13
Austin South Asian | March 2021
In a Chat with President Joe Biden, Two Indian American Restaurant Owners Open Up about COVID-induced Losses Up until a few months ago, this was a highly unlikely scenario: the president of the United States reaching out to you to inquire about the challenges of running a small business and how you have been managing it during the pandemic. But President Joe Biden is here now!
and talk about how the American Rescue Plan will help businesses like theirs,” Biden tweeted. The clip opens with the exterior
“As small business owners during the pandemic, every day is an open question,” said Samir. “When President Biden found out about our situation, he reached out.”
I gave them a call to hear their story
“What is the greatest need you have now for your restaurants to be able to survive?” Biden then asked. Neal added that “their greatest need is for everybody to be vaccinated because if people aren’t out shopping, the economy grinds to a halt.”
In a small clip released Feb. 13 by the White House, President Joe Biden was seen engaging in a remote conversation with Neal and Samir Idnani, the Indian American owners of NaanStop. “Samir and Neal own NaanStop in Atlanta, Georgia — and like many small businesses around the country, they’ve been hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic.
since the pandemic hit, and they’ve had to trim their staff from 20 to 25 to 10-15 people.
shots of the Atlanta, Georgia-based Indian restaurant, which the brothers have been running for the past 10 years. But when COVID-19 hit, they said they had to “completely adapt.”
“How’re you guys doing?” Biden asked. “It’s been pretty rough, hasn’t it, lately?” The duo said that their business has gone down by almost 75 percent
Biden then elaborated upon his rescue plan for small businesses. “I put together a rescue plan that provides tens of billions of dollars in grants to small businesses. We have to invest more, not less. We got to give you a chance to rebuild, that’s separate and apart from dealing with the virus,” he
said. Neal also told the president that immigrant-owned restaurants around them are looking for guidance regarding the grants. “They don’t have the expertise and I’m watching my neighbors make the wrong decision,” he said. Biden then informed him that they’ve set up navigators to help people learn how to apply for grants and also what they need to open up safely. Biden concluded his conversation with a question: “…if I get to Atlanta, can I come by?” “Absolutely!” the duo replied. (Courtesy: https://www.indiawest. com/)
NASA Indian American Engineer Swati Mohan: Operations Lead For Perseverance Rover Landing On Mars (Continued From Page 07) The goal is to get them back to Earth as early as 2031.
process, she also looks after the team and schedules the mission control staffing for GN&C.
“Star Trek” for the first time, she was quite astounded by the beautiful depictions of the new regions
was, however, her first physics class and the “great teacher” she had, that she considered “engineer-
M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from MIT in aeronautics/astronautics.
President Joe Biden tweeted congratulations over the landing, saying: “Today proved once again that with the power of science and American ingenuity, nothing is beyond the realm of possibility.”
While she has been a member of the Perseverance Rover mission since the beginning at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Mohan has also been a part of various important missions of NASA. She has worked on multiple missions such as Cassini (a mission to Saturn) and GRAIL (a pair of formation flown spacecraft to the Moon). According to nasa.gov, Mohan has worked on Mars 2020 since almost the beginning of the project in 2013. She is currently the Mars 2020 Guidance, Navigation, and Controls Operations Lead, at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena.
When the world watched the dramatic landing, in the control room, calm and composed bindi-clad Mohan was communicating and coordinating between the GN&C subsystem and the rest of the project’s team. Apart from being the lead systems engineer during the development
According to a report on floridatoday.com, Mohan said, “I’ve been on Perseverance longer than I’ve been at any school. I’ve been on Perseverance longer than my younger daughter is alive. It’s just taken up such a large portion of my life for so long.” (Courtesy: https:// www.indiawest.com/)
Scientists hope to answer one of the central questions of theology, philosophy and space exploration. Perseverance promptly sent back two grainy, black-and-white photos of Mars’ pockmarked, pimply-looking surface, the rover’s shadow visible in the frame of one picture.
Mohan immigrated from India to the U.S. when she was just one year old. She spent most of her childhood in the Northern Virginia-Washington DC metro area. At the age of 9, after having watched
of the universe that they were exploring. She immediately realized that she wanted to do that and “find new and beautiful places in the universe.” Mohan also had wanted to become a pediatrician until she was 16. It
ing” as a way to pursue her interest in space exploration. Mohan holds a Bachelor of Science degree in mechanical and aerospace engineering from Cornell University and completed her
