COMMUNITY

I have been blessed throughout my life (and especially my adult life) with amazing communities of friends regardless of where I was living at the time.  Though the number of my friends over the years has never been huge (despite what Facebook says), this is in contradistinction to my endearment towards these folks.  Whether it was college in Austin, med school in Houston, residency in Dallas, or fellowship in Baltimore, I have always had a cadre of friends who got me through tough times and helped me to see the joy and beauty in life.  Indeed, the strength of these communities of friends seems to have been inversely related to the 'coolness of the city' in which I was living.  For these people, I am grateful.  You know who you are!

The hardest thing about getting one's first job in medicine/science is that the sense of being in the trenches, which is something which greatly facilitates fellowship/fraternity, disappears. One is no longer 'in training,' and, for me, my most recent move to Portland has meant less friends nearby and less intense friendships with those whom I know locally.  While Portland is an amazing community in which to live (liberal, progressive, eco-conscious, tolerant, amazing outdoors, >84% voted for Obama, etc), I lack a community of close friends here.  I hope that changes over time because life is too short to not be with those whom ones loves (family excluded).  

All of this reminds me how thankful I am for the people who remain my friends from over the years wherever they might be (NYC, Cambridge, Chicago, Wilmington, Palo Alto, Baltimore, SF, Houston, Boston, Austin,...) and whose friendship still keeps me going...

HE'S GOT RHYTHM

We are still not sure from whom he got his moves and rhythm, but Nicholas has it!  The video speaks for itself.

SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE

Tonight I went to see "Slumdog Millionaire" with my friend Brooks at a free sneak preview, and it did not disappoint.  This is a story set in the "Maximum City," as they call Mumbai, and other parts of India.  It is a story of survival, and it is a story of sadness.  In all the talk of "Indian Silicon Valley" and "the new India," it is easy to forget the misery in which millions of Indians live every day.  When you have a country that populous, it is also easy to lose one's sense of humanity and one's sense of the value of human life.  This movie tells the story of those whose worth has been forgotten by all but themselves.

I realize I have had a lot of "ethinic" or India-related posts in the short history of this blog.  I am not someone who wears his ethnicity on his sleeve.  Hell, I do not know my way around a menu in an Indian restaurant and certainly have forgotten the language, but I have been shaped by this place, from which I come, and my race has made me who I am in more ways than I know.  Growing up, I was always one of the few Indian kids in my class.  In my Catholic elementary school in Canada, I was the only Indian kid in my school, and I experienced open prejudice growing up in that small town (will save you the sob stories).  With the exception of 6th and 8th grades, I was the only Indian kid in my middle schools.  In high school, there were 1 or 2 other Indian kids.  It was hard not to feel foreign.

It was not until medical school, when I made some amazing friends who also happend to be Indian/Pakistani, that I realized that I was not alone (in more ways than one).  These were people who had had similar experiences as me and with whom little explanation was needed.  To this day, they are some of my best friends (Amit, Asim).  I dated a few Indian women during med school as well, which was also an experience in shared experience.  These connections and this unspoken understanding were about more than race, but race certainly shaped these people as it shaped me... for the better.  I think empathy, which is really at the heart of Jhumpa Lahiri's prose (see last post), is what binds us and what draws people of all colors to her work and to other human beings.

It is nice to have those moments in life, which remind us of what we are made, who we are, and how we are all connected.  For me tonight, Slumdog Millionaire was that kind of ride.

BEST BOOK OF 2008

Many of you, I am sure, have heard of and read Jhumpa Lahiri.  She won a Pulitzer for her first book "The Interpreter of Maladies," and her second book "The Namesake" was a hit and a movie by Mira Nair.  She released her third book this year, "Unaccustomed Earth," which is my pick for the best book of 2008.  Why?

There is no other writer today, who can capture the extraordinary moments in such "ordinary" lives.  While her writing and stories appeal to the Indian immigrant in me (ABCD- inside joke), her work is about much more than race and ritual.  It is about what it means to feel in this numbing society, in which we find ourselves.  Who would have thought that tales of Bengali housewives or first generation Indian kids experiencing their first crushes would make for such great reading?  Ms. Lahiri did, that is who.  

If you have not picked up "Unaccustomed Earth," I highly recommend you do so.  If you wait a few months, you can buy an edition which says "Winner of the 2009 Pulitzer Prize."  You heard it here first!

