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All right, so this is Gabriel Wang. And Rachel Wong. And we are here today on June 30th, 2014, in the home of Mr. Fred Bhandara to interview him for the Houston Asian American Archive. I told you .

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Go ahead, sorry. Oh, no that’s fine. Um so can you just begin by talking about your family background and where you were born? Yes. My family background is from Pakistan.

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We belong to a small minority community called the Parsis, which are spread throughout India and Pakistan, uh distinguished by our religion, which is the Zoroastrian faith.

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So I was born in Lahore, Pakistan. Um and can you tell us a little bit about growing up in Pakistan? Yes, uh, we came from a upper

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middle class family, so growing up was very comfortable. Uh, al—always though, uh there was uh distinction, because most of

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Pakistan is a Muslim country, so uh we were always aware that uh we were different, you know. So there was awareness of uh difference uh from the mainstream society,

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that Pakistan was tolerant, and, uh, and more tolerant during the time when we growing up. Since then, uh it has become very radicalized. And, um, what was it like growing up?

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This is—you were born not too long after the… Partition. ... partition. Yes. Um what was it like growing up in a newly independent country? Well, uh my parents and my elder siblings were

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scarred by the partition. Lahore was the epicenter of the partition, you know. There was a lot of, uh, rioting and bloodshed on both—communal sides, mainly the Hindu—meaning the Hindus and the Muslims.

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And uh so, uh, what did happen during the partition was the populations were displaced from each country. For example, uh Lahore was a 50% Hindu and Sikh city, and Muslim city,

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and then after partition all the Sikhs and the Hindus left for India. So there was hardly any Hindu or Sikh to be found in Lahore. There was a nostalgia about the old days when I was growing up, because it was only five years since the partition, after—when I was born.

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People did remember it vividly, there was nostalgia for a more secular society, but on the other hand there were very powerful forces for more Islamic, uh,

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face to the new nation. So the—while we were growing up the nation was kind of struggling to find its identity. And kind of we were observers to—from the outside—from the sidelines.

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What was your neighborhood like, growing up? The neighborhood was a ver—uh, a pleasant neighborhood. Uh we lived in homes on large, uh, large lots, and

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uh the homes were big homes, but with multiple families living inside each home. Um… can you describe for us what it was like—your home life and your school

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life? The—the home life, uh, was, uh, idyllic uh until my father passed away when I was seven.

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And uh that was the biggest turmoil in my life, when he did pass away. Uh after that, there was a lot of uh turmoil in the household because uh my mother had a emotional collapse, uh and she sent me off to boarding school.

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And, uh, so I spent two years in boarding school that I really hated, didn’t like much, uh. And the boarding school was in the city called Abbottabad. And if you remember, that’s where they

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found Mr. Bin Laden, you know, that’s where he was uh hiding. So it was in the—the boarding school was in what’s known as the Frontier Province of Pakistan, just kind of a rough area.

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Can you spell the name of the city for us, briefly? It’s very simple; it’s Abbott, A--‐ B--‐ B--‐ O--‐ T--‐ T--‐ A--‐ B--‐ A--‐ D. Abbottabad. It was named after a person called Abbott.

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Um, what did you find negative about the boarding school? Did you have any experiences? Well, the boarding school was in the Frontier Province, and most of the people there are the Pashtuns, they’re the people who live across

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Pakistan, northwest of Pakistan and in Afghanistan. They’re the basically, all the Taliban are drawn from the Pashtun tribes. And, uh, they were—you know, they were just uh

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very rough and militant, uh they have a very rough and militant kind of uh experience. So to deal with them, you have to be equally rough and, uh, you have to be equally rough

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and aggressive. Pull up a chair. Sure. I’m just gonna sit here. Mm--‐ hmm. That’s our daughter. Um. During your childhood, were there activities that you did for fun?

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Oh yes, uh, we played uh cricket, and we played uh squash, which is similar to racquetball, and all kind of things like that. And uh my biggest passion was, uh, kite

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flying. Kite flying was a big thing in Lahore while I was growing up. Now since then, kite flying has been banned in Pakistan because they consider it to be a Hindu custom, so. Are there

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any other memories that you have growing up? Uh… yeah, many memories. I went to a, in Lahore I went a school called Aitchison College, which is a very elite college.

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Uh it’s similar to what’s Eton is in England, all the elite people go there. And, uh, a lot of the people in power today went to that school.

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So uh recently, on my trip when I went to Pakistan the last time, uh I met the Speaker of the Parliament, who was also the acting president, he was a classmate of mine. And then there is a gentleman by the name of Imran Khan, he

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is—he leads one of the biggest political parties in Pakistan. And he was also my classmate, and one of my best friends. Um, can you tell us a little bit about

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your path to the U.S.? Well, uh, I was always fascinated by the U.S. while I was growing up. And once again, uh in the back of my mind, uh

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I wanted to live in a secular country. So, uh I didn’t know that at that time, but I think I realize that now, and uh I just had my, uh from

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middle or early high school, I had my sights set on coming to the U.S. Uh one of the biggest influences from the U.S. were reading the U.S.

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magazines, uh, Time magazine and Newsweek and so on. There was very little television when I was growing up. In fact, the first television station uh started when I was

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12 or 13 years old, so. But we did see some American programs after that. Um going back a little bit, what was your college experience like in Pakistan? Well, Aitchison College, although it is called college, is really a high—uh school.

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From elementary all the way to high school, or A Levels, which is uh a UK uh educational uh mem—system. And I did my A Levels there, and was a pleasant college

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experience. Very intense learning. Uh in fact, uh during the boarding school years, class would start at early morning, and then we would have a little break in the afternoon.

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And then homework would start uh in the evening and go until 10 o’clock at night. So uh we were—and it was a Catholic uh school. But you know, we were...

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studying quite a lot. And then you also had a habit of getting up early in the morning and trying to do things on our own, you know, preparing. So it was very intense.

