A desi guy proposes to his girlfriend in San Fran (via @supremus). One of the more original ones we’ve seen in a while. If anything, the trends of flash mobs seems to be inspired by traditional song and dance sequences from Bollywood movies, so desis popping “the question” in this manner shouldn’t come as a surprise. Thoughts?

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What is the black patch on the leather skin of either side of the Mrdidangam.

Paint? No.

From wikipedia -

“The bass aperture is known as the “thoppi” or “eda bhaaga” and the smaller aperture is known as the “valanthalai” or “bala bhaaga”. The smaller membrane, when struck, produces higher pitched sounds with a metallic timbre. The wider aperture produces lower pitched sounds. The goat skin covering the smaller aperture is anointed in the center with a black disk made of rice flour, ferric oxide powder and starch. This black tuning paste is known as the “sAtham” or “karanai” and gives the mridangam its distinct metallic timbre.” Link

Fascinating little entry.

Interesting video below via a friend’s Facebook update.

Having spent the better part of my evening yesterday in watching the snoozefest that was the 83rd Annual Oscar Awards, I thought I should at least get a blog post out of it. I watched the red carpet arrivals on E! and was sore that there was no sign of our very own Mrs.Aishwarya Rai Bachhan.This morning some internet trolling had me find the pics of  Aishwarya’s appearance.

Ms. Rai Bachhan at the Oscars 2011

( Image from www. redcarpet-fashionawards.com where you will find details on her outfit)

As the site helpfully points out : She carried a Jimmy Choo “Lana” bag. Other accessories included her husband Mr. Abhishek Bacchan. As you can see from this photo:

Abhi and Ash at the Oscars

( image courtesy : www.altfg.com )

Mr.Bachchan Junior cannot be bothered to get a nice shave even for the Oscars. What can one say? This is the guy who couldn’t be bothered to shave for his own wedding! Aish looked glamorous if safe . I am thankful she chose to wear her hair down and not in a beehive.

Also in attendance were A.R.Rahman and his wife.

AR Rahman and wife at Oscars 2011

Image from www.pinkvilla.com

Mad props to ARR’s wife for sticking to her  ethnic style in the face of all the cameras and heaving bosoms!

I may have missed a memo on this but did AR Rahman change his name for the western audiences? Why does every presenter ( starting with Alicia Keys 2 years ago ) call him A.R. RACH- MAN? Did I miss some name change announcement?

Anant Pai, the creator of Amar Chitra Katha and Tinkle died at the age of 81. [BBC]

Anant Pai, widely known as Uncle Pai, to kids who grew up in 1980s India, was a chemical engineer, who followed his passion of story telling. He went to work with Indrajal comics, and was instrumental in introducing The Phantom and Mandrake the Magician to Indian audiences and also in the creation of another comic character, Bahadur. In 1967, he had an “eureka” moment when contestants in an Indian quiz show could not answer simple questions like “Who is the mother of Lord Rama?”. So instead of creating a website dealing with Hindu denigration, he created the comic book Amar Chitra Katha (ACK). Vivid illustrations, simple language and compelling story telling, led to a series of highly popular books among millions of children in India. His ACK comics mostly covered, Indian history and Hindu mythology, but I distinctly remember reading an ACK issue on Jesus. My personal favorites were the epics like Ramayana and Mahabhartha (this one spanned around 18 consecutive comic books). Pai through ACK took us on magical journeys through palaces of kings and queens and magical castles to more historically significant locations like Jallianwala Bagh, the Taj Mahal and the Red Fort. In mythological stories, the message was simple: good always triumphs over evil. We were regaled with tales of wise emperors like Akbar the Great and his smartass minister, Birbal. Kids would eagerly await for the next issue to come out in stores or be delivered to their house.

In 1980, Anant Pai created another comic book, Tinkle, replete with simple humorous tales and characters like Kalia the crow, Suppandi, Shikari Shambu, Tantri the Mantri and Nassurdin Hodja to name a few. Tinkle, is where Anant Pai became Uncle Pai to millions of children. In every issue of Tinkle, he answered letters from numerous children.

