Sir Branson, ustad of the photo op

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Richard Branson inaugurated the first London to Bombay route for Virgin Atlantic last Thursday (via Zoo Station). He cavorted atop a jet wing in a Virgin-colored sherwani and took the Andheri-to-Churchgate local with the dabbawallahs to deliver hot lunches to his staff. In his spare time, he played a cricket match at the Oval Maidan next to Bombay U, paraded before the Gateway of India in a chariot and wore the infamous light bulb-festooned black leather suit that Amitabh wore in Yaarana. He’s also throwing in a couple of free airline tickets for two dabbawallahs to represent at Prince Charles’ wedding (thanks, Turbanhead). This guy’s theatrics put Steve Jobs to shame.

Getting a taste of British-style bureaucracy, Branson nearly got deported for an expired visa; ringing up the prime minister got that sorted. Branson said he’d been wanting this route for 10 years and pushed for unrestricted access to Bangalore, Hyderabad and Ahmedabad, even more aggressive than India’s open skies agreement with the U.S.

In 2000, he inaugurated the Delhi route:

His performance in Delhi in 2000 was even more impressive. Clad in Punjabi dress, he did the bhangra and then rode his way on a cycle rickshaw…

Photo galleries of Branson’s visit: 1, 2

Reclaiming ‘Paki’

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Naeem Mohaiemen, one of the organizers behind Disappeared in America, wrote an interesting essay last summer about how some British Asians are flipping around the ethnic slur ‘Paki’:

About a decade back, Bangladeshi and Pakistani teenagers in England began re-appropriating the dreaded “Paki” word. Once a vicious epithet flung on London streets by white skinheads, the word was now a symbol of an assertive brown community. “Paki Power” graffiti appeared, a clothing label called “Pak1” did the rounds… and Aki Nawaz of punk-asian band Fun^Da^Men^Tal told the press, “We’re not Pacifists, we’re Pakifists!”

“Taking back” racist epithets has long been a cultural touchstone, and a touchy one at that. I took to greeting my British Asian friends with “Paki”, but only when we were alone, never in front of white Brits. One day, I called my friend Usman and his father answered the phone. Mistaking his voice for his son, I launched into “Oii Paki, it’s Naeem!” The long, pained silence on the other end spoke volumes about how the older generation viewed this act of re-appropriation. He was horrified and disappointed in our lack of “historical context…”

Besides the use of “Paki” by British South Asian youth, Australian immigrants have started a gleeful website called “WogLife” and for the Jewish community there’s the in-your-face magazine “Heeb.”

Earlier, Abhi posted about the N word. Mohaiemen riffed:

… Chris Rock explains the ongoing fascination: “This word, it’s . . . the only thing white people can’t do. That’s the only reason . . . anybody writes about it. It’s like white people can’t believe there’s a thing that exists (that) they can’t do…”

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Exporting a South Asian viewpoint

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For quite some time now I have been interested in finding examples of Bollywood and/or other Indian media’s influence on Islamic societies, especially the more conservative ones. I try to blog about such instances when I can. As I have stated before, I see a tremendous amount of potential in the ability of a brown face to deliver a moderate message to another brown face irrespective of religion. Initially I was planning a blog entry only on this announcement today which I saw reported on Asians in Media’s website:

With Al Jazeera blazing the way for brand recognition amongst non-western news channels, no one can accuse India’s Zee TV of lacking ambition.

The broadcaster announced earlier today at an Indian media industry event that it is planning to launch a global English news channel to rival the BBC and CNN.

“The channel, which will be beamed from India, will have content in line with that of international news channels like CNN and BBC and would target a wider audience rather than the Indian diaspora,” Zee chairman Subhash Chandra (pictured) said at the Ficci-Frames conference.

He said the aim was to portray a more south Asian viewpoint to the world in response to global events.

