My informant is a student who was originally from China but came to study in US since high school.

“There is one habit that I’m still afraid to break even now, which is to place my shoes facing inward to my bed. People in my country, well, maybe mostly in my family, that if you let you shoes facing inward, it’s like welcoming the ghosts to wear on your shoes and step onto you at night. Well, I don’t really believe in it that much, but I would still avoid doing that anyway haha.”

I think it’s very interesting that sometimes even though people don’t really believe in the reason behind certain behavior, they still make the decision to do that anyway. It could be a inner fear of those ambiguous things, like “what if they really happen? it’s always better to be safe.”