Fijiana’s ‘Welcome to the Bay’ Sparks Questions About Our Cultural Melting Pot

Where else but the Bay Area can you find some authentic Indo-Fijian slap?

Last week, Richmond rapper Fijiana dropped “Welcome to The Bay,” a track pairing that distinct Bay Area flavor with sounds from the Indian diaspora, including traditional flutes like the shehnai and the bansuri.

Over 808 kicks and persistent hi-hats, Fijiana raps about “going 80 on the 80” from Richmond to Oakland alongside references to dharma and bindis. She even raps a few bars in Fiji Hindi.

In the video for “Welcome to the Bay,” Fijiana stops by immigrant-owned markets in Richmond before pulling up on the homies at Lake Merritt. Later, she hangs out the window of a BMW doing donuts near the historic 16th Street Station in West Oakland, a Fijian flag proudly waving from the vehicle.

“It feels so good that people are connecting to this piece,” Fijiana tells me, reflecting on the video’s overwhelming response. “I almost, like, can’t even believe it.”

Directed by Heaathh and Erik Saevi (with creative direction from Fijiana and Riya Saloni), “Welcome to the Bay” keeps racking up tens of thousands of views on YouTube, Instagram and TikTok, earning praise locally and abroad. And at the same time, it’s added to the longstanding conversation about hip-hop, cross-cultural connections and appropriation.

The song’s success has also offered a glimpse into what goes into making a viral hit. There’s been a genuine wave of support for “Welcome to the Bay,” notably from other Bay Area artists like Keak Da Sneak, IamSu! and Capolow. Yet Fijiana and her team’s savvy social media work has also added to the hype: She posted a doctored meme that makes it look as if famed streamer Kai Cenat reacted to the song. (The clip is actually of him listening to a Jackboys track.)

Like anything that gets a lot of attention online, the comment section adds another layer to the story.

One commenter, also Indo-Fijian, was close to tears, thinking about how “Welcome to the Bay” is helping spread the Fiji Hindi language to all corners of the world. “That really hit me,” says Fijiana, “because it made me very aware that what I’m doing for my people is so important.”

Yet the multiculturalism of the Bay is not without its tension. More than one commenter took Fijiana to task, accusing her of appropriating Black culture.

Fijiana says she understands that Black people are tired of others constantly taking from their creations. She noted in the comments (and in our interview) that at the start of the video she wears a shirt explicitly stating, “Bay Area Culture Is Black Culture.”

The song is reflective of her life experience, which includes a mixture of cultural influences, she says. With that, she acknowledges that some people may never accept a Fijian woman of South Asian descent who was raised in close proximity to Richmond’s Black community. She’s learned to be OK with that.

“Being an immigrant in this country,” she says, “we do grow up in these spaces. I’m actually more around American things than I am of my cultural things.”

Fijiana has faced criticism in the past, albeit it was from the other side of the metaphorical cultural aisle.

In an interview with me in 2022, she acknowledged some people of the Indian diaspora were perturbed about the sexuality in her video for “Sanskari Hoe.”

Even then she discussed growing up in a predominantly Black and Latino community — and the delicate balance she has to strike between her heritage and surrounding influences.

In her latest video, her attempt to effectively depict this cultural intersection pushed Fijiana to call in a second videographer by the name of Oaday Day for a few final, important touches.

“We wanted to tell the story of what the Bay Area means to us, what it means to an Indo-Fijian girl, what is means to an immigrant girl in this community,” she says. “And we wanted to showcase some of our elders in the community and how dope they are.”

The video features Richmond’s Palm Market, Aliyah Jewelry and Apna Foods. At one point, a clerk counts money as Fijiana posts up on the counter. In another, Fijiana lays on bags of rice while she recites her bars. The shots of community extend flawlessly to include other Bay Area artists, as images of rapper 7Namez, producer Kontraband Beatz, model Kiera, photographer Been Milky and others fill the screen.

“This video is so special, because it was so community,” Fijiana says.

In response to a scene in the video where a friend applies oil to Fijiana’s hair, one viewer, a Black woman, wrote, “It’s the Amla oil for me,” showing that certain personal items can have cross-cultural significance.

“As a Desi person,” Fijiana says, “Amla oil is an important part of the culture.” Having your hair oiled weekly is a custom, she says: “Our elders do it for us, and our sisters.”

In the video, the woman oiling Fijiana’s hair is Raven Mapanao, a model, actress and close friend of Fijiana’s. The clip is symbolic, Fijiana explains, as last year while Fijiana was in the hospital Mapanao would regularly visit and oil her hair.

For six months a life-threatening autoimmune disease caused the rapper intense mobility issues and concerns of organ failure. “I fought through it, somehow I made it,” she says.

While her hair gets oiled and the BMW gets sideways behind her in the video, Fijiana wears a tan knee pad and beige hand bandage, representative of the scars of last year. The scene is a celebration of the fact that she can move.

“There’s something about going through something like that,” she says, “as unfortunate as it is, I really think it brought me closer to myself, my art and my intention in a way that I don’t think I’ve ever felt.”

She cracks up while thinking about the song’s producer, a guy named Shub who she met on YouTube. “He’s just some person, chillin’ at his house in India,” she says with a laugh, thinking about the song’s sudden success. “He’s also probably trippin’, like ‘What’s going on?’ This is poppin’ for both of us.”

With additional singles on the way ahead of a forthcoming album, Fijiana says there’s more where “Welcome to The Bay” came from.

“Through each song, through each single, through each visual,” she says, “I’m trying to let people come into this world of Fijiana.”