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You mentioned that you were interested in living in a secular country. Mmhmm. Um, can you tell us a little about why that was? Well , you know, my—I’ve got a

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unique relationship, uh all my friends are Muslims, and I have a lot of respect uh for—for—for the Muslims, but uh, at the same time you need space to breathe, and you don’t want to live in a country

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which is a religious state, or is becoming a religious state. And, you know, you need room to breathe and room to think for yourself. And uh that’s the reason I wanted to live in a

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secular country. Although when I was growing up, Pakistan still had a lot of secular traditions from the British days, but they were uh eroding fast. And also, our family business was uh, in the—we had the—we owned the

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brewery and also a liquor stores, and that was—we could see the handwriting on the wall, that that business would, uh— would—would—would—would—would not survive in Pakistan. How did you decide where to go in the U.S.?

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Well, there was a war that came about in 1971. And, uh… uh, at that time I had admission uh in—I had applied to several colleges, but Oklahoma State University was

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one of the ones that had accepted me, so I jumped on that and decided to uh leave. However, I had to wait out the war, and as soon as the war was finished, I—I left. What were your first impressions when you arrived?

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Well, there—there was a book in the early ‘70s called Future Shock, okay. And in that book, the author Alvin Toffler mentioned what future shock would be 30 or 50

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years from now, and I think we realized the future shock. But for me, the future shock was coming to the United States and uh seeing all the new infrastructure, seeing the

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ease with which people dealt with each other, regardless of the formalities of the old world. That was a big, big shock, or big sense of uh enlightenment.

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Uh the, it—it was just so many thing—things uh that were, uh, that were new. Were there any difficulties when you came to the US?

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Well, there was a lot of cultural difficulties and faux pas in the beginning. I was 18 years old when I came to the US, and that was in Oklahoma, and this was 1972 when I was going through my first year.

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It was not too long after the desegregation movement in the South, so I could see, you know, the whole set of tensions that were there. And, uh, once again I was an observer from the sidelines.

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Yeah. But uh it was very conservative, the, there was no, uh, it was a dry town, there was no liquor in, uh, in Stillwater, Oklahoma. I remember going to Kansas just to be able to go and have a drink,

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you know, uh driving across the border. So, uh, but we—I was there for studies, and that’s what I did. And after a year and a half, I transferred over to—up north, to Wisconsin, which was

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again a totally different experience. Were you active in any student organizations during your time? Sure. I was active in the Pakistan Student’s Organization while I was at Oklahoma, and uh later on I ja—joined

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the sailing club at Wisconsin, played in squash leagues, so I, just had a—had a good educational experience. And what were you studying? I was studying engineering.

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And I graduated with a BS in Engineering in 1975, and went on to do a Master’s. Uh and I studied towards a Master’s in Engineering, and in the last semester I switched over and got a MBA instead, because I thought that would

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be more valuable. And why did you transfer to Wisconsin? Uh Oklahoma was uh very conservative, and, uh, and you know, Wisconsin

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was uh a mu—a much more enlightening—enlightening place, and a much more open—uh, welcoming place for a young person. And at that time it was the height—you know, the

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Vietnam War had ended whe—I transferred in 1973, so the Vietnam War was just ending, and there was this big, uh, what do you call, hip—I don’t want to call it the hippie movement, but that’s what it was, you know.

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They had a different name for it, you know, at that time. And it was, you know, there was a lot of debate going on in American society about—at that time about

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uh h—about the future. And then right after that, we slipped into the Watergate hearings and Nixon’s resignation, so it was kind of interesting time. During your

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education here, did you ever go home? Yes, I’ve been uh at least four or five times. And, um…in Wisconsin, what was it like coming from Stillwater?

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I—in Stillwater, you were still, you were kind of looked on as a, there was a very sharp black and white division, there were not too many Hispanics there, but you were c—certainly classified as a foreigner.

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Up north, there was a much more open attitude, you know. There was—you—there was—you didn’t feel segregated in any way, and uh it was a much more open place.

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And of course, uh so Madison, Wisconsin was very much like Berkeley, uh California at that time, it was the edge of that revolution that was going on. So it was an exciting place to be.

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And what was the name of the Wisconsin school that you— University of Wisconsin. Okay. Yeah. After finishing your MBA, where did you first work?

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Well, after I did my BS, I took six months off, and I, uh I got enrolled in a program for the exchange of engineers, and that program sent me to work in the Netherlands. So I

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worked uh in the Netherlands for a few months, and then also took the time during that period to uh travel all the European countries and got a flavor of Europe, and of course I

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went to Pakistan during that time too. So I took what—seven or eight months off, and then came back to my—for my MBA. During my MBA I was a teaching assistant and a

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project assistant, working on projects. And so that basically paid for the MBA. And after the MBA, uh, started looking for a job, and once again I took six months off,

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and uh went back to Pakistan, uh tried to uh look at my future in Pakistan. And I didn’t see any future because there had been a complete prohibition of—for liquor in Pakistan.

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And in fact it was so severe that, if anybody, if you were caught selling liquor to anybody you could be subject to flogging, public flogging and all that. So it didn’t make much sense to stay behind for the brewery business or the liquor business that we had.

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And at that time I also got married. And after marriage we just decided uh to come to uh the U.S., because I had a green card at that time. So uh after—after we got married and

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my wife got her green card, uh we decided to come to the U.S. I had no job or anything. Started looking around, and ultimately moved from New York to Washington, DC, and

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uh in search of work, went to—got an interview in California, so flew over to California. And ultimately landed a job with the Ford Motor Company in San Jose, California. For your

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marriage, you got married in Pakistan. Yes. Did you have a traditional Zoroastrian wedding? Yes we did. In our home. And can you describe it for us?

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Well, uh it was a very simple ceremony, uh, where—where, you know, the family and close friends gathered in our living room at the home, and uh the priest, we were

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sitting on two chairs, and the priest was there performing the ceremony, and we had a best man for each side. And, uh, or was it a best woman?

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I don’t remember. Man. Man. They’re basically our witnesses. Witnesses. And then the priest basically uh gives a lot of blessings.