THE MEANING OF MUMBAI

It has been almost 30 years since I was in Mumbai.  We knew it as Bombay back then and until recently when it went back to its former name, Mumbai.  This week, it was struck by a wave of terrorism which seems exceptional in a country famous for religious hatred and violence.  While there have been such acts in the developed world (US, UK, and Spain) or the underdeveloped world (Indonesia, Africa), this is the first large-scale, orchestrated terrorist attack on a member of the developing world, which is so clearly on a trajectory to join the club of developed, industrialized, Westernized societies.  These attacks are a rebuke of that movement, of that progress.  What the attackers did not realize, however, is that even something of the scale of 9/11 would not deter that march forward of Indian society.  

The polygot culture of Mumbai is about far more than one's religion, one's station of birth, or one's family name; it transcends all of those factors and is about opportunity and the desire to expand one's sights and fortunes.  A very thoughtful and inspiring column in today's NY Times captures Mumbai well.  It is entitled, "What They Hate About Mumbai." The author, Suketu Mehta, a professor of journalism at NYU who has written a book entitled Maximum City: Bombay Lost and Found, compares Mumbai to a songbird.  People come to this city, he writes, because they long for the sounds of this bird (opportunity and fortune), and they are willing to toil for it and strive for it because they imagine how sweet it will be when they, themselves, finally get to hear it.  Their aspirations for a better life for themselves and their children are no different from the dock worker in the Baltic, the farmer in South Africa, or the first generation Indian-American doctor in Portland.  Hope will win out over fear, and the songbird still sings.  

GIVING THANKS

There is a lot to be thankful for this year: President-elect Obama, a Democratic Congress, family, and  friends.  However, in my day job as an oncologist, I am reminded how fragile our health is and our lives are.  

One of my long-time patients with metastatic prostate cancer, Mr. L, was admitted this week with DIC, disseminated intravascular coagulation- essentially a case of blood not clotting properly.  He had had a tooth pulled, and it would not stop bleeding.  Imagine something as simple as seeing a dentist turning into a nightmare.  His cancer was the cause of his abnormal bleeding, which finally had stopped with aggressive measures such as transfusions.  Ultimately, treating the cancer was the only way to keep this problem from recurring.  Unfortunately, he did not have any good treatment options for the cancer left.  Thus, we had the 'hospice talk.'  Generally during this discussion, I tell patients that we have reached a point where we cannot make the cancer go away, so we want to try and make the symptoms go away with supportive measures (pain meds, anti-nausea meds, etc).  I also remind them that my role in their care will remain "unchanged";  I will just have help from the hospice nurses, who are my "eyes, ears, and hands" in their home, and the patients will not be "troubled" with clinic or hospital visits anymore.  

He was a tough old bird, and as we clasped hands, he said he understood, but he just wanted to be around as long as he could as he gestured to a picture of his new grand daughter.  As a new parent, I understand that desire.  I also understand, on  a daily basis, how lucky I am to be in my shoes rather than Mr. L's.

THE GREAT SCHLEP

In the few posts I have written so far, I have already mentioned my reverence for Tim Russert (God rest his soul!).  Only one person was more instrumental in making me a 'fan' of politics, and that is my dad.  He came here some 50 years ago, much like Barack's father, for educational opportunities, which he could not get back home, and he told me many times about how he shook JFK's hand during a campaign visit to Madison, WI in 1960 when he was a grad student there.  After 2 graduate degrees, he returned home and married my mom.  They settled in Canada because it was easier to immigrate to there than to the U.S.  

Growing up, I was always amazed by how dad knew all the senators and which states they represented (He has been a Biden fan for about 25 years Dave) even while we were living in Canada.  When we immigrated to the U.S. in 1984, my love for politics was born.  I remember watching the 1984 convention with him on TV;  it was like the Super Bowl in our house.   I was the only kid in my suburban Oklahoma City 6th grade class to vote for Mondale over Reagan in our mock election, and this was dad's influence defeating peer pressure.  

My dad and I became estranged after a bitter divorce with my mom in 2005.  I was upset over how things transpired, and we had not spoken for three years.  However, in June after Tim Russert died and I watched the hours of tribute programming highlighting his love of politics and his father, I called my dad.  It was a brief and tense call, but it was the start of us re-connecting. (You cannot make this stuff up people- see also below).

