 Good morning, good afternoon, or good evening. You can go to Levy, India, but you cannot become Indian. You can go to Levy in Germany or Turkey or Japan, but you cannot become German or Turk or Japanese. But anyone from any corner of the earth can come to Levy, America and become an American. Welcome back to A Nation of Immigrants, a new talk show program featuring the lives of immigrants, knowledge, diversity, and inclusion created by St. Tank, Hawaii, and Kingsfield Law Office. We invite renowned immigrants to discuss their life stories, immigration adventures, and contributions to cultural diversity. Today's guest is our good friend Priti Patel. She is a second-generation Indian-American. She graduated from the University of Wisconsin Medicine with a Bachelor of Business Administration degree. She also holds a Dr. Dr. degree from Mitchell Hamlin School of Law. She started her career in private legal practice, then served as assistant general counsel in the telecommunications and energy division with Minnesota Attorney General's Office. Ms. Patel held multiple senior legal counsels and business executive roles with Excel energy and mid-continental independent system operator. Currently, Ms. Patel is vice president and chief transmission officer at Great River Energy, serving as corporate officer and providing strategic direction in planning, development, construction, system operation, and maintenance of Great River Energy's transmission assets while ensuring reliable, responsible, and low-cost energy delivery to Great River Energy's member co-ops. She provides industry leadership by serving on the board of directors for various industry organizations, including WIRES and Midwest Reliability Organization. She currently serves as the board chair of the Great Plains Institute, last but not least, she makes the best vegan food in the world. Welcome, Priti, to the show. Well, thank you very much, Professor and Counselor Wang. Thank you for the invitation, and I'm delighted to be here, and I look forward to our discussion. Well, we are absolutely thrilled to have you on the show. You are the second Indian American we invite, and both of you are female, and it is just to conform my form of belief that if we have more female leaders in this world, we will have peace, and we will have much, much less trouble. But anyway, let's start with your career, your life, and career. And you are second generation Indian American, which means you were born in this country, but your parents were born in India and immigrant to this country. Could you please tell us a little bit about your family and how did they settle in the United States? Yes, it's a story that I love to tell. My parents, like you said, are both of Indian descent. They were both born outside the United States, and they lived very different lives. I'll start with my mother. So she was born in the state of Gujarat in India. She was part of a family of nine children. She lived in a small village, and she did graduate from college, which was somewhat rare for women in her community and of her generation in India. But her family was upper middle class. They did have means. She did come from a large family that was very close, very traditional. My father is of Indian descent, but he was born outside of Nairobi, Kenya, in Thompson's Falls. And he lost his mother when he was very young, four years old. And so he spent his childhood growing up with aunts and uncles in India. And his father continued to work in Kenya. So he graduated college in India and in engineering, and then he and a group of other college students traveled to the United States in the early 60s to get his graduate degree in chemical engineering, which he got in Michigan. And he was part of this group of young students. We have photographs littered all over our photo albums of he and this group of young men in their 20s who had come to this country together. And they all had educational degrees behind them. And that's how they got into the country. So this is when immigration was really opening up lots for Indians to really come in in the 50s and 60s. It began the brain drain of India. And he received his master's degree. He went back to India and he married my mother. His family introduced him to my mother and through the arrangement of the families, but also them meeting and getting to know each other. They said yes. And they said yes after meeting each other for one or two days, and they were happily married for 50 years. So even though they had very different lives growing up, their heritage and their community's bloodlines really made them come together. And then they came back to the United States after he was married, moved to Michigan where I was born, and we moved to Ohio after that, but really they settled in Wisconsin. So since my age of, since I was four years old, and my sisters were born there as well, we have lived in Wisconsin. My parents lived there for their whole lives in the United States. And my father passed away about four years ago. I ended up marrying someone who was born and raised in St. Paul, Minnesota, and we have two children. And we live here. Beautiful, beautiful American story. And I have the great privilege to know your family, particularly your husband, a great man. And as I said that two of you introduced the best of vegan food in the world to me. And I deeply appreciate that. What I came to the United States when I was 28 years old, obviously too late. And I never had the experience to know what it's like to grow up in the United States as a child of immigrant or immigrant. So could you please share with us what it is like to grow up in the United States as a second generation immigrant, namely the child of immigrant parents? Yes. So, you know, I'm sure this experience is not different for others. But I felt growing up, I lived in two