For the past week I have been absent from this website while on an anthropological excursion for SM (like anyone but my monkey assistants even noticed). Sometimes a blogger just needs to get out of their bunker and talk to the real people. The question I was seeking an answer to was a profound one. Do those states…you know, the ones up there near the Canadian border…do they even have any desis that live there? For my excursion I needed a field assistant. My brother (we will call him P to protect his real identity) has lived in Idaho for the past two years and served as a good travel companion.
From L.A. I flew to Portland, Oregon where I had a layover. While walking from one gate to the other I had my first desi sighting. It was a Sikh man with a long flowing beard and an unusually large turban who I spotted in the TSA security line. Upon closer inspection however, two things became clear. First, the man was white and not desi. Second, he was a TSA screener and not a passenger.
Four hours later (damn airline delays) I landed in Spokane, WA where I collected my possessions at baggage claim. I began to re-arrange some of my gear when a woman walked up to me holding a sign.
Woman: Excuse me but are you Mustafa?
Abhi: Heh. No, sorry.
Woman: I’m sorry but you are the only one that looked like he was…lost.
“Lost” of course was a very clever euphemism for “brown.” I didn’t mind though. The name “Mustafa” reminded me of a powerful figure with a glorious mane. For just a minute I forgot about my military short haircut and hummed a little Hakuna Matata as I waited on the curb for my brother to drive up.
Our first stop was Idaho Falls in southern Idaho. In racially homogeneous states it is difficult to tell if people are really looking at you differently or if it is your expectation that they will look at you differently that simply clouds your perception reality. Before I even walked through the door of the restaurant where we had dinner, I was subconsciously on the defensive. There are many of us who would never consider living in some cities or states based only upon our preconceived notions of what racial attitudes there must be like, regardless of the objective reality. Not at that restaurant nor at any other time during my trip was I made to feel uncomfortable. I was uneasy quite often though, mostly because of my own perceptions (and a seven day long beard that made me look menacing to myself).
The next day we reached the Grand Tetons National Park. This led to another observation. In our U.S. National Parks system, a system that brings in many visitors from every state, there isn’t much racial diversity. The overwhelming majority of visitors are white (a lot of them are retirees). Asian-Americans also represent pretty well, but not as much as one might expect. There are fewer Latino visitors than expected as well but African-American visitors are the rarest of all. National Parks are among the cheapest vacation options available to Americans. Pretty much anyone with gas money and a tent can have a good vacation with their family in one. Class and race should not be an issue and yet it is strikingly so. This is even more apparent on the popular and backcountry trails than near the visitor centers and scenic points. Why don’t more minorities visit our National Parks?
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The blogger and his brother in pursuit of a story for SM while searching for “brown” bears near the Grand Tetons. |
Next we went to Yellowstone National Park. I was keeping a running tab on how many desis we encountered during our trip. In five days I saw maybe fifteen and made a big deal about pointing out each family (to the annoyance of P). I didn’t see a single desi in the states of Idaho, Montana, or Wyoming outside of a National Park. In Butte, Montana I had P drive through the city slowly so that I could search for and take a picture of an Indian restaurant. Surely there must be a “Curry Palace” or something? There was none. I insisted that we stay in a desi owned motel but the odds were not in our favor. Doesn’t the AAHOA know that there is a lot of untapped territory up there?
And so I now wonder. Are there any SM readers that live in Idaho, Montana, or Wyoming? Should I have arranged a meet-up in one of those states last week? Would our meet-up have aroused suspicion?
My question remains largely unanswered. Are there any desis up there?
Side note: If anyone is interested in the non-anthropological aspects of my trip last week then I will have more pictures on my blog by late Tuesday.
You have the one qualification required to be a superb wife.
Dude, that’s Mufasa not Mustafa. Ha ha ha.
Niagara Falls can hardly classify hardly ‘wilderness’ – the American side is like a really trashy version of an amusement park, complete with the House Of Horror ride.
As for ticks – pish posh! How did our ancestors survive in their deerskins? At any rate, I’ve ventured into tick paradise dozens of times and have emerged unscathed. Besides, big deal if you get bitten – remove it with a pair of tweezers(don’t twist though, or it’s head might remain behind, causing infection – and don’t douse it in alcohol!). And if you’re really freaked about it go see a doctor.
Hmmmm. To be honest though I always hated that movie 🙂
“Here’s what we all gotta do: get nekkid.”
Yeah…Desi Burning Man!!!!!
is that a proposition? this door only swings one way my dear fellow.
all these years of civilization… discovering the joys of indoor plumbing… then, in the name of progress one finds oneself squatting like a monkey in the jungle… forcing the body to perform functions that have been trained to expect porcelain, closed spaces and running water.
and dont get me even started about the food!!!
