Author Archives: A N N A

Life is Stranger Than Fiction.

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Twice a week, a very kind gentleman comes by with a nifty vacuum cleaner strapped to his back, to spruce up the floors. I say nifty because it looks more like a jet-pack or something a lot more fun than a mere appliance. Anyway, when he strolls in with his trademark, “Hell-oooooo!”, I know it is time to stand up and get out of his way. I usually just move to the other side of my desk and prepare myself for a minute or two of nothingness, but apparently, today will be…something. I hear a familiar voice, but I can’t make out the words above the din of the machine.

I turn around to see who is speaking to me. It is the one Pakistani man I work with, an uber-sweet coworker who likes to make halwa to bring to work, which he then guilts me in to eating—not the first portion, mind you; that goes to our other, “grown-up” coworkers. Oh, no—he comes by towards the end of mithai-madness and always authoritatively says, as he spoons at least three servings on to a paper plate he has helpfully brought with him, “I make you halwa. Eat.”

When I protest meekly, saying, “It’s too much!”, because I don’t want to waste food, he gives me the exact same look I get at home, from my Mom at the end of dinner.

“It’s so little. Why you make me put back in dish? If dish is empty, I can wash. Finish it. Be helpful. So I can wash. I not have all day.”

So, much in the same endearing, parental way he force-feeds me food which my tummy has no room for, he often comes by to “check on” me, the youngest brown member of the team (nine desis work here, total). To see, as he inimitably pronounces it, “how you arrrr DEW-wing!” When I moved away from my desk to facilitate vacuuming, he saw an opportunity and approached.

“Hallo En-ah!”

“Hi…Mm-…hi” I stammered, just barely resisting the urge to call him Uncle. I can’t bring myself to call him by his first name, which is Mohammad, so I just…well, call him nothing. Who cares if it’s a work environment? The man guilts and keeps tabs on me. Being on a first-name basis ain’t happenin’.

“How is your Mum? She in Kelly-for-nya? Or she visit home, maybe?”

I have always loved that: home. My heart immediately softens. No matter how many decades my late father lived in this country (three, if we’re counting), despite the American flag planted dramatically in our front yard, when he wasn’t communicating mindfully, he always said that about Kerala, too. Home.

“No, she is in California. She is well, thank you for asking.” Continue reading →

On “Community Organizers” and their worth…

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Republican Vice Presidential nominee Sarah Palin made history last night, as she addressed the RNC. In her speech, she (of the lifetime NRA membership) aimed barbed verbal ammunition at Barack Obama, though many reports indicated that she would not do so; so much for reciprocating his class-drenched gesture of reminding the press corps that he, too, was the child of a teen mother, and that they should back the muck off of Bristol Palin. I know, I get it– it’s the convention. It’s a pep rally, time to rile up the fans.

Palin displayed exquisite contempt while commenting on Obama’s past work as a “Community Organizer”; and yes, that’s exactly how she pronounced it, as if the words were too strangely shaped for her mouth, as if they should be chaperoned by quotes.

But, community Organizers do extraordinary things. If you don’t believe me, look here, at one of the most revered “Community Organizers”, ever:

gandhi.jpg

From last night’s performance:

Before I became governor of the great state of Alaska, I was mayor of my hometown.
And since our opponents in this presidential election seem to look down on that experience, let me explain to them what the job involves.
I guess a small-town mayor is sort of like a “community organizer,” except that you have actual responsibilities. I might add that in small towns, we don’t quite know what to make of a candidate who lavishes praise on working people when they are listening, and then talks about how bitterly they cling to their religion and guns when those people aren’t listening.

Continue reading →

Class and Compassion are not in Vogue in India

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fendi bib and a bad attitude.jpg

I saw it myself and then a few of you blew up the tip line (thanks, Taara), my twitter and my skypager; on Sunday, the Grey Lady featured an article about Vogue India’s…interesting choice of models, for one of their recent editorial shoots. The “creative” (and by creative, I mean not at all) direction the magazine (which I still can’t procure in DC) stumbled through raised your threaded-eyebrows as well as some of your hackles, and rightly so.

Giving impoverished people $10,000 bags, Burberry bumbershoots and Fendi bibs for their children reeks of an appalling level of arrogance, an utterly clueless infatuation with “edginess”, and a heartless disregard for those for whom India does not yet shine. But let me tell you how I really feel, as I fisk the NYT article freely:

NEW DELHI — An old woman missing her upper front teeth holds a child in rumpled clothes — who is wearing a Fendi bib (retail price, about $100).
A family of three squeezes onto a motorbike for their daily commute, the mother riding without a helmet and sidesaddle in the traditional Indian way — except that she has a Hermès Birkin bag (usually more than $10,000, if you can find one) prominently displayed on her wrist.
Elsewhere, a toothless barefoot man holds a Burberry umbrella (about $200).
Welcome to the new India — at least as Vogue sees it.

