At 5 pm, the reruns would come on.  I knew that the episodes weren’t new.  After all, TV40 wasn’t a channel you turned to for the latest in TV programming.  But the sounds, the sights, the characters — – for me, it was the first time around.

Like clockwork, my dad would get home from work around 5:15 pm.  The evening’s episode of Star Trek would already be underway, but he managed to get caught up.  He would sit down in his living room chair, and we would watch Star Trek together.  Captain Kirk, Spock, McCoy, Scottie, Uhura.  Romulans, Klingons, Vulcans, and tribbles.

Looking back, the whole thing blended together:  The original episodes, the Next Generation, the paperback novels, even discussions about Star Trek on early Internet bulletin boards that I would dial into with my 2400 baud modem.  I’ll even confess to bringing a Star Trek:  The Next Generation poster with me to my freshman year dorms.

But of course, reality eventually catches up to you.  The spin-off series — Deep Space 9, Voyager, Enterprise — all forced me to own up to the fact that a galaxy with other life forms probably wouldn’t ensure that they all walked on two legs and communicated with lips, tongues, and vocal cords.  And as I grew more cynical about the ways real nations interacted, I grew more cynical about the idea that we would someday find ourselves in an interplanetary Federation (of good).

So I drifted away.  I don’t think I even saw the last two movies in the franchise.

It was with some trepidation that I bought tickets to the latest Star Trek movie.  The reviews were good, the critics happy.  But I wasn’t sure what I was getting into.  New faces for old characters?  How would my childhood imagination react?

Apparently, with love, sadness, and nostalgia.  I’d never admit on a first date that Star Trek was such a big part of my childhood.  But it was.  And I’ll never admit on a first date that the latest Star Trek movie was emotionally moving.

But it was.  Even though they managed to create an alternate history to the one I already loved.

Come on in.  Have a seat.  Donations are on a sliding scale, from $10 to $20.

There’s no TV or kitchen, just a nice young sarode player in the center of the room.  Tabla player too.  Oh, and don’t forget Gautam, who runs the show.

We spent our Friday night at the Sangati Center, located at 22nd and Shotwell in San Francisco’s Mission District.  We sat down, we listened to classical Indian music, and we let our minds wander.

A small gathering of ten to fifteen people sat around us.  Anupam Shobhakar played sarode and Bubai played tabla.  A white lady waved her hands and arms along with the music — a little too emphatically, if you ask me.

Two hours later, it was over.  We stumbled back into the street.

We will return.

With thirteen and a half hours between us, it was 6:30 AM on a Mumbai Monday when my cousin Manav updated his Facebook profile:

“…up n awake for the Oscars. Rooting for Rahman, Final Inch n Smile Pinki…”

As my cousin’s morning rolled on, the updates continued:

“…Rahman N Gulzar win for best song.. Jaya Ho….”

When Slumdog Millionaire took best picture? “What an incredible Monday morning.”

And so it happens. A movie not quite Indian, but more Indian than most, captures the attention of cousins in Mumbai, San Francisco, and who knows where else. Edmonton, Canada? Gold Coast, Australia? I don’t know how many in my clan were watching the American Academy Awards.

When you mom was the youngest of eleven, there are a lot of possibilities.

Once when I was in the 5th grade, a white kid in basketball camp asked me a question. I can’t remember the details, but it had something to do with my Hindu roots and the movie Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. You know the scene: members of an Indian cult, offering a dish of monkey brains to a disgusted swashbuckler played by Harrison Ford.

At least the kid in basketball camp had the sense to ask it as a question. But somewhere between his question, a neighbor’s epithets, and everything else, I quickly got the picture. Our family’s journey wasn’t necessarily one that every community member felt positively about. I’m not sure if anyone cared enough to ask my dad how it felt for him to come so far from a childhood in a poor Mumbai neighborhood, when class-conscious neighbors might not have let him play in their homes.

I always thought it a bit funny when Indians and Indian Americans got so excited about an Indian-American tennis star, scientist, or actor. But tonight, things seem a little different. The dominant culture in this dominant nation has celebrated a movie about a poor Indian slum kid who came so far.

This time, I’m not as wary about feeling moved. I’m not as resistant to the tightness around my eyes.

And I’m not afraid to sing, “Jai Ho.”

On the eve of Christmas eve, I stepped out my apartment door and walked down the stairs. It was cold outside, but I still needed to check my mail. I wasn’t waiting for anything in particular.

I turned the key and opened my tiny mailbox. An envelope sat inside.
…..

While growing up, there were regular reminders that I was linked to someplace else. The most obvious were the phone calls. “Hallo? Hallo? HALLO?” It wasn’t just a joke back then. It was the real deal. Before mobile phones, skype, and everything else, there was the loud attempt to make sure the connection to India was still active.

