My father’s beliefs were so rigid that once, when my parents came to visit me at Barnard, I suggested we walk down Fifth Avenue to look at the shopwindows and he refused. He was almost viscerally offended by the idea of frivolously spending money, and of accumulating wealth. To this day, almost everything he’s earned goes back to impoverished relatives and charities in India. Also, waste was a crime. My father had witnessed the Bengal famine of 1943, when the English starved Kolkata. Growing up, I’d be anxious about inviting my American friends to the house for my birthday parties, because my parents would always comment on all the unconsumed food they’d throw away. When I was a child, almost every purchase my parents made was deliberated over. We arrived in Kingston with a few suitcases, a couple of pots and pans. I don’t want to exaggerate, but there was a frugal, bare-bones quality to my upbringing, and a feeling that we were just passing through.