Sexism and the City

Looks like you are new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!What a weekend it was ! As Hurricane Gustav threatened to pound the Gulf coast, a completely different storm was brewing on the political front. John “Maverick” Mc Cain pulled a fast one and named Sarah “Barracuda” [...]

Indian boy kills girl over iPod

Fox News blames it on capitalism. [Fox News] (tip Jennie via email)
10 year old girl in Calcutta brings iPod to school. 14 year old boy wants iPod. 10 year old girl refuses to comply. Boy pushes girl off a bridge. Girl loses consciousness. Boy could’ve taken iPod at this stage but for some reason he [...]

The Gandhi-fication of John Edwards?

Of course, we’re speaking about John Edwards, the disgraced politician not John Edward, the pysch who communicates with your dead great-grandmother for a family recipe.
She saw a Gandhi in Edwardsimg: via Hollywood Gossip
Newsweek’s Johnathan Darman, who covered the Kerry-Edwards campaign in 2004, recounts his encounters with John Edwards’ other woman Reille Hunter. [NewsWeek]
When Edwards [...]

I want to believe: Bigfoot edition (UPDATED)

I confess to a healthy interest in all things paranormal. Alas , not too many of my friends or family do the same. I am always on the lookout for someone to play Mulder to my Scully.
Bigfoot lives, or is dead depending on your perspective
img: via About.com
I follow the adventures of Bigfoot aka [...]

Asok freaks

The reincarnated Asok is asked to work without supervision, i.e. guess what his boss would do and proceed accordingly. Unable to come to terms with this request Asok freaks out and finally goes into shock mode thinking he’s on “Punked”.

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New Yorker goes overboard on Obama satire?

In case you missed it, yesterday news broke of the intended cover of the upcoming New Yorker’s July 21st 2008 edition. [CNN]
Highlights of the cartoon:1. Shows Barack Obama dressed in traditional Muslim garbs complete with turbanBackground: Barack wore a turban and traditional Kenyan attire in 2006 when he visited that nation. [UD]2. Show Michelle Obama [...]

Arranged or Deranged?

Chaudhary Rashid a 54 year old Man in Georgia was charged with the killing of his daughter Sandeela Kanwal(link) .The purported motive is that his daughter reportedly was not happy with her recent arranged marriage that took place in Pakistan to a man who now lives in Chicago.
“The victim was not interested in marrying, [...]

The Summer of My Discontent

June has given way to July and what promises to be a long and hot summer. And I have had the dubious pleasure of watching a brutal, unforgiving presidential primary come to its end. Last time around , I was still a newbie , getting used to life in Amrika. This time I followed the [...]

AP makes like Hindi fim villian

For those of our UD readers who have been here some time you know ( from our FAQ) :

Q. Where do you guys get your material from?
A. Al Gore created this tool called the Internet. No seriously, we just go through the daily news clippings, blogs, tabloids, editorials. You name it. We blog it.

A big [...]

Tim Russert dies

NBC’s “Meet the Press” anchor Tim Russert, 58, collapsed at work with a heart attack and passed away. He was doing what he loved best, voice overs for “Meet the Press”. [ABC]

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The Exorcism Of Susan By The Young Piyush Jindal

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 [...]

Gandhi’s statue placed next to a trash can …

… at Madame Tussauds and this is news, why? [Timesnow]
Break out the tissues, someone’s offendedimg: via TimesNow
And to top it, National Enquirer style news coverage by the TimesNow reporter who covered this non-story.
Two gems from the TimesNow writer:
In a shocking instance of apathy towards one of the greatest figures of peace and non-violence, Mohandas Karamchand [...]

Is she really a “Bond Girl”?

Rediff has this story of Zaraa Adams, an actress of desi origin, who is visiting Mumbai, who is also supposed to be a Bond Girl. [Rediff] (tip Runa via email)
Hot or not, is she really a Bond Girl?img: via Rediff
We didn’t have to post the image but we can, so we will. Besides when was [...]

Olympics and the freedom of choice

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 [...]

“Witch” hunt - desi ishtyle

A man in Bihar named, Ram Ayodhya (Über Desi nomination for the holiest name), hired a “magician” to cure his wife and when her magic did not cure (imagine that), he accused her of black magic and collected a mob to rough her up. Besides the obvious superstitious and social angles to this story, CNN’s [...]

Indian students’ safety on US campuses

DNA India picked up on recent reports of deaths of Indian students in the US and ran a story/op-ed with the sensational headline “Are our children safe in the US?”. [link]
BBC followed up with an even more sensational headline “Insecurity grips Indian students in US”. [link]
As a background to this story, in the last 12 [...]

Hindustan Times redefines ABCD

Über Desi is a group blog primarily brought to you by first generation desis. We still lovingly refer to other first genners as FOBs. But one thing we seldom do is refer to second generation desis as ABCDs. In fact, an instant search of UD, returned only 3 instances where the word had been used [...]

Once the Jeep goes desi…

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 [...]

Symonds depicted as the über monkey in Aussie media

The Australian newspaper, The Courier-Mail, ran a photoshopped image of Andrew Symonds’ face superimposed on Hanuman’s body. tip: Sai via Gmail.
Symonds is the Aussie cricketer whom Indian cricketer Harbhajan Singh allegedly called “a monkey”. Predictably Hindu groups are up in arms against this depiction. [link]
So what do you Über Desis think?
1. It is phunny
2. I’m [...]

Argumentatum ad-hominem? Guilty as charged

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 [...]

LSU’s administration shows insensitivity [2 UPDATES]

[Update1] I now find the article from the LSU Reveille missing. Screen shots at the end.
[Update2] Runa tipped us that the Baton Rouge PD is looking for three or four “young black males” in connection with the murders.

While we are saddened and baffled by the lack of security in Universities across the country, the [...]

Transsexual politics

What do you do when you can’t garner the support of your people? You call your campaign manager and look at new ways of garnering peoples attention.
That is what Soniya de Pavaiya did. She called Elizabeth Jeffords, a retired architect from Colorado, now settled in Bangalore. The common bond between them, they are both [...]

Lankan suicide bombing caught on tape

Will update the post as I find more information.
WARNING: The video is very very graphic. Watch the woman in the White and Yellow Sari

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‘Aliens in America’ walking on very thin ice. [updated]

After managing to watch all those episodes of ‘Scrubs’ and ‘Family Guy’ on my DVR when I finally managed to get to those episodes of ‘Everybody Hates Chris’. As I was forwarding the commercials, I saw a South Asian kid on this new show - Aliens in America, starting October 1st on CW.
The first [...]

Comparing turbans to diapers earns the wrath of American Sikhs

As most of you should be aware by this point, the TSA changed its security policy yet again. The most affected seem to be the Sikhs, Amardeep over at SM had a post about this from a month ago. He writes

I’m also worried because I have a feeling the new policies may be deployed [...]