The Great Ganesha

An article on BBC News a couple of days ago told about Indian soldiers’ suicides. Because of the long, drawn-out war in Kashmir, several soldiers are killing themselves or their colleagues. Here’s a shocking statistic: The army has lost 72 soldiers to enemy attacks so far this year. But over 100 soldiers have already taken [...]

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Pakka NRI Ok. I’ll admit it. I’m one of those desis who only really started watching Hindi films once I came to the US. Before that, I got my dose of Bollywood on the occasional Sunday evening, when Doordarshan screened its weekly movie. And the only reason I really watched them then, was to avoid [...]

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Being of the academic persuasion, a side-effect of essentially having no real-world experience yet (I’m working on it), I find it quite amusing that people are so swayed by the so-called university rankings lists that come out every fall. In fact, many, many years ago, when I was applying for my undergrad here in the [...]

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[Cross-posted on Desicritics]  “What’s in a name? That which we call a rose By any other word would smell as sweet.” – William Shakespeare in Romeo and Juliet “What’s in a name? That which we called Bombay By any other name smells just as bad.” – The Great Ganesha Hey, don’t get me wrong. I [...]

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Seven bombs on seven different commuter trains on the Western Railways went off within minutes of each other on Tuesday (7/11) evening. Apparently all in first-class compartments. Officially, there are hundreds of casualties. Unofficially, there are probably thousands – each compartment holds somewhere in the range of at least two hundred people when full. And [...]

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While most people were (wisely) watching the Law and Order marathon on TNT, the RXGeek (who happened to be in town) and I went to an Indian wedding. It was the son of a close family friend and so it was unfortunately unavoidable. It was a fairly ritzy locale in NYC and, if nothing else, [...]

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I am sure that, by now, everyone has heard about the Reader’s Digest survey that concluded that Bombay was the rudest city in the world. Bombayites are outraged and are defending themselves voraciously. I say: Why? We must be proud of our rudeness. We must shout: We’re rude, we’re crude, get used to it! I [...]

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Earlier, I had posted something about a Slate article which talked about how, even branches of state governments in the US are outsourcing some of their own phone-answering services. The article mentioned the irony of some states outsourcing the administration of their unemployment insurance. I also wrote about how the call center business was booming [...]

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So – its been a few days of silence. The reason for that is I was using my Mem Day to do some touristy things in the city for a change. Went to the MoMA with the RX Geek. The new MoMA, that is. Went to the old one as well, back when it was [...]

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Growing up, Archie Comics were despised by my parents for their lack of literary value ("You should be reading books instead of wasting your time with comics!"), but no less than wolfed down by me. There was nothing like spending an entire afternoon going through a pile of new Archies. In fact, when there were [...]

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