For my 16th birthday, we had a sheet cake from Sam’s Club, and maybe a couple of balloons. It was small with just family, and a few of my school friends. It wasn’t elaborate, but in those days, we didn’t have MTV to show us how ‘the others’ celebrate their Sweet 16. Maybe that’s why I have a sick, sick obsession with watching MTV’s reality TV show Sweet 16, where in the span of a half an hour segment you see thousands and thousands of dollars being thrown down for a measly birthday. From the SM news tab, we’ve now learned desi teen girls haven’t missed the wrath of this reality TV show either.
…Dr. Srinivasa Rao Kothapalli, a prominent cardiologist in Beaumont, Tex., is more than willing to relinquish his checkbook. His daughter Priya turned 16 earlier this month, and she is in the throes of planning a joint birthday-graduation party with her elder sister, Divya, 18. “If you can afford to have a grand celebration, then why not,” said Dr. Kothapalli, who immigrated to the United States from India in the mid-1980’s. “It’s the American way. You work hard and you play hard.”Their Bollywood-themed party for 500 guests will be held in the family’s backyard — all 4Å“ acres, behind the 10,000-square-foot house. The Format, their favorite band, will perform. And they will make their grand entrance on litters, during an elaborate procession led by elephants…”We both want to lose three pounds,” said Priya, who received a Mercedes convertible and an assortment of diamond jewelry for her birthday. Her sister’s graduation gift package included a Bentley, diamonds and two homes in India. [link]
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p>Can you believe this ridiculous consumption? Elephants, diamonds, Bentleys and homes? If this is what they got for their Sweet 16/18, can you imagine the weddings? I can’t wait till the show airs, which unfortunately, has no links up yet on MTV-but I’m sure the mutineers will keep us posted. So let’s see, there were first those two desi girls that secretly partied, Kaavya gets half a million to write a ‘plagiarized’ book before turning 17, and now, we have these girls. Sigh. Such a contrast from the girls, girls, girls earlier this month.
Priya added, “It’s pathetic when people suck up.” Still, dealing with sycophantic classmates and a bit of teasing is a small price to pay for the spotlight. “We both love attention–that’s one of our main motives for having the party,” Divya said. “The more attention the better.” [link]
At least I have something in common with the girls from Sweet 16…I’m kidding. KIDDING. 
Before everyone goes off on how spoiled these girls are and how pathetic this show is, I just want to say that I can’t wait to watch it =)
Hell yeah I’m going to watch it. But not before I get the tubes tied. 😉 You notice how grown men love the show??? And not in a pervy way – I think they may be secretly jealous of the tiaras and frills…. as they hurl insults at the t.v.!!!! hee hee
As far as judging the lavish spending, it may not be my cup of tea, but I don’t care anymore – live and let live.
I would love to crash that. /Sweet 16s are the new weddings.
ps. I’m having a party this weekend and you’re NOT invited 😉 It feels sooooo good to exclude people and make up for my insecurities!! tee hee
ooh, you didn’t mention that it’s on in one hour — wednesdays at 10 eastern. i gottaq check this out. disgusting! (ahem)
Precious!!
I’ve been discussing this show with girlfriends all day today over email. Kinda disgusting though at the same time I wonder, if you have all that shitload of money what would you do with it? I’m all about spurging if I have the money and there is no making a dent in my stash but jeez teach some humility to these bitches. I can relate to the spoiling dad but he screwed up with raising his daughters to be like this so early on. I mean let them discover the joys of being bitchs all on their own when it’s earned! I have no desire to watch a bunch of 16 year olds. Maybe I’m too old but I have no draw to MTV at all.
Unbelievable. And to think that the parents, who are of Indian origin, encourage this kind of senseless expenditure is beyond belief. Seriously I just pity them for trying to be like the Hilton sisters.
Hmmm. And we wonder why so many Indians loathe NRIs…The whole thread contains more than a whiff of Marie Antoinette.
Oh, that was hilarious!
Anyway, who really cares about the spoilt brats? But, I am going to watch the show nonetheless!Ehehehe…
trying? 🙂
disgusting.
very clever.
It’s good to see one of our families espousing American values and uplifting the community. I, for one, would be delighted to house-sit for one of the young ladies’ houses in India – mow the lawn, walk the dogs, polish the doorknobs – all without smiling, of course. I cannot imagine a greater pleasure than serving those who serve our community so well.
I only hope that when they arrive at their party in diamond-studded glory, they do so on the backs of Indian elephants. For such fine young ladies to ride in on African elephants would be a disgrace indeed.