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That’s basically what the ma—wedding prayers are, a lot of blessings for the future. And they throw rice on the couple, and then ask the per—couple, “Are you marrying of free will?” and so

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on. And once that’s all over, the priest uh solemnizes the wedding—the marriage. And you get to sign the book, you know, or the c—marriage certificate. You mentioned that you lived in several big cities, including, you mentioned

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New York— Chicago, New York. Yeah, after I graduated with my MBA I did work in Chicago for awhile, too. And I was working in a—a plant that made uh books and stationery and

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so on. So uh I worked there for a few months, uh then—then after that, uh, I nearly took a year off, you know. I worked there ‘til December for—after graduating, and then went

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to Pakistan, and then didn’t come back ‘til August. In getting an MBA… Mmhmm. ... did you intend to stay in engineering? No, uh, the…

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After I graduated as an engineer and did the internship in Holland, I didn’t have a green card so I really couldn’t work in this country. And the MBA uh was something I did while I was applying for the green card.

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And once I got the MBA, I was, at that time I was given a preference because of my high qualifications. So I got my green card on the basis of having a Master’s Degree.

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To answer your question, uh yeah, at the back of my mind I always thought that I wanted to be, uh have more broad skills, and be more in management. So that was the reason I did my MBA.

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Can you tell us a little bit about your path after moving to California? Yes, ma’am. Uh, we, the Ford Motor Company had an assembly plant in—called

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San Jose Assembly Plant, and it actually was in Milpitas, California, which is a suburb. And uh they were launching a new Mustang there at that time, it was the 1979 Mustang, it was a new shape and all that.

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So there was a lot of buzz about that. And as a uh manufacturing engineer on the factory floor, it was quite an experience. Uh, the shifts

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were maybe 14 to 16 hours long, the days were that long, from 5 o’clock in the morning until 6 or 7 at night. And it was just very intense, and a lot of work all the time.

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And then the recession came after the oil crisis, and uh they shut the plant down—I mean, they shut the shift down that I was working on. So they gave me a layoff notice.

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And uh I was looking around for another job, and I had other jobs, but then they said that because of my outstanding record in the year—two years I had at the Ford Motor

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Company, they were going to transfer me to another Ford division. And the other division was the Ford Aerospace division in Palo Alto. So they transferred me there, and I got a huge promotion, and doubled my salary and all that, so I was happy with that.

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And I started working on space satellites. So from making cars, we went into making—I went into making satellites, and that was a totally different pace, it wasn’t a frantic pace

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of staying up at the assembly line, like the Ford assembly line was. Uh there the project lead times were three to five years long, and it was very intense because we were always trying to second guess and second guess not to make any mistakes,

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because once the satellite went up there was no recalling it to do rework on it. So it was just a lot of testing and making sure that the components that we were working on would work right. And where did you go

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after Palo Alto? Well, I stayed at Palo Alto for over 10 years and uh worked on several different projects, and was transferred through southern California for a while. Uh but, uh, while I

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was working at Ford Aerospace, I was also buying and selling homes in S—in California’s San Francisco bay area. And at that time, because of

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certain court rulings in California, you could buy homes for no money down. So I had a good salary, I was making good money, and I thought I would try and,

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you know, make s—make something out of myself. So my plan was to have some capital accumulated, so I started buying homes and uh I

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ended up owning eight to ten homes over the 10 years, a little more than that in some land. And also there was, after the oil crisis, I finished and all those, there was a great boom in California.

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And uh prices went sky high, doubled and tripled. And uh so that was my side business while I was working at F—in the, in the aerospace business. When you initially decided to build capital with buying

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homes, did you think you would stay in real estate? I really wasn’t sure. Uh I thought I would build up some capital and go into some

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business, and I looked at several businesses uh throughout those 10 years, but nothing seemed to…nothing seemed to be worth giving up my cushy job at Ford and, uh, and taking their plunge.

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So I—kept looking and learning. And then in 80—1988, my sister invited me to come to Houston.

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And I came to Houston, and Houston was a total opposite of California. And at that time, the pri—price of oil had collapsed, and I do remember when I was here, oil was selling from less than 10 dollars a barrel.

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It had collapsed from 40 dollars to less than 10 dollars. And the economy of Houston was in a depression. And being in the real estate business it was just like walking into a candy

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store and seeing everything that you ever wanted to do in front of you. So uh I had a long-term strategy, I knew—I knew that Houston was a vibrant place and it would bounce back. So my long‐ term strategy was to sell everything

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in California, and do through what’s a tax mechanism called a 1031 exchange where you defer taxes and so on. I was—I had accumulated a couple of million dollars in equity by that time,

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through appreciation on those homes. I bought uh several commercial properties in Houston, and uh housing, land for building houses. So I bought a subdivision in Pearland, and uh I

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bought one of the wholesale centers that’s on Harwin, I still have that. And, uh, I uh bought a building, you know, some property in the Medical Center and so on. But in— my main goal was to start building homes in Houston.

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I had started on that path in California to build homes. But instead of building one and two homes, I—I bought a 77- home subdivision in Pearland and started working

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on that project. How did you come to form the Ardenwood Group? Well, uh, we—el—you know, my wife was reluctant to move from California to Houston, so between the late 80s

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and 1992, uh I would just fly down here, okay, you know, every week, or once or twice a month, and spend time here working on my businesses here, and then go back. And I was also, by that time I had left my job at Ford,

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so I—I was working as a real estate agent in California. And I was kind of in a limbo for two or three years, uh because we weren’t sure if we wanted to move to Houston or not.

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And kinda the decision was made ‘cause I had a heart attack in 1991 when I was 37 years old, and I knew I couldn’t carry on like going back and forth between two—two places, and trying to do business in two

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places, so we made a decision to come to Houston. And we made a decision to start, uh, building homes here. And, uh, by that time, all the problems that were associated with the project in Pearland

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uh had—had been solved, which would—which had to do with, uh, in the—in the first— initially the property was in—in a flood zone, or it had been zoned into a flood zone, so we had to work on getting it rezoned out of the flood zone, and getting uh

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FHA approval for that subdivision. Once we got all that, I started building homes. And I had a crew, I—

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I hired people, superintendent of construction, and I hired a sales manager, and set up a trailer on the side and started, you know, selling homes and started from there. And

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that’s what—that’s what the Arden Group w—became—I mean, that was Ardenwood Homes and later on it evolved into the Ardenwood Group. So, since you moved around so much in the US, how would you compare Houston to Oklahoma or New York or uh California?

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Well, uh you know, it’s really a matter of not “how would you compare it” place- to‐ place, but I would tr—I would say I would compare it in time also. As a young person in the ‘70s, I certainly didn’t like the South, okay.

