>> welcome to porter square books. this is being filmed for the buck tv programming so if you can make sure that your phones are turned off that would be lovely. also want to let you know about a couple things we have coming up. lisa is going to be here with her mystery and monday we have the next installment on the series hosted by several contributors today but tonight we are delighted to have you all

here for the contributor to "the new york times" on npr and the "boston globe" and the atlantic and he's here today to present his book and immigrants journey to minimum wage. [applause] >> i'm from india originally and i have an mba from india and i was working when i came here i came from a good educational background and spoke well and came from a good well known organization that would have no problem getting a job but i was

surprised my qualifications and experience didn't matter much i my accent. i was working for the bbc and i met a woman from rural pennsylvania on a fulbright scholarship. i met her and we became more and friends and fell in love. so america became my new home. my parents wanted me to to get a

job and make a lot of money and have kids and live with them forever and ever puti did get an mba but i didn't get the job they wanted. i also married a woman not by their choice but they liked her anyway. i came here and a lot of stuff is in this book. there was a lot of prejudice if you are educated and take a job people will look down on something menial and judge the basis of that so i had that in my mind when i was doing the job i had this in the back of my head people were judging me i have a good degree but i want to

study detectors in a store. so what did i give up in india. i'm going to read a chapter and open it up since you can ask questions. i'd been there a few minutes i saw a middle-aged couple walked in. my heart jumped and i took off my name tab in this book to my shirt pocket. i pretended to look like a shopper myself. i was embarrassed. i saw my parents and i couldn't look in their eyes when they looked at me i'd have to hide

and then my boss came to me and said we have shoppers that want to buy a dvd player and want to know if it will work in india and i told them one of our team members was from india. i had to come out, the man was smiling and said are you from india and i said yes i am. which part? we are from mumbai and have a question. my son is in medical school, we are visiting and now going back the lady said and then scanned me top to bottom. what can i help you with, i said trying to avoid the next question. my friends often volunteered her son's salary and quickly asked mine. it was a way of judging. we are trying to buy a dvd player but want to make sure that it will work in india.

are you studying at the university, the man asked. no, so what are you doing here he said. i'm working here i said. he fired the next question. what's your background. yes, this dvd will work in india i said coming into my background is in media. i am new in america trying to find a better job. >> yes, you seem to be educated. you can do better than this high he replied. i don't know why but i thought they would fly back and tell my parents what i was doing. out of a billion of us in the world the chances of them turning out to know my parents were next to zero but it didn't matter i couldn't get that out of my system. i had no business being in the back room unless i was on boxing the merchandise and all of a

sudden my first reaction was to avoid working and being seen by anyone who looked to the indian. although i didn't know any of them that came to shop it seemed as if i could read their minds when they saw me working at the store. a few minutes another lady came to the store and walked very slowly. my boss gestured for me to take an initiative to help her.

you should be able to look it up on your computer, can't you? i wondered if she had any children or grandchildren and felt sorry for her in her old age she had to buy a battery herself. my mother often ask me to get her eyeglasses extend to pick up her medicine. i couldn't imagine her going to buy a battery on her own. people let were to judge by fay very harshly if she had to do that and my friends and neighbors would look foolish and selfish and irresponsible. lost in these thoughts, cindy put down a screwdriver and was using his speed to she came to me and brought her face right to mine and stared at me a few inches away all i could see was a white face smiling but with gritted teeth she said alright

what did you learn from the customer service training. i stood there and said nothing. she said let me remind you and don't forget every customer has to be greeted within five seconds of stepping foot in the store and i said okay. she stepped back, pointed and said also you should walk up to the customer and not wait for him to come to you. she raised one thumb up in the air and said alright smiling and went back to what she was doing. i waited for her to come to me because i wasn't confident i would be able to answer the question. i printed out the return receipt and handed it to the lady. she looked at me, smiled and said you will get their. as i started smiling i wiped the sweat off my forehead. i felt like i just endured the longest 20 minutes of my life. i looked at my watch and said it is almost time to go.

not yet, another colleague said. we have to do a few things before we close. why don't you grab the vacuum cleaner and i will count the money in the register. i wondered if he hadn't tried to help me because he was insecure and not a good enough salesman himself. i wasn't sure. i left work after a very long and emotionally exhausting day. my wife came to pick me up. city buses stopped running after 9:00 at night. i tried diplomacy talk and she put the car in gear and we drove off. a few seconds later she asked me so how was the first day on the sales floor and i didn't know what to say. i wasn't sure if the 85-year-old lady was more shocking than cindy b. rating me for bad customer service or not being able to help the two gentlemen was embarrassing. she looked at me and i didn't respond. i said how was your day. she said it's alright we can talk again later. so the first chapter i hope you sue a small glimpse of what the book is about and if you want to

ask any questions i can answer. >> so are you still selling and how is it? >> good question. i'm not anymore. this happened ten years ago. 2004 and in 2006. i was working for bbc before so i went back to writing and that's what i do now. >> when during the process of working in retail did you write this book, after ordering? >> much after. i wasn't thinking of writing the book when i was working because i needed to be able to learn to spell and not get fired, so i wasn't thinking about that. but about three years later i

