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Alright, thank you for joining us for the interview. Um, the interview is currently taking place at a library in Zoroastrian Center on Jul—June 23rd. And I’m Linda, and... And I’m Gabriel Wang.

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And, let’s start with your childhood. So where are you from, and what was your childhood like? I was born and brought up in India. Uh, from a early age, I was in boarding school

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in India. And, uh, then I did my undergraduate degree in engineering, at the Indian Institute of Technology in Kharagpur, and, uh, then I came over to the United States in 1968 as a—for graduate

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studies. Um, so could you tell me what was your house like as a child, and what was your family like, and your siblings and stuff? Yeah, we grew up—I—I was born in a very small town in North India, called

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Faizabad. Uh, and my father was posted over there, he was working for a company over there, it was a really small town. And I lived there for the first five years of my life.

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And uh then we moved to Mumbai, at that time it was Bombay, now it’s called Mumbai. So we moved to Mumbai, again, because my father was posted there. And, uh, in 1955, he was transferred again to Calcutta, and we were born there.

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But as I said, I was in boarding school, so I was in a—in a place called Nainital originally, and then in a school called the Doon School in Dehradun. They were both boarding schools. And, uh, so, we used to come home for vacations,

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but we’d be in school basically over there. And what type of jobs did your parents have? My father was an electrical engineer. He worked for a company that manufactured cables, these electric

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cables, all the different cables. And that’s why he moved around to different places. And my mother was a homemaker. She stayed at home and brought us up.

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I have one—one sibling, one sister, I had—she’s passed away now, but I had one sister. Older than me. Um, was there a particular reason why your parents sent you to boarding school, instead of school that

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you can commute from home? Yeah, I mean, that’s an interesting question, because initially where that small town I told you where we were, I mean there was just no schools, and my mother sort of kind of just home schooled me. But she herself

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really realized that she was herself has just done high school; she’d never gone to college, my mother, so. She realized she reached a stage where she couldn’t homeschool us, my sister or me, any further. So, uh, she decided

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to send us to a boarding school because there were just no local schools, English medium schools in the town we were brought up in. So that was the reason we went to boarding schools. How do you think your experience in boarding school influenced you?

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Well, one of the things you gotta understand about the Indian system of education is that most of the boarding schools are, I mean, the initial boarding schools were run by churches, or missionaries, or something like that, you know, those people.

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And they have a much higher standard of education than the local schools. So, uh, then as I said, I went to a school later on, my high school was a school in Dehradun called Doon School, which was just super—probably, if I can say, I can boastfully say it’s the best school

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in India. Best boarding school. I couldn't have gotten a better education in India. Uh, so, it very heavily influenced me, I mean, the quality of the education, the way we were treated, uh you know, and

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it was just a very great character develop— development, uh, it was great for character development for me. And uh, so it influenced me very heavily. I still have fond memories and, uh, of that place, of that school.

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Can you talk about specific um experiences that you had in boarding school? Oh, I don’t know what, how—what you mean by experiences, I mean, I don’t- Um, I guess like, besides, I guess, the education, were there any good stories or- Well, well, one of the things that, again, is over there, it’s—it’s a

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small—it was a very small school. Our graduating class was only about 50 or 55. So, uh, you—you bonded very closely. And you got a lot of friends uh

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whom I bonded with, you know, even now, a lot of my old classmates, we still meet and get together. And it’s not only the classmates, it’s just the school influence, like if now I meet, uh, a student who graduated from

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school 20, 25 years more or later, I can still relate to him, just because of our school experience. It’s just, I guess, the closest thing I can explain that feeling is like if you need to talk about, uh,

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A&M Aggies, you know, I mean they always bond very closely with each other. This—this is a—it’s not a very big school, so there’s great opportunity—we had, it was just great fun, and enjoyed myself over

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there. Um, so being away from home, and I’m sure your household was Zoroastrian, do you think you kept well with your Zoroastrian roots and cultures in boarding schools? Well, pretty obviously, you couldn’t do all of the things that would be done at

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home, you know, but yes, I still pray every day, if you—if you, uh, if you have had some, talk to different people in, about the Zoroastrian uh community, you will know we go through an initiation ceremony, have you been

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familiar with that? Okay, at about age—somewhere between the ages of 7 and 9, all Zoroastrian children go through an initiation ceremony. And it’s called a Navjote.

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And, uh, at that time, you—you wear a—a sacred vest and put a sacred thread around you. We wear that. It’s called a sudre is the vest, and the kusti is the thread. So that is symbol of Zoroastrian people—of Zoroastrians—I

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mean, it’s used on a daily basis, you say your prayers every morning, and you re-tie your, put on a fresh sudre, and you re-tie the kusti every morning after your bath, so. But I would keep doing that in school, I, so, it was, I

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kept—kept that part of the tradition, uh, going. But pretty obviously when you’re not at home, you can’t do all the same things you could do at home. And, it was—it was—the school—the last school, the high school I went to was a kind of secular

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school, there was no reli— overt religious, uh, emphasis, there was no, I mean, it was not Christian or Hindu or Muslim or Zoroastrian, it was just non-denominational, but we still had prayers,

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and we’d have non—non—non-denominational type of prayers, so it was not totally no religion, but, uh, everyone was free to practice their own religions in their own way. So,

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how did you get to choose your major in college? Well, I, I’m a chemical engineer. S—and uh, it’s interesting that I was, I really didn’t know much, you know, I just knew I wanted to be an engineer and I like, guess I

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liked chemistry, so I thought chemistry and chem—and engineering go together in chemical engineering, so. That was kind of the basis of my choosing that, and, uh, again I went to what’s known as the Indian

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Institute of Technology, I don’t know if you all are familiar with that. When I was there, there were only five IIT’s, and they were the highest level. You had to go through an entrance exam, and it was an all Indian entrance exam.

