Monthly Archives: March 2007

More Mature Macaca Molested Montessori Minor

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The jury has returned in the Lina Sinha case, the now 40 year old former Principal of the Montessori School of New York. The verdict? Guilty.

The former principal of a Manhattan private school was convicted yesterday of having sex with one of her students in a classroom when he was about 13 and she was about 30. The jury deadlocked on charges that the principal… also had sex with a second student about five years after she seduced the first boy. [Link]

There’s actually a ton of desiness in here. Prosecutors brought up the fact that she lived with her parents to depict her as a sheltered woman, hence her interest in much younger guys:

Prosecutors portrayed Ms. Sinha as a sheltered woman who lived with her parents in the town house housing the school, which her family owned, until she was in her late 30s. [Link]

How did she live with her parents in the building the school was set in? Simple. They own the school. She not only lived with mom and dad, but she worked in the family business as well:

Sinha has been a teacher for 16 years at the Montessori International School of New York, which was established by her parents in 1969 … The parents own two similar schools in the city. [Link]

Interestingly, reviews of the school are very harsh and negative, particularly on the family owned aspect (to be fair, these were written after the scandal broke and may not be accurate):

It is a completely creepy school. It is family-run, and there seems to be absolutely no accountability. Parents are discouraged from being involved with the school and the teachers; it’s unclear what the teachers’ credentials are… we were quite traumatized by the school. The graduates of the school … seem to be brainwashed, as if all their personality had been bled out of them — it is very very strange. [Link]
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The Tappet Brothers advise Hindu car lovers

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My friend Sanjay decided to have a little fun this past week with “Click” and “Clack”, the brothers who host that wonderful radio show Car Talk (that we’ve ALL listened to at least once on a weekend morning). I should clarify that although his question was funny, he wasn’t entirely joking. Thus, it is a legitimate question, the response to which might be quite informative and useful for some of our Hindu readers who also love their cars. Here is Sanjay’s question:

Hey guys,

I have a macabre question. I’m both Hindu and a car enthusiast. Hindus customarily get cremated when we die. I’m putting together my will and would like to require my ashes to be deposited into the gas tank of my favorite car. Then, I want the car driven down my favorite river road in California. This is how I want my ashes poetically spread. My question is: Will this also poetically destroy the car? If so, I need to make sure the car is then driven directly to a Pick-N-Pull.

Thanks guys,

Sanjay Shah
Venice, CA… [Link]

You can listen to the Tappet Brother’s on-air advice here. Hurry though because the link will only work until the next episode airs. After that you’ll have to download it as a podcast.

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55Friday: The “I Feel Fine” Edition

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oh, hell no.jpg Set adrift on memory bliss…

My screen says, “Please replace this generic password.”

Either my kappipaal hasn’t kicked in yet or I’ve got a severe case of Spring fever (perhaps cowbell could cure it?). I can’t focus, let alone devise a password with 12 letters, one symbol, two numbers and an exclamation point. One of my favorite co-workers stops by my desk, with an eyebrow raised.

“You look lost.”

“Can you like, pick a password for me? Like, passwords are hard.”

“Like math?”

This is our favorite inside joke, this reference to Barbie’s great fustercluck of ’92. Still, despite legendary vacuous utterances, Barbie is beloved not just by me but also his six-year old daughter, because as we three agree, them Bratz dollz are slatterns.

“Sure I’ll pick something for you.” He seems serious.

“You like music. Use a song lyric.”, he instructs, before striding in to his office, which is next door to my desk. Then he pops his head back out…

“I used to use ‘It’s the end of the world as we know it, and I feel fine’ as mine.”

“R.E.M. fan, eh?”

He smiles at me in response. We’re nearly the same age; we were both dorky loners who probably spent all our free time between classes with our headphones on, tuning out the world. We both remember how the release of “Green” in 1988, during the fall quarters of our Freshman/Junior year in high school defined a moment, a mood. Continue reading →

Animals, Mendicants, and Mumbai

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Earlier this week I went on a very long rant about this Dana Parsons article in the LA Times on the sex trafficking of Nepali girls. Today Dana Parsons’ column takes sensationalist trash to a whole other level. Normally I wouldn’t subject anyone to yet another lecture on primitivism, but I think this particular piece is too precious to keep to myself.

