“The mood right now is, Indiaah!”

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Every society reserves certain insalubrious tasks for its newest or temporary initiates. In sports, for instance, it falls to the newest ballboy to launder the jockstraps of the veterans. Here at the Mutiny, an repugnant yet unavoidable duty devolved to interns, aspirants, and guest-bloggers like your humble servant, is to read the online edition of the Times of India. The cyberspace manifestation of what, allegedly, was once the subcontinent’s paper of record, is such a toxic aggregation of horrible writing, execrable production values, and offensive pop-up advertising that going near it requires a certain masochism, or at least a near-pathological eagerness to please.

And yet for you, gentle readers, we will do anything. And so, as a public service, I have excerpted for you the key portions of today’s preview article on George Bush’s upcoming trip to desh.

We begin with the lede:

Bush may be coming to India to discuss the N-treaty but it’s the culture curry which is reigning supreme in his mind.

I know you got the fever for the flavor:

The mood in White House right now is, Indiaah! Come March, India is going to be the flavour of the season in the US, as President Bush and First Lady Laura make their first official visit to India. And India is all set to give President Bush a flavour of desi culture curry.

You may have missed the point about curry:

It seems President Bush loves desi colours, culture and curry. “The President has a lot of Indian Americans working for him at the White House. Very often, he along with the first lady attends Indian dinners.
He always tells me: ‘Oh, I loved spicy Indian food.’ While Laura is a charming and sophisticated lady,” says Shivangi.

Some serious reporting went into this story:

The Air Force One is almost ready for take-off. When we contacted the White House for an official list of the Indian Americans who’ll be travelling with the President, the official spokesperson from National Security Coucil, which is finalising the list said, “We’ll be announcing the names shortly.”

Oh, and did we mention curry?

Another question which people want answered is whether the President, like Clinton, will be digging into chicken curries?

This concludes our public service excerpt of the Times of India, the paper that is to journalism what H5N1 is to chicken curry. Continue reading →

Did the NY Times unfairly reject an intern?

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The New York Times always takes a beating from conservatives that decry that the respected newspaper is too liberal. Over the tip line we hear of an incident that makes me cringe. Rutgers journalism professor Allan Wolper writes in Editor & Publisher about one of his students:

Kejal Vyas, one of my best journalism students at Rutgers-Newark, in Newark, N.J., was in Delhi completing some academic work when he received this Feb. 1 e-mail from Nancy Sharkey, senior editor/recruiting for The New York Times, responding to his inquiry about an internship:

“Hi Kejal, Based on what Allan Wolper has written about us, I cannot imagine that he would want one of his students to intern here. I guess if we need students from New Jersey, we will go elsewhere. Best, Nancy…”

Mark Goodman, executive director of the Student Press Law Center, an organization that monitors censorship on college and high school campuses, was as stunned as I was when I told him Vyas’ story.

“The message here for journalism professors is that if you want your students to get an internship at The New York Times, you don’t criticize the Times in what you write,” Goodman told me. “It seems grossly inappropriate and unfair. I’ve never heard of anything like this happening before.” [Link]

Wolper writes that he followed up with Sharkey on belhalf of Vyas, in order to clarify as to why he was rejected:

Sharkey laughed and said she was being “snide” when she wrote to Vyas. Then, to my amazement, she virtually repeated what she had written to him: “I don’t see why you’d want your students to work at the Times, considering what you’ve written about us.”

It was something that I thought I would never hear from a New York Times news executive. Afterwards, I called Catherine Mathis, the Gray Lady’s vice president of corporate communications, briefed her on what Sharkey had said, and sent her a copy of the Sharkey-Vyas e-mails. [Link]

Here is an old example of something that Wolper once wrote that Sharkey and others at the Times may have disliked:

What would Americans think if they knew that their best newspaper, The New York Times, had allowed one of its national-security reporters to negotiate a book deal that needed the approval of the CIA?

What would they say if they knew the CIA was editing the book while the country is days or weeks away from a war with Iraq and is counting on the Times to monitor the intelligence agency?