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And, uh, I don’t know, maybe about 100 or 200,000 kids sat for the exam, and now it’s a lot more. And, uh, you know, in the five IIT’s, a total of about maybe—that time 2 or 3000 were chosen, so.

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It was a very difficult process to get into the IIT’s, and uh even now, now to get into IIT’s, it’s probably more difficult to get into IIT than it is to get into MIT or Stanford over here. So it was an interesting—but

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choosing was kind of—it was more or less just guesswork. And did that turn out well? Yes, I got a very good education. Uh excellent uh engineering background.

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IIT’s are very very, uh, intense, you have—it was a five-year undergraduate for engineering. And uh we would have 39 class hours a week. And uh that’s equivalent to carrying a load of about 39 credits.

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I mean, I don't know how many students over here in any of the colleges would carry that much, if you consider one hour of one credit, you know, so. It was very intense work.

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And the first two years were basically—you only did basic science. Physics, chemistry, math. And there were humanities also, of course. And then in the third year, we got in—involved in basic engineering, we

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did a little bit of civil, mechanical, metallurgical, electrical, all of those, you got a idea of all the different disciplines of engineering. And in the last two years, you majored in your own, like, chemical, or whichever

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department you were in. So the first three years were more or less common to everyone, and the last two years you went and specialized in your department of choice. What did you do for fun in college?

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Uh, that’s a l—completely different story. The place I went to, Kharagpur, was a real dump, I mean, as—as a… as a location, it was really, really terrible. And the food was horrid.

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The towns were not very… great, so. But we had a good group of friends. So, I mean, let me tell you, the s—there really wasn't much to do

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after hours. It’s not like living in Houston, where you can go out and party, I mean, all the party colleges you hear about? This was definitely not a party college. ‘No-party’ college, I would call it, you know.

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So, I mean, there wasn't really much to do, other than go to the movies on the weekends, or, that’s about it. That was about our only entertainment over there.

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It was—as I said, it was very, very focused to education with nothing else, no really other diversions around you. Did you pursue a career right after college? No, immediately after I graduated from India, I got my bachelor’s degree in Chemical

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Engineering, then I immediately came over to the United States. So, I came here in 1968, and I went for my graduate studies to University of Pittsburgh.

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Was there a particular reason why you chose University of Pittsburgh? No, I’ll tell you what. Then again, these—these—these—we would be sitting around the room with a whole bunch of kids, you know, all of us seniors, and we’re deciding where we want to go to college, and

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we sort of start picking and choosing. And, saying you’ll apply to four or five colleges in the United States, and Pittsburgh happened to be one of them. And uh I got admission to Pittsburgh.

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I got admission to Pittsburgh and the University of Oklahoma. And Pittsburgh gave me a bigger assistantship, which was critical in those days.

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You know, getting money to come over here. So that was the—basically, that was the reason I came, I came to Pittsburgh was because they offered me a better scholarship.

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Why did you choose America for your further education, not anywhere else? I had—I had also applied to, uh, Great Britain in England. I had applied to the University of Manchester, but again, over here I got a better deal.

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Financially, it was much better over here. I didn't get any financially— now, you gotta remember, India in 1968 was completely different than it is now. Uh it was very controlled, and it

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was exceedingly difficult, in fact, impossible to get money. So even—even if a family had money and they wanted to send money overseas, they couldn't, because there was foreign exchange restrictions. So, it was not

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possible for my parents to continue financing my education, simply because they couldn't send money. So uh I had to be dependent strictly on, uh, on scholarships and

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assistantships. Now, I did get some uh basic scholarships when I—before I left India, from a couple of different uh groups over there. And they, because of their ties, of their scholarship ties, were able to remit that money, uh but that was

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very meager amount compared to what you would need to study over here. What was your experience like coming to the U.S. to study? Oh, it was culture shock.

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It was absolute culture shock. I don’t know if you guys are first generation or are you, are you born and brought up over here? I’m an—I’m an international student here.

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Okay, so you were- I was—I was born here. You—you—you were born here. Yeah. Yeah, but if you came here first, I mean, now there’s—there’s a lot more diversity of cultures in many of the places, but India was kind of really, really,

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I mean, coming to United States from India was like really a culture shock for me, uh, just like wonderland, coming into wonderland. Could you tell us some of the culture shocks you’ve had?

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Well, uh, just going out grocery shopping. Somepl—something simple as grocery shopping. I mean, in India if you went out to the store, and you wanted to buy

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soap, you got a choice of two soaps, you know. Over here, you come out, and you got 50 different soaps, and you’re trying to decide which one is better. Is Camay better than this? Or you know, is Safeguard better than, uh, you know, whatever

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it is, you know. So—it’s—it’s just, s—something as small and w—now, we can—I can look back and laugh at it, now I don’t think about it twice. But at that stage, it was really, really uh… Just as

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coming to wonderland. We had never seen that variety of that—exceeding amount of stuff that we could get over here, so. That—that was really a big change for us,

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coming in at that time in 1968. And did you have any problems with the language or the food? No, that is fortunate, because right through then I went to an English medium school. So from elementary

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school on, uh, I would probably say English is my primary—it is my primary language. I’m much more fluent in, in English than I am in the vernacular, I mean, I think and talk and everything in English.

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So, there was no— there was no language problem. I mean, the accent is different, but uh people get used to it. You know and uh again, in the beginning, when I first came here, had a little bit of difficulty

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understanding the—the American accent, but that didn’t me take very long to get used to it and understand. So that wasn’t really a problem, fortunately. During the ‘60s, there must have been a lot of

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civil rights movement and such. A lot of what? Civil rights movement and such? Yes. Did you ever face discrimination or any kind of different attitude from the public?

