"What's a Parsi?" Bud said to the banker, who merely lowered his 
eyelids one click and jutted his goatee at the piece of paper, which had picked 
up on his question and already branched into an explanation. Bud ended up 
regretting having asked, because the answer turned out to be a great deal of 
general hoo-ha about these Parsis, who evidently wanted to make very sure no 
one mistook them for dotheads or Pakis or Arabs—not that they had any 
problem with those very fine ethnic groups, mind you. As hard as he tried not 
to pay
attention, Bud absorbed more than he wanted to know about the Parsis, their 
oddball religion, their tendency to wander around, even their fucking cuisine, 
which looked weird but made his mouth water anyway. Then the brochure got back 
to the business at hand, which was lines of credit.