Coolie No. 1, Another 2020 Disappointment
I interviewed the poised and reticent Shikha Talsania in mid-December for Coolie No 1, starring Varun Dhawan and Sara Ali Khan in the lead. Normally I would have posted the review based on her comments but she did not reveal anything about the movie other than...
Of Sesame and Jaggery, A Friendly Tilgool
Arriving in a new country can burden a person with a new set of expectations. The burden of assimilating in a new culture, while maintaining old traditions comes to mind. As I began this acculturation while raising my family, I found myself trying to balance -...
Your Featured Life
It’s My Future: Climate Change Reform
Nearly two years ago, Greta Thunberg declared that “our house is on fire” at the World Economic Forum. She wasn’t the only one who saw that fire. Here in California, we could see the flames quite literally. As wildfires tore through the state, many teenagers felt a...
Fatal Fallout of Fossil Fuels
At the Front Door: Renewable and Carbon-Free Energy – a column on climate change in our lives Renewable and carbon-free energy is cheaper than fossil fuels! Don’t believe me? Look at your energy bill. San Jose has a program called San Jose Clean Energy, which is one...
Poetry in Bharatanatyam: Vinitha Subramanian
Guru Smt. Vinitha Subramanian, the Director of Natyalaya School of Dance in Austin, has been teaching in the Central Texas area for over 35 years. She has scores of arangetrams to her credit and has staged several dance dramas and thematic presentations such as Jungle...
Community
Tamil Film Exclusively at the San Jose Drive-In
West Wind Drive-In Theatre in San Jose will offer a special limited run three-day run of the long-awaited and critically acclaimed film Master, a Tamil-language action-thriller film directed by Lokesh Kanagaraj. “We are thrilled to have the exclusive Northern...
Letters to the Editor: 1/11/2021
Dear India Currents, First and foremost, I would like to tell my farmers' brothers/sisters that we feel your pain and anguish. I am writing this letter to make a plea that there should be a long term thinking to lift lots of farmers. This can happen when farmers take...
Unlocked: Eight Monologues. One Lockdown
The lockdown has affected us in different ways – introspective, illuminating, irritating, igniting, isolating. Needless to say, we’ll never be the same again. So, why not combine theatre with technology and capture our lives during the lockdown. EnActe Arts attempts...
New White House Could Remove Public Charge Rule
The incoming Biden-Harris administration has an opportunity to immediately revoke implementation of the public charge rule, easing anxiety for millions of immigrants who have denied themselves federal benefits over the past three years for fear of losing their ability...
Voices
Of Sesame and Jaggery, A Friendly Tilgool
Arriving in a new country can burden a person with a new set of expectations. The burden of assimilating in a new culture, while maintaining old traditions comes to mind. As I began this acculturation while raising my family, I found myself trying to balance -...
Gandhi’s Swadeshi & A Dream of Self-Sufficiency
Swadeshi in Mahatma Gandhi’s thinking is a moral value and a practice in socio-economics and intrinsically linked to svarāj (self-rule), satyāgraha (truth-force), ahimsa (non-injury), and sarvodaya (welfare for all). The British Government in India stood for the...
A Story of Luck and Luster
Not a ray of hope, but a mountain of light emerged from the Kohinoor. A dazzling rock carved out from the Golconda mines. A mighty jewel for an emperor’s crown! I steal a look at her chiseled profile, head bent over a book. Black lashes cast sweeping shadows. A...
The Miracle of Christmas
Growing up Hindu in cosmopolitan Bombay, I looked forward to Christmas with a sigh of relief. Christmas for us did not have the bearings and pressures of other Indian festivals, so we could just enjoy its beauty in a laidback fashion through common symbols like the...
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Culture
Coolie No. 1, Another 2020 Disappointment
I interviewed the poised and reticent Shikha Talsania in mid-December for Coolie No 1, starring Varun Dhawan and Sara Ali Khan in the lead. Normally I would have posted the review based on her comments but she did not reveal anything about the movie other than...
Minorities Embrace an Invigorating Cinematic Presence: Rohan Gurbaxani
New York City-based actor who was born in San Jose and grew up in Bengaluru, Rohan Gurbaxani, has been making remarkable but quiet moves in Hollywood over the past few years. Within a year of graduating from New York University, he bagged over seven feature films in...
Ancient Contemporary: Odissi, Jazz, & Cambodian Classical
Making The Mosaic – A column that dips into the disparate, diverse palette of our communities to paint inclusively on the vast canvas of the Bay Area by utilizing Heritage Arts. “Children are taught racism. Children are taught diversity. They don’t see it; they only...
Rohini Chandra’s Beautiful Journey
On a recent visit to India, singer, actor, and filmmaker Rohini Chandra wrote, shot, directed, and hosted a travel diary called “This Beautiful Journey.” Chandra discovers the country where her parents were born and explores regions in Delhi, Haryana, and Kolkata...