And such humility to boot!
Does any remember when MTV used to play music videos.
Oh come on guys, this isn’t just an NRI thing – there’s plenty of obscene wealth spent in absurd ways here in India, in families that are RIs wonly.
In fact, Star World just started airing The Simple Life here, and I bet it’s only a matter of time before someone catches on and starts a similar show with two Indian women.
A Bollywood-themed party.
How fucking original. It’s time Indians moved beyond this silly c*nting obsession for parties.
Kids are spoilt the world over and unless I want to go on a savage teenage-murder-kill cardiologisticide spree with a hunting knife, I find it best if I just don’t think about it.
I’m (honestly) having a big party for the first time this summer and you’re all invited. Booze will come from a big barrel of BB’s special brew, there will be a trough of munchies and the only animals present will be a mangy fox and a fat pigeon. But I can guarantee better tunes than these girlies.
They will be dressed up in ghagra/choli and will perform an item number for us at the end of the night, correct?
Yay! Bongsy is having a party with bollywood dancing fox and pigeon!
razib-y….come, now. we shouldn’t jump to conclusions. let us have compassion for these girls. we’re all human, we shouldn’t judge them.
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.
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I KEED! I KEED! 😀
No no no. NO! No Bollywood at my party. It’s a Bollyfree zone, except when I spin Dum Maro Dum and toke on my four pipe sheesha. Then lecherous girls pinch my bum and push me in front of everyone saying, “ip you dance por one mineet, I vill gib you one money.”
Don’t encourage them Neha. That fox doesn’t need an excuse to break the silence. That may be too subtle a pun, so: As for that pigeon, she’s just a cock tease but I can’t resist a tasty bird.
Actually, is it wrong that I feel a slight frisson of excitement when thinking about a fat pigeon dressed like a nauch girl?
Don’t answer that, I know I can’t have a relationship with a pigeon. It would be wrong; I have a girlfriend.
sure, the sisters have all they could’ve ever wanted….but they live in BEAUMONT, TX!!! let me tell you something….my dad’s first job teaching was at lamar university. my mama made him move really quick. the air smells like sulfur, and they’re not too far from Vidor, TX….home to many KKK members. good times. i’d rather live in a shack in NYC, DC, Chicago, ‘Frisco, or even out here in san anto before living in bungalow in beaumont.
and i don’t have cable….keep me posted!
no really taht was the best part of the article. LOL only one bentley. god, this show is sooooo over the top its ridiculous.
i don’t think it’s fair to fully place the blame on these kids though. parenting is easier when you can buy them whatever they want to keep them happy.
Aw, c’mon. Most of us don’t have the ability (let alone inclination) to live like this family, so any general NRI loathing based on stories like this is unjustified.
razib-y….come, now. we shouldn’t jump to conclusions. let us have compassion for these girls. we’re all human, we shouldn’t judge them.
if they enjoy it, that’s fine. i was just expressing a reflexive response.
give me kv any day over these kids.
@23, deepa
on the contrary, i think dq was spot on. though not in the way you interpreted it i think. i wasn’t being sarcastic in #12…
All gandhian instincts aside, us brown folk have not done too shabbily for ourselves in the vulgar display of wealth traditions. As Madurai Vivekan put it, this is not limited to NRIs. Anybody remember the cover of India Today (the american version) with the little kiddie and her maybach from daddy? I think that was for her 21st. That put these pikers to shame.
Lets us not get into the wedding celebrations (jayalalitha’s display in chennai for her “adopted daughter” a few years ago comes to mind).
i know you were, silly atheist. don’t mind me, i was failing at being funny– i’ve turned in to the patron saint of potential plagiarists here at SM…fyi, here’s MY reflexive rxn to this…show.
Can I have their telephone number please. I need some love (and money to go with it will be helpful too). Heck I will even go to med school to please papa Srinivas Rao Kothapalli so I am good enough, for at least one, of his daughters.
heh heh. No one can accuse the lady of not having a good sense of humour!
Are you people serious? You actually want to watch this?
It’s a free country, and I am free to be as repulsed as possible.
I’m with you, Saheli.
As much as I want to h8 on these girls, I can’t. If they have the money to ball like that and get on Mtv, so be it.