Way to keep it classy, VI. Also, just so you know, the text on that picture says, “Baby’s Day Out: It’s never too early to start living in style.” Continue reading →

My PUMA is flummoxed by Palin.

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“MA!”

“WHAT!”

“Did you hear??”

“What? McCain?”

“YES! Aw, Man! It’s only 8 or so in California…I thought I’d get to tell you.”

“No. I am listening to the NPR. Family Radio has become annoying. That man thinks the world will end in three years.”

“SO???”

“So what?”

“What do YOU think? You were so curious about whom he’d pick…”

“I was really disappointed when I heard it…my heart just went down to the floor. What’s wrong with this old man, has he lost his brain or something? She is a young girl. No experience. She is Governor of state with 8000 population for only two years. What’s she know?”

“I think…Alaska has more people than—“

“Who cares! Don’t interrupt! Point is, I can manage things better than she can. This is guaranteed losing ticket.”

“You wanted Joe Lieberman, didn’t you?”

“I did!”

“And why is that, Mummy?”

“Because he is a Democrat. Was. I mean, he is independent. Also, he was so nice to you, when you met with him and his wife.”

“Awesome reasoning, Ma. Anyway, if not Sarah, then whom?”

“I would rather he gone for that…kid…the Indian…the governor…” Continue reading →

The Caption Game: The “Pukka Baby” Edition

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Avni and the idli.jpg

It is Monday, and that means it is time for a ridiculously-delayed (the last one I posted was last fall, I believe) edition of your favorite way to commence the day– The Caption Game. Since the vast majority of us are hungover, bleary-eyed, exhausted pensively contemplating our sure-to-be productive work week, captioning a funny (or in this case excruciatingly cute) picture is a gentle way to ease in to Monday.

This is little Avni and she is consuming an idli. Avni, idli, idli, Avni. Adorable, no? Avni’s mom was kind enough to allow us to imagine funny things baby might be thinking, as baby noms on one of my favorite South Indian foods. Blogger Neha Viswanathan of Global Voices Online inspired all of this when Avni showed up on her flickr stream. I thank her for securing permission from Mother, baby and idli, for this post.

Perplexed? Bemused? Hung-over? Consider previous editions of the Caption Game, awailable for your edification here: onnu, rendu, muunu, naalu, anji, aarru, erzhu , ettu, onpatu , pathu…

p.s. Backstory re: picture, after the jump. 🙂 Continue reading →

Free and in DC tonight? Let’s help Padma.

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With all the tips you mutineers helpfully send in, plus the links you submit to our News tab, there’s no shortage of tragedies for us to read about, daily. Still, one recent story stands out to me as so heartbreaking, it’s apathy-shattering [via WaPo]:

With school out for the summer, Raju and Jayanthi Soundararajan took four of their children to India on a spiritual pilgrimage to visit Hindu temples, a guru, and friends and family left behind decades ago.
…while riding on a rural road in the southern part of the country, the Gaithersburg family’s rented sport-utility vehicle and a truck collided head-on, killing both parents and their two teenage daughters, 14-year-old Lakshmi and 16-year-old Priya. Only the hired driver and two of the Soundararajans’ sons survived, friends said.
Since then, the Washington area’s Indian community has come together to bolster an older daughter, who was not on the trip and has told friends that she wants to care for her brothers. Friends are raising money for Sairam, 11, and Pavan, 20, because both faced years of medical and education expenses even before they were seriously injured in the collision.

Imagine being in your 20s, working your day job and singing in a local band at night, doing whatever mundane things we all do…and then overnight, losing most of your immediate family– and realizing that you are the only person who two vulnerable boys have left, to advocate for and care for them. From akka to guardian, instantly…

Sairam is autistic, family friends say. Pavan, who is severely disabled with cerebral palsy, needs constant care. An Indian assistant helping the family with Pavan’s wheelchair also died in the crash.
“The crisis is not only the accident,” said Basil Rajakumaran, 76, a family friend in Gaithersburg whose cellphone rings every 10 minutes with people asking how they can help. “We have to take care of these children.”

Continue reading →

Game, Set, Somdev!

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Last night, I unexpectedly ended up at the Legg Mason Tennis Classic, where I watched Andy Roddick struggle early on and then barely defeat Argentina’s Eduardo Schwank (my tennis-obsessed date dismissively characterized it as “outlasting him”). I wasn’t that interested in watching Mandy Moore’s ex- swing, but the next match had me sitting up straight and paying rapt attention– and not just because I was suddenly court-side.

