" 46embroidered on the peak, Future-Arjun was holding hands with a young woman wholooked not unlike Kajol, his current filmi crush.(Kureishi 11)Kunzru explores the obsession with America through his protagonist Arjun Mehta. America isportrayed as the =Promised Land‘ where IT professionals like Arjun can realise their dreams. AsArjun goes for his job interview to the Databodies the Indian professionals are made to believethey are in high demand in America. America is a land where they ?have a skills shortage. Theywant as many programmers as they can get? (Kunzru 7). Moreover the narrative of American lifemakes him feel he is really important in terms of his skills:Boy, good programmers like you are gold dust over there. Everyone knows Americancollege students are only interested in cannabis and skateboarding, right? You leave itwith me. If you‘re telling the truth, you‘re going to be raking in the dollars just as soon aswe can get you on a flight.(Kunzru 10)Since the aim of this paper is to explore the idea of =homing in‘ in the host country it is importantto refer to Judith Brown‘s concept of ?economic trajectories?(62). In her study of South Asianmigrants Brown pays attention to the manners in which the diasporic communities try toestablish themselves economically in their new home.According to Brown the economy of thehost country also greatly affects the ways in which the diasporic subject will be received in thecountry. She divides the societies in three types depending on their economies: ?agricultural,industrial or post-industrial?( 62).Unlike Britain where migration was of the unskilled labours, migrants to the US were highlyskilled professional (Brown 73). Arjun Mehta‘s migration is from the urban cities of ThirdWorld nation to a post-industrial economy of North America (Brown 73). As Brown observes inher study of South Asians: ?Unlike the first South Asian migrants to Britain many of them had47professional qualifications before they arrived and often went straight into the professions…?(73) In case of Arjun Mehta the basic impulse behind his voluntary migration is his Americandream. As we see in the novel Arjun belongs to the Indian middle class. Kunzru satirizes theways in which the middle classes in India are obsessed with sending their children to America.Moreover, for the family having a son working in America is a matter of pride and status. ForArjun‘s father America is a matter of status and prestige among the extended family and friends:For a long time Mr. Mehta had been unable to feel altogether optimistic about his son.Something about the boy emanated muddle…News of a job in America was mostaffecting. His joy was augmented by the thought that finally he had one back on hisbrother-in-law. (Kunzru 16)However, Arjun‘s inability to survive in the new country can also be read as a socio-economicfailure. As Judith Brown observes:It is clear that even where a post-industrial society offers great oppurtunities to Indianswith much-needed skills, the route of migration in never an easy one, and creating a stableeconomic base for oneself and one‘s children, on which to build a new life in the diaspora,still takes much thought, commitment and hard work( 74). As soon as Arjun‘s arrives his American dream is shattered:It was July, and Arjun had been in the states for a year, a year for repeating this walk, orwalks like it. To the store, wherever the store happened to be. Back from the store. To thebus-stop. Back. Long intervals, standing in skeletal vandalized shelters. Wind andsilence. The California of the non-driver.(Kunzru 38)48Arjun‘s alienation is further highlighted when he is unable to find a stable accommodation in thenew country. Kunzru equates the sense of being uprooted from one‘s home as being physicallydiminished:At first it had been because he did not feel confident, settled enough. Then it was becausehe was never in one place. More recently, now that he was desperate, now that the senseof being diminished by this envarionment had become a suspicion of actual physicalshrinkage…(Kunzru 38).From his familiar envarionment Arjun lands in the squalor of California‘s suburbs. He realizesthat ?he was living in a =low-income area‘. In his bedroom the drone of traffic from Highway101 was a constant presence…A hydrocarbon stink lay heavy in the air, and during the night thetraffic hum was accompanied by police sirens and cracking sounds…(Kunzru 41).Drawing on the idea of Avtar Brah‘s =homing desire‘, in his essay ?Problematics of TheorizingDiaspora and Siutuating Diaspora Literature?, Swaraj Raj suggests that ?the homing desire is thedesire to create the home where one is, that is in the host culture…?