How can young girls get a sense of self and confidence in tackling the larger world? On the recent Take Our Daughters to Work Day, two South Asian organizations came together to make this a reality. South Asian Women’s Leadership Forum (SAWLF) partnered with South Asian Youth Action (SAYA!). Over 45 high school students got a chance to visit corporate offices such as JP Morgan Private Bank, Harper Collins, MTV, Infosys and Colgate, thanks to SAWLF women who are already working in these companies.

He’s fifty percent Japanese and fifty percent Indian, so does that make him a Lexus-Nano hybrid? Or a Toyota-Ambassador? This might be my own sorry attempt at stand-up, but Dan Nainan’s mixed heritage has certainly had him laughing all the way to the moolah house. Always squeaky clean, his humor has found many takers in the South Asian community across the diaspora. Here the funny man answers some serious questions.

McMansions, hefty bank balances, unfettered success, Ivy League schools, a world embroidered with dollar signs.

For many Indian immigrants, that was the fabric of the American Dream. Add to that a Lexus and maybe a BMW in the double car garage, lots of travel, lots of dining out, and the ability to live a rich lifestyle.

For other Indian immigrants, the American Dream was much more modest—just the ability to survive, to consolidate some savings and send funds back home to family members still in the village.
Yet all these dreams, big and small, modest and immodest, have been gathered, whipped up and churned in the ruthless and noisy cement mixer of the economy—pummeled, pushed and battered by the worst crisis in memory as the global economy has taken a severe beating.

When you need to find a wonderful restaurant where do you turn? Forget reviews and restaurant guides, just hop into a cab and consult your taxiwalla!

Layne Mosler is a New Yorker who has found that the cabbie who knows his way on the streets of Manhattan can also guide you to the right restaurant. Constantly navigating the city, cabbies are a great resource for off-the-beaten-track inexpensive places with authentic food.

Is Bollywood entertainment getting outsourced? At a big Indian wedding in New York there are the usual beaming uncles and aunties, lots of great Indian food, the latest Bollywood music. The dance floor clears and there’s a bespangled dancer doing all the classic moves from ‘Umrao Jaan’ as the appreciative crowd gathers around and claps.

The dancer is Russian and doesn’t speak any Hindi!

She is Inessa from Uzbekistan and is quite the star at Indian community events in New York, be it weddings, engagement parties or other celebrations.

Can two Asian actors – one an Indian and the other a Korean – be regarded as All-American? And can Hollywood actually make a comedy with them in the lead?
They can – and it did.

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.

Vijai Nathan, Nandini Mukherjee and Pooja Narang prove that there’s nothing more rewarding than following a passion and making it a profession!