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No, I’ve gotta say no. Uh, not from the public. And, uh, I would say… In a university environment you

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don’t normally see that much, you know, discrimination. Now, I came in ’68 and you’ve got to remember that 1968 was the height of the Vietnam War. So, I’m going back to probably before you all were—were born even,

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so some of that history you may not be aware of, but most—all the American college students were getting drafted that time, for the war. So, uh, when I came to the University of Pittsburgh in the

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graduate program, there was only one full time American student, because all the rest were being drafted. And we were all—most of us were all foreign students over there.

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So at least, the—the culture was more accepted—accepting and uh open for foreign students, so we never really faced any discrimination, uh in—in—in, as such.

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I—I can’t remember any incident in college life that, you know, was negative from that point of view. And how was keeping your Zoroastrian roots in the States, in Pittsburgh?

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That—that became very difficult, I mean, that does become very difficult when you’re in a new culture and a new environment, away from home, and away from all that environment. So, I mean, again, questions like saying your daily prayers, you say your daily prayers.

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But again all the other customs, and ceremonies, and all that one would do if you were at home in the family environment, those all get—got lost. Or couldn’t happen

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when you were in a—in student life. So that did disappear, kind of, from my life. Were you able to connect with anyone else with a similar culture and background when you were in grad school? Uh, I knew some of them over there, but,

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really again, there was—there was a couple of families over there, but—like we’d go over there for New Year celebration or, you know, just once a year, or twice a year, we’d see them, you know, but really not on a—interacting on a daily basis or on a very

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frequent basis. So no, we really didn’t have that connection. And in those days, there weren’t just that many. I mean, there were no centers like

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this Zoroastrian center over here. There wasn’t any in those days, so you couldn’t get that… getting together and bonding with your community. Or interacting with your community.

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Then who was in your social circle? In Pittsburgh? Mm-hmm. Well, mainly students other foreign—other students, I mean, yeah, we, we were a close-knit group of Indian students and, you know, we were sort of, just naturally bonded because we had some

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commonality, so, culturally and language-wise. So we would mainly interact, I would say my early students days was more interacting with my fellow Indian students.

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Did you live on campus? What was your neighborhood like? No, no. We lived off campus. Because, I mean, I—I arrived like what, one week

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before school was going to st—open, and by that time most of the, I mean, the dorms were all taken up. And they don’t normally give, uh, accommodation, dorm accommodation to

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graduate students, so, I think it’s probably even common over here. Uh so we had to look off campus, and uh, by that time all the good places were taken.

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And we—we were—the first place we lived in was a slum dwelling. I mean, I can—I cannot say anything better than that about it. It was a real slum dwelling. In fact, uh, it was so bad that

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at that time, there was a local Pittsburgh newspaper, the Pittsburgh Press, uh came in and reported, interviewed us and photographed us to write about how terrible the student accommodation was.

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I mean it was really terrible. But again, we were all young people, we were all friends together, we were all living together, so we enjoyed ourselves. We had great fun even though the place was terrible.

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And were these people that you lived with people you had met—that you had known before in India? Or did you just meet- No, I had not met any of them in India. We all met locally over here.

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We all met at the foreign students’ office. We were all kind of—one, it just happened to be we were there, and one of the guys just says, ‘Would you like to share an apartment?’ and I said yeah, so. Four of us lived together in a two-bedroom

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apartment, so, turned out to be really nice. Two of the students were MBA students, and two of us were in chemical engineering. So turned out real nice, because both of us, uh, sort of—both groups, we had interactions

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because we were students together in school, and it was really nice. So what brought you to Houston? Did you come to Houston right after you graduated from grad school? Oh, no no no. No, after I, after I finished my

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master’s degree, I was working on—going on to do my, uh, doctorate. But I lost my assistantship. This was back in ’71, when uh it was very difficult, I mean, there was high

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inflation and all that, but that stuff was going on. It was really bad financially. And they dropped my assistantship. And uh so, I had to start taking up a job.

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And I took up a job in Pittsburgh, and uh just, after that it was very difficult for me to get back into academia and finish my PhD. So I never did complete my PhD.

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But, uh, I worked in Pittsburgh for nearly four years, and, uh, I worked for an engineering—an environmental engineering consulting firm. I did my master’s degree in uh chemical engineering.

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But I took a lot of courses at that time in environmental engineering, mainly in air pollution and water pollution control. Now you gotta remember back in the late 60’s, early 70’s, there was no environmental

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movement. And there wasn't even an environmental engineering department. So uh it happened to be that air pollution was taught in the School of Public Health at that time in Pittsburgh.

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So my advisor at School of Public Health was also an adjunct professor in the chemical engineering department, so I could work in—I could go in both departments under him. So, uh, while I was doing my master’s degree, I did a lot of courses in air

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pollution control and water pollution control. That time there certainly was no environmental engineering. And then after that, it happened to be that when I was taking this water pollution course, uh one of my—this

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professor, who taught it, was actually, he was—worked full time for this consulting firm in Pittsburgh. So when I was looking for a job I called him up and I said, ‘Hey, uh I’m looking for a job.’ He immediately gave me the job

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because he knew me as a student, so he immediately gave me a job. So my first job was doing uh environmental consulting in Pittsburgh. Uh then in

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1976, I got a job offer from Pennzoil Company in Houston, and uh transferred down to Houston with them. So been in Pittsburgh—uh, been in Houston ever since then.

