The Hindu : New Delhi News : Raising a toast to American `desis'

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Dec 14, 2005

New Delhi

New Delhi

Raising a toast to American `desis'

Gurmukh Singh with his new book `California Dreams'

These are "desis" who stepped ashore from their own "Mayflower". Pioneers of the American "desi" experience, these are people who made it big in their own field far away from the blinding lights of fame. Written by Gurmukh Singh, the book carefully chronicles their experiences in the trend-setting part of the land of milk and honey: the bright sunny California.

From Dalip Singh Saund who began the struggle for equal rights for Asians to Mehnga Singh, the first Indian car dealer -- a must-have in that part of the world -- "California Dreams: India Shinning in the Land of Hollywood" has stories of ordinary people who made a success of the go-West movement.

Having paved the way for the Patels in NASA and the bespectacled boys who powered the Silicon Valley, the people in the book are "real" heroes who have lived the American dream in its true form. The firsts in their field, there is this story of a dentist -- a graceful Sikh, Amarjit Singh Marwah, who came to the US on a Guggenheim Fellowship way back in 1959 -- and was responsible for the violet-eyed Elizabeth Taylor's smile and the handsome Gregory Peck's grin. He started off his practice when the curry was not even a whiff in the air.

While the Indians have come far from that time and now Diwali is also celebrated in the White House, the book has the testimonies of those who have worked hard constantly and quietly. It has been published by British Columbia Books. -- Mandira Nayar

-- Mandira Nayar

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