Monthly Archives: May 2005

Blog bidness

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Alef: By popular demand, we’ve posted a page showing all our banners and explaining the references. It’s also linked from the FAQ. Cliff notes for the Mutiny — it’s kitschy goodness.

This is one of my favorites. Dimple Kapadia and Rishi Kapoor have a Scooby-Doo, Daphne-and-Fred thing going on, crossed with a hapless Japanese bystander from Godzilla:

Ba: I know we asked earlier that people link us as ‘(Author) from Sepia Mutiny,’ but yeah, that’s pretty verbose. Just plain ‘Sepia Mutiny’ is fine, thanks.

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Who’s your daddy?

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Apparently these guys are –

Two tribes living on India’s Andaman islands may be direct descendents of the earliest modern humans who moved out of Africa 70,000 years ago, scientists reported last week. …The Great Andamanese and Onge tribes have remained isolated in the Andaman and Nicobar islands for tens of thousands of years. This helped the scientists to search for signs of origin that erase quickly when populations intermix. …They found the Onge and Great Andamanese — both Negrito tribes — resembled the African population more closely than east Asians or the mainland Indian population of today…These tribes still survive as hunter-gatherer communities using primitive tools and living in the jungle.

And, of course, an obligatory “blame it on the Brits” angle –

Their populations have also decreased steadily with about 20 Great Andamanese and 98 Onge surviving today. It is believed that before British colonizers reached the islands in the mid-18th century, the Great Andamanese population numbered over 5,000.

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Get that dirt off your…lungs

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ambassadors.jpg

India’s most polluted city is full of talk AND action:

Authorities in the Indian city of Calcutta have ordered all vehicles manufactured before 1990 off the roads unless they convert to green fuel…by the end of the year.

“9,587 taxis, 7,464 buses, 6,784 auto rickshaws, 1,164 minibuses and nearly 30,000 goods vehicles” could be affected. Why a ban?

A recent study by the Calcutta-based Chittaranjan Cancer Research Institute and Calcutta University indicated that close to 50% of the city’s residents suffer from major respiratory disorders.
Cases of lung cancer are also increasing throughout the city because of the high level of air pollution.

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Bank shot

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Hear, hear! The first Los Angeles Carrom Open is hereby called to order (via Hollywood Masala):

First Prize $501, Entry Fee: $5 Per Person

11335 East 183rd Street
Cerritos, CA 90703
(562) 865-9892

All preliminary rounds will Start at 10:00 AM on Saturday, June 4, 2005
Quarterfinals, Semi finals and Finals will be on Sunday, June 5, 2005

A striking idea. I have a feeling that ‘Big Middle Finger’ Nooyi and her super-slippery talcum powder have this one in the pocket.

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“He bowled left-arm orthodox spin with great accuracy…”

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From my much-beloved section on Wikipedia which highlights new articles:

Did you know…Palwankar Baloo was a Dalit (also called Untouchables) who helped break down the Indian caste system with his prowess at cricket?

Another fave line, apposite for this day of good-natured one-upmanship about regional pride:

A Hindu club in Poona challenged the Europeans to a cricket match, creating a dilemma over whether or not to include the obviously talented Baloo in their side. The Brahmins in the Hindu side were against it, but some Telugu members argued for his inclusion…

w00t progressive Southies! 😉 Continue reading →

A hot slice of Freshizza

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What is a Freshizza? A Fresh-pizza of course. It has the type of hip, cool sounding name that will entice young people with a disposable income to eat it. Right? I mean Mentos were known as “the freshmaker” and they were cool. Will Smith was a nobody until he became the Fresh Prince. The Hindustan Times reports:

Pizza Hut, the world’s largest pizza chain, on Wednesday launched a new product, Freshizza. The launch was marked by an innovative cookery show hosted by the fresh face of Bollywood actor Zayed Khan and food critic Rashmi Uday Singh.

The highlight of the show included a special demonstration of the pizza dough being made fresh at the restaurant in Janpath, New Delhi. The new crust is neither too thick nor too thin. It has delightfully soft texture and uses a uniquely flavoured tomato sauce, Mozzarella cheese, combined with an exciting range of toppings and garnished with orange Cheddar cheese.

Wow. Janpath must have been rocking in an orgy of excitement as that dough was worked over. I can only imagine. Where can I get me some Freshizza? Apparently google.com hasn’t yet heard of it. Neither has the official Pizza Hut website. Folks, I think Delhi has finally arrived as a world-class city, a trend-setter.

It is the result of months of pioneering effort by the Indian and international research and development team. India is the first market to launch this product.”

Holy crap. This is like the Pizza equivalent of the Manhattan Project. I’m glad major Indian news media is covering this. Continue reading →

Acid-washed genes

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To those bored with M.I.A. hype, pretend I’m drawing a cloak of invisibility around this post. Pretend it was hidden somewhere far, far away where nobody would ever read it. In other words, my personal blog 😉

First up, Maya Arulpragasam’s dad and album namesake got a few lines in a 1995 book called Tigers of Lanka. The book describes his Sri Lankan escapades after training in explosives in Lebanon (via Nittewa):

One of the first three Tamils to go to Lebanon was Arul Pragasam, alias Arular. He reached Kannady, also in Vavuniya, in 1976 with a view to settle down and establish a base to woo the educated class into joining the EROS… Arular, with his Kannady farm barely 20 miles from Pirabaharan’s hideout, met the LTTE leader several times beginning September 1976. With his degree in engineering and newly-acquired knowledge in Lebanon, Arular passed on to Pirabaharan ideas about making explosives. In turn, Pirabaharan agreed to provide incendiary chemicals to Arular.