You mean you don’t like animated-into-a-lion-cub Jonathan Taylor Thomas singing Elton John songs?
Having lived in the Pacific NW, I can say that there aren’t many macacas up there at all. I knew one supercool guy doing environmental law for EarthJustice in either Butte or Bozeman, and I’d try to get to Idaho and Missoula every once in awhile for hiking and swimming in the gorgeous lakes, but yeah, in general, very very few brown people there. Even in a place like Seattle, most of the macacas are on the east side by Microsoft and not in the city proper. You can go a long time in the NW without seeing someone South Asian.
Oh! And the fact that Idaho is the center for the white supremacist movement in the US doesn’t help matters for that state.
That being said, the NW does have incredible places to hike/camp: the Olympics are gorgeous, the Cascades are dry but beautiful (especially the Alpine Lake area), as well as the obvious locations like Glacier in Montana and Mt. Hood near Portland.
xnomad:
One of my favorite hikes ever…Looking out onto the Harding Icefield is spectacular.
I will most certainly vouch for that. It’s not an uncommon occurrence at all. My experience hiking in the southwest, appalachia, and even costa rica (best hiking ever) all support Abhi’s observations. Although, in costa rica all the hard core hikers seemed to be european.
“find me a shaded corner and pour me a cold lassi any day.”
naah. for sheer exhilaration and feeling alive, nothing beats running through a leech-infested forest as fast as you can and then gingerly de-attaching them from your body.
For folks who have lived in India daily life is a litany of shoving, pushing,and vagera vagera exertions. Coming to America, why should they subject themselves to huffing and puffing up mountains and hills?
Also, in India , nature is a given. Until recently, it was around you. You smelled the fresh air, went for a salt water bath. Nature was not a destination. Something to be objectified and ultimately abused. Look what is happening to the Himalayas and it ain’t all Indians.
gaah!! I just remembered this passage from “IT” with the flying leeches and this one attaching to the kid’s eyeball and becoming fatter with a white viscous fluid while the kid flailed around in agony.
another reason to stick to the urban landscape.
Not if left up to India’s politicians…
I will be down in Idaho, Yellowstone National park, Grand Teton Natl park this weekend…will update u on the desi sightings :))
i am sure some of you’ve figured out i was tooling around up there…:-)
to answer your question razib, i usually stick to ontario parks where the ground is frozen and the women more so (to paraphrase you) – still… ticks are the only thing i havent encountered here – all other king-sized bugs flourish here – my run in with ticks though was in arkansas and colorado. on a tangent, they recently found mockingbirds in my neighborhood up here – hwo’s to say the tick infesttions wont creep up north in the next few decades :-/ . My answer … DEET. i have gallons of the stuff. yes it causes cancer, but it’s a better alternative to having deerflies tear into the flesh. and my dear who’s god it is anyways… i knew i was a true son of the soil when i carried a canoe through a km portage with a dark cloud of mosquitoes around my head. little suckers fed to their fill, and i squirmed not… i knew then i had attained a higher plane of enlightenment – the flask of brandy helped too.
and um… i have gone naturale in some sulphur springs in new mexico. no longer my youth is sagging now, both of them… besides the place abounds in fat old hippies in wrinkled tummies whose belly sag covers their front anyway.
to get to the point… i am sure all of you have photos frolicking in the outdoors – how about a collage – or some sharing on flickr – what do you say?
I accept your bet, and raise it with the proposal that nothing beats being a passenger in a hired cab in India when your driver is veering your car across both sides of the road at breakneck speed, at night and with no headlights, while you hang on for dear life as he attempts to avoid repeated head-on collisions with “Horn Please”-displaying trucks hurtling towards you ahead.
While the cassette deck is blaring the latest Bollywood soundtrack at full volume, of course.
The word “desi” combined with “camping” can only mean one thing: THEPLAS.
oh miss neha i’m rolling in my can of beans…. that and yoghurt dabas filled with koru shaak… 🙂
neha, i don’t appreciate your gujarati-centric interpretation of brownitude. i entered theplas into wikpedia and all it comz up with is “gujarati people.” you frozen northerners have hegemonic tendencies.
Is ‘thepla’ something like parantha ?
guju-puleez.
Years ago, my parents decided camping was the excellent Canadian thing to take part in. Purchased tent, sleeping bags. Crammed ourselves into overcrowded camp site, surrounded by chain-link fence and beyond, a parking lot. In the morning we started up the stove and warmed up the keema* on the Coleman propane stove.
These days, I prefer wilderness canoe camping. And my parents prefer five star hotels.
