#3 Going to the temple

To find a real Hindu temple in America, you will probably have to drive half the way across America. By ‘real’, I mean complete with shikaras laden with god images and the works. The temple in my hometown, San Diego, is a tiny room in a commercial building next to the Indian grocery store, in the same complex that also housed a mosque. In India, going to the temple is often a pilgrimage. Often, people climb thousands of steps to the get the top of the hill that houses the temple.

In America, going to the temple was just a part of a pilgrimage that included buying groceries at the India store and having dinner at the Indian restaurant.