good morning i am hugh burrows, welcome to mosaic. this is a program about the sikh faith and people particularly in the bay area. it is our honor to be joined by the chair of the sikh foundation of palo alto. welcome sir. >> thank you. >> good to have you here. let me throw something to you. i know -- how do we begin -- how can you help us begin to understand the sikh people and sikh faith. >> we will be happy to do that. it will take a little while to talk about various aspects but i think we can refer to origins of sikh faith if you like. 500 years ago our founder of sikh religion, the first guru

of the sikhs said there will be one god he called him kar. only one god. god is described in many different ways but it is the most mono theestic religion around. no difference between man and god. you can have teachers that will help you, but you can reach god through your teachers, directly. no intermediate necessary. god is defined -- always has been. always shall be, sole creator without fear without anonymity, forgiving and of course formless. god is defined as a formless god. yes. so that is one aspect of sikh religion which one has to understand. mono theestic religion with a formless god. if you look at the holy book of

the sikhs, which was written by a fifth guru, it is a magnificent document. the origins of it are still around so this is one of the very few original documents of the religion that are still around, for anybody to see. and that particular book is written in poetry to music, and it talks about relationship between man and god and in between there is discussion which helps every human being in the process. if you read this thing very carefully, you feel that sikhism believes in absolute equality of all human beings

and without any question, race, religion, no issues, you are all equal and i think in the history of any religion is the first religion which in the holy book there is number of pages devoted to equality of women. absolute equality of women. i think when you look at the women's suffrage movement in this country, 150 years, 500 years ago the guru taught aboutabsolute equality of women and man. we are all the same. there is another thing interesting about sikh religion that we respect all other religions. all other religions we respect them and support them in any possible way. because my feeling is that the

gurus said there are a number of other super human beings which we call profits that came a thousands of years ago but they did wonderful things for humanity and we must respect them. the other thing is, that we don't believe in conversion. we simply do not go out to try to convert some body to seek sikh religion. you are born as a sikh if you want to convert yourself out of your own goodwill you can do that, but otherwise sikh's conot go out and try to -- do not go out and try to convert other people. sikh's are supposed to be very hard working. this is specified in our holy book. you are supposed to work hard rather than hindu's for example what they believe is that you take part of your life and devote it away from humanity, to try to learn about god.

we are told not to do that we are supposed to partake in the world, go out and earn and specify that we give a certain percentage of our earning for chair phi. >> i am specified we -- charity. >> i am specified we take a break. we will be right back

welcome back to mosaic. this is the program about sikh people and sikh faith we are joined bay project manager with the sikh foundation in palo alto. we have met already the imminent doctor, the chair of the sikh foundation. would you pick up from our

discussion and tell us, perhaps, the number of sikhs are there a lot of sikhs in the world? in america? >> about 24 million sikhs all over the world. vast majority of them are in punjab, then other parts of india and they have migrated all over the world you have a large number in england, in canada. in fact, in canada they are a few percent total population. they say there are a half million sikhs in american but i don't think that is correct i believe it is closer to one million in the united states. approximately 2 to 300 guru diwallas, house of the lords all over the united states.

a lot of sikhs go there and have their functions and so on but we will talk more about sikh's in the united states. >> yeah, almost what the doctor said, a million, 40% of those numbers are here in california. the bay area in itself is the second largest of sikh population next to yuba city only. and recently, just last month the california state legislature, passed acr-181 that declares november 2010 would be declared the sikh american awareness and appreciation month. and under this it recognizes sikh americans have been in the u.s. for over a century, they have contributed immensely toward the states economy. they have leading roles in the

industries, farming, strucking, high tech, medicine. you can find sikhs everywhere in all walks of life. >> we have a photograph here that -- tell us about this. >> this is a picture of sikh immigrants who landed in san francisco in 1910 at angel island retention facility. so they have been -- this was the first time and this is punjabi on the walls of angel island in san francisco written i have been here for 9 months when he was detained before he was let go. it has a very long past in that sense. >> very much a part of the bay area. and there are how many -- i would say temples. >> sikh temples. >> yeah, in the bay area. >> five. >> five and where? >> well, there is one in san jose which is the finest i

