by Divya Valluri

Divya Valluri is the quintessential California girl; confident, talented, vivacious and earthy. Her parents have given her a couple of very useful gifts; Indian roots and American wings. WNI’s August 5th parenting article “The confused Indian American Parent” in which PR Ganapathy talks about praise in the American system and Sukanya Mahadevan explores the efficacy of a crazy extra curricular schedule for kids, evoked this response from Divya; I think it’s interesting that parental concerns about the dichotomy of Indian and American cultures never really address the effort children growing up in the United States inevitably have to make to create a balance between the two. We definitely go through a struggle to combine the Asian values of our households with the American values in the outside world, and still have solid relationships in both places. I respect the valid concerns Indian parents have with raising their children with a combination of solid values and limitless opportunities. I don’t think my parents are going to be reading this any time soon, so I can safely say that I sincerely believe they raised me with a perfect combination of the two. So here we go: Continue reading →