Last year was fun. So three weeks ago, when one saw Sree’s email wondering if someone would represent this Über blog at SAJA’s annual conference this year, disappointment arose. With work being the dampener during the week and cricket occupying much of the weekend these days, it was natural that the timing of the invite left one confused. But with some deft juggling, time was set aside on Saturday for a trip down to the intersection of 115th and Broadway. However nothing similar could be managed for Friday (or Sunday …

The ink has not even dried on the papers and the goodwill has started to flow in. Barely a month has gone by after he signed a $2.3 billion deal to buy prestigious, but ailing British car makers Jaguar and Land Rover from their overlords in Detroit, Ratan Tata is already doing his bit for their turnaround.
A few weeks ago, barely days after the deal was signed, UK’s premier car magazine, Autocar, reported that Tata had toured Jaguar and Land Rover’s facilities for a week and come off complimenting …

If you are a hardcore sports fan, you will definitely be familiar with ESPN360. For those of you who are not, here is the lowdown (via Wikipedia)
ESPN360.com is a broadband network for live sports programming in the United States, Mexico, Brazil and Europe. In the U.S. the network can only be accessed through Internet service providers who have signed up and paid ESPN for the programming. The entire service is free to the individual (the ISP pays for the cost) with few advertisements.
And ESPN360 now carries live cricket! So …

(scroll to the bottom for an update)
The makers of the new Mike Myers homage to juvenile toilet humor, have managed to garner support from an unlikely source. The same source that the movie parodies, well sort of.
The North American Chapter of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON) has just urged Hindus protesting Guru Pitka’s on-screen antics to lighten up and be enlightened. And pleasantly surprised as we are at UberDesi, all we are going say about it is “asphinctersayswhat”.
Say what? Exactly!
Perhaps the first Hindu organisation to comment on the …

The Pundit of Pizazz, Stephen G. Colbert, helps Barack Obama find a new religion by exploring Hinduism with Hindu Temple Society of North America President Uma Mysorekar and presents some Hin-do’s and Hin-don’ts.

Via Boing Boing comes this amazing story about dark forces and spiritual healing, an incident that will be out of place on a Twilight Zone script. And we, at UberDesi would not have even batted an eyelid, if not for the fact that the main protagonist in question was our own Bobby. No, not that Bhabhi (Hate to disappoint you, Amit!), but the Bobby who occupies the gubernatorial mansion in Baton Rouge.
Piyush Jindal’s faithful following of the Catholic Church is no news. But it appears he has had one more …

… until the fat lady sings. Or in the case of Formula 1, till they sing the national anthems.
Just over an hour ago, the desi presence in Formula 1, Force India, found this the hard way. Just over 10 minutes to go before the clock ticked to zero (there is a 2 hour limit on the duration of every F1 race, in addition to the lap limit) at Monaco and because of a few DNFs plus the timely appearance of the safety car, Force India driver Adrian Sutil was running …

Submitted by Anantha
Name of Restaurant: Dosa Grill (http://www.dosagrill.com/)
Restaurant Address: 1980 Route 27, North Brunswick, NJ-08902 (Near the intersection of Route 27 & Cozzens lane)
Restaurant Phone: 732-422-6800
1. What kind of meal did you have?
A. Dinner

2. What kind of food is it?
A. South Indian / North Indian mix

3. What did you eat and drink?
A.
I had -
a. Idly in Sambar (Mini Idlies soaked in sambar) @ $3.75
b. Gunpowder Dosa (Spicy Milagai podi dosa with masala) @ $7.25
Friend had -
a. Veg Samosa @ $3.75
b. Ghee Roast (Thin crispy rice crepe flavored with Ghee ) …

Our friendly neighborhood desi intern could be in trouble. And America waits with bated breath.
After coming back from the dead with a piece of All-American candy in him, it had been a relatively calm period in Asok Land.
But not any more. Yesterday, Asok was provoked into using some banned Dark Arts version of telekinesis. Now the powers that be at the Indian Institute of Technology know and our man could be in trouble.
For more on the developing story and the chain of events that now includes a stink eye, a …

Much has been said about the Olympic torch relays and the fact that some people are calling for the torch bearers to boycott it to express solidarity with the Tibetans. I have a couple of things to say, things that seem to have been conveniently forgotten in all the politics and events of the past two weeks. And I will take the risk of being labeled heartless (and possibly leftist/communist etc., if the trolls get here).
I have constantly seen three stakeholders in this issue – the Chinese and the Tibetans …