“Hello?” My dad was talking to a relative in Mumbai. “Hello?” My mom was chatting with a sister in Jaipur. As my brother and I played Atari video games, we were reminded once again that we had family on the other side of the planet.

There were also the letters. Sitting in the kitchen drawer, the sheets of light blue paper were filled with Hindi script that I couldn’t quite read. The letters folded themselves into pre-stamped envelopes. A postmark on the outside sealed the deal. “Airmail / Par Avion.”

We had received news from India. Our family ties continued.

Sure, I had cousins. And sure, I had my own childhood visits. But always, my links to that place were determined by my parents’ “hellos.” My own visits were mere introductions. They were nothing compared to the grand weight of my parents’ childhoods and the communications that kept them in touch with those who shared their memories.

…..

On the eve of Christmas eve, I looked at the envelope in my apartment mailbox.

I found it curious. The paper wasn’t quite the same bleached-white that I was used to seeing. The address on the front — my address — was written a little differently. It didn’t stop with my city or zip code. It ended with an even more basic signifier: “USA.”

But above everything else, it was the postmark that got me excited. The round black circle of the postal worker’s stamp contained words in Hindi and English: “Vasant Vihar, New Delhi”.

This was different from email. This was different from a Facebook update. It had been a long six months since I last hung out with my friend Deeksha in Delhi. She had sent me a card.

Her handwritten note was accompanied by a pre-printed message. In English, Hindi, Bengali, and three other Indian languages whose scripts I wasn’t sure of — “Season’s Greetings.”

I had received my very own mail from India.

After the Mumbai terrorist attack, a friend in New Delhi with a fondness for Batman comic books emailed me her thoughts.  She is Kashmiri in ethnicity, Muslim in roots, and would probably self-identify as secular in practice:

“I can’t seem to process the attacks and all it could entail, and what the ’solution’ is, very clearly.

Will ramping up ’security measures’ mean my personal freedom gets curtailed?

Even more scarily, will my Muslim friends have to watch every word they say, go through harassment for renting a flat, have to be on the defensive whenever somebody talks of Islamic terrorism?

Not that all of this doesn’t happen already.”

First, there was the theater student turned TV station employee turned finance company administrator.

Then, the part-time English teacher who writes poetry.

Next, the investment bank escapee turned photographer.

And who will visit my apartment-in-need-of-a-tenant tomorrow?  The human rights nonprofiteer turned disaster-management employee.

Oh yes, there were flakes along the way.  I suppose I shouldn’t be too angry that they wasted precious hours of my evening.  Could have been at the gym.  Could have been with friends.  Could have read the Sean Penn interview of Hugo Chavez and Raul Castro that I read while waiting anyways.

But I guess that’s how it goes.  Flakes have a way of weeding themselves out.  Which is probably for the better.

My Mumbai friend Avehi Menon took some pictures on a recent trip to Bihar, one of India’s less developed states.  Avehi and I used to hang out during my six months in Delhi.

Bihar faces significant challenges:  poverty, corruption, and organized crime.  Still, all of that slips away for a moment when you see the optimism and curiousity of a room full of kids.

It makes a difference what language your victims speak.  By targeting foreigners and wealthy Indian elites, the Mumbai terrorists have received saturation coverage — at least in U.S. media.

Why?  For one thing, it is a national U.S. holiday, and there’s little domestic news to report.  But equally important — so many of the Mumbai victims speak English.  These are some of the most expensive hotels in India, and only the wealthier classes congregate there.

There have been other terrorist attacks in other nations.  And there have been other terrorist attacks in India. But the language (and nationality) of the victims makes all the difference in how the attacks are covered by international media.

I always found the export of “Indian spirituality” to be a dubious industry.  Somewhere between the foreigner-oriented ashrams and the exchange of dollars into rupees, I smelled a little exotification.  Still, I maintained a healthy skepticism towards my skepticism.  In concept, there was nothing wrong with the idea of one nation’s ideas being exported to another (much wealthier) nation.

Somewhere in the midst of this skeptical swirl, I perceived Deepak Chopra.  Part diasporic ambassador, part Indian doctor myth, part spiritual marketing juggernaut — Deepak Chopra is a lot of things.

I must admit that my skepticism took a backseat when I read/saw his comments on CNN’s Larry King Live and on CNN International.  He was speaking about the terrorist attacks in Mumbai, and how political leaders should respond.

There are problematic generalizations in his comments — the “Muslim world,” Pakistan as a “failed state.” But he also pointed his audience in important directions:

Deepak Chopra: …The situation is complex, Larry, because it could inflame to proportions that we cannot even imagine. It has to be contained. We now recognize that this is a global problem, with only a global effort can solve this.

