The Washington Redskins’ cheerleaders recently performed in Hyderabad Bangalore, during an Indian Premier League cricket match. A Washington Post reporter took the following photo:
(Click on the photo to see the faces of the men a bit more clearly.)
There is also a detailed Washington Post article about the event here. Also, we wrote about the rival Twenty20 cricket league, the ICL, here; cheerleaders seemed to be a part of the mix there as well.
I dont know about others but whenever I see a shot of those imported-cheerleaders cheering at the T20 game, I cringe. I feel embarrased to see that on TV, I havent psycho-analyzed my feelings about this, but what I know is that it is a very unsettling image for me.
“Dinesh, these cheerleaders’ skins aren’t red!” “Shut up, Raj. Just keep smiling! It’ll be a lonnnnng time before we see hot, sexy half-naked women in a public place, up close again.”
wah, wah.
Gori, Gori, Mella Chori, Chori
“You know Shankar, I always wondered what full-on cultural colonialism with racial overtones would actually look like up close. Now I know.”
“You’re right, Bala. What about our own homegrown pom-pom squads? What are they to feel, huh?”
Can’t resist one more.
“Ramu, is this what Kishore Mahbubani had in mind when he says ‘a turbulent era of de-Westernization has begun in Asia’ in his new book?”
“Possibly. But remember Mohan, he also said that India’s propensity to keep both eyes and ears open, and engage with other civilizations will eventually situate it equidistant between the West and the Rest of the East.”
(Thanks to Bobby32 and the news tab!)
“Whew! I’m glad that fence is up to prevent them from attacking us. I mean, those girls look dangerous.”
“What are those words printed on her shirt?”
“See, Raj, American colonialism is way differnent than British.”
“Wow! They are really hot.”
“Yeah, especially the guy in the back row.”
“Clad only in the finest of Werther’s Originals Summer Collection, the transplanted Red Injin CheerMongers pummeled the air with lusty blows fit for the darkest corner of the Shah’s Harem” –Orientalist Ad Agency.
I realize that native Bangaloreans are bitter about this, but they are just clinging to trishuls or religion or antipathy to people who are not like them as a way to explain their frustrations.
“‘Mericans – named after Indians – Doing the jobs that Indian citizens refuse to do!”
It must be the closet thing to Playboy for these guys.
Give me a K! Give me an L! Give me a P! Give me a D!
Either the middle cheerleader has two heads and four feet, or there is some horizontal figure-of-eight action going on.
From the article Rahul posted (@11), this bit was just to good pass up:
Suresh, standing, white shirt: “I have B.Sc. in E-Comm! Fust class fust! Caste no bar!”
(pre-game) Dinesh to Raj: We are going to meet all the bitches tonight.
And Raj to Dinesh: “and I am Santa Clause”
“Um Cindy?”
“What Susie?”
“I think, like, these are are the wrong Indians. The one on our team’s helmets has feathers, not dots. And the skin in the stands is brown, not red.”
“Why is that one guy holding up a sign that says ‘caste no bra?”
Rahul S: “Yaar, I’m only here for academic purposes. Just want to see how many of those girls are Hindu and/or Gujarati.”
Facing growing opposition from Native American groups, Redskin’s representatives lobby Indians for permission to use “Brownskins.” Crowd inexplicably yells back; “Wheatskins!”
…i like potato skins.
22 · Manju said
Hilarious. You (here) pingpong, and Rahul
S(on the miniskirts thread) are making my day. Yes, I have a pathetic life.Hot professors travel to India seeking RAs. “This is not what I intended,” laments Portmanteau.
Manju is on FIRE!
“Oye Raj, is that Bal Thackeray in a burqa ogling the cheerleaders?”
“Papa-ji, this is so much better than the time you took us to the zoo to see the baboons.”
[loud whistle] “Psst…Look here, Miss..MISS…MY NAME IS MANJU TOO. COINCIDENCE…I THINK NOT!” [thrusts pelvis]
Globalization works both ways. Outsourcing cheerleading operations to the US is such a big hit in India!
