Daughters of Appalachia 004

Amee Patel grew up in Beckley, West Virginia until she moved away for college. She currently lives in Washington DC where she leads a user experience research team for a big company. She didn’t really expect to end up there, but finds it fascinating to study how people engage digitally.
 
Outside of work, Amee considers herself an amateur crafter (currently really into pottery, crochet, and watercolor), an avid reader, urban hiker, and explorer of any place she’s never been before. Amee is obsessed with her three-year-old niece, who she considers to be the greatest person she knows.

Hillary: Where did you grow up and how would you describe it to someone who hasn’t been there before?
Amee: I grew up in Beckley, West Virginia. It’s the kind of place where people slow to let you make a left turn in traffic even if it is rush hour. Where you almost always run into someone you know when you go out. Where, in my experience, people were open and curious about my family, our background, and gracious with the concept of community.

My grandparents lived with us, and that sense of communalism resonated deeply with my multigenerational household. As immigrants who had moved continents and countries multiple times, (and in my mom’s case, fled a coup), starting fresh wasn’t new for my parents - and Beckley ended up being a soft and safe place to root for our family.

Where in the US did your parents first move to from India? Was it primarily for work?
It was. My dad is a radiologist and there was a need for that specialty. They had a short stint in Staten Island, and then a few years in Northeastern Pennsylvania while my dad completed his medical training. 

We moved to Beckley, WV in 1987 and it became the longest place any of us lived. I have an older brother and younger sister. Our grandparents came around the same time and moved in with us when my sister was born.

Have any of them talked much about their experience first moving to WV?
We talk a lot about it! It’s a pretty memorable time in our family, where we first met people who become our lifelong family friends. My sister was born, I started kindergarten, and my brother had to quickly get over his car sickness since West Virginia is nothing but beautiful windy roads. The mountains really took us all in and became a special home.

What is one of your earliest memories?
Probably moving to Beckley, right before I turned five. Things that pop up for me then: My sister being born shortly after. My mom taking us to the dollar store to get road trip activities for our first trip down the newly opened Interstate 64. How special I thought it was to have twins in my kindergarten class (to this day these two are still the most special humans!) The way mountains rise and envelop the road on the drive from Beckley to Charleston. Being packed into tiny townhouse dinner parties with the other Indian families that lived in the area. The windy Rural Acres Drive with a view over town that my grandfather regularly proclaimed as ‘Kampala Hill’ for the way the lights at night reminded him of his East Africa days.

What’s something about Appalachia that might surprise people who aren’t very familiar with it?
Usually, people are surprised by the fact that I grew up in WV, and then even more surprised that I wasn’t the only brown person I knew. I generally expect and understand their surprise, but bristle when they assume it was a hard place to grow up as a non-white person. For me, people were more curious than judgmental, generally respectful of culture, kind and compassionate, humble and helpful. People want to paint a place with a broad brush, but the nuance is important. Looking back, I can see why this place worked for us. Indian families are tight knit, thrive in community, and show love with food and acts of service. My dad, now a retired physician, used to come home for lunch every day, and it wasn’t unusual for folks to stop by then knowing he’d be home, where they could get some quick medical advice with a cup of my mom’s exceptional chai. Even though the food that landed on our tables was very different, my friends also had grandmothers who maintained age-old from scratch cooking in the way of people who know how to do much with little. It was home that gave me so much, and though the world feels very different now than then, that’s a claim I won’t soon give up.

What is a work of art (define that how you want) that has meant a lot to you? 
I feel like I am perpetually affected by art so it’s hard to pin down, but a few things come to mind. I had some incredible English teachers who never shied away from challenging us to read and think boldly. I remember reading I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings and feeling like I understood language as a gift for the first time, strength reclaimed in the written word, what it meant to bear witness to someone else’s lived experience. I was really immersed in Anne of Green Gables. I loved the way she was who she was, emotions and impulsivity and imagination with little abandon, an independent gal ahead of her time.

My dad and his siblings are all deep lovers of the arts and came up in the magnificent musical era of 1960s-70s London, so the Beatles’ Abbey Road is probably the first album I really absorbed. 90s country was the soundtrack of my formative teenage years and 4-H camp summers, when I really started to find my feet in the world. 

My aunt was an amazing artist, and her paintings still hang in all of our homes. That, coupled with my dad buying me really nice watercolor pencils at an age where I really should have only been trusted with Crayolas, really cemented for me that creating for the sake of it can be a part of life at any time.

Tell us about a Daughter of Appalachia who has inspired you.
Rhiannon Giddens for her contributions to folk music and representing the diversity within its origins - she’s incredibly talented and her voice is transcendent. Jennifer Garner for her unabashed love of WV, kind spirit, and hilarious cooking videos - she embodies the accessible and open nature of Appalachia. My sister - the only one of us born in WV, and the kindest, most empathetic, loving best pal anyone could ever have.