Asians lack presence. Asians take up apologetic space. We don’t even have enough presence to be considered real minorities. We’re not racial enough to be token. We’re so post-racial we’re silicon.

Once home to perhaps twenty-five families, enough to hold an annual festival and organize a soccer league for the men, Hong Kong by 2001 had only four Khatri families. I had met all of them at a Divali party at Hemesh's place the night before our interview; they barely filled the apartment. Some of the children were growing up with Chinese accents