I really believe that such a channel has the POTENTIAL to rival Al Jazeera in ways that any channel promoted or created by the West will never be able to. In doing some background research for this entry however I came across this story in Time Magazine about a 13 year old minstrel in Afghanistan. It was interesting enough that I got completely sidetracked from my original post. However, I will explain how the stories are tenuously related at the end. Continue reading →

Boozing in Bhutan

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As if the beautiful scenery, burgeoning democracy, and religious devotion to penises wasn’t enough, Bhutan gives us another reason to book our next vacation there: They love to party!

In Thimphu, trendy bars and pubs have mushroomed. They are popular with young city-dwellers who drop by most evenings for a drink after work. During a night of pub-hopping in Thimphu, I saw most places choc-a-bloc with young men and women. Alcohol swigging, swirling cigarette smoke and uninhibited laughter. In one, a few couples were dancing to loud music. The health secretary, Dr Thinley, says the government is working on awareness campaigns to encourage people to drink in moderation, and also keep a check on the liquor brewed from rice at home. [BBC News]

Sure, the incessant carousing has led to rampant alcoholism, but so does marriage, and you don’t see anybody leading a crusade against that. Well, at least not against heterosexual marriage.

BBC News: Bhutan faces up to alcohol problem

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‘Apprentices’ battle lawsuit

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Former “Apprentice” contestant Raj Bhakta has been sued by a company in Florida that hired him for $4,000 to host an event last December. They gave him half of the fee upfront, but Bhakta never showed up:

On the night of his scheduled appearance, however, Raj was a no-show. “I was sick and couldn’t go,” Raj explained. “I called them up and said, ‘I’m sorry, I can’t make it. I’m ill and I’m going to send back the money.’ I even offered to go back and show up for free another time for their time and troubles.” But for Vacations Only, the offer was apparently not enough. Even though Raj says his assistant returned the advance, Vacations Only claims they never received it. Now they want nearly $25,000 in damages. “I was amazed,” Raj admitted. “You know, I hadn’t gotten a phone call saying that they hadn’t gotten a check back and instead of getting a, ‘Hey, would you mind sending a check?’ I got, ‘Within 30 days you get sued!’ But we live in a litigious society.” [Celebrity Justice]

Bhakta hired fellow contestant and Florida-based attorney Bradford Cohen to represent him. You may remember Cohen as the guy who gave up an exemption, and was subsequently fired during the early weeks of season two. You may remember Bhakta as the guy who got fired for just being way too awesome.

Celebrity Justice: ‘Apprentices’ united: Bradford to represent Raj
Previous posts: A Brown Apprentice??, Life after being “Fired!” and ‘Apprentice’ Raj returns with a vengeance

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Child needs bone marrow transplant

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From the parents of Rajan Vyas, a 6-year-old boy battling leukemia:

You can save the life our our 6 year old little boy, Rajan Vyas, who is suffering from leukemia, and is waiting to receive a potentially curative bone marrow transplant. TIME IS OF THE ESSENCE. Many Asian-Indians are waiting for a marrow transplant, but currently the bone marrow reigistry has very few Asian-Indian donors. We MUST come together for those in our community, including our neighbors from Pakistan, and Bangladesh. Even if you don’t match Rajan, you can save the life of others waiting for a South Asian donor match. Registering with the National Marrow Donor Program (NMDP®) is simple:

– You need to be in generally good health
– You are between the ages of 18-60
– You complete a health screening questionnaire
– You painlessly give a small amount of blood for tissue typing

All testing fees are waived for minorities

TESTING IS SIMPLE, PAINLESS, AND COULD SAVE A LIFE
PLEASE GET TESTED TODAY!
Click here to find the donor center in your area

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I tried to be as brave as a cricket player

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Last week I blogged about high altitude heroics, and although nobody (except Manish) commented I thought I’d take another stab at it, believing that lack of comments doesn’t equal lack of interest. The Hindustan Times reports that two Indian Airforce pilots are being inducted into the [Smithsonian Institute’s] Aviation Hall of Fame:

Indian Air Force (IAF) pilots Wing Cdr SK Sharma and Flt Lt AB Dhanake will be inducted into the aviation hall of fame at the prestigious Smithsonian institute in the US for a daring high-altitude rescue.