UVA’s beloved Somdev Devvarman, the reigning NCAA men’s champ (two years running!), played someone else and he did it so well, I don’t even remember who his opponent was. He was fierce, unrelenting…just a gritty player. It was mesmerizing to watch (and quite a thrill to out-shout the punk behind us, who was hating on our boy). Suddenly, for the first time in over a decade, I was interested in tennis again.

Behold, shady background info from wikipedia (I’m late for the match!):

Somdev Devvarman (also known as Somdev Dev Varman) is the reigning and two-time NCAA Men’s Singles Champion. As a recent graduate out of the University of Virginia who hails from India, Somdev is best known for having captured the 2007 NCAA Singles Championship by defeating Georgia Bulldogs senior John Isner in the final. In one of the most dramatic finals in the 123-year history of the tournament, Devvarman scored a 7–6 (7), 4–6, 7–6 (2) win over the tournament’s No. 1 seed. A year later, he defeated Tennessee’s J.P. Smith 6-3, 6-2 to take home his second consecutive NCAA Singles National Championship. It was his historic third consecutive appearance in the NCAA singles final.
Devvarman, the son of Ranjana and Pravanjan Dev Varman, was born February 13, 1985 in Assam, India. He has an older sister, Paulami, and older brother, Aratrik. The Dev Varmans originally hail from the north-eastern Indian state of Tripura. Devvarman picked up the racquet as a nine-year-old in Chennai in 1994 and after learning the basics he made it to the Britannia Amritraj Tennis Academy in 2000. [viki]

The video I embedded above will fill you in quickly– cheesy shots of him moving around like it’s a Sesame Street stop-animation-skit aside– about Somdev. He’s humble, cheerful and adorable. We likey. In fact, we likey so much, we may be live-micro-blogging it, via Twitter. If we can tear our eyes away from watching him play, that is… Continue reading →

Someone Named Dan Cox Chokes on his Foot

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…instead of having the humility and decency to remove it. He must really like the taste of toe jam (or not have anyone around who can administer the Heimlich). To each their ignorant own (thanks, anonymous tipster).

Who is Dan Cox, you are surely muttering? He’s the writer and producer of a documentary on the Governator, but no one here at the bunker cares about that– what’s more mutinous is his eyebrow-raising post over at Mediabistro’s “Fishbowl LA” blog, which one of you was sharp enough to catch and release our way. The title of his post is “Spielberg wants Bollywood“, and its relevant text is below:

Steven Spielberg, ever the iconoclast, is just saying NO to the studios these days. As has been reported over and over, he’s doing a deal with India’s Reliance ADA Group.
The India contingent is putting up a billion bucks to give Spielberg carte blanche (or however that translates to Indian) to make and distribute whatever he wants.

(snip!)

Regardless, Speilberg’s looking and the majors are all considering (but not relying on, ho ho) his Reliance cash, but invariably it’s likely that Spielberg will be back in bed with Universal, where all of his filmic links have been in the past, whether DreamWorks SKG or Amblin.

No, it is not to be made fun of, you asshole

The India Reliance deal is supposed to be completed this week. We’ll see if Spielberg starts wearing a Sari or has a red dot implanted on his forehead. [link to stupidity]

Classy. Now I’m no big-shot, one documentary-creatin’ Hollywood insider, but I do understand “American” words loud and clear; I mean…the American language surely exists, because such a successful person would only conjure a tongue called “Indian” if it were true, no? He wouldn’t be THAT lazy or willfully ignorant? Oh, wait…

I’m not going to back down from anything I posted.There was nothing negative intentionally spoken or implied about Indian or Pakistani of Hindi or Bengalese culture. There was simply an amusing look at why and how Steven Spielberg is more interested in $1 billion from an Indian contingent than he is in finding it on Wall Street or from the studios or from his backyard. [link to stupidity]

THAT is from a comment he posted, in response to outraged readers who called him out for his inexcusable kundi-holery. He says his piece was “simply an amusing look at…”, I say “you know exactly what you were doing and for that, YOU SUCK”. Tomato, thekkalikya.

But wait! THERE ARE MORE CRINGE-INDUCING WORDS WHERE THAT CAME FROM!

Now, maybe it wasn’t all that amusing.Maybe I come off as a club-footed xenophobe. [link to stupidity]

Remove two “maybes” from that quote and lo! It’s suddenly, magically accurate.