worlds, essentially. And I'm sure others have the same experience, where you have the world that your parents know of, and they've created for you at home. And you have the world outside your own. And quickly interrupt. What language you spoke at home? So at home, we spoke Gujarati, which is a regional Indian language. And in India, there are many regional languages outside of what generally people know of Hindi, right? So we spoke Gujarati at home. And so, you know, we had a very pleasant life growing up in Wisconsin, you know, very pleasant, a very good life. And I think a large part was because my parents embraced what they viewed as the positive attributes of American culture. They didn't reject American culture and just cling to, you know, traditional Indian culture. But they also did strongly embrace all the positives of the Indian heritage and culture to make sure we were immersed in that. So as a young person, I would say that, you know, growing up, I spent probably most of my young life trying to put my whole world together in my mind, right? Trying to put my identity together, which you just find isn't easily defined for most people. But I think when you're a child of immigrants, it's more undefined at time. So I knew I was an American, but that label didn't really fit me. I felt I always identified and I still do as being Indian. So, you know, it's just what's inside of you, right? So most of my childhood, I felt some tension between, you know, the culture that I would immerse myself in, you know, at school, and then the culture that my parents gave us and kept alive within our home, the one that I would come home to, right? Every day, you know? So it's like, you know, during the day, you know, you're eating with a knife and fork and then, you know, I come home at night and I'm eating roti and Indian food with the tips of my fingers. So you just, you manage two worlds. And when you're young, they're very different, right? Because you've got two cultures to identities and, and, you know, I talked to my sisters about this. Sometimes it felt like you were on the outside looking in. And maybe this is what it's like when you're not in the majority culture. You always feel like you're looking in. And the worlds really came together for me once I got married. But it took, it took a long time and you just get comfortable in those two worlds, right? Yes, I agree. I can relate to a certain degree that you and your husband and it, of course, your kids bring, just represent the best of two worlds, both Indian and American. And for me, it's a little bit different because I was the cultural shock or the identity crisis came abruptly. And when I came to the United States, when I was 28 years old, and suddenly I became a minority. And for 28 years old, I was the majority. And you're in the brilliant Han Chinese culture, even I'm more Mongolian than Han Chinese. But then suddenly I realized, oh my God, now I'm a minority. That was a painful and long process to adjust. But I'm delighted to hear that you are really aware of this identity. And you managed to put together the best of these two worlds. And so I understand you still travel to India occasionally and bring your family over there. What was your last time in India? And what was your impression? Even you were not born there. And could you do some comparison to your previous trip? Sure. So the last time I was in India was in, I think, the late 2019, in December of 2019. And I had gone with my immediate family and my mother and my sister to spread my father's ashes. And we did that at Trivani Sangam, which is the intersection of three holy rivers in India. You have to take planes, trains, and automobiles to get there. And a few impressions. I've gone to India my whole life. Since I was very young, we've made periodic trips for weddings. And I've spent summers or winters there when I was young. So I've seen it over time just change. So compared to what it was like this time in 2019, from what I grew up in, it's just so much more modern. It's modernized quite a bit. When we would visit in the 1970s and 80s, India was still a very young nation. It was just decades out of colonial rule. And just a huge urban, rural divide, stark poverty. A lot of goods were on the black market at the time. You had Western American products were really not allowed. And so I just have these memories of my mother. When we would visit, she would want to bring all these American goods to share with her family in India. And we would have to smuggle them in through customs in India. And so I still remember you couldn't bring alcohol into India. And she would bring alcohol. And she would use that to bribe customs officials to get whatever she wanted into India, like electronics or things she wanted to give her family, which she couldn't do. But she would do that. So I have great memories of that. Very courageous woman. But today it's very different, right? You can get everything there. It's a modern economy that's been built over the last 50 years. They've had tremendous growth improvements in their infrastructure and roadways. I remember growing up when we would go from one large city to another, the driving was painful. Now it's just the roadways. Everything is so different. They've continued to remain a democracy. Everybody has a cell phone at scenes. And like other countries, social media has changed a lot there. It continues to be a very poor country. But I think the things that I notice are this last time, India is supposed to be a secular country. And what makes the country so special as I was growing up and learning about India and traveling there is just the ethnic, the linguistic, the religious diversity that exists. And all those communities are kept together in India because of secularism. And I think it's one of its greatest strengths. Politically, not