Monica Yunus and her father Dr. Muhammad Yunu I’m totally devoted to Dr. Muhammad Yunus and Grameen Bank’s micro-lending program. Sitting in New York front row seat a month ago, listening to Dr. Yunus tell the inspiring history of microfinance from Bangdalesh to Omaha, I had no idea that his daughter Monica Yunus is an opera singer with New York’s Metropolitan Opera.

Monica Yunus was born in 1979 in Chittagong, Bangladesh to Nobel Peace Prize recipient Muhammad Yunus and his then wife, Vera Forostenko. Yunus has one younger half-sister, Dina Yunus. Yunus’ parents met in 1967 while attending Vanderbilt University. They were married in 1970. Yunus’ parents’ marriage ended within months of her birth, and Forostenko returned with Monica to the United States claiming that Bangladesh was not a good place to raise a baby. Forostenko is the daughter of Russian immigrants to Trenton, New Jersey, United States and she returned with Monica to live with them. via Wikipedia

Listening to Monica Yunus for two minutes leaves me emotionally breathless. No wonder the NYTimes calls her “especially winning” and the Charleston City Paper “utterly captivating”. Monica’s voice ranges from a low A 9A4) to a high F (F6).

Monica Yunus, daughter of Dr. Muhammad YunusI’ll write more about Monica Yunus in my Journal, which is coming together around her, Daniel Pearl and Elisha Abas, who I heard last Sunday in a piano recital that left me weeping.