It must be pointed out yours truly was not among the fortunate few who got their letter answered by Uncle Pai. However, I had the fortune of meeting him in real life, when he gave a speech at my school. Few attended because the powers that be at my pathetic school did not deem it necessary to publicize his visit. My first and only impression of him is a rather slight unassuming gentleman with an infectious smile and sharp wit. Details of that day are hazy and this is what I recollect: Uncle Pai had each student walk to the front of the room and tell everyone what they planned to be when they grew up and the answer always was engineer, doctor, ***enter standard white collar profession*** or take over father’s business. My answer was “engineer”, when Pai asked why, my answer was “because my father is one”. Pai’s retort was “But what do YOU want to be?”. Deep words, the meaning of which I did not understand until, ironically, after I became an engineer. But this interaction is one I’ll always cherish.

In his personal life, Pai and his wife did not have any children, but between Indrajal, Amar Chitra Katha and Tinkle, Pai’s works reached millions of Indian children across multiple generations, and it must be pointed out multiple continents. This tweet, summarizes Anant Pai’s impact on the Indian psyche.

Thank you, Uncle Pai.

My sleepy town has never seen such excitement. Evidently , for the last  so many years The “Tri Valley University ” in Pleasanton  in the East Bay of the San Francisco Bay Area has been operating as little more than a diploma mill. On January 19, ICE agents raided the home of the President of TVU Susan Xiao-Ping S. No ordinary home this. Nestled in the to-die for gated community of Ruby Hill, complete with its own designer golf course, this was a $ 1.8 million home with 5 bedrooms and four and half baths. Purchased evidently through ill gotten gains at $ 300 a credit for a course in the Tri Valley University. 95 % of the estimated 1500+ students at this University are/were Indian. Immigration got a little suspicious when when  more than half of the students reported living in one apartment at 555 El Camino Real in Sunnyvale  ( see : http://pleasanton.patch.com/articles/update-federal-complaint-calls-private-college-in-pleasanton-a-sham).  Desi papers all over this news : ( See TOI : http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/US-university-shutdown-India-seeks-report-on-students/articleshow/7372311.cms; The Hindu : http://www.thehindu.com/news/states/andhra-pradesh/article1129655.ece)

First a few facts from the ground as it were. Pleasanton is a quiet suburb with a population of around 68,000. If we had an actual University that house 1,555 students we would have known about it. The very fact that no-one around here has heard of this operation shows how shady the set up is.

The website of the University is such a hack job , riddled with typos and unbelievable claims that its next to impossible to comprehend that anyone could have been fooled into thinking that this was a genuine University.

From the various news reports, its obvious that the students ( a majority if not all) knew that this was a diploma mill. I quote from “The Hindu”:

Investigations by Immigration and Custom Enforcement (ICE) found that while students were admitted to various residential and online courses of the university and on paper lived in California, in reality they “illegally” worked in various parts of the country as far as Maryland, Virginia, Pennsylvania and Texas. The ICE has called it as a “sham university”

The students ( all on F1 visas obtained via an I-20 from TVU) were attending 100% of their classes online. Major red flag there as anyone with an iota of common sense knows that on an F1 you are expected to attend a certain number of hours in -class.Many of them were not even physically in California but were working in other states through a rather liberal interpretation of what “CPT ” ( Certified Curricular  Practical Training )  means.

The local newspaper ( pleasantonpatch.com) has a couple of articles on this whole mess. The comments section under those articles have exploded with mostly TVU students whining about being deported.  They are calling on everyone from ICE to the US government to save them. Surprisingly , not a single student has approached the Government of India

Read more: US university shutdown: India seeks report on students – The Times of India http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/US-university-shutdown-India-seeks-report-on-students/articleshow/7372311.cms#ixzz1CHSRIccZ

“According to the group that came to the Consulate, a large number of students had not violated any visa or immigration rules and were unaware of the fraudulent nature of the school. Their primary concern is to complete their education for which they feel that they should be allowed to seek admission in other schools,” said Ashok Kumar Sinha, Consul (Community Affairs), Indian Consulate San Francisco.  ( link)

We respectfully plead with you not to penalise us or our families and bring shame to our entire family and the village/ towns we come from, by deporting (removing) us from the US and causing us loss of name, reputation, money, resulting in devastation to us and our families and crashing all of our dreams

The United States on Monday rejected New Delhi’s complaints about radio-tagging of some Indian students caught up in a visa and immigration scam and defended the practice saying it is “standard procedure for a variety of investigations, and does not necessarily imply guilt or suspicion of criminal activity.”

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