think there is a picture of that later on in the show and then there is one in -- >> there it is now. >> that's right a beautiful picture of -- it is a multiacreage story building which is able to house thousands of people and there is schools that educate the children in bun jab by and sikh. -- punjabi and sikh. >> and the sikh parade in yuba city you said is a large population of sikhs. >> san jose. fremont. >> el sebronte, hayward and berkeley. >> are they open to people? >> yep. >> is it a closed -- >> open to anybody who wants to come in and everybody gets free food.

yep. regardless of who you are, the sikhs -- and that is not only true in san francisco bay area. any where in the world you go to a sikh temple you can have dinner served to you. >> i know for a fact the fremont gardwalla serves over 3,000 free meals a week. go in any time, 24 hours, you can have a free meal. >> that comes from the tenant of the faith? >> origins of sikhism, we wanted everyone to be treated equal. akbha the king was meant to come in and sit next to other kings and fed lunch. >> -- sit next to other sikhs and fed lunch. >> the hindu has cast system,

the sikh's 500 years old, young by indian standards, ancient by american standards is a horizontal equality, centered -- why in ritzar? >> that is the place where the guru who started the golden temple, one of the most important monuments we have of the sikhs and all sikhs any where in the world visit it because that is the place where the first gudwalla was opened and it is in the middle of the lake. it was opened by the muslim -- they had a muslim to open it for us. it shows why we consider all religions equal. and here is an image of that. maybe we will go to break now when we come back we will pick up more about this very special

program about sikh's and faith and sikh's in the bay area. that image of the golden temple in india

we are talking about the sikh faith and sikh's in the bay area. what does sikh mean? >> the word means learner, a

student basically. we consider ourselves learning all the time and therefore new information comes in, we absorb it and use it as we go along. i think this is the teachings of the ten gurus which we will talk more in some detail >> sikhism is a religion based on the teachings of ten teachers whom we call as gurus. it was founded in the 15th century and he was followed by nine other living gurus and guru gorbansingh was the 10th. he ordained for the sikh's the form we see, identity we see the men wearing turbans and other articles of faith. it was the 10th guru -- >> what year did the 10th -- >> 1699 was the year when this

was established. it came out because of the persecution the sikh's faced. our fifth guru who established the golden temple and he took the writings of the guru's hymns they had written and that of the other saints and compiled it into scriptures he was martyred by the mogul rulers of that time. he was the first sikh guru martyred and then the ninth guru was also murdered by the mogul rulers in delhi. so out of that the pacifist sikhs, over a period of time turned into fight up for their rights and the guru ordained this form so that the sikhs

could stand out and stand up for anybody's rights if they are persecuted under tire any or injustice. >> i read somewhere, to be a sikh is to be a warrior both for the outside and also for the insign. >> saint soldiers. >> saint soldiers. >> but it is important to understand when the guru had five of his men followers he baptized them and then they baptized him. this is a very beautiful function that the guru performed for us chef >> baptism. >> yes. yes. baptism is a christian word but it is very similar. >> ritual washing and awakening. >> yes. >> how is it viewed? >> it is called ritual of baptism by steel you have a steel vessel and add water and

you add some sugar into it. the sugar symbolizes the sweetness that you have to bring to your personality and the steel symbolizes the strength that you have to bear. so that is ... >> one baptized in equality. >> yeah. >> why do sikhs wear turbans. >> this is part of what the guru wanted us to do. there are five things we are supposed to do one is wear a turban the other is wear a khollah a steel bangle we have a comb to keep the hair clean and so on. >> fascinating. >> yep. >> and that is part of the belief that -- these are my words here is how god created me and -- >> which is probably true look at all the profits in the world they all had beards.

