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FREMONT, CALIFORNIA, May 26, 2001: The change in Fremont was subtle. One day, Hillside Drive was renamed Gurdwara Road, for the Gurdwara Sahib Temple, which Sikh residents built there. There is little doubt that over the last ten years, a blue-collar, somewhat anonymous, community has essentially disappeared. In its place has arisen something dazzlingly different: a magnet for Asian immigrants, including many Hindus, forsaking urban enclaves to move to the suburbs in such numbers that they transform them. The new Fremonters include Silicon Valley engineers, entrepreneurs of every persuasion — from Hindus owning convenience stores to Chinese chief executives living in Mediterranean palazzos — as well as Fijian Indians, Filipinos and one of the country’s largest concentrations of Afghan refugees. The latest census figures disclose that the Asian population doubled since 1990 in this city of 206,000 people, to 37 percent from 19 percent. Nationally, Asians now account for 4 percent of the population. Among cities of more than 100,000 people, Fremont is one of five with the highest percentage of Asian residents.

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