Comment by justboxing | Hacker News Reader

Comment by justboxing | Hacker News Reader

The story totally checks out. I moved from Boston to San Francisco in 2006, did a cross country drive. Back then we only had flip phone, so I would use my laptop and The Microsoft Streets software with a GPS. Every day, around 3 PM, I would pull in into the parking lot and locate a Motel 30 or 40 miles ahead using the GPS and Streets software, and call and book a room.

8 out of 11 motels I stayed in were owned and run by Gujjus (Gujaratis, originally from the state of Gujarat in India). I was really surprised by this, because until then, I was only used to seeing East Indians working either in Tech or in Gas Stations, 7/11s.

Being a 1st generation Indian immigrant myself, almost always the owners would relate to me and tell me their immigrant story. And yes, almost all of them said the same thing the story mentions, i.e. borrowing money from family to buy a run-down / cheap motel business, live in it and work on it. One of them even shared their Gujju dinner with me as I'd arrive late and all the restaurants were closed in the Area ( Eureka, CA)...

Not all of them carried the business forward though. 1 guys son was working to be an Airforce Pilot and another's daughter was going to Law School. As told by their fathers neither one wanted anything to do with the Motel business, but they put in their work as kids, working at the motel while off school and such.

After moving to San Francisco, I met another Indian-American "Patel" , born to Indian immigrant parents. He too had a family run motel in Portland and would tell me stories of how everyone in the family had to pitch in to make it work. Gujjus are hard working people and I really admire their work ethics and grit.

My last ex was Gujarati and her father owned a Holiday Inn Express and a Days Inn. We both worked remote at the time and a good chunk of our relationship was spent staying at various hotels under the IHG banner for the "owner's rate" (a small denomination less than $1).

Their network went well beyond any particular industry though. The first family friend to come to this country ended up in Houston in the early 70s, quickly accumulated wealth by innovating accounting techniques for big oil. He sponsored the next wave, which included her father who started as a nuclear plant engineer and travelled around the country for a couple decades before moving into finance then hospitality.

Each successive wave would sponsor others - they all were relatively successful in India but came here to be executives at tech companies, surgeons, professors, real estate investors, etc. They really took care of each other.

While the family did much of what was mentioned in the article, including living at the Days Inn for a couple years at one point, it didn't mention anything about partnership stakes in these properties. That seemed to be a big thing, or at least I had the impression that diversifying property portfolios was common. Her father owned his properties outright but that was because he bought his partners out during the financial collapse in 2009. When we last talked 2 years back, he was looking to acquire new partners and invest in other properties.

As you say, there was a tension to bring the children in but they had little interest in moving to a place in a so-so part of Florida - the children were well educated, travelled, cultured etc and preferred to live in big cities. My ex and I did grudgingly discuss it as being an option if we started a family.

>>8 out of 11 motels I stayed in were owned and run by Gujjus (Gujaratis, originally from the state of Gujarat in India).

I had a Gujrati friend while doing my Engineering in Bangalore. He quit round about the 5th Semester, went to the US to start a Motel. And from what I heard the last he had like a chain. Never returned and finished his engineering though.

I remember starting round about the 2nd semester he would frequently visit the US to see his cousins who ran Motels. He was quite famous in the class that he used to get us all sorts of rare merchandise from the US not available back then in India. I'm talking about the time when a bar of Snickers was like an exotic chocolate in India.

One of things you will see in certain Indian communities(Gujrat, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Bengal) is a very high degree of community affection and willingness to help their kind.

I heard the family based GC, I guess that EB3 wait times are now like 16 years, largely because once a family comes, they apply GCs for everyone in their family.

The Gujaratis are known for being very enterprising folks. It is culturally respected in the community to have your own business, whether it is a small corner shop or the biggest corporation. India’s biggest private corporations (Reliance Industries) was started by a Gujju. Gandhi and the current PM also hail from this state.

> The Gujaratis are known for being very enterprising folks.

The downside is that some of the biggest and famous crooks are from the same community as well.

There's lots of famous financial fraudsters and crooks from any community. Look at the Ivy League graduates working on Wall Street who caused the 2007/2008 financial crisis.

> from any community

Which is not relevant to this post and the GP comment.

yea true

If we accept the premise that Gujaratis are particularly enterprising, then unless they are particularly less prone to criminal behavior than other communities we should except some enterprising crooks as well!

Can't say criminals aren't enterprising. At least successful criminals.

I'm not sure such comments are appreciated on HN. All communities and groups in the world have crooks.

I am talking about some of the biggest and famous crooks in India not just any crook.

Which is an irrelevant point and needlessly pedantic in the context of this thread about Gujjus. What I hope is even less appreciated on HN is the pointless "yeah that's true of any community" nonsense the minute anyone says anything with specificity.

There's a much older and a much more substantive article about this as well: https://www.nytimes.com/1999/07/04/magazine/a-patel-motel-ca...

I stayed at a very good Gujju run one in Ukiah last summer, maybe the same family?

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