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Um so how would you compare Houston to Pittsburgh? Very different. When I first moved down here, I moved down here in ‘76. ‘Course, by that time, when I was working in Pittsburgh, your whole circle of friends changes, and you know, I was much

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more friendly with people at work, and you’d—you’d improve, you’d get . And I remember I was telling my friends over there that I’m moving down to Houston, and uh they said, ‘Are you crazy? Those Texans, they don’t

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even like Yankees, let alone liking foreigners!’ You know, and I was kind of really scared, because in Pittsburgh, I never really had any, you know, felt any discrimination or felt outside, but I was kind of concerned about

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moving down to Houston. But I must say, I’ve never felt that over here, you know. You know, it was—people—I find people really friendly over here, so. How about the neighborhoods and stuff?

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Well, I first came down here, I was single that time, so I was in an apartment, you know, living. We made friends in the apartment and uh friends at work, so. You can, you know, as you move from place to place, your

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circle of friends change. And, uh, I had a great time, I—I love Houston now. It was very different in ’76 when I came out over here. All this area was completely undeveloped, you know,

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so. Was there anything difficult about transitioning to Houston, or was it an easy process? No, it was quite easy. Uh, as a—as a—when I first moved to Houston as a city, I was not really impressed by it, because Pittsburgh is beautiful.

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I don’t know if you all have travelled up north to Pennsylvania. You’ve got real hills and rivers and all that. And I come to Houston; it’s this flat, bland place. You know, I’m saying—you know, where as anything—And, and in the early—I mean,

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in the mid 70s, just, Houston hadn’t developed to the stage it is now. I mean, it was a completely different city. You know, it was much—there really wasn’t that much cultural life, and no, uh and now you have so many

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restaurants and things to do and all that. There really wasn’t that much and—it was just starting to develop in the 70’s. Because—that is because of the oil boom, I mean, uh, ’76, when I moved down here, was the height of the oil

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boom in Texas. The f—one of the booms. And uh there was just fantastic opportunity, people moving down, a lot of people from uh north were coming down, who

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were unemployed, losing jobs in Detroit, in the auto industry, they were all moving down to Houston. So Houston was a boom town. Booming town. But it hadn’t developed to the stage it’s now. W- Where was your first

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settlement here in Houston? And what was the neighborhood like there? I lived just a little west of the Galleria area, area. Uh, near Westheimer and Fountainview?

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I don’t know if you are familiar with the area over there. So I, I —that was the first place we—I—I— when I first came down, I found an apartment over there. And then, my office was downtown, so I had to commute downtown.

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In those days, the commute was horrible. I mean, it was—it would take you about an hour each way, if not more. Really horrible. The roads, I mean, they hadn’t developed—they hadn’t built up, you know,

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I-10, or any of the, 59, all of them were all—there would just be one big parking lot in the morning and evening. That was probably one of the worst things about Houston, was just terrible commute. What was the demographic like in your neighborhood?

00:28:55.250 - 00:29:15.060

I think, I mean, the—the apartment complex I lived in was a lot of younger people, so, we—we, young working people, so, you know, we mixed around a lot with them and, uh… I—I, we had quite a varied

00:29:15.820 - 00:29:33.450

community over there, so it was not limited to any one area—thing. Now back in those days there were just not that many Indians, uh, in

00:29:34.310 - 00:29:53.230

Houston. I don’t remember what the numbers were, but in the early s—at least, in the— in the, in the late 60s, early 70s, the Indian community was maybe made up of two professions, engineers and

00:29:53.230 - 00:30:08.490

doctors. There was not that wave of immigrants coming in like there is now, so, uh, mainly only engineers and— and doctors were coming over. Again, they would come here for studies, and most of us would just, after studies,

00:30:08.490 - 00:30:25.250

stay on and start working over here. So it was a very educated community, and relatively affluent because of the, of the professions they were working in. And then later on, you know, there was a lot of, bigger immigration

00:30:25.400 - 00:30:38.620

rush started coming in. So at that time, it was very limited. In fact, when I came to Houston, we only got one In—one Indian store where you could go and buy Indian stuff, you know, groceries and all

00:30:38.680 - 00:30:48.270

that. There just wasn’t a—there were no Indian restaurants, for example, nothing, you know, I mean. Now there are a whole bunch of them, but that time it was very limited, so.

00:30:49.620 - 00:31:04.370

Very different, Houston, from what it was now. So what stopped you from going back to India, either in Pittsburgh or here in Houston? That’s a good question because, I mean, that’s one of the things, you know, you—you... I guess once you

00:31:04.370 - 00:31:19.530

started working you get used to this—this kind of life over here, it becomes, you know, a lot more difficult to go back. And at that time in the 70s, India was still not doing well, you know, I mean, uh, economically, and uh,

00:31:20.200 - 00:31:37.270

jobs were limited, opportunities were limited, and uh... So that was probably the main reason why I stayed on over here, because, had a good job, I was doing well, you know, I mean, independent, and uh...

00:31:37.440 - 00:31:55.650

So that was really the reason why, I think looking back, I didn’t go back into—and—and, to, to India. Um so in what year did you meet your wife, and how did...?

00:31:55.650 - 00:32:11.710

We got married in ‘78, and uh… we—my wife is from India also, from Mumbai. We met over there, and uh we got married, and she came over with—in—in ‘78, and uh

00:32:12.130 - 00:32:25.690

so 36 years now. But, uh… she—as I said yeah, she’s from India and we met over there, and got married and came over. And I have one son.

00:32:25.690 - 00:32:37.590

And uh he lives in Dallas, he’s a lawyer, he’s working over there. Is she a Zoroastrian? Yes, she’s a Zoroastrian, yes.