*Ground beef, a traditional part of desi breakfast. Unless, as I learned later in life, you happen to be a Hindoo
where ikram? are you ontarian?
i’ve enjoyed algonquin and killarney in the recetn past.
“DEET. i have gallons of the stuff. yes it causes cancer, but it’s a better alternative to having deerflies tear into the flesh.
hairy_d: – there are now some pretty good alternatives to DEET.
“i knew i was a true son of the soil when i carried a canoe through a km portage with a dark cloud of mosquitoes around my head. little suckers fed to their fill, and i squirmed not… i knew then i had attained a higher plane of enlightenment – the flask of brandy helped too.” – impressive example of the cycle of life 🙂 there’s nothing more ego-deflating than realizing you’re just food for one of God’s creatures, be it a mosquito or a leech.
Jai:
that is indeed a worthy challenge, especially since i’ve been in autorickshaws driven by men with a serious death wish in their hearts and maniacal laughs emanating from their lips as they sideswipe everything on the road. on balance, since i value my life, i will stick to leeches.:)
I was excited about the skin so soft revelation, but alas! it never worked for me.
I went canoeing with a friend in Algonquin a few years ago and thought it was beautiful. It was also empty. Why don’t more Torontonians head up there, Neha? And Toronto poet Anne Michaels has a few great poems about Algonquin that are worth reading (but I’m too
busylazy to find now).That explains why I’ve always felt more thepla than human 🙂
A thepla looks like a spiced and toasted chapati. The dough includes flour, oil, salt, methi, garlic if you’re into it, chilli powder and turmeric. Once you have ingested the wonderous thepla with koru shak (dry potato subzi), a la Chick pea’s excellent suggestion, and finished it off with a cup of masala chai then you too will begin speaking in mithu mithu (that’s sweet sweet 🙂 gujarati.
Why don’t more Torontonians head up there, Neha?
mebee cuz your feet are frozen all the time. kanadians….
I love Theplas with cottage cheese.
I’ve been to Algonquin as well! Woohoo!
…ahem. I realise such a fact is nothing to write home about, but hey I’m not Canuck.
theplas are yummy. nothing like a spicy one in the midst of all that wilderness :)..and o btw, you were asking for Indians with a dot right? Nope, sparse. The other kind, tons.
This is massive Canada, things always look empty here 🙂 But you may be right, from what I’ve seen people here like to go cottaging more than they like to go camping. And there is a LOT of cottage country around Toronto. Seems like everyone has a cottage, from ceo to superintendent. People often spend more money on their cottage than their city homes!
“I was excited about the skin so soft revelation, but alas! it never worked for me.”
i tried one with picaridin and it was effective in moderate mosquito conditions. but then again, i would have to test it in a truly mosquito-infested area to really see whether it worked.
I love mine with peanut butter!
we have a cure for frozen feet here, it’s called “real beer” 😉
The best thing was when my parents went to Yosemite National Park and my Pops kept calling it “Yeshumati”.
And we always bring our own aloo, puri, acchar, and coca cola when we are going outdoors. Cheee, who is going to eat that ghasss-poos salaaad? 😉
we have a cure for frozen feet here, it’s called “real beer” 😉
ah, you’re drunk all the time? that explains so much about the left over north americans.
😯 You must have gone at a good time… algonquin is one of the most popular vacation spots around here… it also hosts several summer camps and has private cottages… and until one canoes an hour or so, it’s pretty crowded… at least to these solitude-seeking eyes…
here’s the kicker… algonquin park probably has the only cafeteria contractor in the world that serves vegetarian chili… thick, hearty delish stuff.
I usually need to stagger my trips around the holidays. fer instance, i avoid heading out around long weekends, but the weekend after would be heaven… and the colder it gets the lesser people out there.
speaking of the ethnic make-up in the wild – interestingly, in my last winter camping trip around christmas – i was surprised to see company in the park interior.. a bunch of korean kids by a lake… i’m a bit of a loner, so that’s ok – but it was really surprising to see them (male and female) in the middle of nowhere, spending the christmas break … it was twenty under by the way at night and the ground was frozen wherever it wasnt covered by snow.. pretty tough crowd i tell you, these koreans. the only other folks i met were some russians who were camping by the periphery and were only there for ice fishing.
meena.. you did my heart proud.. thank you… thank you… algonquin is ontario’s jewel .. and i’m proud to have shared it with you… next time, do try killarney… for those who dont know – there is a fair population of moose and wolves in the park interior… early spring you can even drive through on the arterial roads and wherever the road salt has flowed into the ditches with the thaw, you’ll see moose grazing.
meena… i havent been to europe ever – can you suggest some similar vacation spots in your neck of thewoods?