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Th—it’s hard to describe what it was like, you don’t—you don’t know, but it wasn’t a very welcoming place for foreigners. And now, of course, Houston, being in the South, is a

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very welcoming place, and places like the R—New York and the Midwest are what’s called the so--‐ called “Rust Belt”, or those are the place—places that fell into atrophy. So now the tensions are

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kinda reversed, uh you know, they don’t want the competition from newcomers and some of the other places. And California, of course, is—is a place of its own, it’s a—the

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only thing I remember about California is work, work, work, work. It’s always, you know, a lot of work and a very hectic place. It’s a beautiful place, but life there is very

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hectic. So life here in Houston is a little easier‐ paced, so I like it here. You mentioned a lot that, um, Oklahoma was conservative, and I was wondering if

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you would be willing to tell us a little bit about that? Just as a young man, you’re looking for dates, okay. And when everybody turns you down, you get the message, you know. So that’s—that’s what I

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wanted to share with you. Um, when did you begin your family? Well, uh, while I was working for Ford in California, uh we were blessed with

00:34:51.120 - 00:35:03.740

our first child in 1980, so uh I was 27 years old at that time. And then we had another child in 1983, two and a half years later.

00:35:04.860 - 00:35:16.670

And uh Zareen came several years later--‐ Six. ... in 1989, you know. So we had our family uh while I was still working for Ford.

00:35:16.960 - 00:35:34.880

And Ford was kind of like a v—very, it was, it was like a very cushion—cushioned you from all sides. There was insurance, there was uh job security, there was

00:35:34.880 - 00:35:43.310

vacations. So it was very hard to leave Ford. But I decided to leave Ford and pursue things on my own. Was there a Parsi community there?

00:35:44.080 - 00:35:58.410

Yes, there was a Parsi and Zoroastrian community in California. There was uh an equal division between uh Indian and Pakistani Zoroastrians, and, uh and—and the

00:35:58.410 - 00:36:10.590

other side of the Zoroastrian community was from Iran. And in fact, the Iranian Zoroastrians were more dominant. So I—I was elected the president of the uh Indian, or

00:36:10.890 - 00:36:26.130

Pakistan—the Parsi community, and then uh we—we kind of negotiated with the Iranian side, and, uh, and set up our first uh community center.

00:36:26.550 - 00:36:41.020

And also a small prayer hall in Cal—in San Jose. Are there any notable differences between Iranian and Parsi, Pakistani Zoroastrians? Oh yes, the biggest difference is language.

00:36:41.990 - 00:36:53.160

Uh, you know, we speak our Indian language, which is Gujarati. The Iranians speak Farsi. Now, there are some In—Iranians

00:36:53.160 - 00:37:05.600

who did come to India so c—they have, uh you know, they can speak both languages, but most Indians don’t speak Farsi and most of the Iranians don’t speak English. So there is a big communication gap.

00:37:06.410 - 00:37:22.340

Also there is a lot of cultural differences; uh the Z—the Indian Parsis, and I mean Indian/Pakistani Parsis, uh want to be more organized and follow the rules and so on.

00:37:23.190 - 00:37:38.050

The Iranians don’t uh like too many rules, and, and for example, one difference is uh in our Parsi community, we all give annual contributions to

00:37:38.050 - 00:37:54.090

our association, and we raise funds through annual contributions and so on. And the Iranians just didn’t want to, uh no matter how wealthy they were, they didn’t want to become members and pay contributions, they just wanted to do lump sum

00:37:54.140 - 00:38:09.260

donations. And there was a lot of cultural differences like that. Did your children each have a navjote? Yes, uh, my children had their navjote in California, my elder children and then

00:38:09.260 - 00:38:27.220

Zareen had her navjote here in Houston. Did you, upon moving to Houston, become active in the Zoroastrian community here? Yes I did. I became active in the Zoroastrian community here,

00:38:28.000 - 00:38:41.600

and after my experience in California having, uh, successfully built uh the prayer hall and community center there--‐ well, we purchased the community center and built the prayer hall,

00:38:42.230 - 00:39:02.600

and I was involved in that from the Parsi side; I saw them struggling to do the same, and uh I thought I could contribute to that, and I did. But, before I get into that, uh my home building bec—business,

00:39:04.040 - 00:39:19.330

became extremely successful, while in the—while I was here, uh Houston turned the corner—I was lucky, and what I’d planned as a ten year project to build seventy homes, I was able to do it in a

00:39:19.510 - 00:39:35.060

couple of years, you know, in Pearland, and I purchased uh several hundred acres in Katy after that, and uh started building homes in Katy. So the home‐ building business became very pro—prolific and profitable.

00:39:35.670 - 00:39:51.840

I was making lots of money, and uh so I wanted to use that money to further the cause of our community, and I made a donation, I announced a donation to build a community—the

00:39:52.830 - 00:40:13.660

Zoroastrian center in—in Houston. And uh, so uh, after I announced the donation in 19…93, uh, we set about it and did a lot of planning, and uh,

00:40:14.100 - 00:40:26.710

my original vision was just a small kind of a prayer hall that we had done in California. The community here was much more ambitious, and they used my donation as a leverage,

00:40:26.710 - 00:40:41.870

and raised more money. And eventually, we ended up with uh ten or twelve acres of land and, uh, and— and what was going to be a small hall became a hu—quite a big hall, and

00:40:42.090 - 00:41:00.850

then with an adjacent prayer room and lib—and—and other, other rooms to go with that center. So it’s, uh, we finally got started building it in 1986 and finished…no, sorry, 19…

00:41:01.270 - 00:41:20.500

---96. ...96, and finished it in ’97. And it’s still there, it’s—we’d like to welcome you if you haven’t been there. you mentioned that there’s…a new project on the horizon?