00:32:38.270 - 00:32:54.910

Parsi. So did you guys move in Houston after you got married? Yes, we—uh, when—when I first got married, we were s—when we first came, when she first came, we were still at the apartment. And then later, a couple of years later, we bought a house, and we’ve—we’ve been

00:32:54.910 - 00:33:05.930

living in the house since then, so. Where is that? I’m out in, uh, West Houston, not—not out into Katy side, but, uh, near Kirkwood and Westheimer.

00:33:06.810 - 00:33:17.510

In the Kirkwood and Westheimer area. Do you like your neighborhood? Yes, I like my neighborhood very much, it’s, uh... When we moved out there it was just all being built, it

00:33:17.540 - 00:33:33.770

was all—literally, around us were all rice fields. Westheimer, from Gessner west, was literally a two lane highway. And uh one of the reasons we bought where we was because they had just started

00:33:33.890 - 00:33:43.700

building—expanding it in. ‘Cause if they—if they hadn’t, I wouldn’t have moved out over there. ‘Cause you can imagine the traffic jams on a two lane highway, one lane going this way and one lane going that way.

00:33:44.820 - 00:33:56.860

But uh they just started, uh, broadening Westheimer at that time, out to our place, so. That was one of the reasons why it was more attractive, because the commute would be a lot easier.

00:33:57.840 - 00:34:13.640

But it was all very—it was a brand new development building, and just coming up. Now it’s fully mature, and we really enjoy got everything around us over there, so, it’s really nice. It’s probably, what, 10-12 minutes from here

00:34:13.840 - 00:34:30.590

on the Beltway, it’s not far. What are some differences between the neighborhood you live in now and the neighborhood you lived in when you first moved to Houston? Probably not—I mean, uh, if you’re familiar with Houston, that whole area around

00:34:30.630 - 00:34:43.220

Fountainview and Westheimer is, you know, basically just all apartment complexes, you know. At least in that, they’re all heavily apartments, so. Then we moved into a subdivision where there are homes, so that was a difference, you

00:34:43.220 - 00:34:59.790

know, I mean, moving from an apartment complex to a home. And yeah, so that was a difference. How did your wife adjust to life in Houston? And did she have a job here?

00:35:01.590 - 00:35:17.360

Well, it was—it was probably a lot more difficult for her to adjust than for me, ‘cause I had already, I mean, I came as a student, and when you’re a student, you know, you’re a lot more flexible and easier. And for example, just—just to give you a com—couple—some of the difficulties she faced

00:35:17.360 - 00:35:32.690

when she first came here, uh, she didn’t know how to drive. And so, if I went to work, she was stuck at home all day, you know, until I could get her to start learning to drive and get her out of...

00:35:33.370 - 00:35:48.850

In the initial stage it was very difficult for her, but uh she, she adapted pretty well, I must say, she did a great job and uh made friends and adjusted very well to the life over here. Did she have a job here?

00:35:48.900 - 00:36:04.420

How did she find… Yeah initially—initially she was working, I’d say she worked right up to the time we had our child, and then she basically stopped working after that and, you know, to raise him. Uh, but initially, when we first, when

00:36:04.420 - 00:36:21.620

she first came over here she was working. And what type of job was she involved in? Uh, she—I—I was working at Pennzoil, excuse me, I was working at Pennzoil at that time and she also got a job over there, so it was very nice because we could commute to back

00:36:21.620 - 00:36:41.520

and forth together, so. In terms of raising your child, um, did you enforce Zoroastrianism in him? This is a… this is a really interesting question that you ask,

00:36:41.570 - 00:36:57.280

because… After my son was born, that was one of the issues that I was struggling with is, how do we raise him as a Parsi Zoroastrian in a foreign country where

00:36:57.310 - 00:37:11.260

he doesn’t have the influences that we had when we were growing up, you know, the family, uh, culture. I mean, I spent time with my grandmother, and my grandmother would, you know, do things, ceremonies, she’d take us

00:37:11.260 - 00:37:20.740

to the fire temple and all that sort of stuff. And none of those, that, if I can use the term, ‘religious infrastructure’ existed over here.

00:37:21.880 - 00:37:40.270

So, uh… One of the things that I basically… Until this time I basically did things as we were taught as kids, you know. I really hadn’t studied anything on my own to understand it.

00:37:40.850 - 00:37:56.130

So after my son was born I really took an interest in studying Zoroastrianism on my own, and uh, I started reading up and studying and building a library. I’ve got to—I’ve got to say, I probably got one of the best

00:37:58.390 - 00:38:09.910

private libraries on Zoroastrianism in, in the United States, I can say that. I’ve—I’ve got probably 7, 800 books or more. Probably about—most—more than—I’ve—

00:38:10.680 - 00:38:28.180

I’ve got probably as many as there are over here, so... I—so uh, took an interest in it, and of course, tried to, you know, teach my son all the stuff that’s you have to go through, and uh, so… How,

00:38:29.570 - 00:38:40.850

how well is ingrained in him, only he can tell. Um you mentioned some other religious practices that you practiced as a child. Can you, like, elaborate on

00:38:40.850 - 00:38:53.130

those, like going to the fire temple and all that stuff? Yeah, that’s—yeah I mean, you know like, when we’d go and spend time with my grandmother in the evening she’d take us over to the fire temple, and uh, you know, we’d— we’d—there’s certain religious ceremonies that are done.

00:38:54.590 - 00:39:08.350

And—uh—things that are done, like for example, uh certain ceremonies are done on auspicious days like your birthday, and these things, and uh, so, you have a little religious ceremony before, in the morning, you know, and uh, so.

