At The NRI: Food = Love ?

I have a new post over @ The NRI, on food, love, and being Indian: Why must my Indian aunts insist on cooking for me? For me, traveling home is a fraught process. First there’s the cross-country flight, then the cross-Pacific flight, overloaded immigration queues, packed baggage carousels, and clearing customs with a small, worn out kidlet. And then comes the hard part: visiting extended family. Read...

Cleanliness is next to…

Indians are very clean–does my untidy house make me less of an Indian? I like neatness. I enjoy seeing things in their proper places, and baking in a clean kitchen. Most NRIs I know are the same, house proud, well-groomed, and neat as the proverbial pin. Sometimes, though, cleanliness has to go. Read more @ The...

Indian Women are Perfect (at the-NRI.com)

I am a perfect mother, a perfect wife, a perfect daughter. How do I know this? Because I’m Indian. Perfect Daughter When my parents give me unasked for advice about Baby, I put on my best phone smile–the all-encompassing, “Of course!” followed by a slight-to medium lilt as I expound on the many reasons I should have thought of such a valuable idea but did not and how I,  a first time ...

Thank You Come Again (at the-NRI.com)

Apu Nahasapeemapetilon is a legend of Indian cinema. Sort of. Over the past twenty-one years, several Simpsons characters have made their way into the zeitgeist–several of whom are minority characters. But rather than being vilified, Apu has been claimed, somewhat lovingly, by Indian convenience store owners everywhere. How do I know? In December of 1989, the year The Simpsons hit the small ...

Birbal and the NRI (at the-NRI.com)

When I was small, my father told me stories. Sometimes they were standard fare, rehashings of Cinderella or Goldilocks and the Three Bears (he particularly liked Goldie because it starts with one of his favorite foods–porridge with honey). As I grew older, though, Dad started throwing in other stories, Indian stories he’d heard growing up. My favorite? Birbal. Read more @ The...