Once a LTTE courier carrying nitric acid to the Kannady farm was caught by the police after he could not give credible explanation about his presence in the Vavuniya forest. Arular, who came rushing from Jaffna on hearing about the arrest, told the police that he had ordered the acid to pour it into snake pits. Mercifully, the police were convinced by the explanation and released the courier. But Pirabaharan would not leave any evidence; at the first opportunity he had the police station raided and all documents related to the arrest were taken away…

Second, Turbanhead points us to some shaky handheld video clips of M.I.A. performing at Coachella. Live performances, like drinking, rarely look good in daylight, but Punk Ass Bitch reports that M.I.A. got a rare Coachella encore:

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What would Hanuman do?

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I have continued to read Slate’s dispatches feature this week which is titled “The Monkey God’s Army.” Despite criticism from a few SM readers on some finer points in the article, it has remained an absorbing read, and there are still two installments left. Rather than quote from the article itself (which I urge you to read) I will instead quote from The Fray. The Fray is Slate’s discussion board that is often full of gems. Slate editors recommended this posting from The Fray:

Hanuman is worshipped by a lot of people who have no affiliation with the Dal. The very phrase – Monkey God – sounds awful! Hanuman, happened to be a monkey. He is worshipped for his devotion to Ram. For his supreme love for the right way, regardless of how much pain he would have to bear. Not because he was a monkey. But because of who he was despite being a monkey. There is a very rich tapestry of philosophy and culture – to demean all of that in this manner is disgusting. It shows a complete lack of understanding and sensitivity towards Indian culture.

I have no qualms with being harsh with either the RSS or the Bajrang Dal. But if the KKK had decided to call themselves Jesus’s army, to belittle Jesus would have been as stupid and pointless as belittling Hanuman in this context.

The title reflects a racist insensitive view of Hindiuism and I, for one, would strongly urge Slate to post an apology and a retraction of the title.

Then we find this one which curiously wasn’t recommended by Slate editors:

Obviously, this newspaper editor is an ignorant fool. He doesn’t even know the Vedic Scriptures which flourished in India starting at least some 5,500 years ago, but are actually infinitely prehistorical.

For the education… let me offer some barebone background information. The last “Golden Age” or SatyaYuga, some 4,000,000 years ago, was the Age when dinosaurs also roamed the earth. The Bible also touched on that when it said, “when Men were giants.” (Some species of man were). What you know call the denizens of the “intermediate world,” i.e., animals, plants birds, and the filth-born, also speak the common language on earth, and understood each other. Meaning, an animal can speak to man, and vice versa and understood each other. The personification of the animals, the sky-ranging creatures like the birds, as well as plants were as intelligent as man.

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Bong on Bongs

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Tatonnement pokes fun at fellow Bengalis, who may just lay claim to being the French of India, Pondicherry be damned:

Q) What do you call three Bengali men?
A) Two Political Parties…

We are actually a race of well-bred intellectuals interested in art, culture and the finer things of life. Gentlemen who watch cricket and… What’s that you say? Dravid is a better captain!?! …

For Bengalis more than other communities, the size of their immediate cohort almost completely determines their behaviour. The average Bengali is a pack animal… The sight of other werewolves is just the spark he needs and Dr. Bruce Bandopadhyay finds himself answering the call of the wild – transforming into a green-skinned monster… laying waste to every heavy vehicle… [the] Bonglomeration… is a sight to behold…

The Bonglomeration has risen in the past to fend of attacks from such savage races as the British and the Punjabis, who made the mistake of underestimating the capacity for violence in the Bengali, thanks probably to impressions formed based on Bengalis they personally knew…  remember that however mild-mannered your Bengali colleague may seem, do not provoke him in the presence of the Bonglomeration. Your life is forfeit if you do…

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Witless in Seattle (updated)

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Here’s one blogger’s reaction to desi American star Indra Nooyi criticizing Dubya’s foreign policy:

America’s Parasites: Parasites feed on their hosts while providing no discernible good in most cases. I can’t think of any other name for folks who enjoy freedom and self-acualization in the United States then turn their back on us — befuddingly, after significant but remunerative sacrifice and challenge that they were FREE not to take.

Translation: there’s ‘them’ and then there’s ‘us.’ Immigrants are ‘them,’ no matter how long they’ve been in the U.S. (nearly 30 years), no matter how educated (Yale), no matter whether they’re U.S. citizens (yes). Never mind that we need them to plug our skilled labor shortage: we’re doing them a favor by letting them in.

This East Indian-American woman is at the top of her game professionally in a country that celebrates women achievers much UNLIKE her country of origin. BUT she is not satisfied! She must disparage the United States for not doing enough to coddle the corrupt, morally and financially bankrupt ‘international community’. Priceless!!!

Archaic usage of ‘East Indian,’ check. Ignorance of India’s female achievers, check. Multiple exclamation points, check. Assumption that she’s a parasitic economic refugee, check. (Nooyi graduated from IIM-Calcutta and worked at Johnson & Johnson India before ascending to CFO of Pepsi.)

Ignoring the substance of her argument to unleash a personal attack on her nationality and gender, check. Translation: uppity immigrant bitch needs to go back to where she came from.

Would he make the same points if Nooyi were an Englishman in New York? Would he make the same points of fellow conservative Arnold Schwarzenegger?

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