(56). Raj observes that ArjunMehta‘s revenge is ?actuated by his desire to create a home in America…?. It is an importantobservation because Arjun Mehta‘s identity in America depends on his profession. As aprofessional he occupies a highly vulnerable position and is being susceptible to deportation.According to Raj, Arjun Mehta‘s revenge act can be ?interpreted as a signifier of the resistanceof the diasporic self to the logic of capital which thwarts its homing desire?(59). However, I wishto draw attention to the fact that =homing desire‘ as advocated by Avtra Brah is an everydayexperience of lived realities. Arjun‘s American dream is shattered when he realises that his jobwith the American company Databodies is not secure. Arjun turns into a form of cheap labourrecruited from the Third World countries. Since Arjun does not have a fixed job he has no money49as well. The company that recuits him ?would pay him a grand total of $500 a month, half ofwhich would be taken as rent the house-share?(39).Like Nazneen Arjun also undergoes emotions like nostalgia and despair. His initial days arespent confined to the home that is rent to others like him. The first thing that Arjun notices is theAmerican lifestyle which overwhelms him: ?The idea of American poverty, especially a poverty which did not exclude cars,refrigerators, cables TV or obesity, was a new and disturbing paradox, a hint thatsomething ungovernable and threatening lurked beneath the reflective surface ofCalifornia?.(Kunzru41).A job is important for Arjun as it is reflectedin the fact that he decides to stay in America ratherthan go back. Arjun is portrayed as a computer addict in the novel. Kunzru demonstrates acharacter whose world revolves around codes and wires. The novel also employes a lot oftechnical jargon which at times becomes difficult for the reader to comprehend. However, I wishto discuss the novel as a diasporic text which captures the complexities of being uprooted fromones homeland. Arjun finally secures a job at Virugenix a ?global computer security specialist? (Kunzru 52).Coming from a different culture the environment at Virugenix is entirely devoid of humancontact. As Arjun observes: ?Everyone left their phones on voicemail and most wore headsetswhile they worked, creating a private sonic space that was , according to custom violated only inan emergency.? (55) In an interview given to Suchitra Behl Kunzru overestimates the role playedby the media as important in the writings of British Asian writers. ?Yes I think it will... I think in 20 years time, the writers of South Asian descent who areconsidered British writers and the focus of coverage on them might be on issues of race50and identity. I mean my coverage in the British press is all about race... I have writtenabout that this time around, but I'd be interested to know that if I decide to write a novelwith all white characters, whether I will be allowed that by the media or not will be thelitmus test. It is when you can come out as a British Asian writer and you don't have towrite about a specific British Asian thing. Only then will you know?.(Kunzru)In another giveninterviewto Ahmede Hussain, Kunzru talks about what it means to be aBritish writer of South Asian descent. What Kunzru mentions is very similar to what Rushdiewrites in Imaginary Homelands. According to Kunzru:?for those of us who don't live there, South Asia exists as much as an idea, a horizon or apoint of reference, than a daily reality. I can imagine many things. I may even have aperspective that gives me greater insight into South Asian life than my Polish or Jamaicanor English neighbours in London. But it's not the same as living it every day. That's a jobonly non-diasporic writers can truly do?. In a similar vein Rushdie observes that diasporic writers acquire a kind of ?double perspective:because they, we, are at one and the same time insiders and outsiders in this society?(19).Like Ali and Kureishi, Kunzru believes that writing for him is a way to negotiate his identity: ?Somebody like myself, I'm a son of an Indian father and an English mother. And my Indianfather came from quite a conservative and established family in India but emigrated to the UKwhere he became just like any other immigrant, really. He arrived with a little money in hispocket…I grew up in a suburban area which was quite homogenous, and at a time when therewas quite a lot of hostilities for immigrants in some sectors of British society. And so, my "