to get into that too much, but India has been just been shifting a bit over the last, I don't know, so many years. There's competing visions of what India is. Who is she really? And I think during this last trip we were on, we experienced a number of internet and cellular shutdowns by the Indian government because there were protests in India over a new citizen law that excluded Muslims and there were protests everywhere. And we were there for just maybe two, three weeks and we were subjected to a number of shutdowns. It's become common practice under the current administration. So that's been something that's been different. But what I have really enjoyed just my experience in learning about India and visiting the home of my ancestors, when you consider something that's a gift or a problem in America, India is a place that gives you great content. Yes, I really appreciate you sharing your insights and comments about India with us. India has occupied very large part in my heart, both spiritually and secularly. Spiritually, India is a secret land of Buddhism and has been my long time dream to visit Patigaya in the near future. And secularly, so I grew up in China and we have a population as large as India and India probably will exceed China to become the most popular nation in the world, but still now it's probably comparable to China still. But when I was in elementary school, my teacher told me that don't even think about Western style liberal democracy. Look at India and they fail. And so it doesn't work in Asia. And now I grew up, I would argue, wait a minute, who said it failed? I think it succeeded and succeeded splendidly. As the most important, this is for a larger country like India and China, it's painfully difficult to transform from a pre-modern state to a modernization. And when I say modernization, obviously we're not only talking about the highways, skyscrapers, mobile phones, we also talk about the rule of law and the representative democracy. And India, in my view, just succeeded splendidly. And there are issues, but it has achieved this transformation. The Iraq is, you know, bringing the transformation from a pre-modern state to a modern state. Anyway, I don't want to comment too much about, you know, the political issues as your advice. Let's talk about your career. You are, you know, you grew up in a middle-class family and very pleasant life in Midwest, a heartland of the United States. And as a model, immigrants, as they said, you know, the Asian Americans, were you just expected to be a dentist, a lawyer, or is it something you chose by yourself? Or is it just a reasonable expectation from your parents and the community? So, yes, Chong, I did choose my profession by myself. I think my parents were interested in me becoming a lawyer. They did not necessarily, at the time I was making the decision, view it as a profession that they thought was sound, just coming from where they came from. You know, being a lawyer versus going to med school or something in the sciences, like my father was a chemical engineer, they had hoped the sciences. But I think I knew this is, you know, I wanted to go into the practice of law. And I also knew that I may want to work in the public sector at some point. And so, it wasn't, they got behind it and they supported it, but it was not their preference. Well, even before that, what I really wanted to do was major and Russian area studies. And I think one interview with the CIA pretty much had my father saying, you are not, you are not doing this. Good, good. I'm glad you made the right decision. But you spend most of your career as a business executive and the leader in the business. And you also had experience with the attorney general office. And what's your takeaway from serving the public and working in the private part? Sure. So, you know, I've been in the electric industry in some capacity for, you know, about 23 years or so now. It's nothing that I went into intentionally. But I am so happy that I am in this industry. So when I started my career, it was as a litigator in a law firm, I represented architects and engineers and construction lawsuits, and did insurance defense work. And I had been given some advice in law school that, you know, cut your teeth at a firm where you can learn quite a bit of the, you know, writing briefs, making arguments, going to court, because I knew that I wanted to be in the public interest in some capacity. I didn't know exactly what. And so after being at the law firm, I did get to go to the attorney general's office after that and represented the public interest in the utility space. So utility regulation. And again, that was because the position was open. But once I got into it, I really enjoyed myself. I love the electric industry. It's dynamic. You can't pick up a paper without reading about something in the electric industry. That wasn't always the case. It was a bit of a sleepy space, you know, decades ago. But right now it is just vibrant. And so the difference, so here's what's interesting about the space in the electric industry is that when you work for a utility, or as I do, a cooperative, an electric cooperative that serves, you know, two thirds of the geography of the state. So we're the second largest great river energy is in the state. You really are working for the public interest, because you provide a service that is, you know, a life service, the provision of electricity, nothing can happen really without it. So it has always met all the values that I've wanted in a position. Thank you very much. I have to confess I failed the physics and chemistry in high school. That's why I have to apply for art school in college. That's a joke, but it's not really a joke, because my father is a physicist, my mom is a chemist. And I just couldn't understand both. I'm working on a case