started thinking i don't think i would do that kind of job again or go back to selling batteries and stuff that i didn't know existed. i don't know why people listen to a radio in the shower, so hard to convince someone to buy a shower radio when you don't know what it's for. so anyway five years after i finished the book. i had quite a bit of distance and a different perspective i went back to india and thought about it a lot. i wanted to write for me and my friends and people to know what it's like to work for two years and to sell to americans with an extra syllable in every word. [laughter] >> [inaudible] >> i >> it was good. i worked in bbc in english and my accent was different about i thought i was fine when i came

to virginia in charlottesville you drive 10 miles and people have different dialect and a southern drawl so i have to get used to that and it took me a long time to understand them and to them to understand me so it was rough. but the book is also not just about my experience. it's about me learning about my colleagues and how i learn about poverty in the united states and the people working with me to make ends meet by $7 an hour. i didn't have any death or child support to pay. people working with me had kids, they had to pay child support and healthcare, mortgages and they were trying to do the file working with me and i often thought i can quit this and go back to india i can do what i

was doing there. thinking of th people like wrong and cindy. they didn't have a place to go back to, this was their life and they were going to get out of that particular store they would probably end up in a different one but a similar kind. i developed a lot of empathy for my colleagues and also helped me to re-examine my self so i can come high-class hindu and for two years i lost all the privileges i had. i was sitting on the floor vacuuming and cleaning and doing these jobs. i thought about what about the people that do these jobs back in india. maybe this is what they are good

for they didn't have and education to get a good job. a lot depends on what advantages you have in mind. it's a vicious cycle of a dog trying to chase his tail. if you work in retail in different parts of the united states were just in virginia?

i was the best person to come and buy a cell phone from. >> did i hear you say you went to business school? did that help you in your sales and writing >> in writing yes. it didn't help me get a job but it helped me knowledge wise i learned a lot of subjects like organizational behavior and stuff like that so it helped me converse with a lot of customers and talk to them to learn about my customers as human beings in heavy conversations. a lot of times my boss didn't

like that i talk to my customers she thought i was wasting time but people came back so it did help me in some ways. but it didn't help me to get a better job. >> it teaches you a different kind of writing. i knew that i had a journalistic eye even while i was working so it did help me in some way just wondering how the customers treated you. >> good and bad. people couldn't communicate and

there was a barrier. they didn't take me because of that the upward social mobility.

>> do i select that? >> i'm not for sure. the book is about downward mobility. here all of a sudden it took a dive from standing on your feet for eight hours. it was for two years.

it would have meant that i moved to a different city on a different store and i was with my wife was going to school at northwest virginia so i chose to be in that store and that position until the point i quite enjoyed it and few retail after that. >> i wonder how it stands up to dignity [inaudible] >> my dignity took a big dent in the beginning just like wearing

a name tag and standing in front of a sales floor every day. customers when they come in they are nice to you but you have to be nic nice and spinal every dao matter what your life is, how unhappy you are you have to put oon a smile so it's a hard job and you have to be nice to every single person that they don't have to be nice to you at the same time. not saying every customer is rude but you can kind of people that are not so nice. so somebody says something and you get upset but you can't get upset because you have to carry on so it is a balancing act. you learn to brush off and keep going. in my case i learned what it's like to be a salesperson and be in somebody else's shoes.

some people are still working those jobs and a lot who come here start at subways and motels and dunkin donuts and stuff like that and a lot of them are educated people. they just do this because their education is not valued at the same level. i met a lot of people that are doctors back in india that didn't want to do the seven year residency but they took a job at like full foods because they want to send their kids to school. it's a lot of suffering and some people give up a lot to come here but of course america offers them a lot to move ahead but also sacrificed a lot. >> what are your impressions of the states versus india professionally and socially? >> professionally, i learned that things get done in america.

you go to the post office you can post your letter and mail and by stamps and decide okay i'm going to do this. in india it can eat two hours. things don't work as orderly.

this is my new home and i'm in a good position to write about both cultures. so there's a lot of material. i started writing the book five years after i left and there was a high turnover job.

i went back to india for a year. but plumbers and electricians and everything i build a house in nine months and that was the shock.

i went back to driving my honda so we go back to india as a constant learning situation. given the changes in the social and political environment since ten years ago how do you think the challenges and the situation might be different and now in a similar situation to being a highly educated person working a low-wage job in the u.s.. >> good question. thank you for asking. >> the minimum wage has gone up. i don't know what it is now.

maybe it's gotten better but i'm sure that it's hard. i'm thinking it hasn't become much easier. that is a whole different book.

my in-laws were born on a farm and never left 60 years or 30-years-old in every single person that was released it was in one village so then i go there and everybody knows because there's only one brown guy in the whole village. they have a lot of questions and sometimes they were kind of strange like do you wear a turban because one a long time ago wore a turban and my father, grandfather in law stopped a guy on the side of the road and said have you seen [inaudible] and he said what? aren't you from india and he said no i am from guatemala.

[laughter] after my grandmother in law to read this book i said it's okay i've been for a long time, you're going to like it. i've been married for 40 years so they know me now and i know them. it's a constant learning process. >> thank you so much. [applause] he will be up here signing.

thank you all.

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