Parsons’ article concerns his attempt at something called “perspective.” He received an email recently from his cousin who is on business in Mumbai, filled with details on the horrible living conditions there. Because of this said email, Parsons now feels a sense of enlightenment and gratitude at the fact that he doesn’t have to live in the squalor that his cousin describes.

You can already guess where this is going. The column outlines the horrors of Mumbai, as narrated by Parsons’ cousin:

There are animals everywhere. Common to see dogs lying in areas by the road. I don’t know how they survive, but I’m told animals are sacred and you watch out for them. There are cows wandering through the streets.
We saw several naked people. Not always children. Several relieving themselves.
Our driver pulled over near some marshy area that I took to be rice fields. I got the camera out and was ready to shoot when we saw that the driver was relieving himself at the side of the car.

Ok, we get it — animals, nudity, and public urination, oh my! How is this substantive news by any standard, and more importantly, how can anyone find these details enlightening, as Mr. Parsons claims?

Truth be told, I’m really not surprised that there are people who view the world the way that Dana Parsons does. What I do find upsetting is that the LA Times is carrying this trash and passing it off as journalism. Then again, what else should I expect — time and time again I have been appalled at their international coverage. I will concede, however, that the LA Times is good for covering a few things, namely: state and local politics, the Hollywood industry, and most importantly, a certain college basketball team that’s going to rout Florida on Saturday. But even if the LAT has no intention of upgrading their international coverage, it’s time for them to cut Dana Parsons off from covering anything related to South Asia. He really needs to be stopped. Continue reading →

Just Say NO to Faux.

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Sanjaya. No.

Sanjaya-kutta,

Why?

You make it so hard to cheer you on, when you do ugly things with your pretty, pretty tresses. It’s just not okay. At all. Don’t you care about the greater desi community? How will THEY be affected by your reckless decision to have bad hair? You represent our hopes and assimilative aspirations– be careful out there. We’re counting on you and if you fail, we will never forgive you. Ever. Unless you go to medical school.

Sanjaya Malakar performed “Bath Water.” Randy Jackson said “Listen, the hairdo is definitely interesting. I like the kind of Mohawk look.” Paula Abdul said “To watch it on stage and not go for it, it’s kind of like we’re going ah, come on.“ Simon Cowell said “I presume there was no mirror in your dressing room tonight.” Sanjaya replied “You’re just jealous that you couldn’t pull it off.” Simon said “I couldn’t I agree. Sanjaya, I don’t think it matters anymore what we say, actually. I genuinely don’t. I think you are in your own universe and if people like you, good luck.” [linkosity]

Still, I wish you only the best– I just do so with my eyes closed, until someone tells me it’s safe to open them again.

Sanjaya zindabad,

A K K A Continue reading →

A Rather Cheery Article in the NYT on the Decline of Sikh Turbans

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The Sikh community has survived wars with the Mughals and then the British, the terrible bloodbath of the Partition, and then 1984 and its aftermath.

But according to a recent New York Times article, what is really weakening the defining symbol of Sikh community in India is just… well, laziness:

Like many young Sikhs, he found the turban a bother. It got in the way when he took judo classes. Washing his long hair was time-consuming, as was the morning ritual of winding seven yards of cloth around his head. It was hot and uncomfortable. (link)

And:

The dwindling numbers of turban wearers reflects less a loss of spirituality than encroaching Westernization and the accelerating pace of Indian life, Jaswinder Singh said.

He puts the start of rapid decline at the mid-1990s, as India began liberalizing its economy, more people began traveling abroad and satellite television arrived in the villages of Punjab. Working mothers are too rushed to help their sons master the skill of wrapping a turban, he said, and increasingly they just shrug and let them cut their hair.

“Everyone is working harder to buy themselves bigger cars,” he said. “They don’t have time to teach their children about the Sikh heroes. Boys take film stars as their idols instead.” (link)

Anecdotally, talking to cousins and other relatives, I’ve had the same impression: young Sikhs in India see the turban and beard as 1) hot and 2) unfashionable. It’s also interesting in this passage that busy working mothers are cited as part of the problem. (Quick poll for the Sikhs reading this: who taught you how to tie your pagri? Many Sikh men I know were taught by women in their families.)

Though she does have quotes from people who are unhappy about the phenomenon, I must confess that on an emotional level I do find Amelia Gentleman’s article a shade too cheery considering how much anxiety this trend causes amongst traditional Sikhs. Indeed, as the defining symbol of the Sikh tradition declines, it’s hard not to think of the core of the religion as declining as well.