00:39:08.670 - 00:39:21.790

We’d go through all those things but those were all done, practiced over there because we were in that environment, it’s very difficult to do so- We tried to do a few of those things for my son, my wife and I as he was growing up, we’d— you know, special

00:39:21.790 - 00:39:40.070

things for his birthday, and on those kind of occasions. But, uh, no—no—no major religious ceremonies, because it just was, again, i—in—in—in Zoroastrianism most of the formal ceremonies are conducted by priests, and it

00:39:40.070 - 00:39:54.360

would just not—Now we’ve got a whole bunch of priests over here who do ceremonies, they do ceremonies in the home and they’ll come to your home and perform ceremonies. But in that—when I first came over here we didn’t even know of that to be done, so, who could do it.

00:39:57.010 - 00:40:15.550

Um… did you obtain citizenship? Yes. ... here in the States? Yeah, uh, that’s interesting, because when I was in Pittsburgh as a student, as part of my— one of the, one of the, uh, assistantships required me to have—to be—it was to

00:40:15.590 - 00:40:28.210

be American citizen. And, uh, I told my s… professor said, ‘I can’t get citizenship,’ it—and I said, ‘First you gotta get a green card and then you gotta get, you have to wait five years to get a citizenship,’ and I

00:40:28.210 - 00:40:44.540

said, ‘That’s a lengthy process.’ So I said, ‘Can I get an exemption from that?’ So, they talked to whoever was in charge of it, and they said, ‘If you apply for your green card sort of showing that you’re on your route to citizenship they would accepted

00:40:44.540 - 00:40:55.640

that.’ So in—in 1970 I applied for my green card. Now you got to remember, that that was the time of the height of the Vietnam War, as I told you.

00:40:56.140 - 00:41:10.500

And if you got a green card, you had to register for the draft. So I—in those days, you could get your green card in about four or five months, it’s not like the three or four year wait now.

00:41:11.600 - 00:41:26.560

So I got my green card and I applied for, uh, I—I had to go and register for the draft. Fortunately, I didn’t get drafted, but, uh... So I got my green card in 1971, and, uh,

00:41:28.110 - 00:41:41.430

I didn’t apply for citizenship until 19, I got my citizenship in 1998. So for a long time I was just here on a green—I still had my Indian citizenship, but I was on a green card. But then

00:41:41.510 - 00:41:55.440

in 1998 I applied for citizenship. So now both my wife and I are both, uh, U.S. citizens. My son, of course, was born here, so he automatically got...

00:41:57.580 - 00:42:16.750

Do you feel like you identify more strongly as Indian or as American? …That’s… a difficult question to answer. Culturally, I’m Indian. Basic culture, I’m Indian, but, uh, in every

00:42:16.750 - 00:42:27.850

other sense I’m an American. I mean, this is my country, I hold my allegiance to this country. But uh, if—if you talk about from a cultural point of view—foods, you know…

00:42:28.890 - 00:42:48.100

uh, customs and all that, that’s still more Indian. But I think you would see that in most immigrant communities, especially first generation, like I am, you know, we tend to, to have stronger roots to the culture we come

00:42:48.160 - 00:43:07.360

from. Now, does my son have those same roots? I don’t think so, but uh, you know, I mean, I think he would 100% identify himself as an American. And… you’re okay with that? You know, I mean it’s, yeah, I’m okay with it, it’s him, I mean, it’s his life.

00:43:07.440 - 00:43:23.420

He’s born, brought up over here, he’s been raised over here, so this is his home, this is his culture, this is his life! So yeah, I don’t have any problems with that. Going back a little bit to when you talked about citizenship, is there anything that

00:43:23.420 - 00:43:39.020

sort of pushed you to finally, like, apply for the citizen? I’d started—I mean, I was travelling and doing that, and I really realized at that time that an Indian passport was becoming difficult, and uh. And then I just realized, I said if I’ve been here all these years now, by

00:43:39.020 - 00:43:53.030

that time I’d been here, you know, some... 20 some years, and I said, ‘If I’m gonna not decide to go back to India, I might as well get my U.S. citizenship.’ So those were all kinda factors in deciding to get my

00:43:53.030 - 00:44:07.520

citizenship. Were—were there any difficulties in obtaining the citizenship? No there were—weren’t. It was just a matter of going through the form—formalities, you know, you put in

00:44:07.520 - 00:44:18.540

your forms and you wait and then you get called up and you go for interview, and uh, you know, just going through that process. I can’t remember now, it took me probably about a year or 18 months at that time—from

00:44:18.540 - 00:44:32.160

the time I applied to the time I got my citizenship. Somewhere between a year and 18 months. Do you— Oh, go ahead. No I said, but—it—it was nothing—there—I didn’t have any problems, other than just the

00:44:32.160 - 00:44:45.360

wait. Do you still go back and visit India? Now more often, yes. In fact, I’m leaving next week to go to, back to Mumbai. So, I was— me—I had to

00:44:45.360 - 00:45:01.560

make sure that, you know, I could get this in before I went, this interview in before I left for Mumbai, yeah. Uh, now I’m kind of—when I left, I didn’t—I—you didn’t ask me and I didn’t tell you, uh, I left Pennzoil in 19—end

00:45:01.870 - 00:45:19.820

of 1998, and uh they gave me an earlier retirement package, and I started, decided to start consulting on my own, so I got my own private business, so. Now I’m at a stage when I can kind of, slowing down from...