But hello India, what I wrote also wasn’t a diatribe about the sub-continent.
I’m fully aware that a sari is a female garment as well as the fact that a red dot on the forehead is not there to be made fun of. It may have cultural or religious relevance. But what should be made fun of is the fact that Spielberg is taking his money from whichever provider that he can find, whether his head is adorned with pink polka dots. [link to stupidity]

Oh, honey…I’m so sorry to break this news, but…India ain’t reading you. India (unlike me) has better things to do with her time, than read you. Also, if you are fully aware of who wears saris and what red dots might signify, then Dan, you have no excuse for what you wrote. Continue reading →

“Chad” of the Bud ad Snaps, Nearly Kills ex-gf

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Shelley Malil.png

SM reader Meenbeen tipped us off to a horrific crime story, earlier today:

Shelley Malil, an actor who played one of Steve Carell’s co-workers in The 40-Year-Old Virgin, has been arrested for investigation of attempted murder after his former girlfriend was critically injured when she was stabbed more than 20 times, authorities said Tuesday. [People]

Malil’s family, friends and lawyer persuaded the actor, who has also appeared on Scrubs, NYPD Blue, ER, Seinfeld and The West Wing to turn himself in.

Shelley Malil, 43, remained in custody on $2 million bail after he was taken into custody late Monday as he left a train in Oceanside, California, the San Diego County Sheriff’s Department said. His arraignment is scheduled for Wednesday…
Deputies found the victim Sunday night while responding to reports of screams for help and breaking glass in San Marcos, about 15 miles (24 kilometers) east of Oceanside. [fox]

According to both of the stories quoted above, Shelley Malil and the victim, 35-year old Kendra Beebe, had broken up recently, though TMZ states that neighbors thought they were still in a relationship; it’s difficult to nail down a time line of events, since some eye-witnesses saw the two going to the gym together the morning of the stabbing. A few articles also mention that Malil and Beebe took her children to the beach, the same weekend this occurred.

NBC 7 news reported (via video, so no quote) that Beebe’s two young children were at home, asleep, at the time of the attack, which occurred when Malil encountered Beebe in her backyard with a man with whom she was on a date. Sepia Mutiny: we dredge TMZ so you don’t have to…

According to Wikipedia, Malil was born in Kerala and came to the U.S. when he was ten years old, in 1974. WaPo has the quainter version of his backstory:

Shelley began pursuing his dream of entertaining people on the high school stage, where his leading turns often earned awards in district competitions in Texas, where his family settled after emigrating to the U.S. in 1974. As a child, he had dreams of becoming a comedic actor like Bob Hope, whom he first saw on a neighbor’s TV set, the only one in the fishing village on the southern tip of India. [WaPo]

That’s the background information for an online chat Malil did, in 2001, after gaining fame for playing “Chad” in the popular “What are YOU doing?” commercials for Budweiser (for which he won a Clio). It’s disconcerting to read the transcript now, and to find myself nodding in agreement with some of his responses…I keep self-reprimanding, “DUDE! You’re concurring with a savage, almost-murderer!!”

Here’s a YouTube clip of the award-winning ad, below: Continue reading →

Kal Penn Hearts Obama

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A

Yesterday, I attended the ASIAN AMERICANS FOR OBAMA EVENT WITH ACTOR KAL PENN, in Macacaville, VA. No, I’m not shouting at you, I’m just too lazy to reformat what I copied from the press release that uber-Dem Toby Chaudhuri was kind enough to send me. 😉 Like all good desi events, it didn’t start on time, which was highly awesome for those of us who were fighting our way from DC to Farlington during rush hour, in the hopes of seeing the biggest brown actor of them all stump for Obama.

So many references were made to a certain set of movies with which you are all familiar, that I have resolved to not mention them once (not! once!) in this post; instead, I’m going to give you the highlights of what Kal Penn said, about his favorite contender for the potentially-soon-to-be-not-White House.

Penn got personal, as he speeched at us with tales of his grandfather’s involvement in the struggle for India’s freedom and a more recent influential event in his life– a phone call he received from a good friend, from Texas, asking for advice.* This friend was struggling to finance his education, and he had been offered a job with Satan with Haliburton, driving trucks through Iraq for $90,000 a year. It was a tempting, and obviously perilous offer for someone making minimum wage. Penn was deeply affected by the awful situation his friend was in and that’s one of the reasons why he’s taking the time to get involved and motivate people across the country to support Obama; he sincerely believes his man has a plan.

The actor, who is currently starring in one of MY favorite shows, “House”, commenced his entertaining remarks with “Happy Macaca day!”. Indeed, it was the second anniversary of the infamous event which transformed our community in to some monkeys with which to reckon.

The one-hundred plus people in attendance seemed to enjoy his message…and the event itself, which was lively, upbeat and well-stocked with delicious food. Seriously. While I can’t personally vouch for the chicken–which my friend had fourths of– I CAN say that after Penn was hustled in to a waiting (yet fuel-efficient) SUV, I devoured the best samosas I’ve EVER had. Toby and Ruby…who was your caterer?? Continue reading →