Diwali, debate drama, and maybe dhamaka

Welcome to Export Quality, your home for news by and about South Asian Americans and Canadians - with a little spice

🎆🎆🎆Happy Diwali!

I really did not think I would ever see Diwali make it to one of the greatest American treasures — and practically the only U.S. export that hasn’t been harmful - Sesame Street, but here we are. I know there are a growing number of children’s books, Mira the Royal Detective, and Diwali parties of all manner for adults but this is Sesame Street!

It’s how so many of us learned English, among other things. And now we’ve come full circle to see these super cute kids.

It’s hard to find positivity these days, so I’m hanging on to this. And you know cookie monster loves parle-g. 🎆🎆🎆

Over on EQ’s new Instagram account - which you should follow - I noticed so many news outlets covering Diwali all over North America (Canada, you’re better about a lot things and inclusivity is one of them). There may only be about five million South Asians in the U.S. but our impact is certainly outsized.

Along with this cultural visibility, we’re seeing a growing force in politics as well. I’m not just talking about Kamala Harris or the infamous desis in the Trump administration, but about state and local politics where a connection to community is crucial. (And again, Canada you likely have us beat on representation in your Cabinet-level positions and provincial politics! I would love to hear more from my readers up north on this though.)

And, I don’t think there is a higher profile local election in the country, and maybe the world, than the New York Mayoral.

For those of you who were able to watch and even participate in my live chat last night here on Substack, thank you! Let’s keep it going in the comments.

If every election in NYC is full of characters and drama, this one is a supercharged DDLJ level of drama, a Bollywood blockbuster.

We are lucky to have a desi trying to get into Gracie this year as I revive and build this newsletter and our community here! Regardless of your preference, Zohran Mamdani is taking an important step for us diaspora kids - especially those outside of the Hindu, Indian majority.

Like Harris’ run for president, Mamdani represents something much bigger than himself. South Asian New Yorkers have been making the city run for decades, and most are or have been lower income and ignored, particularly the Bangladeshi community. There are some upcoming stories on this that are fascinating and lovely, so watch

Jennifer Chowdhury

’s Port of Entry for that and read this piece in the meantime on the rise of the South Asian community in local politics here in our little town.

The emotional aspect of this race extends beyond just our community and seeing ourselves, our children, our history, struggles, and future in Mamdani - a weight he seems to be handling well.

I’ll spare you a blow-by-blow account of the debate since we did that in the live chat, but you can watch the whole thing here thanks to NY1:

Outside of the LaGuardia Center for Performing Arts in Long Island City last night a crowd of people were chanting “USA!USA!USA!” NYC isn’t like the rest of America, but it’s deeply American in ways people forget - until election season. These patriotic voters were supporters of former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo and I couldn’t help but think it was veiled dig aimed at surprise political darling and former Assemblymember Mamdani.

Why? Because for those supporters it seems like it’s somehow un-American to vote for the brown, Muslim, “kid,” as Cuomo called him during the debate. None of them would say that to my face when I talked to them just beyond the police barricade, so this is only my between-the-lines observation. However, coupled with following the political action committee (PAC) mailers drama and social media rhetoric these groups have paid for and promoted that included a fair bit of fear mongering and almost all the -isms, I’m thinking I may not be so far off.

I was lucky to be able to sit among regular people during the final debate of the campaign season thanks to the CUNY Journalism School, where I do some of my work these days supporting community and ethnic media. But, not sweating it out over a laptop in a backroom with other reporters for the first time in recent memory also meant an unvarnished look at the audience - good and bad.

While waiting for the debate to start, a woman from Manhattan in her 60s, struck up a conversation. “Hopefully he’ll come back to himself tonight,” she told me about Cuomo.

She didn’t feel Cuomo was aggressive or went on the offensive enough during the last few debates and was hoping he would do that tonight.

She also went after Sliwa, which I found curious considering the red beret’d founder of citizen-led crime watch group Guardian Angel is not actually the real competition.

And then we got to Mamdani bhai. She said his name incorrectly and, given the context, I didn’t correct her. [My friends and family will tell you I have the world’s worst poker face, but I seem to be able to keep it together when I’m out reporting. One of my biggest pet peeves is mispronouncing names as a means of dismissal, as you can imagine]. She said she thinks “it’s disgusting” what Mamdani said regarding Israel, adding with a catch in her throat: “I’m Jewish and I would like to live. And there’s only one way to interpret what he’s said.”

She also told me she doesn’t like journalists’ coverage of Cuomo after finding out where I work, but remained otherwise friendly. However, I cannot say the same for all of the Cuomo supporters in attendance.

It was reflective of the animosity, fear, xenophobia, racism, Islamophobia, and general desperation New Yorkers are experiencing right now. And, I can say for myself I felt a lot of that in the room while I listened the under-the-breath mutterings from Cuomo supporters around me anytime Mamdani spoke and especially when they confronted the Mamdani supporters in the row in front of us during the debate multiple times to ‘fact check’ them on a variety of issues. It was a familiar feeling of antagonism and reflective of the election writ large.

Of course, there was a fair share of comments from the gallery of Mamdani and Sliwa supporters when Cuomo spoke, too, particularly when he failed to directly address the allegations of sexual assault brought by more than a dozen women when he was still in office.

Cuomo’s campaign has thus far been an exercise in his public rehabilitation. He said he left office to ‘make it easier’ on New Yorkers. However, Sliwa had one of the best lines of the night in my opinion: “Andrew, you didn’t leave office, you fled.”

I have done my fair share of Sliwa-teasing in the past, but as this campaign has progressed and particularly at the debate: no one can say that man doesn’t care about low income New Yorkers. He does so unwaveringly and with a passion we don’t often get to see in more ‘managed’ candidates like Cuomo, or even Mamdani.

It’s a passion that is reflected in those voters too as his message and Mamdani’s actually overlap quite a bit when it comes to raising taxes on the uber-wealthy, helping make rent and groceries more affordable, and shoring up support for certain assistance programs. Of course, their messaging and approaches diverge but the central point is clear: New York can’t be what it is if we keep pricing out those New Yorkers who have been here for decades and make the city run, unrecognized.

One line that got the crowd very riled up, in all directions:

I genuinely can’t predict what will happen on November 4th. Whoever wins, there will be some anger, frustration, and sadness in the city. But I’m hoping for hope — and maybe some dhamaka, those joyful sounds absent of hate — on election night instead, because New Yorkers could use a little of that right now.

And now, on to your required reading:

The Wayback Machine’s snapshots of news homepages plummet after a “breakdown” in archiving projects - Hanaa’ Tameez for Nieman Lab

This Chicago Neighborhood Was Just Named the Coolest in the U.S.—Here’s How to Experience It, According to a Local - Meena Thiruvengadam for Travel + Leisure (Good travel writing is deceptively hard, and Meena makes a joy out of it!)

🎉🎉A belated congratulations to two friends Nidhi Prakash and Ashish Malhotra on becoming Knight-Wallace Fellows at the University of Michigan!🎉🎉

Immigration fuels the US economy. Here’s what happens when there’s less of it - Zulekha Nathoo, et al USA Today

The nation’s community health centers face money troubles - Shalina Chatlani for Stateline

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