NOW Live from the Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center

SALTAF™ 2006 marked the third year that the Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Program partnered with the Washington, DC chapter of the Network of South Asian Professionals (NetSAP-DC).

And what an amazing, full day we had…

Time:
Saturday, November 4, 2006
10:00 a.m. – 6:30 p.m.

Location:
Baird Auditorium
National Museum of Natural History
10th Street and Constitution Avenue, NW

The morning opened with the U.S. premiere of Nagesh Kukunoor’s DOR—the still unavailable, but you’ll-see-it-here-first latest feature from the maker of the hugely successful Hyderabad Blues and Iqbal. In DOR, two very different women—one independent and feisty, the other submissive and traditional—are thrown together by the most tragic of circumstances. When one husband inadvertently kills the other while both are working overseas, the would-be murderer’s wife must somehow secure the the signed forgiveness of the grieving widow in order to save her death-row husband’s life. Director Nagesh Kukunoor was in the house and engaged in a lively Q&A before and after the screening.

Two phenomenal literary panels started off the afternoon. The first featured Kiran Desai, whose latest book, The Inheritance of Loss, just won the prestigious Man Booker Prize, making her the youngest woman in Booker history to win. Her mother, the illustrious Anita Desai, was quite a crowd-pleaser at last year’s SALTAF. Kiran was joined by Samrat Upadhyay, hailed as the first Nepali author writing in English. He’s the lauded author of Arresting God in Kathmandu, Guru of Love, and his most recent, The Royal Ghosts.

Our second panel featured Devyani Saltzman, whose internationally acclaimed debut memoir, Shooting Water: A Memoir of Second Chances, Family, and Filmmaking, is about her experiences making the stunning film, Water, with her filmmaker mother, Deepa Mehta. Water made its U.S. premiere at SALTAF 2006. Together on stage with Devyani was Tarun Tejpal, who arrived from India just in time for the upcoming U.S. publication of his first novel, The Alchemy of Desire. Already a critically acclaimed debut in the United Kingdom and the latest darling of the London literati, Desire hits stands in December.

We closed the day with the DC premiere of Punching at the Sun, winner of Best Narrative Feature at the 2006 San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival. Director Tanuj Chopra talked about his debut feature. Set in the rough streets of Queens, New York, a vulnerable South Asian American teenager tries to make sense of a life turned upside down by the senseless murder of his hero-older brother, coping in a post 9/11 world where withdrawal and isolation seem to be the only way to make it to tomorrow. Hyphen Magazine called Punching “the best South Asian American film ever.”

To see what The Washington Post thought about this stellar event, click here for a reprint of the day-after article.