They would be properly horrified. [Link]
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Incredible advert!sing

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As I tried to catch some shut-eye at Chicago O’Hare yesterday, I kept hearing Indian music playing in the background and finally tracked down the source. This very slick ad for Indian tourism is running endlessly on CNN’s airport network. It’s part of the Incredible !ndia campaign, which used to be Incredibly L^me.

I agree with this critique:

Not bad but they need to do a few more urban-themed things… they all seem to focus on rural women spinning around with pots on their heads… There’s nothing wrong with pushing our history (indeed it is a big tourist draw), but by dropping in some stuff from modern India we can really change people’s perceptions. Remember, this is a bit like what Japan did with its Shinkanshens… India must be marketed as a nation where futurism runs alongside tradition. [Link]

The Turkey Welcomes You campaign shows off a modern subway system (watch clip), though it uses a lot of cheesy, Daler Mehndi-esque, gratuitous greenscreen.

Continue reading →

For the Love of Language

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I meant to post about this in a more timely manner, but a brown holiday I find somewhat romantic is commemorated every February 21st in Bangladesh; yesterday was Language Movement Day. Also known as Language Martyr’s Day, its point is to remember the protest made on behalf of the right to use Bengali as a national language:

Around 1950-52, the emerging middle classes of East Bengal underwent an uprising known later as the Language Movement. Bangladeshis (then East Pakistanis) were initially agitated by a decision by Central Pakistan Government to establish Urdu, a minority language…as the sole national language for all of Pakistan. The situation was worsened by an open declaration that “Urdu and only Urdu will be the national language of Pakistan” by the governor, Khawaja Nazimuddin. [wiki]

300px-Shaheed_minar_Roehl.jpg Now you’ll know why Bangladesh’s Shaheed Minar monument exists where it does:

On February 21, 1952, dozens of students and political activists were killed when the Pakistani police force opened fire on Bengali protesters who were demanding equal status to their native tongue, Bangla. The massacre occurred near Dhaka Medical College and Ramna Park in Dhaka. A makeshift monument was erected the same night by students of University of Dhaka and other educational institutions, but soon demolished by the Pakistani police force. [wiki]
The movement spread to the whole of East Pakistan and the whole province came to a standstill. Afterwards, the Government of Pakistan relented and gave Bengali equal status as a national language.[wiki]

First they won respect for their language, then in 1971, they won their freedom. Continue reading →

Enter Sandman

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Sudarshan Patnaik, an Indian artist who notably recreated the Taj as an “ultimate sand castle”, is cocky about his next endeavor (via the BBC):

(Patnaik) has built a huge sand sculpture of a rooster on a beach in Puri city, a resort in Orissa state, to create awareness of bird flu…
It took him five hours and eight tons of sand to create the sand rooster.

As Abhi already posted, the deadly H5N1 avian flu virus was discovered in Maharashtra a few days ago. I’m curious as to how well this sandy approach will actually work:

“This sand sculpture is basically to create awareness about bird flu because a lot of people don’t even know about this disease. And a beach is a place where a lot of domestic and international tourists come,” Mr Patnaik told the Reuters news agency.

Patnaik, who made a similar artistic statement after the tsunami, isn’t stopping with just a rooster– hens and eggs are planned, as well. Continue reading →

That’s some damn good acting

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The following would be hilarious if it weren’t actually true (thanks for the tip Suhail). The BBC reports:

The actors who star in movie The Road to Guantanamo were questioned by police at Luton airport under anti-terrorism legislation, it has emerged.

The men, who play British inmates at the detention camp, were returning from the Berlin Film Festival where the movie won a Silver Bear award.

One of the actors, Rizwan Ahmed, said a police officer asked him if he intended to make any more “political” films.

The men were released quickly and not arrested, said Bedfordshire police.

The film is a docu-drama based on the experiences of the “Tipton Three.”