And you know, one of the things that I think is happening is that these militant terrorist groups are actually terrified that [President-elect Barack] Obama’s gestures to the rest of the Muslim world may actually overturn the tables on them by alienating them from the rest of the Muslim world, so they’re reacting to this.

You know, this is Obama’s opportunity to actually harness the help of the Muslims.

You know, there’s 1.8 billion Muslims in the world. That’s 25 percent of the population of the world. It’s the fastest-growing religion in the world. We cannot, if we do not appease and actually recruit the help of this Muslim world, we’re going to have a problem on our hands.

And we cannot go after the wrong people, as we did after 9/11, because then the whole collateral damage that occurs actually aggravates the situation.

In India, this is particularly inflammatory, because there’s a rise of Hindu fundamentalism. We saw what that did in Gujarat, where, you know, Muslims were scorched and they were killed, and there was almost a genocide of the Muslims.

India has 150 million Muslims. That’s more Muslims in India than in Pakistan. So this is an opportunity right now for India and Pakistan to recognize this is their common problem. It’s not a Muslim problem right now; it’s a global problem.

…

King: Do you think that this is just the beginning, that there’s a potential impact, or more?

Chopra: There is a potential impact of a lot more carnage. But it can be contained. And right now, one of the questions, you know, after I heard Barbara Starr talking about how coordinated this is, that there are militant groups that cross international boundaries, is who is financing this? Where is the money coming from? We have to ask very serious, honest questions. What role do we have in this? Are our petrodollars funding both sides of this war on terrorism? Why are we not asking the Saudis where that money is going that we give them? Is it going through this supply chain to Pakistan?

It’s not enough for Pakistan to condemn it. Pakistan should cooperate with India in uprooting this. They should be part of the surgery that is going to happen.

It’s not enough for Indians to blame Pakistanis. Indians should actually ask the Pakistanis to help them.

And it’s not enough for us to worry about Westerners being killed and Americans being killed. Every life is precious over there. We have got to get rid of this idea that this is an American problem or a Western problem. It’s a global problem, and we need a global solution, and we need the help of all the Muslims, 25 percent of the world’s population, to help us uproot this problem.

King: What does India immediately do?

Chopra: India at this moment has to contain any reactive violence from the fundamentalist Hindus, which is very likely and possible. So India has to condemn that by not blaming local Muslims. They have to identify the exact groups.

And the world has to be very careful that they don’t go after the wrong people. Because if you go after the wrong people, you convert moderates into extremists. It happens every time, and retribution against innocent people just because they have the same religion actually aggravates and perpetuates the problem.

King: Are you pessimistic?

Chopra: I think Mr. Obama has a real opportunity here, but a challenging opportunity, a creative opportunity.

Get rid of the phrase “war on terrorism.” Ask for a creative solution in which we all participate.

King: Is it because the war on terrorism really can never be won because the terrorists (inaudible)?

Chopra: Because it’s an oxymoron. It’s an oxymoron, Larry, a war on war, a war on terrorism.

You know, terrorists call mechanized death from 35,000 feet above sea level with a press of a button also terror. We don’t call it that, because our soldiers are wearing uniforms. They don’t see what is happening, and innocent people are being killed. So, you know, terror is a term that you apply to the other.

King: Thanks, Deepak Chopra, as always, extraordinarily enlightening.

It is a curious thing, this business of labels.  The terrible attacks in Mumbai could easily be called 11/26, but instead, the corner of the screen says “India’s 9/11″.

It is an Indian network, beamed into my parents’ living room via Dish TV.  I’m not sure if the network is primarily directed at the Indian diaspora, or if it is for viewers in India, with satellite subscribers thrown in as a marketing bonus.  (It is primarily in English, but the Hindi accounts go untranslated.  That makes me think this is real deal Indian reporting for multilingual Indian audiences.)

Is the label “India’s 9/11″ intended to make “Westerners” understand the emotional and political impact for Indians?  Is it intended to give Indians a way to describe the impact to themselves?  Are we Indian-Americans — my parents and I — just odd bystanders to the deep penetration of America’s “9/11 experience” into the language of English language news consumers in India?

I had made two trips to India in the years since “America’s 9/11.”  The first was at the end of 2001, and the second was a seven-month stay from late 2007 into 2008.  I believe it was the first visit when a cousin in New Delhi told me that what America considered a big deal — the Al-Qaeda attacks in the U.S. — were something Indians had been experiencing for years:  separatist bullets, Islamic fundamentalist bombs, and the government response.

That makes it all the more interesting to see an Indian news network use the language of 9/11 to describe the burning hotels, hostages, and flying bullets in Mumbai.  It is an odd logo to see at the bottom-right corner of the screen.