New immigrants in ethnic enclaves tend to have a stronger support system but once they fly the coop into the prestigious suburbs and into Americanization, there is a chasm of distances to overcome between friends. We are monetarily richer but are we poorer in friends?
Browsing: Lifestyle
Two dads and a daughter make for a very special love story
Christmas in Pune is special, says caricaturist Vikram Nandwani, because in his neighborhood people from all faiths join in on the celebrations, giving it a very local twist. “All Parsi Biryani joints go full house on Christmas Eve, People make Karanjis – a favorite Maharashtrian sweet made during Diwali – at home, and everyone – I mean everyone – comes out to the main markets in the evening to see the lights. The festivities end with kids being dragged into midnight mass.”
Today we look at a darker side of the picture – aging parents. “As my father gets older and reaches an age where he needs more help and emotional support than ever before, I am confronted with a challenge that almost all young desis face today: how to juggle our responsibility towards our parents, which is an integral part of our culture, with the many demands of our hyperactive cosmopolitan lives and our focus on the realization of our own potential and dreams. Ultimately, we all find different solutions but the underlying emotional conflict is the same for everyone.
Guest Blog: Talkback with Sanjay Sanghoee
What can you, an immigrant who came with nothing but a battered suitcase filled with bits and pieces of a disappeared life, offer this new country? What gift can you give America on its Independence Day celebration? A Punjabi immigrant love story.
Widows have had a hard lot in India and other South Asian countries. The breadwinner is the male and the whole community revolves around him.
New York is the city for reinvention, for doing old things in new places, unexpected things in unexpected places and so here was I, right in the middle of Times Square with about a million other unknown people standing and doing surya namaskar in the middle of traffic – honking cars, buses and an unending stream of pedestrians.
“Pride was so powerful for many of us. We Bhangra’d and garba’d our way through the gay district of Chicago, Boystown. Not only has it been 50 years since the riots at Stonewall, but it is the first pride for me after IPC 377 was overturned,”
Intercultural Marriages are Becoming More Common – “I think the combination of two different backgrounds offers a unique insight in life, the hard working immigrant story mixed with the confidence of belonging. I also think intercultural children are generally better looking!”
What happened to the New York model who became a nun?
Her transformation from an “It” Style Girl to a Buddhist nun is so complete that people who knew her earlier do a double-take. She admits, “It was hard at first because your sense of identity is tied to how you look and your look determines your self-worth. As a renunciate you shave your head, use no makeup, perfume or high heels – but the beauty of wisdom that adorns you is far more beautiful than any couture dress.”
Vaccinations have certainly made this dream scenario possible. “This year, the Fourth of July is a day of special celebration, for we are emerging from the darkness of years; a year of pandemic and isolation; a year of pain, fear, and heartbreaking loss,” said President Joe Biden
If you grew up in India you will remember the magic of myths and folklore which was passed on to you by your grandparents, loving aunts and grand-aunts and their loquacious helpers. There were stories for all occasions: stories at meal-time, stories at bed-time and even stories for monsoon evenings. Stories for sad times, and stories for happy times.
As you grew up and left home, either for further studies, to find work or to get married, you haphazardly packed these childhood tales into your suitcases, in-between the spice boxes and the photo albums and the clothes. And then you forgot about them. Until you yourself became a parent – in a new land, in uncharted waters.
Meet Dr. Chetna Singh, emergency care physician at Ocean Medical Center in New Jersey. For the last year she has grappled with the unending coronavirus pandemic, working the frontline in the emergency room. Right from the first beginnings through the first wave to the second wave life has been lived out with the somber reality of packed hospitals, with patients on ventilators and near death, fighting against a relentless virus.
There are many young women who agonize about starting a family during their child-bearing years and are searching for solutions. In an earlier feature we had explored the route of adoption which can create families where none existed. For others, there is the less traveled way of surrogacy – conceiving their biological child through surrogacy.
2020 in America -Pandemic, Economic Disruption, Vote Wars. The year revisited through reports about tragedy and triumph.
In this grim time of the pandemic, what can be more joyful than having the iconic AR Rahman visit you in your home, on the wings of music, along with singer Ila Paliwal and the celebrity chef Vikas Khanna?
He makes hundreds of pink origami lotuses bloom in the Rubin Museum of Art with a twist of his fingers.
He recreates a surreal miniature world of animated figures and glittering jewels in the show windows of Cartiers on Fifth Avenue.And yet, Uttam Grandhi is a mechanical engineer who’s created new PPE and masks for this age of COVID
The tea had a special earthy flavor in this cup and the fact that the clay container would once again become one with nature seemed a beautiful idea. After all, aren’t ancient civilizations traced out by the clay remains of their days?
Our civilization of course will probably be remembered by the piles of plastic containers and garbage stuffed landfills we will leave behind! So the idea of the reborn clay utensils really appealed to me.
A world-class music concert, a major dance festival, a film festival are the delights of summer, must-see events on our social calendar. In years past each was a much anticipated real life event, with dressed-up crowds meeting their friends and rubbing shoulders with celebrities. Here we share the past memories and how each event has been reborn, reinvented this year.