11 · Rahul said
Sorry, I find the whole concept of “cheerleading” in professional sports very sexist. I don’t understand why the protests are just being brushed off. Sure the fundamentalists are protesting, but so are the women groups. It’s so easy to brush off the protests because Hindu fundamentalists are taking part in it. And to be honest, some of the points they are making do gel with the arguments the Women’s groups are making.
Sorry, “cheerleading” in professional sports really don’t need to be expanded to India.
But the actual reasons are not going to matter to anyone I guess. It’s just going to be seen as outdated Indians protesting some great American tradition. Please.
i bet the men there were disgusted by such slutty behavior and untanned skin.
“Susie, I think I see the guy who helped me figure out how to work my Tivo.”
24 · portmanteau said
That’s sad. Maybe you should hang out with those Gujrati Indian girls to learn how to spice up your life.
“DING”
Susie, I think I see the guy who helped me
figure out how to work my Tivoput up my webpage.Son turning to Father: “This is why I must go to America. I will make you proud and marry a cheerleader who can make aloo paranthas.”
“Washington sends highly persuasive representatives to build consensus for nuclear deal.”
The cheerleaders are jumping for joy because they are probably getting more money doing these side projects compared to their salary earned in US games.
34 · Rahul S said
They broke my heart. Sluts.
The only comment that made sense was 31 (de-lurker)
Amardeep, what do you mean by “Click on the photo to see the faces of the men a bit more clearly“? Would you type that for an NFL game? A suggestion for your next caption-this: Post a picture of Indian men watching Angelina Jolie strip on screen.
Btw, with minor changes, most of the comments above would work for any game in any country.
Sri PS: The photo is definitely not from a Hyderabad match. The only matches so far have been in Bangalore, Delhi and Mohali.
I wanna make love in this club !
I cringed at the cheerleader bit (of course Vijay Mallya brought them in!) and thought the WaPo article was painfully ignorant (claiming a normal match lasts seven days, and pitching Twenty20 as a sign of brash new liberalized India, as if One Day Cricket hadn’t taken hold almost thirty years ago!), and I particularly snorted at the claim in that breathlessly naive, exoticizing, saris vs skin article that “this was more skin than most Indian men would see before marriage,” because our item girls do no mean job of giving men their pre-nuptial kicks either. But all the men around me in India remarked on the cheerleaders and I realised it’s really very aspirational, the idea that “we” can get “safed chamra” to come and dance for us, sort of a porn fantasy come true for Indian men.
@Sri – yes, that was Bangalore, not Hyderabad. @SP – have you seen the number of ‘safed chamras’ (but only women) in your average Bollywood song & dance number, or a music video? Will there be any matches in Ahmedabad? Maybe we can have our very own Borat sing the Khazak national anthem & praise that other Mr. Modi’s war of terror…
This thread has made my day wonly saar. Deee-lishh.
The photo is definitely not from HYD. And it smacks of V. Mallya’s …errrrrrr… class.
I’m a non-bitter native Indian Bangalorean. I’m rooting for the show of more skin – the arugument being: the more skin they see, the less they’ll eventually harass ‘woh sleeveless ladki cheeeee chheee shameless’ on Indian streets.
Generally, showing more skin influences one’s frequency of rooting too. Too many puns. My “head” hertz.
Tipu, very good point about safed chamra in item numbers – which I also see as a similarly aspirational phenomenon, similar to the popularity of Eastern European belly dancers in the Gulf and other parts of the Middle East.
46 · pingpong said
I guess Rahul was right.
From the article
WTF?! Is it too much to ask that articles about India to be written with basic competence — w/o bloopers and lazy stereotypes?
Is irrelavant flame bait for a fluff piece really needed?
Actual reasons may vary. For instance, it’s equally probable that since the Number Two tries harder, the Number One hertz.