Trending
Each of Us Killers: Vignettes of Immigrant and Indian Lives
Jenny Bhatt’s debut collection of stories, Each of Us Killers brings us a sampling of experiences of a writer who has lived and worked in India, the United Kingdom, Germany, and now resides in a suburb of Dallas. Bhatt has worked as a writer, literary critic, and...
Choice and Democracy: Musings on Elections 2020
It is official. Joe Biden is the 46th man to occupy the Oval Office. Well, at least as official as it can get given the incumbent’s congenital aversion to concede. My first reaction to this victory was of course one of elation. Elation at the thought that policy by...
Ram-Rajya in America? Yes, You Heard it Right!
In October, I performed Kathak in celebrations to commemorate Dussehra, the Hindu festival that celebrates the victory of Ram over Ravan, Durga over Mahishasur, Good over Evil. As did all other aspects of our lives this year, these performances were moved online....
Insider to Outsider: Reversing the Trend in Hindu Discourse
This article is part of the opinion column – Beyond Occident – where we explore a native perspective on the Indian diaspora. Late last month, days before the US presidential elections, a prominent media outlet published an article on Indian and Hindu-American...
This Diwali, We All Could Use Some Light
From Surabhi’s Notepad – A column that brings us personal essays and stories, frivolous and serious, inspired by real-life events and encounters of navigating the world as a young, Indian woman living outside India. Dressed in an orange salwar kameez, donning a small...
Tirunangai Women ARE Women, J.K. Rowling
(Featured Image: Swetha, a transwoman and Founder of the nonprofit Born 2 Win, with actor Kamal Haasan, a supporter) Sarah McBride, Democratic candidate from Delaware, will become the first transgender state senator in the U.S. All over the world, including in India,...
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The Road to College Admissions
Lost for where to start your journey to attending a top U.S. college? Wondering if you're behind your peers? Confused about what step comes next? We have a map to help you find your way. There are steps you can take all four years of high school to improve your...
Register For Chabot College’s Spring Semester Today
Apply today for Spring Classes at Chabot College! Looking to train for a new job, transfer to a four-year university, or learn a new trade? Chabot College offers over 20 student and academic support programs to help you reach your educational and career goals. Chabot...
Opinion
City Hall Socialists’ Indian Concerns
This article is part of the opinion column – Beyond Occident – where we explore a native perspective on the Indian diaspora. Ever since the Seattle City Council ran a campaign to pass a controversial resolution against India’s Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) last...
Is the GOP Worse Than Trump?
Forum – A column where you get eyes on both sides of a hot button issue. Is the GOP worse than Trump? No! The American voters have spoken and President Trump will vacate the White House. He will be relegated to a forgettable footnote in the history of our nation....
That Get Rich Quick Scheme Is A Scam!
While trawling the Internet for part-time jobs in September after being furloughed from her travel company in March, Sumathi Rao, a New York-based travel agent, spotted a job offer in her FB newsfeed she could not pass up. It seemed too good to be true The Fouray...
Voting in Anger In the Election
Though the high turnout of minority voters gave Joe Biden the edge in this election, exit polls showed that the majority of white voters favored Trump, exposing a ‘race gap’ in election 2020. While three in five white voters (58%) supported Trump in 2020 like they did...
Health & Wellness
An Unseen Epidemic: Indian Americans & the Opioid Crisis
On 5th July 2020, Ikonkar Manmohan Singh Sandhu, a young 23-year-old boy, died from an opioid overdose in Michigan just months before he was to be married. He is by no means an isolated case in the Indian American community. A small group of doctors are sounding the...
Step Into the New…You
Renewal: You and The World Around You As I tuned into this topic, I became aware of the internal environment that is created because of the people in our lives and how we perceive ourselves in relation to them. Often keeping others comfortable becomes our comfort...
Pause and Look Back: 2020 Wellness Themes
Sukham Blog – A monthly column focused on health and wellbeing. As we draw the curtains on a tumultuous year and look forward to better times in 2021, we should pause to take stock. Let’s reflect on the year we’ve endured; acknowledge and accept the tough, troubling,...
Why Men are Angry and Women Abused
What was startling about the two domestic violence (DV) videos that aired recently on TV and on social media was not just their disturbing subject matter featuring battered women, but the frequency with which such content appears on the news during this pandemic. On...
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Lifestyle
The Age of Religious Fanaticism: The Tonic
Newly released book The Tonic (Leadstart Publishing Pvt Ltd, 2020) is an intriguing story set in 1992, against the backdrop of the Babri Masjid demolition and the Bombay riots. Shuttling constantly between the past and the present, the story shares some vivid imagery...
Youth
It’s My Future: Climate Change Reform
Nearly two years ago, Greta Thunberg declared that “our house is on fire” at the World Economic Forum. She wasn’t the only one who saw that fire. Here in California, we could see the flames quite literally. As wildfires tore through the state, many teenagers felt a...
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