>> that's a wonderful thing. i think this is probably a good place for us to break a little bit and when we come back this is a fascinating conversation on sikh's and sikh's in the bay area i am hugh burrows, stay with us

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we are talking about sikh's and sikh's in the bay area. before we get to more about the bay area, tell us a little bit about yourself where were you born, where did you grow up? what do you like to do? >> to begin with, i am a sikh and i understand this tradition i live this tradition. i am also deeply interested in the arts, and when i met the doctor many years ago the combination worked very well and i have been with the sikh foundation for many years now and had the opportunity to work on very many field relation, propagation of sikh arts i have worked with artists, museums, worked on publications for books for the sikh foundation we have an annual sikh fine article lane door we use. >> the sikh foundation, along with the doctor is a major ben

fang tore, in fact -- benefactor in fact you have established a sikh collection. >> with the asian art museum. >> beyond that what compelled you to be interested in the arts? >> oh, my god i have been interested in arts from childhood days in particular, i inherited number of paintings in some books on the life of the guru that were actually produced 150, 200 years ago by one of my ancestors and they went from one generation to another ended up with my grandmother who eventually gave it to my father and he gave it to me 30 years ago and brought it here. and those 40 paintings on the life of the guru are now part of asian art museum in addition

to another 60 pieces of art that i gave them. so there is a permanent exhibit of sikh arts. >> we thank you for that. we have a few minutes left, where were you born how did you get to the united states how did you get interested in fiber optics. >> well, i was born in morgah india, punjab and grew up in deradune. went to american mission school. did my bachelor degree there and one of my professors said light travels in straight lineas a young boy i said to myself no, it is not true i started working on methods of bending light around corner and it wasn't until i came to imperial college in london that i was introduced to the concept of using glass fibers for transmitting images around corners, and that is what i have been working on for all

these years and it has been a very rewarding and exciting experience. >> well s you have been known as the fibre of father optics i believe and distinguished career as a ' gent, university of call foreign -- regent university of california what are you interested right now? >> a number of different things but sikh foundation is one of the most important ones. the art work we do there, we have set up a number of chairs of sikh studies, there are four chairs in california at university of california, santa barbara, university california at river side and now university california at santa cruz and one at cal state east bay you are talking about one or two more chairs these are permanent chairs of sikh studies that will stay there forever. this is fascinating the work sonia was talking about the art

that we do, calendars we make every year and we have a web page that describes these activities. >> i have been talking to you, there we are the sikh foundation. as we look at those sonia, where were you born, grew up and how did you get to the bay area. >> i was born in india and grew up in india, and i have been here in the u.s. for five years now. >> wonderful. >> well, we've just scratched the surface of being sikh and sikh in the bay area but remind us some more about sikh's in america in the bay area and somethings about your faith. >> well, i think one of the most important things in our faith is as i said earlier, working hard, being

entrepreneurial and giving for charities. those are very important aspects of our life. and most of us try to do that, and find it fascinating. >> do you -- there is a holy book. >> there is a holy book. yes. >> written -- >> transcribed -- written by our ten gurus, and a number of hindu and muslim saints that is all included in our holy book and most of the muslims there were sufis and our gurus. >> mist tickets. >> yes -- mystics. >> yes, very interesting people and one of the things we have done, there was a mosque built in punjab area, and after the partitions, most of the muslims left for pakistan but that

particular mosque was in very bad shape so we have helped with assistance of sikh foundation and unesco to upgrade it and get it to a point to be delivered back to the muslims. >> i think what you said equality, importance of equality, women and openness to all faiths, and so, no overt conversion but everyone is welcome. >> sure. >> centered in amritzar with the golden temple and people are still taught punjabi. >> yes i would say sikhs and non-sikhs probably 100 million people that speak punjabi language. >> i will need some help from you after we get off air. i am hugh burrows, a very special mosaic is there a sikh greeting or blessing that you would use? [ speaking in punjabi ]

>> great see you next month ,,,,