Rosarita, Desai’s newest novel, is the story of Bonita, a young Indian woman from New Delhi who has come to San Miguel, Mexico for Spanish immersion courses. One day in the Jardín, she is confronted by the woman Vicky who becomes The Stranger and later, The Trickster. The Stranger claims to have known Bonita’s mother, Sunita. Except, The Stranger calls her Rosarita. Rosarita, insists The Stranger, was once a great artist who had travelled from India to learn from the great painters of Mexico.
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It’s an open secret that migration is the backbone of our food systems. And Punjabi workers are an essential part of the Italian cheese industry.
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In my family, caste was mostly a far away concept. As an adult, I am trying to constantly interrogate my positionality within my Indian identity and that includes acknowledging the privileged aspects.
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Takeaway Party Anyone? Chef’s Kitchen Chinese takeaway in El Cerrito, California was a beloved after school institution when I was in high school. There was only a small counter, no indoor seating, and an open kitchen. Every so often a burst of fire would shoot up from one of the furiously moving woks. There aren’t […]
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What’s great about cinema though – lest you thought I wasn’t going to mention books versus movies – is that it has helped to diversify this aesthetic of storytelling. So I was especially thrilled when I first came across Biren Nag’s Kohraa, (‘The Fog’) a film from 1964 which is an adaptation of Rebecca the novel by Daphne du Maurier and film by Alfred Hitchcock.
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Meera Syal’s Life isn’t All Haha Heehee follows the lives of three best friends who grew up together in the Punjabi community of East London.
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In Meera Syal’s semi-autobiographical novel, Meena Kumar is the only Indian girl in the former British mining village of Tollington. While her parents wait in vain for their daughter’s sudden and definitive metamorphosis into the model Indian girl, all Meena wants is to be a Tollington wench.
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Like any respectable Indian family, the Shantis didn’t use the house kitchen, they cooked in their garage.
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The home mandir is integral to daily living. It’s your ‘last stop’ before you start your day and before you go to bed. If something good happens, you go here to show your gratitude. When something challenging or terrible happens, you come here for comfort and strength.
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Granted, the cartoon sidewalks are usually spotless apart from the occasional pile of leaves and errant chewing gum, but that doesn’t mean it would have been any better if they’d taken their shoes off. Feet on books? No. Just, NO.
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