This is the first time such an honour has been conferred on IAF pilots by the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum.

Sharma was awarded the peacetime gallantry award Kirti Chakra on Republic Day this year for rescuing three injured mountaineers from a world record height of 23,260 feet. Dhanake was his co-pilot during that mission.

I can’t seem to find any press release about this on the Smithsonian’s website but I’m sure it must be true. The Times of India story from a year ago details the circumstances of the rescue:

Sharma and Dhanake flew the rescue missions on May 11, 12 and 13 [2004] in severe turbulent conditions and in the face of jet speed winds.

“Landing a helicopter, above its service ceiling of 23,000 feet, at an unprepared site on a snow-covered mountain slope, at wind speeds of 35-40 knots, was definitely not a bed of roses,” recalled Sharma.

Sharma, commander of the Bareilly-based 111 Helicopter Unit, who takes his inspiration from cricket superstar Sachin Tendulkar, said they managed the remarkable feat with sheer perseverance.

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Steven Tyler wrote a song about this

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The last time I asked Ennis how his personal lowe story was going, he just looked at me woefully and shook his head. Thanks to Eastern Eye, I’ve now figured out what happened:

Ravi Arora, 39, from east London, flew 5,000 miles [to Delhi] to meet a potential bride he had met through shaadi.com… only to find out that she was not born a woman… “I was in front of a girl who no longer looked like one and sounded very different from the Manisha I had been spending two to three hours every week speaking to… The photos were of her cousin, the phone calls had been made by her sister and she had been operated on to become a woman.”

Lest we think Arora is prejudiced, he hastens to add:

“She has a right to express her sexuality as she wants, but by lying about herself, a seed of doubt about all the other profiles on shaadi.com have been placed in my mind.”

I don’t know what’s harder to believe: Arora’s incredible story, or that he actually trusted the profiles on dating sites.

The butterfly effect

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I love book excerpts. Like film trailers, they offer up the juiciest bits from potentially marginal titles. Here’s a good one from NYT columnist Tom Friedman’s latest, The World is Flat. Hedge (fund) hog and sound bite artiste Dinakar Singh compares minds to perishable inventory in dockside godowns:

”India had no resources and no infrastructure… It produced people with quality and by quantity. But many of them rotted on the docks of India like vegetables. Only a relative few could get on ships and get out. Not anymore, because we built this ocean crosser, called fiber-optic cable. For decades you had to leave India to be a professional. Now you can plug into the world from India. You don’t have to go to Yale and go to work for Goldman Sachs.”

”… the railroad overinvestment was confined to your own country and so, too, were the benefits,” Singh said. In the case of the digital railroads, ”it was the foreigners who benefited.” …That overinvestment, by companies like Global Crossing, resulted in the willy-nilly creation of a global undersea-underground fiber network, which in turn drove down the cost of transmitting voices, data and images to practically zero, which in turn accidentally made Boston, Bangalore and Beijing next-door neighbors overnight.

In Friedman’s butterfly formulation, the Global Crossing bankruptcy let IIT kids enjoy both cash and kachoris. It’s the global version of ‘work in your pajamas’: enjoying family, festivals and food at home.

A Mutinous DC Film Fest

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Imagine my surprise upon opening the handy-dandy filmest DC insert in the Washington City Paper, to find a plethora of Indian films being screened. Now, I am used to seeing one or two, but amongst the many other fine films from other countries being screened, 10 Indian films have been selected for screening. A couple highlights of the selections include an opening night screening of Rituparno Ghosh’s Raincoat (starring TMBWITW Aishwarya Rai) sponsored by Air India and Nutella, a screening of Chokher Bali also starring Rai, both with Ghosh in attendance, the stunningly beautiful, musically amazing, yet poorly scripted Dil Se (score by AR Rahman), Dev starring Om Puri and Amitabh Bachchan (with Amitabh in attendance), and Songs of Mahulbani which will be shown with the Oscar nominated Little Terrorist. Continue reading →