After the British government secured their release following a two-year ordeal at the notorious American Guantanamo prison camp for suspected terrorists, one of the first things Britain’s so-called “Tipton Three” did was to file a lawsuit against United States Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. The men denied any links to terrorism and claimed they had been tortured at the camp.

In their compensation claim, which is still pending, they alleged they had been “repeatedly struck with rifle butts, punished, kicked and slapped. They were short-shackled in painful stress positions for many hours, causing deep flesh wounds and permanent scarring.” They also claim they were “threatened with unmuzzled dogs, forced to strip naked, subjected to repeated forced body-cavity searches and intentionally subjected to extremes of heat and cold for the purpose of causing suffering…” [Link]

With regards to the airport detention, the details are still being sorted out:

They have called for an urgent inquiry into what happened while one of the film’s producers, Melissa Parmenter, said the detention was outrageous.

Bedfordshire police have said they will issue another statement specifically concerning the allegations made by Mr Ahmed and Reprieve. [Link]
Continue reading →

Why Bush is right

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Yes. Please take a minute to compose yourselves. You did read the title of this post correctly and this is the reliably left-leaning Abhi writing this post (and not someone who has infiltrated our North Dakota bunker and is holding me at gunpoint). On Tuesday, President Bush forcefully defended his administration’s decision to allow a sale which would turn over the control of operations at major American ports to a company based in Dubai, in the United Arab Emirates, and controlled by that government. Here is one news report following the decision:

U.S. lawmakers formally asked the Bush administration Thursday to reconsider its approval of a sale giving a company in the United Arab Emirates control over significant operations at six major American ports.

The lawmakers, including four senators and three House members, sharply criticized the UAE as inconsistent in its support of U.S. anti-terrorism efforts.

They also said the country was a key transfer point for shipments of nuclear components sent to Iran, North Korea and Libya and was one of only three nations that had recognized the Taliban as Afghanistan’s legitimate government…

The Associated Press reported Saturday that government-owned Dubai Ports World had won approval for the $6.8 billion deal from a secretive U.S. panel that considers security risks of foreign companies buying or investing in American industry. [Link]

Here is Bush’s strong response today, where he actually threatened to veto any bill that curbs this sale (note: he has NEVER vetoed anything):

He called on opponents to explain why they opposed a Middle Eastern firm taking over when they did not oppose a British company being in control.

“I am trying to conduct foreign policy now by saying to the people of the world, ‘We’ll treat you fairly’,” he said.

“It would send a terrible signal to friends and allies not to let this transaction go through,” he told reporters. [Link]

For the rest of this post I am going to go out on a limb and trust in two things. I will leave it up to individual readers to decide whether to go out on this limb with me or not:

  1. I will trust that the “secretive U.S. panel” mentioned above has adequately considered and addressed the security risks involved in this deal.
  2. I will trust that there isn’t some larger Machiavellian plot behind this whole thing that will make the President’s friends rich at the expense of others.

Continue reading →

A mass grave of a different feather

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I’m really busy today but I still want to put a topic out there that is worth discussing. This means that I’m going to have to resort to some lazy blogging. Please forgive my complacence. Every blogger knows that a good picture is worth a thousand words and can bail you out from time to time:

A good poster for vegetarianism

A veterinarian doctor puts chickens into a pit for burial at Navapur, in the western Indian state of Maharashtra, Monday, Feb. 20, 2006. Farmers burned their dead chickens and health officials went door-to-door Monday in western India for signs of people infected with the deadly H5N1 bird flu virus as a massive poultry slaughtering operation entered its second day. (AP Photo/Rajesh Kumar Singh)… [Link]

The slaughter seems pretty bad already and may get a lot worse:

The bird flu is taking grip of the world slowly and steadily. Because of massive population density in India and to some extent china/South East Asia, these countries may plunge into a deep deflationery depression cycle. According to some experts, in India, people and poultry live close to each other. In the country side most families keep poultry for eggs. With a serious break out of bird flue, India can lose 18% of its population within the first year. If the outbreak is not controlled, 38% of the population can be affected.

