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The Indian Americans of today are keen to share their heritage
with their compatriots be it in business, social or cultural
endeavours, reports Lisette B. Poole
Affluent and confident, the Indian American community in
the San Francisco Bay Area is coming of age. From computer
industry entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley, physicians in major
hospitals, and professors in colleges and universities, to
owners of grocery stores and community newspapers, they are
working to leave a tangible legacy.
Meanwhile, their children are blazing new trails as magazine
publishers, filmmakers, singers and clothing designers, expressing
the vibrant mix of their Indian heritage and American experience
in songs, movies, stories and fashion shows.
The northern California community, more than 200,000 strong
and said to be the largest in North America, will soon break
ground for a new multimillion dollar India Community Center,
informs chairwoman Talat Hasan.
Signs of integration and social influence are evident on
the local and state levels. This recognition brings pride
to many of the older generation who put down roots here in
the early 1960s and struggled to study, work, become accepted
and forge an identity for themselves in this region.
Many say they chose to settle here to draw strength from
a well-established community of Sikhs who had ventured to
California in the early1900s and settled in Yuba City nearby.
They were mostly farmers but newer immigrants were involved
in medicine, technology and business in more metropolitan
areas.
"Being Indian is cool now," says magazine publisher
Deepak Srivastava. "The generation with established family
roots is well-grounded in education with at least master's
degrees in their professions, good jobs and lots of disposable
income. They don't have survival issues. They are a long way
from where their parents started."
Srivastava recognised these signs early on and understood
that this group, as comfortable in silk saris as in hip-hugging
jeans, needed to identify with a medium they could call their
own. So he sold his home to raise money for the birth of Nirvana.
In two years it has become a glossy, quarterly magazine catering
to a well-heeled clientele. The blend of stories, travel and
health advice, fashion tips and personal testimonies target
a holistic image aimed at young Indian professionals but also
appealing to their peers in other Asian minorities.
"The 30-something women of my generation actually have
the best of two worlds," exclaims Farah Ahmed of New
York. "Our perspective is global. Community and family
matter to us. We appreciate and promote our heritage and culture
while at the same time we value our achievements and personal
independence." Ahmed is the executive editor and attorney
handling print and Internet advertising for Nirvana Woman.
The magazine is headquartered in Mountain View in the heart
of Silicon Valley near the offices of Indian-born Sabeer Bhatia
who spearheaded Hotmail. Editors say it has a circulation
of 40,000.
The ability to straddle both worlds is an asset many in the
community reflect in fields including media, music, entertainment,
fashion design, education and health. Some, who were once
California teenagers, have even become household names. For
example, Raj Mathai, sports director for NBC11, anchors the
nightly TV sports broadcasts. M. Night Shyamalan just released
his latest movie Lady in the Water. Kerala -born Mathai has
twice won an Emmy, America's premier television award. He
hosts the top rated "Sports Sunday" programme that
attracts high profile sports figures. He is invited to be
master of ceremonies at galas and fundraising banquets.
Another familiar face in the mainstream media is Sanjay Gupta,
CNN's senior medical correspondent, a neurosurgeon by profession.
He also hosts the half-hour weekend show "House Call
with Dr. Sanjay Gupta." Some in the community credit
Gupta for drawing many South Asians into medicine and journalism.
"Music, like most forms of art, brings some sort of
cohesion for the South Asian community in North America,"
singer Kiran Ahluwalia says. "I lump together Canada
and America because in both countries the communities are
just coming of age and for the first time you’ve millionaires
who are South Asian," she said in a National Public Radio
interview. "Their parents were born in Pakistan, Bangladesh
or India but they were born here. So we need definition for
ourselves; we are hybrids. There are two cultures in us; trying
to balance the two cultures in us is the larger thing."
Ahluwalia who left India as a girl, was a successful bond
trader in Canada before embracing music which she enjoyed
more. In her recently released, self-titled CD, Ahluwalia
celebrates the ghazal but she also sings contemporary songs
with traditional lyrics.
On a parallel track, Anoushka Shankar, a sitarist, pianist,
conductor and composer, is passionate about Indian classical
music and admits she is on a mission to show that it can be
as fashionable as Bollywood pop. In May, 2005, before she
released Rise, she and her father Ravi Shankar played a sold-out
performance at the San Francisco Opera House.
The desire to share and expand values led Swati Kapoor, a
native of Rampur, Uttar Pradesh, to fuse Indian fashion into
a cross-cultural couture. "Every garment has an Indian
signature," she says as she spreads an ornate black-on-silver
georgette evening dress, and moves on to show a collection
of soft, glittering, silk saris, embroidered tunics and pants,
beaded corsets and skirts, matching scarves, earrings and
bracelets.
Her clientele is varied: Americans, Middle Easterners, South
Asians from India and Pakistan, young debutantes, established
political figures and San Francisco socialites. Kapoor explains
that she consults with a client, offers a broad picture design,
works with garment industry designers in New Delhi and Mumbai
and voila! each dress is unique and à la mode. "Our
lives are global. Fashion too is global. I just try to adapt
the garment to the personality. The right dress helps my clients
stand out, " she says enthusiastically.
Three years ago when the dotcom industry went bust, Kapoor
says her master's degree in graphic design, passion for art
and the attraction of the mainstream population to the cultures
of the growing ethnic immigrant communities converged. "I
decided I would be my own boss. I worked 20 hours out of 24
preparing a line of clothes." She now has a thriving
business. Her fashion shows are packed.
According to the U.S. Census 2000, Asians make up 11 percent
of California's population. But in the nine Bay Area counties,
Asians make up 19 percent. Including people who are part Asian,
the group constitutes 12.3 percent of the population statewide
and 21 percent of the Bay Area.
"I feel almost as much at home here in Fremont and the
Bay Area as I would in India," says Charu Prakash. "We
have come a long way from when we first arrived in the area."
She brings the flavour of India to the table and teaches others,
including her sons, to experience it. "Diwali is the
peak of the gourmet season," she says. Her most popular
dishes are chicken tikka masala, fusion dishes of paneer and
vegetables, samosa roll-ups, desi-style artichoke dip and
petite tortilla warm-ups. She included these in a 2005 Calendar
of Indian Cuisine.
"We are witnessing a thirst to pass down and share knowledge.
We have an obligation to leave something very tangible that
is not just money," says Hasan of the India Community
Center. "Generations of kids now and those who will follow
them would not be well-served if we do not leave a legacy
of culture, traditions and values, and give back to the larger
American community around us."
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