It’s easy to stare at the tube and pass judgement. It’s a little tougher to step back and acknowledge that this is a magnified expression of what seems to be an increasing trend amongst us. How many times have you gone to an Indian party and seen people jockeying for attention. Girls going out of there way to give dirty looks and make others feel inferior, guys making a big scene about their table service… Which, btw “playas”, is only supposed to be for 4 people not 20. It’s not a hotel room at SASA… What happened to the good ole days when we moonlighted as thugs on clubs nights. It was so much cheaper.
My personal fav. is the quote from the full article: “Â…her party would be a ridiculously lavish, invitation-only affair, inspired by the film “Moulin Rouge.” There would be can-can dancers, a fleet of stretch limousines for friends and family and a $1,500 cake. I wanted something with a lot of substance,” said Sophie, now 17, without a hint of irony, “not just a regular party but pure entertainment for everyone.”
So you know how every airhead has a catchphrase these days?
Here’s mine. I find myself using it a lot:
“I want to slap the brown right of them!!!
Feel free to borrow it. I’m not really about the American Dream.
Um, that should read “right off them”
The catchphrase (TM) isn’t used to being written.
You think it’s justified to loathe/stereotype NRI’s based on these really outlandish examples?
As others point out, there are also examples of disgusting excess practiced by a small percentage of very rich Indians in India.
Or, if you mean something different, please tell me what it is. Thanks.
Cicatrix, I think that should be “catchphrase (c),” rather than “catchphrase (tm)” — and if we borrow the catchphrase, do we have to return it? Can we capitalize on it to the tune of hundreds of thousands of dollars? Because I just loooove your work.
what if priya gets married to a desi version of federline…now that would be worth watching…
It’s excessive but spending 200K on a sweet 16 is nothing compared to dropping $78 mil on your daughters wedding.
Though I guess spending big on weddings is more desi than spending lots on sweet 16s.
oh wait, maybe it is catchphrase ™ after all — since the idea is that “every airhead has a catchphrase.” sorry, never mind.
hell yea, diamonds and bentleys bitch!
if you got the dough, spend it. anyone who says otherwise… when you’re earning it, we’ll see who’s saving…
i don’t really care so much about the stupid hoes, but the father is a pimp for dishing out his dollars like that.
so what if his kids are spoiled… when you’re old and gray, you got no one else to drop bills on. maybe your moms and pops, but they’ll probably tell you “keep your paisa beta, thank you so much for offering” or something.
the only thing that threw me off… do cardiologists seriously pull that much bank? he has to be making upwards of 400K-500/yr. especially if one of the hoes is robbing in a bentley…
holla
yes, i mean something different. it is this:
what these ppl are to you, you are to most indians. i thought that was what dq meant by that comment, and this sentiment i agree with. and the marie antoniette? the “simple cake” you mention above. ok, the analogy may not be exact, but you get the drift.
it is not that indians think you are exactly like these sweet sixteens. much the same way you dont distinguish between kennedys and dr. srinivasa rao kothapalli (the father in this story).
it is just that nris don’t recognize their privilege either, and often their actions are seen as abuse of privilege. the point is that the same prism you see these rich kids, indians use it to see nris (and of course the richie riches in india too).
Yeah, I was wondering that too 🙂
when you’re old and gray and filty rich…. You could buy maybe buy vaccines for Africa?
It’s easy to stare at the tube and pass judgement
Well, actually, I find it difficult to even contemplate turning the tube on in this case.
But a word about this “judgement” business. There’s judgement as in standing before God and answering for your actions. There’s judgement as in speaking with the voice of the law and the state. There’s judgement as in issuing contests, prizes, designations, and grant money. None of those are really appropriate here.
But we all “judge people” all the time, and we have to. I have only 17-18 waking hours in my day. I have only so much time to read, write, watch, converse, and interact. I have only so many people who’s personalities and interests I can store in my brain, and whose souls I can try to relate to. There is a constant process of elimination going on, and a constant process of search. Repulsion and attraction. “Am I interested in talking to this person? Yes. Keep listening, keep talking. Let them reveal themselves.” How much? How little. This is status. I am constantly assigning status to people, exactly like a processor prioritizing jobs. It’s not a judgement of moral value or worth as a human being. It’s nota queue for who gets in the bunker when the bombs go off. But it is a judgement, however temporary. For every open minded acceptance of possibility and potential that I apply to a person, I am unintentionally eliminating the opportunity to apply that same open mindedness to 10,000 other awesome people.