And so it finally goes down… sort of.
Autoblog is reporting (via Autonews.com) that Ford and Tata have put in the finally signed off on a 2.65 billion deal. Finally, Tata gets its hands on Jaguar a once proud brand that has since fallen into bad hands and a inept management, and Land Rover, a iconic brand that has seen a sharp resurgence in the past few years.
One can’t say for sure that Ratan Tata is the knight in shining armor, but hope is certainly the last resort of the damned. …

Ok, that title does not make any sense. But the news is nevertheless huge.
After Tata, now it’s Mahindra. Gawker Media’s automobile blog – Autoblog is now reporting that Mahindra and Mahindra may soon own the Jeep brand.
In order to reach the markets that matter, M&M may be looking to forge an alliance with Chrysler LLC. The Indian firm originally began selling Wranglers in its home market and might be interested in taking Jeep off Cerberus’ hands. A report in the Economic Times says that “M&M is reportedly in talks with …

Last week, I speculated that 2008 could turn out to be India’s solely because of the trendsetting auto industry. It can be argued that these trends are by no means cutting edge technological. Rather, this upswing in newsworthy snippets has solely been caused by some smart economics and business decisions. And curiously one company, Tata has featured in most of these discussions.
It has mostly been about Nano. Tata’s new golf cart like roundabout has created ripples in the world automotive press. Skepticism abounds regarding the car’s emissions, but I consider …

The last couple of months have seen a bunch of India related news snippets in the automotive media. The three major auto blogs that i subscribe to, Autoblog, Jalopnik and The Truth about Cars have all devoted multiple posts to India related subjects recently. While the Nano and the Jaguar/Land Rover sale have gotten the majority of the mileage, a couple of other pieces caught the eye this past week.
First, it has emerged that Chrysler’s electric cars division, Global Electric Motors (GEM) is working with Tata Motors to bring a …

If you are desi, you will know that the Indian cricket team is currently touring Australia. And things have not been going well for India. Australia have been their usual efficient selves while the Indians, hampered by a mind freeze by their own board that pooh poohed the lack of preparatory games before the test matches and some horrific umpiring, have since crashed to successive twin defeats at Melbourne and Sydney. While all the chatter on and off the field was animated, the actual play by the Indian team …

Were reports of Asok’s demise greatly exaggerated? Well, yes, if you believe in the ancient Hindu principles of karma and reincarnation. So it seems that he is back from his seemingly temporary stay in heaven. His cloners really did “Make it happen with Snickers” and now he has been reborn in Amreeka with a piece of All-American candy in him?

Questions pertinent to his desi-dom have appeared. Now that he has been reincarnated, does he apply for a fresh H1B? Would he have to restart his green card process afresh? Or …

Asok (age unknown), the world’s most famous desi intern and telekinetic IIT alum, died today. Details of the sad death are yet to be known. Sources say that the presence of a curious Grim Reaper as his co-pilot in a prototype moon shuttle and the apparent lowering of the value of his life to below that of a lab monkey, may have been contributing factors.

By all accounts, the world will be poorer because of the permanent absence of this soft unassuming gifted man. Asok was a intelligent human being whose …

One Halloween, a few summers ago, on an unusually balmy night, one decided to adopt the best spirit of Halloween that one could and dress up as a M.i.D (Man in Dhoti, if you are asking!) for the best Halloween street party in the world.
Sadly, no one understood! *sigh*
But surely a lot of you feel different, no? So, if you are desi and you had dressed up, either earlier today or in the past years, post your favorite Halloween photo in the comments (with faces blanked, if needed be). And …

In the last couple of years, a slew of budget airlines have cropped up in India. But not every Indian can experience the joys of air travel. It never has been the case. For example, I lost my air travel virginity (for the record, I am not a member of the “Mile High Club” yet) when I flew here in 2001 to start grad school in Ohio.
Six years on, the status quo has not changed. Most of these airlines are not budget enough, by Skybus standards. But they do offer …

It is official. Alonso and Hamilton have just completed a McLaren 1,2 at Monza. But the talking point in the Indian context is that the decision on the venue for the Indian GP is expected in a week.
This piece of news is probably a week old, but sadly slipped under the UD radar. But SPEEDTV analysts, while covering the race have just reported that F1 designer Herman Tilke (the main brain behind tracks such as Baharin, Shanghai and Malaysia) was in India last week to survey the proposed sites. Tilke …