Lavina Malwani
Lavina Malwani writes features for India Today, Little India and Newsday. Since the 80s she has documented the growth of the Indian-American community, its celebrations and its concerns. She has written about issues that affect South Asians - culture shock, immigration, gender and race. She has interviewed an eclectic bunch from Zubin Mehta, Amy Tan and Ivana Trump to cabbies, swamis, gang members and dotcom millionaires. Her byline has appeared in several publications including Asia Magazine, Avenue, Brides, Asia Inc., Beard House, which is the magazine of the James Beard Foundation, Winds, the Japan Airlines in-flight magazine, Art and Antiques, and Leatherneck, the magazine for American Marines. She currently writes two monthly columns, Foreign Letter, in The Hindustan Times, and A New York Minute for India Today. She writes regularly for the lifestyles magazine India Today Plus, inside outside, which is India's leading design magazine, Hinduism Today and Traveler's India. Lavina first sold her humor pieces and fiction to Femina while studying at The Convent of Jesus and Mary in New Delhi. She continued to write for Indian publications while majoring in History at Lady Shri Ram College in Delhi. She lived in Hong Kong for seven years and in Kinshasa, Republic du Zaire, for three years before moving to New York with her husband Jackie and two children. She is a founding member and president of Children's Hope (India) Inc., a New York-based nonprofit organization of women professionals that raises funds for children's health and education in India. The organization has supported scores of projects in India since 1992 including medical clinics, balwadis, shelters and heart surgery for infants. Children's Hope has also set up college scholarships for needy South Asian students at Newcomers High School in Queens.*Profile excerpted from Saja.org