with a piece of land, a property in Wisconsin right now. And there are some documents to understand, ACDC, field, EMF, radiation, I have no idea what this is all about. Sit down some time. I think it's too late. I might call you later just to understand a few things anyway. I don't want to waste your time on my, you know, very elementary questions about, you know, utility electricity, but we do want to ask you two questions that we normally end our show with two questions for our distinguished guests. The one is if you will give some advice yourself in your plenty, what would you say that time travel permitted? And the second question is if there are any things you enjoy reading or watching right now, either books or TV show or newspaper articles, you would like to share with our audience. So two questions, please. Okay. Well, I'll take the first one. Any advice I would give professionally to someone in their 20s? I would say a few things. First, you know, whatever you're working on, you know, take the time to learn your trade. There's no, and this is advice I give to a lot of young folks that are coming into the industry is no matter what you do, nothing is a substitute for the deep hard work that you need to do in whatever you are in. There's no replacement for time and experience, right, when it comes to your profession, you know, trying to run for a title isn't going to somehow give you more knowledge or more power. It might give you authority, but it's not going to give you more knowledge or power. So just put the time in, don't circumvent and go job to job, put the time into your trade. A big thing is, as you think about your future in your 20s, you know, get to know and appreciate yourself. Ask yourself, you know, what are the attributes that you truly can offer? You know, what differentiates you? What is it about you? Is it hard skills? You know, those are always important, but it's those softer skills that really differentiate people that make you valuable to your employer or to your team. So just get to know yourself. The more you know about yourself, the more you can offer. And, you know, I always say, you know, there are certain folks that like clear lines of understanding when it comes to a job function. And there are people who love gray space and you can give them anything and they can navigate, but you need to know who you are. So I think those are two things, you know, because it helps so you don't fit yourself into a culture of work that doesn't work for you. Know yourself, you can find the right environment. I also take calculated risks in your career and I'll give you an example because it's because I took some risks that I got to the place I'm at. I was at, you know, I was in Excel Energy's General Counsel Division and I was the lead lawyer for a billion dollar project that they had. And when the head of the project was promoted, they asked me to consider stepping into that role. But here's the catch. I had to leave legal and go into the transmission business. The role was developmental, so it wasn't permanent. So I, you know, once it was done, I may not have a job to go back to. And I had to take a salary grade down one. So think of that. How many people would say, yes, I'm going to make that move? But I did because it was the business experience that I knew would complement my legal experience and open up opportunities. So I did it. It was a salary grade down and it wasn't permanent. And I, so these are risks that I think you have to ask yourself, you know, either great risks I can take. And then finally, I'll just say all business is personal. Relationships matter. So keep up with relationships in a meaningful way, you know, make time for the connections that you make, lunch, coffee, make these mutually beneficial. Invest your time in people. Don't just call them when you need something, right? Make sure you've built that relationship. It'll pay later. Wonderful. I wish I heard all of this when I was in my 20s or save my decades of effort. Well, finally, we're almost running out of time at any particular recommendation, very briefly. Well, you know, if I think about just, you know, notable books that influenced me, I would say that one was The Road Less Travel by Scott Peck. So I was given that book by a childhood friend when I graduated law school. And I didn't really at the time appreciate a lot of the messages of the book. You know, I always remembered them, but I don't think I appreciated them, which is probably why she gave it to me, to make sure I would remember it as I progressed. You know, life is difficult. You know, there are a lot of paths that are less traveled by people because they're just more challenging. But really, the upshot of the book is about spiritual growth, not religion, but really, you know, creating your own religion, which is your worldview. And, you know, the book just emphasizes simple concepts like discipline and sacrifice and just finding a way to grow spiritually in life to find happiness. Terrific, terrific recommendation. And the terrific show, pretty. We are thrilled to have you here and share your insights and share your life story. I, both my audience, our audience and myself learned so much from you from this conversation. Let's continue our conversation and we look forward to welcoming you back to the show and to share more of your insights and your comments on current affairs. Thank you so much. Today's guest is pretty Patel, Vice President, Business Leader and General Counsel. Thank you so much. Thank you so much. Aloha. Thank you so much for watching Think Tech Hawaii. If you like what we do, please like us and click the subscribe button on YouTube and the follow button on Vimeo. You can also follow us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and LinkedIn and donate to us at thinktechhawaii.com. Mahalo.