Exiles returning home

I just had a chance to read Anand Giridharadas’s article “India Calling” from the NYTimes last week and thought it was a beautiful description of the so-called “brain circulation” phenomenon – the children of Indian immigrants to the US returning to India for work in all kinds of careers – human resources, technology, fashion, etc. Some of his descriptions of the ensuing culture confusion were hilarious.

c/o New York Times

More importantly for our purposes, I thought the article highlighted the fact that even asking the questions that we’re asking about giving “here or there” may become irrelevant soon as the South Asian American community becomes increasingly mobile and increasingly global. Perhaps, as several of my friends have done, we’ll be spending a few years in South Asia, then a few years here, maybe to go back and forth often for business trips, maybe half the year there in retirement like my parents do… Where will we be called to be civically engaged? Where will we call “home”? Where will philanthropy matter the most?