00:45:20.240 - 00:45:34.910

not quite retired, but, I’m still working but I’m not working full-time. So I’ve got a lot more ability and freedom to do what I want, so it’s a good opportunity for me to be able to go back and forth. I still have a lot of relatives and

00:45:34.980 - 00:45:50.460

family in India, so, uh. I enjoy going back and spending time there. So I don’t— And it has definitely changed a lot—every time you visit? India has changed dramatically, I mean in 20 years, it’s

00:45:50.750 - 00:46:11.300

kind of really amazing changes in India. A lot for the better, some for the worse, uh. Uh but it’s very different from the India that I grew up in. Um… so, according to some of the notes that we have, um,

00:46:12.690 - 00:46:22.920

your uncle is an Indian army general? Was. He was. Could you tell us a little bit about- You’ve done some pretty good research on me already, what, did you Google me?

00:46:23.290 - 00:46:35.020

Aban told us, like, some— Oh, Aban told you? Okay, yeah. I thought you may have Googled me! I mean, that’s—that’s the in thing right, now, to Google people before you meet them,

00:46:35.130 - 00:46:49.880

to know a little bit more and surprise them with what you know. Uh, my father’s younger brother, uh, was the field marshal in India. Uh he was the general, the chief of army

00:46:49.880 - 00:47:08.560

staff at the time of the Bangladesh War, I don’t know if you all have familiar with that history or not, but uh, basically uh he led that whole campaign. And uh, after that he was promoted by the then-prime minister

00:47:08.560 - 00:47:19.340

Indira Gandhi to Field Marshal, which is the highest level of five-star general. So yeah, so. And has that… Great person, great person.

00:47:20.250 - 00:47:37.070

I mean, I know he’s my uncle, but he was—he’s really one fantastic person. And has that like, sort of influenced you in any way? In your views, or...? Well, I don’t—I mean, influenced, I mean, I guess again it’s part of the, growing up with a family, and I

00:47:37.140 - 00:47:51.660

think this is where it becomes to me, things become very important, are the family values, growing up within that environment of family. And I think, if I can say so, probably it’s a

00:47:51.800 - 00:48:09.490

lot more in the Asian community, you know, we—we—we tend to value family ties and uh cultures and be closer to the family, we don’t—we don’t want to do anything that will—anything that reflects negative, that we do negative

00:48:09.490 - 00:48:20.210

reflects negatively on the family. So, those are sort of— again, the cultural thing that we’ve all grown up with, and I’m sure you all have that same set of values and feel the same way.

00:48:20.790 - 00:48:36.470

So growing up in the family environment over there, you know, you just pick up all that stuff. Oh, did your uncle ever, like, tell you any stories about his war, um, experiences, or did you just sort of like, learn it, like, secondhand?

00:48:38.860 - 00:48:52.330

He did—he used—he used to tell us, can’t remember all of them, yeah. But, uh, uh, he was a, I can’t remember if he was a captain or a major during the first—during the second World War, and he was in Burma, and he got wounded very s—He got, he got,

00:48:53.580 - 00:49:09.260

uh, a Japanese sniper shot him, got nine bullets in his stomach. And he survived. I mean, it was a real miracle. And uh, but he would tell us about some of those incidents and, uh,

00:49:10.000 - 00:49:24.890

what, you know, his… other escapades, can’t remember any of that. But yeah, he—he, as I said, I think the, one of the characteristics about him was his personality.

00:49:26.030 - 00:49:43.370

He could walk into a room, and I’ve seen this happen, and like, in a minute everyone would be around him, you know, he just had a magnetic personality to. And he was, he always made other people feel at ease, that was his, I think that

00:49:43.370 - 00:50:04.530

was part of his character—that he could make anyone in a room feel at ease. Um, coming back to Houston, so how did you get involved with the Zoroastrian community and this association? Okay…When I first came to Houston

00:50:05.110 - 00:50:24.770

in ‘60, in ‘76 as a student, I mean, as a, to work by myself when I was still single, I really didn’t know any other, uh, Zoroastrian Parsis over here in Houston, and, uh, it was—After we got married, when my wife came down in ‘78, then we were given introductions

00:50:24.770 - 00:50:37.780

to, ‘Oh there’s a family over here, you need to call them,’ and then we sort of called them up and started mixing. And at that time I don’t think there were more than about probably, ‘78, probably about 30

00:50:37.780 - 00:50:53.810

or 40 uh Zoroastrians in Houston. And, uh, we would started getting together, we’d meet like once a year, at New Year’s time, and we’d meet at some hall and just celebrate New Year’s together, all of us.

00:50:54.460 - 00:51:15.050

But it slowly started, this community started building and expanding, and we started meeting more people. And, uh… after my son was born, and he was growing up, we—one of the people over here

00:51:15.400 - 00:51:28.830

started having Sunday— teaching Sunday School for the kids. And we would run it— we do it, uh, an individual’s home, Hoshang and Arnava Sethna, I don’t know if you’ve talked to them or heard— You

00:51:28.830 - 00:51:46.100

haven’t talked about—Okay. This—we used to do it at their home, and maybe about, on Sunday about 30 or 40 people would gather with maybe about 10 or 12 kids. And it was one-room school—schoolhouse, we would have.

00:51:46.570 - 00:52:03.620

The little kids would be sitting, and the older kids, and the adults. So—and we’d sit around and talk and just, and, uh, we’d just have, we’d have a Sunday school where we teach to the kids and the adults would sit around and talk. And during one of those conversations it came up that now we’re

00:52:03.620 - 00:52:14.240

getting to a critical mass that we can’t meet in someone’s house, it’s just too large. We needed to have some formal place. And then the whole— that

00:52:14.240 - 00:52:33.860

was the time and the whole idea developed of getting a center came up. We started talking. And a few families, uh, pitch in. They did have a formal Zoroastrian Association of Houston as a non-profit already

00:52:34.260 - 00:52:48.970

registered at that time, when I came, but we didn’t have any property, so we were starting to talk about that. And just about that time, uh… I

00:52:48.970 - 00:53:02.270

was elected to the executive committee of the Zoroastrian Association of Houston. So it was during our—my time on the community that we formally started developing the idea, building this thing.

