Chit Chaat & Chai podcast is hosted by three Indian American women, Mala, RC and Ritu. This passion project of theirs brings awareness of many issues facing women and men in the South Asian community. 

Episode 38 features a discussion with Rahul and me, about our journey in a multicultural home, culminating with the publication of Mixed Desis: Stories of Multiracial South Asians. 

Following is a partial transcript of our conversation. The entire podcast can be listened to by clicking on the link at the end of the transcript. 

“But for today, we're going to actually be talking to Rahul Yates and Punita Khanna. Punita Khanna is the mother of this young man, Rahul Yates. They've both written a book called Mixed Desis.

And it's going to be basically about multiracial South Asian couples that are, you know, we're seeing increasingly more and more of couples being from different backgrounds getting married. RC has a son-in-law who is Caucasian Catholic young man. So we'll share a little bit of that.

Welcome Punita and Rahul to our podcast, Chit Chaat & Chai. Punita, tell us a little bit about yourself.

Well, my background is Asian Indian, and I'm married to my husband, John, who's white. And, my parents immigrated to the US. My dad came in 1965, and then my mom came with three of us kids at that time in 1966.

I've grown up in Chicago the entire time until I moved away to Los Angeles. We were one of the first generations of families that immigrated here.

How did you meet John?
John was the Gods or the Universe's 40th birthday gift to me. I was not married in my early twenties or all the way until I was past 40. I met John on my 40th birthday in October of 2001.
And you've been married how many years now?
We will have been married 22 years.

And we'll introduce Rahul at this point. Rahul is your son. And Rahul, tell us a little bit about what you do.

Hi everyone. I'm happy to be here. I'm Rahul.
I was born and raised in LA. Punita is my mom. So I'm Indian on my mom's side and white on my dad's side.
 

And I just finished my first year at Harvard. I'm studying economics and South Asian studies. 

I've been very involved in the multiracial community over the past few years.
It was something that was a very big part of my life and extracurriculars in high school. So I've talked a lot about my multiracial identity and now I'm excited to be here sharing with my mom and share our dual perspectives on this same issue.

You all wrote a book together, which is amazing. What is it called, Ritu? I know you have the book.

I do. It's called Mixed Desis: Stories of Multiracial South Asians. I started it.
I haven't finished it, but I'm excited to get through more. 

Punita, what was some of the struggles maybe that you faced when you got married? Did you face any racism from either side?

I was very lucky. I did not face any struggles. My family was just very happy that I was finally getting married.

My life was a different trajectory than anyone else's that I know that's around my age. I grew up in the US. I faced the push to get married at a young age, like most other Indian girls in my community back in the, I think mid to late 70s. 

There was such a small community of immigrants here that had come in the mid to late 1960s.
At that time, our parents were looking for husbands back in India, because there really weren't any Indians that grew up here anywhere, North Indians or Punjabis. And what happened in my case was that four or five of my girlfriends were immediately married off. The high commodity at that time were Indian doctors. Our parents went to India, found the Punjabi Hindu Khatri physician and married the girls off.

When the girls would be about 18 to 20 years, because some of the thinking was, well, they can finish college after they get married. Oh, we found a good boy. But unfortunately, what happened was one after the other, the men came, settled in the States and divorced the girls.

And this was, you might remember at that time, green card marriages. And it was such a shock to our small community that it alarmed my dad. And then, so when it was time for me to start college, he actually let me live in the dorms and complete college.

“Though, you know, this was back in 1979. We'd already had up to about half dozen girls in the community that were divorced. I was the first girl from our community that was allowed to leave home, live in college, finish my education.

Between the ages of 20 and then 40, those 20 years, I had the ability to grow independently. I just remember like one meeting, some Indian guy that was a graduate student here, and I thought, I have nothing in common with him. And so, I just picked myself up and ran away from Chicago and moved myself to Los Angeles.

And then, you know, and then on my own, I completed two graduate degrees, got jobs, moved apartments, bought my condo. I really benefited from being outside the community. 

The Indians that came in the 70s or 80s, I feel that those families were very different.
And so they grew as India grew and changed, but our parents had not. For example, you know, when it was time, my brother was just slightly younger than me, time to get married, he did the typical thing, but go back, he met a few girls, selected my sister-in-law, brought her back here. And that was common.

When I moved to Los Angeles, I lived my life outside of that.

So you met John, and then I'm sure you must have dated for some time. Did you discuss, you know, the different family backgrounds and religions? I'm sure you must have talked about that because there was a lot of differences.

Well, you know, I was 40, but I had come to the resignation that I may never get married or have kids. And when we started going out, that even if I was thinking about going out with him, that if things progressed, I wanted to have kids. And he was fine with that.

Religion wasn't an issue for us because I didn't grow up immersed in the Hindu religion. I would say we're culturally Hindu. Again, when I was younger, there weren't any temples.
There wasn't a community. We didn't have much exposure to the religion. We celebrated Diwali and mom observed Kurva Chauth.

And, in our case, John doesn't practice any religion. His brother had converted to Catholicism, so there was a segment of the family that are very strict Catholics. And Rahul has some sister Catholic cousin nuns.”

Click link to hear the podcast, https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/chit-chaat-chai/id1630216562?i=1000656962257