00:41:21.110 - 00:41:38.320

Yeah, the new project on the horizon is, well, the initial phase one of the center was built, which was the main hall, a thousand square‐ foot hall along with a small prayer room and some other facilities, then later on in the year 2000, uh another atrium

00:41:38.320 - 00:41:51.410

was added to the hall, uh so now the structure is about 14,000 square feet and it has a library and a atrium and several other rooms for children’s studies and so on. But we

00:41:51.410 - 00:42:08.960

are still lacking what’s called a traditional prayer, uh, temple, okay, for lack of a better word. In—in—in our language we call it uh Atashkadeh Agiary, and uh, there’s always

00:42:08.960 - 00:42:27.120

been a dream to build a first one in North America, so uh, this year, uh I announced a, uh, a anonymous donation uh to build one. And the reason for being so cagey about it and making an

00:42:27.150 - 00:42:40.770

anonymous donation was to remove my personality from the question about whether we should build it or not. And there’s a lot of tensions in our community about uh

00:42:42.380 - 00:42:57.880

how to accept uh intermarriage, and how to—and conversion. So of course, I’m on the liberal side, and people know that, so uh to remove myself as a factor in the decision making, that’s the

00:42:57.910 - 00:43:17.110

reason for keeping it anonymous, ‘cause they—I don’t want my views to taint people, so that— you know. Anyway, we had a general body meeting about two or three months ago and the whole project was presented to the community, and uh the

00:43:17.110 - 00:43:30.540

community voted overwhelmingly uh to accept the project, and also to keep it as an open project so that anybody could enter it the—to as a sanctuary, okay, that was one of my main

00:43:30.540 - 00:43:44.930

goals. And the other main goal is about 60 to 70 percent of our young—children, are marrying outside the community. It’s not as insular as in Iran or in India, and there are lots

00:43:44.930 - 00:44:01.150

of different reasons why we were so insular in Iran or India, because we were forced to become insular. Here, it’s an open society, it’s a secular society, and there is freedom of religion which is uh not—not so, I mean, which, is taken for granted, but which is not so

00:44:01.150 - 00:44:15.840

in Pakistan or India or Iran, for example. So, uh, if—if somebody is marrying into our community, we should be welcoming—welcoming to them, we should accept them, and

00:44:16.150 - 00:44:31.140

uh, and my—you know, what I don’t want to happen to our community is to die by extinction, by becoming smaller and smaller, and rejecting, uh rejecting the spouses of children who marry outside.

00:44:31.760 - 00:44:48.890

So that’s—that was our main reason for handling it the way I’m handling it. Oh, so when we ask other, um, Zoroastrian community members about religious

00:44:48.890 - 00:45:02.340

customs that they had, um, back home in India or Pakistan, they—some of them mentioned going to the fire temple and stuff? Would this temple be related to a fire temple? Yeah, it would be exact f—it would be the first fire temple—

00:45:02.340 - 00:45:16.520

Oh, it would. —in North America, okay? And I’ve got a very good architect friend in Pakistan who has designed it for me, he is the one who designed the Zoroastrian Center for us, too. So the same guys—and—and the fire temple is going to be located on

00:45:16.520 - 00:45:31.990

the site, uh it’s the same site, it’s a 10 acre site, so there’s plenty of room for the fire temple. But, uh, we will have to evolve our thinking, just like, you know, I take the example of uh

00:45:32.120 - 00:45:48.670

Judaism, in the 1870s and 18—after the Civil War, the—the American Jews had a lot of debate between conservative and, and—and they—I think they call, not liberal but

00:45:49.290 - 00:46:02.350

there’s another faction… Reform. ... Reformed Jews, you know. So, we don’t want to have a schism in our small community ‘cause we are so small as it is, but we have to

00:46:02.350 - 00:46:17.580

reform from the Indian traditions. The Indian traditions, because of the nature of Indian society, uh, you know, there is a very strict caste system in India, and there is—uh you know, you

00:46:17.680 - 00:46:31.280

are not allowed to, you know, and we had—there was a lot of reasons for not accepting uh others into our religion, because we had made promises when we found sanctuary in India, that we would not convert.

00:46:32.030 - 00:46:45.630

And in Iran, I’ve been to Iran, and the priest, the head priest in Iran told me, “If I convert anybody, they’ll come and kill me,” okay? So it’s very simple , you don’t convert because—because your life would be, you know, you would

00:46:45.630 - 00:47:01.920

risk your life. Similarly in Pakistan, you know, it’s illegal to convert. So America, of course, you have to appreciate the freedom of religion that we have here, and uh basically we have to live like Americans,

00:47:02.960 - 00:47:15.630

and—and think like Americans, and that’s what I’m trying to impress on—on the community. I was fortunate that I came here as an eighteen year old and was able to absorb the American culture and way of thinking.

00:47:16.090 - 00:47:29.260

Some of the older members in our community, who came here at a much later stage in life, are not able to get over that. At home… Mmhmm.

00:47:29.320 - 00:47:44.160

... what language do you primarily speak? My wife and I speak Gujarati. Uh the children don’t speak any Gujarati because once they start watching television and—as they’re growing up, they lose sight of it.

00:47:45.000 - 00:48:01.860

I do appreciate the—the Chinese community and Iranian community because uh they make an emphasis on teaching uh the language to their children, you know. We just missed the boat on that, you know, but it’s hard to go back, so.

00:48:03.620 - 00:48:19.860

I speak other languages too, I—I speak the language of Pakistan which is Urdu, and I speak Hindi, and I speak the language of the province that I grew up in which is Punjab—Punjabi. Did you learn any of those languages from your family?

00:48:20.850 - 00:48:40.100

No, you just learn it as you are growing up in school. Um, besides language, are there any ways in which you are passing your Zoroastrian culture down to your children? I think I’m more intrigued by the mainstream American culture, you know,

00:48:40.440 - 00:48:55.050

and uh, most of my political activities and all are in the mainstream, uh I told you about the boards that I sit on, the Sharpstown Management District Board, which is a kind of like

00:48:55.110 - 00:49:09.180

a devolution of the powers of the Houston city council. The board is set up by the state, and the members are appointed by the city council, and then you make uh decisions to

00:49:09.210 - 00:49:23.310

the local area. Now of course, Sharpstown uh Management District includes Chinatown, so most of the members are from Chinatown, uh like Kenneth Li and uh Mr.

00:49:23.310 - 00:49:36.580

Wang, who was the owner of Metro Bank, and all those people are the—are the—are on—are board members, there’s few other—one other Indian person who owns a lot of property in Hillcroft, who is also on the board.

