I visited Steve Raymer's site, where I found "Images of the Indian Diaspora". These pictures are copyrighted,if you want to have a peek-a-boo, visit the site . There are listed under his current projects.

But unlike other mass migrations, the Indian Diaspora maintains far-reaching cultural ties with the motherland. Indians do not so much assimilate the culture of their adopted lands, but instead bring the culture of India to the 110 countries where they live.

Everytime I scan the web to find out more about the Indian diaspora in Dubai, I reach no where. I have a lot of friends working there, doing well. Most of them are now leaving Dubai, to live in Canada and Australia.

Me, being a researcher on "Films on the Diaspora", I look around for audio-visual stories, I have seen movies from Mississippi Masala to Bride and Prejudice, the story line is the culture of India, that we like to fantasize about, exotic to point of being 'only exotic'. But what I yearn to see is the story of the Indian diaspora in the Middle-East, we have heard horror stories of maids being confined, of workers having no legal rights.

So when I read this article Dubai's Kerala Connection - Hidden behind the Gulf State's development are Indian "foot soldiers of globalization" which also had pictures, I think I have found a man who is equally interested in capturing the diaspora in pictures as I am.

Steve Raymer is an associate professor of journalism at Indiana University in Bloomington and was a National Geographic Magazine staff photographer for more than 20 years. He is working on a photographic book about the Indian Diaspora.

Why is everyone after "Desi Dollars" - From the Indian Government to the large American Multinationals who'll stop at nothing to seduce the Desi's to part with their hard earned money.

(The Gandhi statue in Houston, set up by the India Culture Centre, Houston)



I read a news item, where NRI , Krishna Vavilal is about to raise $1 million for India Chair in Houston varsity.

I really am interested in 'Indian Culture and its Preservations'. One of the best ways to preserve a culture is to make it an academic course in a University. One of the best ways to live a culture is to live in it.

The project is to collect $ 1 million (about Rs. 4.5 crores) to set up an Indian Chair in the University of Houston wherein the future generation of the Indian Diaspora could learn and study about the vast and rich cultural heritage of India and its glorious history.

However, once you read the above article, you tend to get the feeling that the Indian diaspora in the US, wants the younger generation to learn more about India. A very laudable effort. But one must realize academics puts perspective into a higher intellectual or artistic realm. Students begin to think they know much about the topic, but do they feel for it, do they live it? And I am sure the second-geners, are facing the tough act of balancing the Indian and the American, will the course address that challenge.

I really am one for confluence of culture and scholarship, but I think the course also needs to address how the younger diaspora can get into mainstream society. Rather than just another community trying only to preserve its culture, which is fine, but you could promote culture much more by being in the mainstream.

This course shouldn't become a right-wing Indian department, but a secular course where anyone interested in India could pick up a course.

Good Luck to Krishna Vavilal.

(This is a Mauritian stamp commemorating the end of Indian slavery)

For all of you People of Indian Origin, I found a site, that will allow you to get information on your ancestral family back home. I think this is a great service by the Government of India - to offer the "Old Diaspora" particularly the immigrants who left India early in the century, a chance to get to their roots. I wonder if they'd be interested. If yes why? If no why?

I heard about this site awhile ago and finally got around to doing a google, when I landed this site.Trace your Roots in India

This website is designed to address the queries from the members of the Indian Diaspora on their ancestral roots in India in a systematic manner, in an interactive mode by developing a database through a questionnaire , transmission of the data to the administrative unit in the relevant district in India.

She is beautiful, she is everything gorgeous and she's Indian.

I find that people in India find Aishwarya beautiful, abroad she seems to be representing the modern Indian woman. And I find most of the NRI blogs that I read, enamoured by her.

NRI Director, Gurinder Chadha featuring Ash in two of her movies "Bride and Prejudice" and "Mistress of Spices" , speaks a lot about the NRI obsession with the lady and how she represents the new Indian as being 'transnational'.

1. Is it that the NRI's want to believe that Ash is beautiful because she is Indian?

2. Do they think she is lending her face to sell India in the West. Oprah! David Lettermen...

3. Does the NRI believe that Aishwarya is an Icon, representing Indian modernism?

4. Is she the one thing they can be proud of from back home?

Whatever it is, I appreciate the market-savvy lady - wrapping the whole world around those lovely eyes.

I had a meeting with my Guide today and he was satisfied with my progress on the proposal. So I am going to be having a Doctoral committee interview in the second week of August and that will clear the line for my body of work to be translated into table of contents, chapters, paragraphs and then an entire bound thesis.

I have also applied for a fellowship to study in the US - the land where Desi's make movies about Desi's.Crossing my fingers, for I would love to interact with South Asian scholars in the US myself being located in South Asia. Imagine the exchange and the cultural difference we might have.

Well gotto run!

I have been extremely busy trying to finish of my proposal for the Ph.D. It is tough getting the proposal together. But hopefully by the next week, I get the first draft out.

I found this article on the "Coolies" by Francis Assisi.

From 20th century’s indentured Indian laborers, who crossed Kala Pani in steamships, to today’s globally savvy professionals, who jet across intercontinental and cultural space, all Indian immigrants may be viewed as coolies: hitech coolies, coding coolies, medical coolies, intellectual coolies, academic coolies, scientific coolies, and business coolies.

The Indian diaspora consisting of coolies left largely for economic and social reasons,in the colonial times. To take away the coolie identity has take a long while. Why is the term being resurrected again? We provide world class service and labor at a lower price, does that make us coolies.