nterview with members of the SMU Sikh Student Association

Q: How did you and the SMU Sikh Student Association build off of previous successes of the Turban Days?

Suri: We had SMU's first Turban Day last year in April. The event was very successful, much more successful than we expected. We tied about 90 to 100 turbans that day. We had only 50 turbans, and we were using $20 gift cards as an incentive for people to come wear a Sikh turban.

We were very skeptical about the success of the event, when we started out at 10 a.m., but by 11:30, to our surprise, all the turbans were gone. That really encouraged us, and gave us the notion that this thing could really work. When the students came back, they were happy and excited….they wanted to keep the turban as a souvenir instead of the $20 gift card. They didn't do it for the gift cards.

It was a very positive and satisfying experience for everyone involved. It motivated us to pursue our vision of making SMU more diverse culturally and in terms of religious tolerance, and we became an official student organization in October of last year.

When I think back, the turban day at SMU really worked because when people saw their friends or classmates wearing a turban, they were automatically intrigued to learn why their friend who has never worn a turban was wearing a turban today out of the blue. So they asked questions from their friend/classmate which led both students to indulge in a constructive dialogue making them more diverse and more of our religion.

Most importantly, the flow of information was without barriers, because of the relationships between students; whether they were friends or in the same class or members of the same organizations. They kept the turbans tied for 4 hours, so they had to go to classes or meetings etc, and it exponentially raised awareness for us. We tied about 100 turbans, and if those 100 people even talk with 5 or 10 friends, that means we were able to reach 500 to a thousand people.

Q: What influenced your decision to expand to other schools?

Suri: From the success of the SMU Sikh Turban day, we realized that our model of having college student wear a turban for 3 to 4 hours and go to classes/meetings really worked. It was received very positively by the SMU students and appreciated very much by the DFW Sikh community.

Hence we wanted to take the event to the next level and make even more people aware of the Sikh religion. So, this year we're working with all the major universities in DFW: Texas Woman's University, University of Texas at Arlington, University of North Texas, Texas Christian University and University of Texas at Dallas.

It really worked out for us because all these universities have spring break the week after ours, so this ensures that we can personally go to all of these universities and help in organizing the event at these universities. I guess the biggest motivation for us is again, exponential awareness. This allows us to interact with more college students at more campuses.

We hope as a result of their experience they will have constructive dialogues with the people they interact with that day, which will allow in a more open flow of communication, which will help them become more diverse and aware about the Sikh religion.

But, most importantly, our biggest hope is that it will reinforce for them that you don't have to judge people by how they look, but by who they are and what their character is. A lot of people get put off by the distinctive appearance of the Sikhs (with the turban and the beard), and they might not try to get to know them because of how they look.

We are really fortunate to have a great team here at SMU; the members of the SSA are really committed to the vision, and have put in a lot of hard work. We are really fortunate to be able to obtain the support of different organizations at five different campuses who agree with our vision and who are helping us to promote this event at their campuses. They have found the model for the event to be really interesting and something that they think would work and benefit their campus in a positive way.

We are very grateful for everyone who has contributed in our pursuit of converting our vision to reality.

Q: What are you hoping to achieve in the Dallas community with Turban Week?

Suri: We are really keeping our fingers crossed, and patiently waiting to see how the event is perceived by students at these five universities. We know that college students are much more open minded and more willing to new experiences.

We hope this is a positive experience for them, they become more aware about Sikhism, and they get something meaningful out of it. This is very important and valuable for us because down the road when these students have their own families, they will be able to teach their kids about value of diversity and pass on their knowledge/experiences.

If they see somebody making a racist remark, they can pass real knowledge on to their children and make them more diversified in the process. Again, it goes back to exponential awareness, the ripple effect by a pebble in a pond, by how one person's experience will hopefully positively impact others.

Q: What have been your primary challenges in organizing and implementing the previous Turban Days, and what have you learned from them?

Sachar: Primary challenge starts from the moment we decide on the event. The tough part is organizing everything and making sure that people are aware about what we are doing and why we are doing.

Unless the message is sent out the whole purpose of Turban day is not complete. Most important things is to make sure that we send out the right message. We are just trying to make people aware and diverse.

Before the Turban Day we were unsure whether people will show up or not. But with last year's Turban Day we understood that people here are more than willing to learn and understand about different cultures.