00:49:37.510 - 00:49:54.930

So I serve as that, the other board that I’m the Vice Chairman of, is the Alief board, it’s known in International Management District, and uh the primary force on that board is a Chinese gentleman by the name of Wea Lee, but uh the reason that we set up the

00:49:54.930 - 00:50:09.280

International District Board was because uh there’s a very strong Vietnamese community in Alief, and they didn’t want to be associated with the Chinese, so they called themselves Asian rather than Chinese, so there’s a lot of political tension between

00:50:09.280 - 00:50:22.920

the two, so they set up a different board for the uh Vietnamese, and I serve on that board too. And—and I s—they put me on both boards so I could be a liaison between the two, two boards, you know.

00:50:22.920 - 00:50:37.330

And do you know anything more—want to know anything more about management districts? Uh primarily we deal with security p—you know we—we—I—I’m the chairman of the Public Safety Committee, so the

00:50:38.390 - 00:50:51.800

P—Police Chief and all his captains and all, we have a meeting with them once a month in each area, and uh we set policy and we—and, and we—the District Attorney’s there and we set policy for them,

00:50:52.890 - 00:51:04.090

and they give us reports on w—what their goals are. And it’s a way of bringing things down to the local level and solving things, so. And then you see all these different signs that are going

00:51:04.140 - 00:51:19.510

up, so beautification is another thing, when you see—if you go to the Galleria area, you see the different arches and all that, so the—the management districts do that, too. In Chinatown, we have all these uh different-colored street signs,

00:51:20.750 - 00:51:34.020

in Har—in Hillcroft, we have the Mahatma Gandhi district, which I helped form, and there we have the Mahatma Gandhi district signs, and we’re working on the beautification of Bellaire and so on, so,

00:51:34.020 - 00:51:49.910

we’re working on that. So, in the last ten years, you’ve seen Houston change quite a bit. Yes. Mmhmm. Can you…tell us about that?

00:51:49.960 - 00:52:03.650

I think, uh, from, in the last ten years, uh there has been a certain confidence in Houston. There was a lot of lack of confidence in the 80’s and 90’s, late 80’s and 90’s,

00:52:03.780 - 00:52:18.760

and Houston had bumper stickers saying that, “God, give me another oil boom and I won’t waste it this time.” But uh since then, uh you know, the s—the economy is

00:52:18.760 - 00:52:36.040

developed—dependent on oil, but the economy has diversified, there has been slow and steady growth in Houston, uh and uh and now, I think, we are finally in the stage of boom. So Houston, like Rick Perry keeps touting,

00:52:37.230 - 00:52:50.760

uh Texas is the only place—one of the strongest growing parts of the country, and Houston is also part of that, the growth is taking place in Houston, and when you travel to other places, uh you can see the

00:52:50.760 - 00:53:06.460

difference, you know. Uh for whatever the reasons are, Houston is doing well. Become more cosmopolitan. And it’s become more cosmopolitan. Do you

00:53:06.520 - 00:53:20.100

think Mayor Parker has assisted in the growth of the city? In fact, Mayor Parker gave me an award two—two weeks ago, do you mind if I show you that picture? Sure.

00:53:20.100 - 00:53:34.590

Okay. So yes, uh, she’s a dynamic leader, and I know her well. Uh on the other hand, uh, what’s her

00:53:40.460 - 00:53:59.790

uh Uh, I had a lot of respect for Bill White also. He was a great leader, too. So… Zareen, can you find that photo of the mayor?

00:54:00.300 - 00:54:17.740

Sure. Uh, I knew Bill White well, and—and now Mayor Parker, and I’ve worked with several council members, uh I’m good friends with several council members. And if I’m correct, Bill White also

00:54:19.180 - 00:54:33.080

ran against Rick Perry , some time ago? Mhm, yes. Do you believe he would have made a good governor? Well, having known Bill White personally, he’s an extremely intelligent and

00:54:33.080 - 00:54:49.620

capable man. He live—he, he was a CEO of a very large industrial, or, corporation in Houston. Oh, just digressing, the

00:54:49.620 - 00:55:04.970

Mayor gave me an award for uh the public safety performance that I, you know, being the chairman of the committee, and having worked on it for five years, she gave me an award recognizing that, yeah. Okay. Thank you.

00:55:04.970 - 00:55:17.070

And, next to her is this council member Laster, this is a former council member MJ Khan, he was from Pakistan, he’s a good friend of mine. And then this is the council

00:55:17.070 - 00:55:34.810

general of uh Pakistan, he was invited to the event, because anytime, uh you know, anyway, he was there. Your question about Bill White? He—he was a, he’s a very capable man, uh,

00:55:36.860 - 00:55:50.570

he ran a very big company before he became mayor, uh during mayor, uh, during his term, his eight-year term as the mayor, I’ve never seen the council so united, and such dynamic leadership,

00:55:51.430 - 00:56:05.730

that—that he gave. Uh he was a wonderful mayor during Katrina, he really rolls up to the task when Houston was flooded by all those refugees and so on, so um I had a lot of respect for

00:56:05.730 - 00:56:19.410

him. Uh well did he win or not? Texas is a Republican state, he didn’t have much— much of a chance uh going, but he’s made a good effort, and he ran.

00:56:26.260 - 00:56:41.460

Were there any people in your life who had a great impact, or influenced you? Well of course, my mother influenced me a great deal, she wa—and my—and my

00:56:41.460 - 00:56:55.760

father. And then, uh, I’ve told you my father passed away when I was seven, so my elder brother uh was like a, he was seventeen years—sixteen years older than me, and he was

00:56:55.760 - 00:57:12.650

like a father figure, he had a big influence on me and so did my elder sister, and, uh, those were the main people in my li—in my life who have influenced me, other than my wife. Yeah.