Attraction and repulsion are fundamentally gut-reaction judgements. Part of growing and maturing is learning to reign those in, refine them, control them, and override them. But judgements we must still make. I firmly believe you can train yourself to like somethings more and other things less, just as my parents trained me to adore fried bitter melon. I try to keep as open mind as possible, to find in every new person I encounter that which is attractive and endearing. But there are too many people who get ignored by dumb luck, and too many people who earn my time in ways they don’t deserve through dumb luck. So once in a while–not too often, I hope–I proactively acknowledge repulsion and a complete lack of desire to further interact with another person. Is that a judgement call? Yes. Usually it’s hard. But some people make it easy, and that’s not my fault. Every now and then someone willingly, willfully, happily puts out a piece of themselves into the public, and that display is so repulsive I can relax and easily, easily say, “You know what, there is nothing here that I wish to try to admire or learn from or enjoy or be inspired by. I move along.” To not be honest about that would make a lie of all the appreciation and inspiration and interest I apply to so many other persons and topics.
Honestly, I’m sure my opinion is utterly worthless to them, which helps me to say that freely. And if they stumble upon this comment one day and are actually hurt by it, I wouldn’t mind if it makes them think a little about how they’ve chosen to spread around their wealth. I have no problem with wealth or spending (though you got to wonder about all the diseased hearts that were squeezed and pumped of earnings just to say alive–ah, yes, the beautiful service of practicing medicine!), but the whole point of luxury spending is an indication of taste, and the whole point of indicating taste is to win other people’s agreement and admiration and build social status. I refuse to contribute to that goal in this case.
I can accept that if the Indians in question actually are less privileged than me, but I find that even Indians who are more privileged than me see all NRI’s as being better off than them. That I find very unfair.
The difference here is that I actually have a clear idea about how the lifestyle/privilege of these specific girls differs from mine – whereas the “Indians” you speak of a) apply their conclusions based on observing some NRI’s to all NRI’s and b) often don’t actually have a clear idea about the “privilege” they are assuming – i.e. they hear a number in dollars, convert it into rupees, and assume an NRI is making the equivalent of an astronomical number in rupees while having a cost of living which is the same as in India.
Example? BTW, I could turn your statement around and say that Indians in India don’t recognize their “privileges.” Family support is invaluable. Time spent with grandparents on a frequent basis is irreplaceable. If you want to talk about lifestyle, I know plenty of people who don’t realize that it is not common practice here for middle-class families to have servants (cheap, exploited, etc.) to take a load off the housecleaning, etc.
What I’m saying is that I don’t think that there is an excuse for Indians in India to extrapolate the fantastic stories of the privilege and wealth of some NRI’s to the whole NRI community and to “loathe” them. Not that it’s going to stop them.
Human nature is human nature. You can’t knock the brown out of that.
I don’t have cable, but I’ve heard of this show. Pardon if this sounds condescending or judgmental….
but WTF? I am embarrassed by this entire family. No, I am embarrassed for them. The sad thing is, these girls are only a slighty more exaggerated portrait of so many I know. ugh.
Funny, I’ve had an Indian relative sigh about my “simple birthday cakes.” To which I replied, “but you got to see our grandmother every day.”
Which would you rather have?
Thank you espressa. SOMEONE said it.
What I intended with no. 8 was a reference not only to these Beaumont loons, but those of us who are weirdly gleeful about the show and the prospect of watching it. Like it or not, from the perspective of most Indians, we and the loons are in the same category of obscene spenders. The prospect of someone from India reading some of the posts on this thread fills me, as an NRI, with embarrassment. Enjoying this circus, given our collective privilege, is akin to participating in it.
Marie Antoinette lived on a fake farm, wore sheperdess outfits, pranced around with sheep, playing at being rustic while French peasants starved. If we who are privileged do not find the behaviour of these people sickening, in light of the poverty in India, how are we better than La Antoinette?
Mind you, I like Byte’s cake interpretation better.
Someone please address issues like these;
Pakistani woman, jailed for being raped in Saudi Arabia, deported
http://sabbah.biz/mt/archives/2006/04/26/pakistani-woman-jailed-for-being-raped-in-saudi-arabia-deported/
http://www.khaleejtimes.com/DisplayArticle.asp?xfile=data/subcontinent/2006/April/subcontinent_April924.xml§ion=subcontinent&col=
There are numerous incidences of these kinds are taking place in Saudi.
To people who begrudge ostentious display of wealth
Come on people
Indians (living in US) were missing Hilton sisters, now they need not be embarassed about absence of symbols of modern hedonism.
I wish this was shown in India, I would have watched for sure.
Regards