This is my first post, so I’m just going to get right into it.  This is just something that I spent some time thinking about last night. Most people know these terms but I’ll just spell it out anyways.  An abcd refers to Indians that are born in American and have the confused notion that they are actually Indian, thus the term American-born confused Desi.  In contrast, there is the fob, which means fresh off the boat and refers to Indians that were born in India and later came to America.  I’m speaking generally when I say that these two groups don’t get along.  In my opinion the relationship is somewhat of a recognition of the other group but ignoring.  I suck at writing by the way, so I’m bad at trying to put into words what I’m thinking haha.  Just ask if you need any clarification.  Basically, the abcds believe that they are indeed Indian and that they have culture.  But they also like the fact that they have adapted into the American culture as well.  It is kind of a balancing act for them where they try to figure out where they belong and thus the whole confused part.  Fobs on the other hand know the language and customs very well as they have been in India for most of their lives.  They are sometimes ridiculed for their accent and other such things. This is one aspect of what I was thinking about.  Just the fact that there exist two different groups that seem to inherently not get along with each other.  The other thing that I have been thinking about related to this is the fact that there are so many different “types” of Indians.  This issue never really came up until I came to college.  Until then, anyone I met I would just tell them I am from India.  I thought that was all I needed to say.  In college people would ask where from? India.  Where in India? Hyderabad.  Oh where is that? Its in South India.  Ohh, I’m from West India.  Just like that, it seemed everyone I was meeting created this distinction.  I always used to think that India was One.  Then it got split into so many different types, and each one was more proud of their own area.  I mean I definitely liked the fact that everyone had such pride for their culture.  I guess I just had a different idea of what being an Indian was.  I never really thought, North, East, West, South like that.  I thought anywhere I go, its the same.  Maybe its my naivety.  I’m not saying that I think there is something wrong with the way it is or the way people think about it.  I just want to offer my perspective on this, shed a new light on it.  I know I didn’t go into a lot of detail in explaining this but I think I got the jist of it.  Now, to me, what being an Indian has meant one thing all along. I never thought of it as knowing the language or the festivals and movies and music and such.  I mean growing up in India you learn so much about the way of life there and its obviously different than growing up in America.  The cartoons are different. The movies.  The food.  Quite a lot that seem different.  I’ve always thought about the Unity in Diversity, but that’s a whole topic in itself.  Growing up, the one thing that I always believed made me Indian was the truth that in India we treat the Guest as God.  This is what I’ve always felt of India.  Every Indian knows that whenever a guest comes to our house we go out of our way to make them feel at home.  We treat them with the highest respect.  I have never gone into the home of an Indian and left without at least being offered water.  Its a kind of tradition we have.  I love it.  Since then, throughout my life I have expanded on that and learned more about it.  I am grateful to have learned this from my country.  But I no longer think that it is the trait of an Indian; it is the trait of every human.  And now I don’t just think about a guest in the home.  My home has become the whole world and guests are all those I meet.  I found a quote once that went along these lines. “I expect to pass through this life but once. If, therefore, there can be any kindness I can show, or any good thing that I can do to my fellow being, let me do it now, as I shall not pass this way again.” -William Penn.  I hope to inspire people to not be afraid to be selfless and to treat all those you meet in life with lots of love.  We are all the same, no matter how many differences we have.  I’ll end with one more quote from my spiritual teacher. “There is only one religion, the religion of Love; There is only one language, the language of the Heart; There is only one caste, the caste of Humanity.”