00:57:12.650 - 00:57:27.770

And did your siblings also emigrate? My sister did immigrate, uh she did immigrate in her later life, she was probably in her forties when she came here, but uh she’s a very

00:57:27.940 - 00:57:39.890

feisty person, she’s a writer, she’s written many books, especially on the partition of India and Pakistan. Do you want to get some of her books, please? So, uh, and

00:57:39.890 - 00:57:55.520

some of her books have been made into movies. And she became a professor at, oh, one of the big Ivy League universities, uh Radcliffe college, and Harvard and all that, and—

00:57:55.520 - 00:58:13.790

and, so, uh, she did well, but now—now she’s retired, you know, so. Did your mother stay in Pakistan? Yes, my mother stayed in Pakistan, uh and never, you know, she was kind of

00:58:14.460 - 00:58:27.690

afraid to venture out. Old—old—older people are like that, they li—like their zone of comfort, so, she didn’t want to venture out. You mentioned that your family,

00:58:29.470 - 00:58:42.540

and the surrounding community was scarred by the partition. Did your family get separated at all? No, my family, uh, being Parsis, we were—we were

00:58:43.330 - 00:58:53.370

kind of left alone, fortunately. We didn’t have to choose whether to go to India or remain in Pakistan. We could—you know, we were allowed to stay where we were and keep our businesses.

00:58:53.980 - 00:59:06.150

My father had businesses in what is now India. Because India is only 12 miles away from—from where we live, the border from India is only 12 miles away. And he had businesses in other

00:59:06.910 - 00:59:25.210

adjacent cities, and he carried on with those businesses, but then when tensions grew between the two countries, uh, you know, those businesses, uh, were nationalized. I see. And—and to describe it more, uh,

00:59:28.330 - 00:59:43.460

there was nostalgia for having a secular, like, you know, nostalgia for the old India, which was secular, and all—different community members lived together. And there was just some regret that all of them were not there

00:59:43.460 - 01:00:02.290

any longer, but there was uncontrolled events during partition, and it couldn’t—you know, it was just very unfortunate and, uh, and sad. But, uh, it’s happening in other places, it’s happening in Iraq now, you know, their countries are getting torn apart.

01:00:06.810 - 01:00:28.180

Now that you live here in Houston, do you think of yourself as a Houstonian? Yes, I think of myself as a Houstonian, as a—as an American. How do you feel about…being called a Texan? It’s okay.

01:00:36.780 - 01:00:48.550

What holidays do you celebrate at home? Where’s “Cracking India”? Couldn’t find the one about partition. Oh, we cel—okay. We, we celebrate,

01:00:52.210 - 01:01:06.580

uh, we celebrate Nowruz, which is the main Zoroastrian holiday. And uh we celebrate a lot of different jashans, so, uh, and we

01:01:06.640 - 01:01:24.840

celebrate Christmas, and we celebrate New Year’s and we celebrate the Fourth of July. We celebrate all the American holidays. I recognize your sister’s name. You do? She’s quite famous!

01:01:24.840 - 01:01:38.720

She taught at--‐ Mmhmm. She taught at Rice University, at Mount Holyoke, and then she—at Brandeis. Yes. She’s taught a lot... At University of Houston. …but she’s approaching 80 and in she’s in poor health now, you know.

01:01:39.470 - 01:01:56.480

And, if you want to learn more about the partition of India, there is a book uh that she wrote called Cracking India where she describes the events that she live—lived through. And if— there was also a movie that was made out of that—from that book, and it’s called

01:01:56.680 - 01:02:14.330

Earth, and it’s available on Netflix, so if you have Netflix, you can download that movie and watch it. Do you still go back and visit Pakistan now? Yes, uh I do go back and visit Pakistan because the brewery I had mentioned

01:02:15.360 - 01:02:30.290

uh is coming back to life. The prohibition has been, strangely enough, uh the prohibition has been relaxed in the last five or six years uh to a great extent. And, uh, I still have an

01:02:30.290 - 01:02:47.720

interest in the brewery so I have gone to look—look after that investment, and uh this family, her—her mother is still there, her parents were still there ‘til a few years—I mean, her father was alive until a few years back, her brothers

01:02:48.380 - 01:03:02.160

uh are there, so my wife goes back to Pakistan every year to visit her parents and I was going back until my mother passed away in 1995, but, I—I go back infrequently

01:03:07.710 - 01:03:29.130

now. Are there things from Pakistan that you…wish you could have with you here? Mmm… I don’t know, we had a vacation home in the mountains, I miss that! Um, of

01:03:30.590 - 01:03:42.710

course, uh being able to drink— The easy pace of life. …yeah, the slower pace of life, and being able to go into the brewery and drink the fresh beer from the brewery, or, uh, do you want to bring those

01:03:42.790 - 01:03:55.470

bottles, the—the whiskey and all that, please? As a woman of course, all the servants, and… There’s a—there’s a cushy life there, so uh

01:03:56.310 - 01:04:12.180

you know. Did you happen to build this community? No, I built a community in Katy—well, the one in Pearland, which is, uh, I did

01:04:12.290 - 01:04:31.020

built part of the south, uh I a—added on to the south, so I’ll give you a tour of the house later. Uh I built a seventy-home community in—in Pearland and then, I built a much larger community—

01:04:33.520 - 01:04:45.780

These are some of the products of that brewery, so, of course, I’ve not brought any beer bottles back, but, are you a drinker? It’s a little early.

01:04:46.150 - 01:04:57.120

I—I am not…. I’m not—I’m not going to offer it to you. I’m a—I’m the only one of age. Yeah. So, uh, but you know, but uh it’s a full range of, it’s a full range of products,

01:04:57.900 - 01:05:14.750

including fruit juices, and uh— Jams, jellies. —jams and fruit products and so on, and uh, and, like, you know, from being nothing during the prohibition and the stock being totally

01:05:14.790 - 01:05:27.230

worthless, it has become—it has become very valuable, as a place—which was a surprise to me, so yeah.

01:05:27.590 - 01:05:43.340

Uh, I’d done this PowerPoint the other day, the community had basically asked me to give a talk about real estate, so I’d described my, uh, accomplishments there. This is—I just wanted to show you some

01:05:43.420 - 01:06:00.230

pictures, I have about—close this off, dear. I’ll lower it. The—I have 12 major commercial properties that I’ve been concentrating on, I gave up the home building in 19—uh 2004.

