Ryana R: I came here for a Friday prayer. We pray 5 times a day, but every Friday we have a prayer here, at NYU. An NY professor leads the prayer here. It’s open to the entire community so you don’t have to be an NYU student to go. I used to go here for my grad and undergrad. I don’t live in NYC anymore, so when I come back to the city I always make a pit stop here. SAF: What brought you back today? R: Well, my parents live in Queens, but I came mainly for the lecture tonight, it starts in about an hour. SAF: Where are you from? R: Queens, born in the Bronx, raised in Queens. Ethnically, I’m Bengali. SAF: What do you do? R: I’m an engineer. SAF: Is that what you always wanted to do? R: No. I thought I wanted to be a doctor. But I realized I’m better in math, and I wanted to get a job. I didn’t want to go the route of becoming a doctor after college. My decision of becoming an engineer was mainly because of financial reasons. For security. SAF: If security and finances were not a concern, what would you want to do? R: I don’t know, I’m still trying to that out myself, it’s a journey, right? I like to help people, I like to empower people. I consider myself a voice, because I’m very outspoken. So, something in that route. Now that I am in the financial field, I would like to empower people. Help people make smart financial decisions. I feel like the American education system doesn’t teach you how to be financially literate. It just teaches you skills and how to use your skills to work for an employer. That’s pretty much what American society is now. It revolves around the fact that most of us are not financially literate. I feel like that’s probably going to be my calling. SAF: Do you ever get discriminated against from your religious practices? R: Not really, because I grew up in a very ethnocentric area. Like when 9-11 happened I never really got the flak of it. Because I don’t really look Arab, I look more South East Asian. I feel like if I was more light skinned I would have been targeted. But I wasn’t. I didn’t feel the threat of it, and even if I did… it’s New York City. Nothing surprises you, nothing, SAF: Has anything about NY ever surprised you? R: Not really. It’s a great city to live in. It’s a melting pot of culture. So where I currently live is upstate NY, and for the first time I feel like a minority. It’s predominantly Caucasian. I work at a manufacturing facility and it’s not as diverse as NYC. SAF: How was the transition? R: Easy. It’s job, right? You have your networking events you go to and you just make a different life. I do like the closet space I have! Because you don’t have that here. I have a walk-in closet. I could stick my full sized mattress in it. Something I never could have done in NYC. SAF: What do you miss the most? R: The FOOD! And the ratchet people. I miss the homeless people that would entertain me on my train ride to school. SAF: What’s your biggest fear? R: Not having kids. I want kids. Not being to have that, I feel like I would live an empty life. I want to pass down a legacy, raise them, not being able to have that would make me feel half empty. SAF: What do you look for in a partner? R: Someone who is stimulating. Obviously someone who is attractive, I’m gonna be stuck with them for the rest of my life. Goal oriented. Someone who isn’t a couch potato. Someone who is willing to grow, physically and intellectually. Someone who is taking steps to develop and motivate himself and also motivating me. SAF: If, god forbid, you can’t have kids, what would you do? R: I would adopt. SAF: Young, old? R: I like babies because I like the baby fat! I like the folds in the thighs; I want to see that! I think the younger the better. You develop that attachment more when they don’t know how to speak and it’s just their little mannerisms. It’s not about molding them or shaping them, it’s about seeing their raw emotion.
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