According to media reports, a poultry farmer has died of suspected bird flu in western India, where the country’s first outbreak of the H5N1 avian flu virus has been confirmed. [Link]

Continue reading →

Reincarnation

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‘Try it, you’ll like it!’ my brother once told me before handing me a peanut butter, honey and banana sandwich. My brother was the king of weird food mashups. From my brother I learned that you can make a burrito out of leftover Thai, taco sauce on anything is tasty, and you can get away with Maggi spicy ketchup on fruit. Years later when I regularly dished lucre in the direction of Asia de Cuba and Sushi Samba, I thought back fondly. Bro, you should have patented.

On the advice of several Mutineers, I dragged the entire family to Avatar’s in Sausalito tonight. Sausalito clings to the Marin Headlands like an Italian fishing village, if only pescatores drove Ferraris. Avatar’s serves food which is a mashup of Punjabi, Mexican, Jamaican and California nouvelle. One of the owners charmed my parents into ceding control of the entire experience to the chef, his mother. The game was to try and guess the ingredients of each dish.

The pumpkin enchiladas were delish, the saag paneer enchiladas almost as good. The ravioli makhani reminded me of my favorite Indian food hack. We all swooned over the samosas with apple salsa sitting atop white and brown chutney drawn in patterns like cappuccino foam. The only dish which disappointed: the mixed veggies atop watery basmati with a mint chutney base.

The restaurant is simple and homey, but the menu is much more satisfying than at its chic Indo-fusion compadre, Tabla in NYC. A sister restaurant, Avatar’s Punjabi Burritos, sits just up the road in Mill Valley. This snack shack don’t lack — I’ll be back.

The late Avatar and his family and friends have created Marindian cuisine, which successfully blends Punjabi, Mexican and a bit of Jamaican flavors, ingredients and techniques…

Literally, if we find ourselves within 100 miles of the Bay Area, we are going to Avatar. [Link]

Related post: Indian food hacks

Continue reading →

Black and White

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Believe it or not, the word most frequently heard in cricketing circles today is a perfectly normal English word – not chucking, sledging, googly, fine-leg or doosra. Racism has always been lurking around the fringes of the game – when unapologetically segregationist South Africa was kept away from cricket, several (mostly) white players from Australia and England would sneak in to play a game or two, lured by the money; risking lifetime bans. Each quaintly labeled rebel tour would inspire a few articles condemning apartheid, and (predictably enough) British newspapers would write muted articles about why things weren’t really that bad, and why people shouldn’t get their undergarments into intricate knots over a mere game.

Neighboring Zimbabwe had an all-white cricket team as well, but that didn’t raise too many eyebrows because the team hardly won anything, but mostly because they played for a country ruled by a benign black dictator.

But today, things have changed. The benign dictator is not so benign anymore, and of late, he has been maintaining a punishing schedule – creating food shortages in his country by taking away farms from white farmers. But Robert loves playing games, and he is going to make time for cricket, punishing schedule or not. And how well he plays. First, he cleanses his team of all white players – using other people of course, why would a powerful man get his hands dirty? – and then obviously pleased with how clean the team looked, he is now on another cleaning spree – this time to get rid of all the good players, especially the pesky ones that want to get paid for their services.

Several interesting strategies have been employed in this round, including but not limited to robbing players of their money, death threats, divide and conquer. Meanwhile, the standard of cricket has dipped alarmingly in the country, and most games involving them bear a more than passing resemblance to games involving the Atlanta Hawks. But Mugabe doesn’t know that because he has no time for the NBA. Plus now his team is all black, and isn’t that good enough?

Meanwhile, events in Australia are ensuring that things stay balanced on the racism front. Crowds at cricket matches in Australia are always a bit more, um… boisterous than crowds elsewhere, possibly due to a lot of beer and not too many bathrooms on the grounds, but this year they’ve taken their bad behavior to new depths. People have learnt new words, and are not hesitant to try them out on visiting cricket teams.

Continue reading →