01:06:04.680 - 01:06:20.440

So, now uh my main concentration is commercial properties, I have close to a million square feet of commercial properties in Houston. Uh here’s an example of a 100,000 square foot shopping center on Harwin,

01:06:21.580 - 01:06:33.840

and this is an example of a medical office building in the medical—uh, in the medical center, here is the M. D. Anderson tower behind it. Uh I have five properties on Richmond Avenue on

01:06:33.930 - 01:06:47.880

the Richmond strip between Fountainview uh and Hillcroft, and these are some of those properties and shopping centers. Uh this is also a property in southwest Houston, which is

01:06:48.250 - 01:07:03.060

uh a medical use property. And uh, this was a new purchase, I—I own a hospital, and it’s called the Westbury Hospital, I don’t know if you know where Westbury is, uh it’s near

01:07:03.060 - 01:07:20.060

Meyerland Plaza, you know. And this is the office building next to that hospital. And, uh, I—I own about 500—450 apartments and, one of the reasons that the Mayor

01:07:20.160 - 01:07:37.700

recognized me was my work in—in uh apartments—apartments are typically associated with crime and negative images, and I’ve taken—and I’ve owned this for fifteen years and I’ve taken it as a project to convert and make it into a

01:07:37.700 - 01:07:52.270

community, so when I came there the occupancy was very low and it was full of crime and so on, so that was my motivation to get into all these political bodies, and—and I chose the Public Safety Board

01:07:52.720 - 01:08:07.170

for that reason, so I could influence the—the—the—the public safety in—in that area. And I set up a mosque over there, because a lot of the people uh who live there are of

01:08:07.230 - 01:08:22.340

South Asian people. I’ve set up two churches over there, we—we patronize the Boy Scouts, we patronize—we are working with the Alief Independent School District to have after-school programs and summer programs in the apartments.

01:08:22.890 - 01:08:37.510

We are even working on a new plan—children could—could stay in school and be bussed home at 6 o’clock instead of 3, you know, instead of that—that time. So we are working on a lot of

01:08:37.510 - 01:08:51.640

different projects, okay, and, um, and that’s basically my incentive to go into the political activities for Alief. And, uh, this is the hospital,

01:08:53.640 - 01:09:10.320

it’s 137-bed hospital and it’s uh mainly a psych hospital, it’s going through a lot of uh financial difficulties now but we hope to uh overcome those financial difficulties and—and set it up.

01:09:10.320 - 01:09:21.870

It was—learning about hospitals and how to run a hospital has been a major challenge, you know, so. And my future projects are to develop the land in Katy.

01:09:22.130 - 01:09:37.310

I own 205 acres in Katy, and uh we—we built close to 300 homes there, and now we’re proposing to build a lot more, uh close to another 500

01:09:37.350 - 01:09:54.480

homes. Uh I sold 50 acres to the school district, Katy School District, they’re going to set up an elementary and junior high there, and this time I won’t build the homes, we’ll just develop the lots and sell it to other builders.

01:09:54.480 - 01:10:11.600

So, I’ll give you a copy of that, or email it to you if you like. Thanks. What do you enjoy doing in your free time? I—I enjoy reading, I enjoy watching sports and I enjoy—uh

01:10:13.140 - 01:10:24.390

I have, I joined a racquetball league so I go to the league every—twice a week, and I play racquetball. Uh I enjoy travel, we are always traveling somewhere or the other.

01:10:25.400 - 01:10:38.780

This year I’ve traveled to China, I’ve traveled to Pakistan, we just came back from Alaska last week, in fact, I was in Alaska when you e-mailed me. Last year we traveled to South America, Chile,

01:10:39.560 - 01:10:54.360

Argentina, Falklands, Brazil, Uruguay, all those countries, and then, prior to that we had gone to Iran and Egypt and— Turkey. Turkey and India, so we’re just doing the

01:10:54.900 - 01:11:08.460

typical— Balkans. Yeah, Balkans—you know, we’re just doing the typical traveling, just, but I won’t let up on my business, I’m very fortunate that my son who—who’s a CPA has joined

01:11:08.460 - 01:11:23.570

me, so he carries on the business when I’m—so I can be allowed have a vacation. I just had a question about your name. Do you know if um your first or last name

01:11:23.570 - 01:11:37.960

has any significant meaning in your original language? Typically in Parsis the first name is a Persian name, so “Feroze” is a Par—Persian name, and I don’t know exactly what it means, it means “precious stone” or something like that.

01:11:37.960 - 01:11:51.350

The last—the last name is an Indian name, and uh it—basically, it goes back to the place in—our area in India, where we are from, where we—you know,

01:11:51.350 - 01:12:08.080

where my ancestors uh were from, and it also means “trader,” you know, somebody who does th—who was—who was a trader. And is there any significance in you also choosing an American name?

01:12:09.130 - 01:12:26.080

Yes, just to make it easier. Because, uh, when I was building homes, you know, I— I was selling a lot of the—most of the homes myself, because pretty soon, you know, being a real estate agent and all, I was selling the homes myself, and

01:12:27.420 - 01:12:49.280

it was just easier to deal with a lot of people, you know, rather than explain my name and all that. What do you consider to be your greatest accomplishment in life so far? I think the greatest accomplishment is not building, you know,

01:12:49.450 - 01:13:10.310

building a so- called empire or anything, it’s just uh being able to have a happy and fulfilling life and being able to contribute to my community and my family. Is there anything that you would like the next generation of Zoroastrians or

01:13:10.680 - 01:13:30.660

Pakistani to know about your immigration experience? Well, my immigration experience is set in a certain period of time, you know, it was set in the period of time when I came here, uh it was the Vietnam war era and the protest

01:13:30.660 - 01:13:47.040

era, and then during the Reagans’ time, America just got down to business and so on. So what I’d like them to know is, anything is possible. America gives you, like, all the

01:13:47.040 - 01:14:04.980

immigrants who are successful, I would like to just point to the fact that America gives you a lot of possibilities and a—allows you to succeed, and it requires a lot of hard work, it requires strategic planning and staying the course,

01:14:05.760 - 01:14:20.470

you know, and not getting eh disheartened by— there’s all kinds of setbacks that I’ve had and experienced, but uh— touched a little about mental illness that—that we had in the family, uh and also touched

01:14:20.470 - 01:14:32.740

upon the fact that I suffered heart attacks and all that, but uh that doesn’t mean that you sit down and cry in your—in your shirt sleeves, you know, you just pick up and learn to

01:14:32.740 - 01:14:41.560

deal with it and go on, you know. Well, thank you so much. Alright, thank you. Thank you. Thank you for coming.