00:53:02.620 - 00:53:19.870

It hadn’t started but the—we were, we were concretizing the idea, and getting things organized to build up the center. It wasn’t until much later, because, okay, so we needed funds, that was the main thing, so it wasn’t until much later that the center was built, after I had left all the

00:53:20.000 - 00:53:33.180

committee, but. This was an evolution, you know, just as I said, from literally just a few families meeting once a year, to now we have this center. I—you can probably see the little kids sitting over there , in the, you

00:53:33.180 - 00:53:48.030

know, in the Sunday school learning, so. It’s really become a—it’s, and now I think about, I think about the total number is about 600 or so Zoroastrians in Houston, so it’s built up. It’s changed rapidly.

00:53:48.420 - 00:53:56.850

In fact, I don’t—I don’t know half the people here now. When I first came I knew everyone. Now I see so many new families and so many young kids that I don’t even know who they

00:54:02.110 - 00:54:18.230

are. Um, so what would you consider to be your greatest accomplishment in life so far? …I’d probably say raising a family, raising my son. I think that’s what I’m most proud of.

00:54:18.710 - 00:54:30.790

He’s a great kid, I’m very, very proud of him. Uh, I mean, I think if there’s a single mo—accomplishment that I have to say, great tried to the top. That would be it.

00:54:31.880 - 00:54:49.490

Uh, if—I think I’ve had a good career, I’ve earned my job, I—I worked for Pennzoil, I got to be the Corporate Director of Environmental Safety and Health, I had a good tenure over there, and then took off and, uh, started my own business and

00:54:50.200 - 00:55:06.960

I’ve been reasonably successful in that. So I mean—I think I’ve had a fairly accomplished life, which I can be proud of. Um, if you can tell your son one thing that’s really important about your immigrant life and your

00:55:07.060 - 00:55:28.170

immigrant experience to the States, what would it be? I think the adaptability, the ability to adapt to different cultures and different situations, and uh, being flexible, and uh, you know, just having

00:55:28.170 - 00:55:44.190

an open mind, you know. Accept everything, you know, don’t—don’t be prejudiced, try not to be, you know, see the negative things, see the positive things. And uh, I—I think those are all things that I tried to accomplish while I was coming in over here.

00:55:44.260 - 00:55:54.850

I mean, I know—I know a lot of Indians who’ve come back, who’ve come here, lived here a year or so, and gone back to India completely disenchanted, you know.

00:55:55.580 - 00:56:12.540

Uh and I think probably the reason for that is because they were so close-minded, they weren’t willing to accept the different styles over here, the different cultures, the ability. So to immigrate you have to be basically open-minded and accepting.

00:56:17.370 - 00:56:34.990

Okay, um… do you have any additional things that you want to share with the archive? Anything that we haven’t asked but you want to share with the public? I just say that, uh, like to say that I think the diversity of Houston

00:56:35.520 - 00:56:48.990

is what makes it so great. I think all of us who have come here from different cultures have added to this city. I mean, I drive down Bellaire and I

00:56:48.990 - 00:57:06.760

see the, you know, Vietnamese and Chinese and that culture. I go down to Hillcroft and I see the Indian culture. Uh, you know, and go out further north and see the Korean culture. And you know, that’s all part of the wonder of

00:57:06.930 - 00:57:24.410

Houston, is that it has been very accepting of all the immigrant communities. And I think, to me, that’s what really added to this wonderful place, so, uh. As I said, when I came here it was probably not as diverse.

00:57:25.580 - 00:57:40.030

It—I—it was not—it was—definitely was not as diverse as it is now, and, uh, it was—But it—it’s always been a hospitable and accepting city. But now with this wide diversity it’s become much more open.

00:57:40.030 - 00:58:00.120

And I think, I think the greatest beneficiaries are people of your generation rather than my—we had a little bit of a difficult time, but you—I think when you go around you see much more acceptance, and it’s not unusual to see, go into a restaurant and see, just

00:58:00.790 - 00:58:12.850

wide variety of people from different cultures and backgrounds. And it’s just accepted now. You know, no one looks at you like, ‘Oh, who’s that funny-looking guy over there?’ or something. But when I came here, that—it was,

00:58:14.990 - 00:58:28.630

uh, very different when I lived in—when I was in Pittsburgh and I was working, I remember I was working up in a small town in uh north central Pennsylvania, and, uh, I was based

00:58:28.630 - 00:58:43.790

over there, I mean, s—for, I’d go there for a whole week so I was living in a little hotel. And by myselfs in the evening I would walk down, just walk down to the marketplace and you know, you could see people looking over there, who’s that funny looking guy over there.

00:58:44.640 - 00:58:58.920

Uh, uh, especially in a small town, you know, when you have a foreigner, but now you walk around, no one cares who you are, from what background you are, or whatever. You have any other ...? Uh—yeah, I think that’s it.

00:58:58.920 - 00:59:08.580

Yeah, alright, thank you so much for… Thank you so much! Yeah. Thank you so much, I enjoyed, um, talking with both of you. And if you have any follow-up—Now, you got my email. Mm-hmm.

00:59:09.060 - 00:59:19.140

Please e-mail me because after the 1st of July I won’t be available. Okay. Now, what is the next process, what is the process, what’s going to happen now? You gonna transcribe this? Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm, yeah. It’s gonna go up…

00:59:19.830 - 00:59:27.950

Do I get a chance to edit it or look at it or what? Um, yeah we can send it to you after… Yeah, we can send it, the copy… You can...