Abhi, I have a friend who has lived in Boise forever and she has quite a big group of desis who meet regularly for chat and chai- she says they are all Mallus except her. I dunno if they read SM tho… btw you should pull a “shikari shabu” when you go hikin next time- that would be so hot
hairy_d,
Well, if you surf the internet I’m sure you’d find plenty of peaceful places where you can get in touch with nature. The Ardèche in France is very popular. I believe you can go wild-water rafting there, among things. Anyway camping is just hugely popular in Europe, so you won’t have any difficulty finding anything. A lot of folks went on an excursion to Barcelona recently(I didn’t go) and I gather from the photos that the Pyrenees are really beautiful. Also, you could give Scandinavia a try. Plenty of opportunities around here as well.
I forgot – the Ardennes in Belgium – hugely popular.
Plenty of opportunities around here as well.
…for hittin’ it :=)
re-92, i meant to quote this: Also, you could give Scandinavia a try.
loses the effect since i have to correct a typo ;=(
What’s all this talk of brownitude vs. white-itude?
In my experience, any of the national parks over long weekends are chockful of desis – minivans full of desis of all ages, cars full of desi fob grad students, young desi couples etc. I can’t vouch for other days, but on long weekends in Grand Canyon you really run the risk of being a desi roadkill if you’re not careful (not dissing desi driving, that’s in comparison of being someone else’s roadkill on some other day). I’ve seen similar scenarios in Vegas, any given such park in Utah, Colorado, and in Yellowstone as well as Yosemite. Once we visited Arches Nat’l park UT on Dec 25. Not a native soul. All visitors were either desi, or other asian origins. Lots of camcorders, and tongues I didn’t understand!! Not surprising but counters the point about low number of desis at such places.
Can’t suggest that’s all due to any intrinsic urge to be one with nature. I think its because it remains one of the cheaper vacations when you don’t have money, or when folks come around, or when you want to get away from the city etc. And it entails long comfy highway drives full of chit-chat and latest bolly-songs on awesome highways in very nice rental (or other ) cars.
tx for reassuring me guys 😎 the plural of anecdote is data, right?
What is a “shikari shabu?”
Shikari ShaMbhu ..of Tinkle fame.
Abhi: Neha calls them “Thepla” because as I remember she is in Canada via Porbandar, via Dubai (?) or something like that! That term is “Kathiawadi”. We (Gujaratis from Ahmedabad) call them “Dhhebra”. They are excellent with plain yogurt or as you like it with cottage cheese. In good old “Inja” when we were young and went on occasional picniking, “Dhhebra”, with little “Chhundo” and some “Batata Pauaa” and may be “Sukhdi” for sweet will be a heavenly meal in the wilderness. Oh one more thing, when anyone stumbled into a shy and petite gorgeous girl who acted as if she was lost, they all were eager to show her the way!! Good to have you back. Hope you had great time with your Bro…..Love. Dad
razib, you perv 😛
erm, plenty of naturist campings ‘n beaches around as well, something that’s a rare commodity in the USA I hear…there’s one close to my house…
razib, you perv 😛
don’t be repressed. when in stockholm, do as in stockholm 8=) in other words, do, & do, & do….
folks… we have a winner here. 🙂
i dont agree with the color coding thing either. wanderlust exists in the hindic soul as much as any – among the literary representation – recall vikram seth’s wonderful trip into the himalayas, salim ali’s work in ornithology, pico iyer’s explorations, … heck even our fat, frabjous rushdie put on khakis for his trip into S. america.
then, my final proof… the piece de resistance… bollywood. all the glorious vistas painted on the silver screen … the grand canyons, flowers of every hew sprinkled through the green meadows, the fog rolling through the valleys, what else is it but an expression of our aspirations. ultimately popular culture reflects what we want. i concede that it could be a case of indian cinema shaping the indic mindset, rather than the other way around – but it is indisputable that our desires are played out in the movies. i will leave it to amardeep to produce a thesis stringing this together in a cogent presentation 🙂
we are not alone.
q.e.d.
Have you ever been to Yosemite National Park? All you will ever see is desis of various types, shapes, attires, languages and physical ability. Occasionally, you may catch a white american there. No kidding! I have even seen bunches of elderly maamas and maamis gamely trying to conquer a few of the park’s medium difficulty trails. On the west coast, Yosemite in summer is an Indian mecca only next to Disneyland and Las Vegas. As for Idaho and Montana, I know of a few desis living there (in the Des Moines area and in the Great Falls area). Surprisingly, they speak of no negative attitudes towards them. They are in diverse professions ranging from teaching at universities, to banking to medicine.