Oddly, one of the factors named here — India’s hot climate — is less of a factor in places like the U.S., the U.K., and Canada. Continue reading →

Further Conversational Excursions with our Community’s Future

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orly-42517.jpg sexxy5@biPrinc3ss sup

GujuHottiee120586: um…who the f r u??

sexxy5@biPrinc3ss kapila…its a new sn

GujuHottiee120586: what happened to NjDe$iQTpie

sexxy5@biPrinc3ss cant use it rite now

GujuHottiee120586: ???

sexxy5@biPrinc3ss remember that guy we met at bb las wknd

GujuHottiee120586: u mean U met…he looked like bert lol

sexxy5@biPrinc3ss eat me

GujuHottiee120586: yah wat abt him

sexxy5@biPrinc3ss he wont leave me alone!

GujuHottiee120586: wat do u mean

sexxy5@biPrinc3ss he keeps IMing n hes so anoying

GujuHottiee120586: so block his furry ass…don change ur sn n confuse ur frenz lol thats not very feministe of u

sexxy5@biPrinc3ss nooo…I cant…soooo meen Continue reading →

The Supremes and Arranged Marriage

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The Supreme Court has been asked to overturn a case arguing that under certain circumstances the fear of an abusive arranged marriage can be grounds for asylum.

The plaintiff’s request for asylum granted on appeal by the Second Circuit which argued that where forced marriages are valid and backed by law, the plaintiff “might well be persecuted in China – in the form of lifelong, involuntary marriage.”

The government is now asking the Supremes to overturn this verdict because they are afraid it would make America a haven for women fleeing abusive forced marriages. To be fair, they’re saying this is a decision that should be taken by Congress, and not the courts, but they also warn that this could lead to a flood of women in arranged marriages applying for asylum.

At the center of the case is a woman from China, not India:

At age 19, Gao was sold by her mother for the equivalent of $2,200 to become the wife of a man in her home village who, Gao says, will physically abuse her. [Link]

She was granted asylum by the appeals court, which extended the grounds under which one could traditionally apply for asylum:Approximately 60% of marriages worldwide are arranged

To qualify, an individual must show a well-founded fear of persecution on account of race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion.

In most cases, the persecution is meted out by a government. But the Second Circuit said in the Gao case that persecution could also stem from a personal relationship in combination with government-enforced customs.

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May I be the Mother of 100 Sons…

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…for they shall all be spermy. (Thanks Anonymous tipsters!)

My Stewie-like plan to flood the world with my genetics is even MORE likely to be successful than I previously fantasized. HA! From MSNBC:

U.S. women who eat a lot of beef while pregnant give birth to sons who grow up to have low sperm counts, researchers reported Tuesday.
They believe pesticides, hormones or contaminants in cattle feed may be to blame. Chemicals can build up in the fat of animals that eat contaminated feed or grass, and cattle are routinely given hormones to boost their growth.
“In sons of ‘high beef consumers’ (more than seven beef meals a week), sperm concentration was 24.3 percent lower,” the researchers wrote in their report, published in the journal Human Reproduction…
Of the 51 men whose mothers remembered eating the most beef, 18 percent had sperm counts classified by the World Health Organization as sub-fertile.

Score ANOTHER one for Team Vegetarian. I’ve never TOUCHED red meat. w00t! Continue reading →

Kal Penn, UPenn, Wait…what happened??

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kal.jpg

GujuHottiee120586: wuz up, ho?

NjDe$iQTpie: who u callin a ho, ho?

GujuHottiee120586: watevr

NjDe$iQTpie: OMFG, i totally forgot to tell u!

GujuHottiee120586: ??

NjDe$iQTpie: u r gonna DIE when u hear this

GujuHottiee120586: wtf? if its that big a deal u wouldve texted me. u need to stop w the frapuchinos lol

NjDe$iQTpie: biach, please…im desi, its all about the chai tea latte

GujuHottiee120586: like thats keepin it real…such a dumb name for a drink..i mean…is NOT a latte

NjDe$iQTpie: N E WAYZ

GujuHottiee120586: hurry up…my momz like tivod koffee with karan and shes going to watch it in like 2 secs

NjDe$iQTpie: FINE. ok u know how ur parents wanted u to go to penn soo bad n u were all, “hellz no, i aint goin to college n livin at home” n they were all sad n shit?

Continue reading →