yankees. And somehow now I can also report that I am 37 years old. All of those statements still surprise me !
How did you come up with the idea for Me on a Tee?
Rachel: I was lucky to have my paternal grandfather who liked to write stories of his childhood in the Bronx. I think that lay the groundwork for my American Studies college major, and my interest in how this nation was formed and prospered and became the destination of choice for migrants near and far. There’s something truly unique about America.
Becoming a parent and realizing we had so much to impart to our children about their family history led me to question if children (and even adults) today are fully aware of their ancestry. I thought showing someone’s ancestry on a t-shirt would be a fun way to educate and spark conversation. Every family has some neat stories about how ancestors came to the US, what early days here were like, how they adapted, etc… Let’s make sure the stories aren’t lost.
How do you explain to your children about their heritage and why they don’t look exactly like mom or dad?
Rachel: We’ve told the older one that kids are a combination of their parents and that’s why she looks like her father but has my hair color. My 5 year old has told me she is “from the Empire State Building” and she is not Indian, though we’ve explained to her otherwise 100 times. I think eventually she’ll get it.
What challenges do you think parents of multi-racial or multi-cultural family face?
Rachel: Just the amount of information my husband and I need to learn about each other’s traditions – for me, Indian culture, his family’s religion (Jainism), and names of foods; and for him, Jewish holidays and some Yiddish words here and there. A big learning curve for both of us.
We live close to New York City, so the population around us is quite diverse. We haven’t had any incidents in which people were rude to us. We just expect from time to time someone will be perplexed by our family. Usually it’s when parents see me and the girls together often, then my husband may drop my older daughter off at a birthday party and they will comment to me later “oh, we didn’t realize your husband was Indian.”
What’s the most interesting Me on a Tee shirt that someone has requested?
Rachel: We’ve had some interesting combinations like Cuban/Chinese and someone who was Luxembourger — I’ll leave you all to search that ethnicity online. I love when we have to design a new flag for a lesser-known nation.
Is there anything else you’d like to add?
Rachel: I try to categorize the questions as simply curiousity. Answer the questions, shrug, admit it is confusing, and move on. People like patterns and straightforward labels and we’re an aberration of a matching family — but that’s ok and every year it seems I notice more families like ours.
Here’s your chance to win your very own custom Me On A Tee of your choice. You can choose between the flags in honor of Flag Day or the ever so cute Pie Chart Shirt.
To enter, visit Me On A Tee and leave a comment with which shirt you like.
For more entries, do any of the following and leave a comment for each one:
- Follow Me On A Tee on Twitter and tweet about the contest linking back to this page
- Example: Show off your ancestry with @MeOnATee flag shirt from @thienkim http://bit.ly/jGUUpH
- Share this contest on Facebook (use little icon below) and leave a comment.
No compensation was received for this post. Thanks to Rachel for providing a custom shirt as a giveaway!