I was inspired to find out today that dad recently become a US citizen and voted in his first presidential election this month (He had not become a US citizen earlier because he thought it was ridiculous that he would have to renounce his Canadian and Indian citizenships).  He had been a big Clinton supporter in the primaries, but when he saw videos and pictures (passed on to him by my sister) of Nicholas talking about 'B'rock Obama,' he said he realized what Obama represented for the next generations, mine and Nicholas' and how this was my 1960.  Sarah Silverman talked about 'the Great Schlep.'  I guess this is my version ... Kerala-style.

LETDOWN?

I am not sure if I am alone here, but is anyone feeling as though the Obama administration has turned into business as usual (read 1992)? The campaign that was supposed to be about change looks more and more like the politics of the past. While I am a practical person, I do value justice. To that end, why is Lieberman still in the Democratic caucus with a committee chairmanship? I could understand waiting until the votes were back from AK, MN, and GA before making a decision, but to let him off like this seems rather ... political. The other thing I find unsettling is the fact that Hillary Clinton is poised to be our next Secretary of State. I did not work as hard as I did to defeat the Clintons in the primary after their disgraceful campaign only to see her (and by default Bill) elevated to such heights despite NO foreign policy experience. This reeks of Mike Brown and FEMA to me.

I have always been a very teleological person, but the journey to this victory seems a lot sweeter than the actual victory and its aftermath right now. Perhaps my expectations were too high, or perhaps it is too early. The next few months will tell the tale, but the likes of Rahm Emanuel, Hillary Clinton, et al leave me wanting.

COVER ART

The New Yorker had a pretty inflammatory cover with Obama in a turban and Michelle with a huge Afro holding a machine gun this year, which prompted a letter from me. In it I wrote, "If we cannot look to the New Yorker for a biased, pro-liberal, pro-Democrat message, where can we look?"

They have redeemed themselves with this cover and the contents of the Nov 17 issue. Some amazing analysis on Campaign '08 and what lies ahead.

There were many times I thought about canceling my subscription- articles too long, I do not live in New York, no time to read during internship, residency, and fellowship, but I always thought doing so would be "selling out" or giving up on the right-brain part of me. This week, I was reminded why I kept my subscription. This is best issue I have ever read from them. Old Abe would be proud!

NICHOLAS '40

On my way to work today after dropping off my son Nicholas, who is three, at daycare, I was thinking about how far this country has come.  Last week, a 1/2 black man with the name Barack Hussein Obama, about as radioactive a name as one could imagine in this day and age, was elected the 44th President of the United States.  His candidacy throughout the primaries and general election was inspirational to many of us, but I felt a special thrill.  Here was a truly self-made man, who made the most of every opportunity, who put education and hard work first, and who despite being a "skinny kid with a funny name" thought that "America had a place for him, too."  

I have not always felt as though anything was possible or that America had a place for me, but when I look at my son, who also happens to be biracial and smart as a whip, I see no external obstacles to his success.  I see no walls, which he will not be able to scale if he puts his mind to it.  I no longer think it is possible to dream too big.  If Nicholas chooses to run for the highest office in the land in 2040 when he turns 35, I know that his background will not stand in his way.  The Republicans would be another matter though!  Never before have I appreciated the favorite saying of my hero Tim Russert as much as I do today: "What a country!"

ON THE GROUND

One of the most amazing aspects of Campaign '08 was reaching out to Americans and making them aware of what Barack stands for.  I had never been involved in a campaign until this year, although I had given money, so this was quite a departure.   My friend Brooks and I canvassed in NE Portland, the most racially diverse part of the city and state and a neighborhood in transition. This was in September when Oregon was still in single digits.  

I knocked on a door, and an elderly African-American man answered.  He said he planned to vote for Obama.  There were a few small kids in the living room watching cartoons.  The man said he had a few questions for us, and he asked us to step outside.  First, he wanted to know whether felons were banned from voting.  While we were uncertain, we told him it would be no problem (every vote counts!).  Next, in the most serious tone one could imagine, he asked me if I thought that whites in Portland would riot if Obama won.  Mind you, Portland is one of the whitest but also most liberal cities in the country.  I jokingly told him that whites and folks like me in liberal Portland (and across many parts of the country) would riot if Obama lost!  He smiled and with that we registered him to vote.