The Tongue Painter...

"An artist in India's southern Kerala state displays his talent for painting pictures using his tongue. Ani K, a drawing teacher, drew inspiration from a fellow artist who painted with his foot. However, learning his craft was not without its dangers as he suffered headaches and nausea from the paint fumes. Eventually he mastered the art and is now able to finish one canvas in 3-4 days," reports Reuters. A determined person... wonder if this will power could have been put to more productive use?



Here's what will follow, controversies about dishonoring Hindu gods, because he paints with his tongue (which is of course considered very disrespectful) and the harms of toxic paints... Goodness gracious is all I can say!

Hope And A Little Sugar

Hope and a Little Sugar is a new Bollywood/American collaborative
movie released this April. It is currently doing the film festival
circuit. This is the story of a Hindu American who loses her husband
in the 9/11 attack. She later falls in love with a Muslim boy much to
the consternation of her father in law who is consumed by hatred
towards Muslims due to the 9/11 incident. But he changes his mind when
he receives the same treatment from Americans who mistake his turban
and beard. This change of heart is at the crux of the movie. This
movie is a reflection of what is happening is real life.

The racial and religious intolerance that is brought to light by this
film is very relevant in today's society where we are quick to jump to
conclusions bases on the color of ones skin or religious disposition.
The fundamentalists might force us develop an attitude towards those
of a particular religion. Shouldn't we be rising above all that and
stop being judgmental? What makes a person is their own personal
character. Race and religion are accessories to this character no
doubt, but to stereotype, generalize and condemn one because of what
they are wearing or who they are praying to, is grossly unfair, is it not?

Hope and a Little Sugar is on the web at--
http://www.hopeandalittlesugar.com/

Bollywood As a Social Vehicle

In an article titled "Bollywood No Longer A Dream Too Far for India's
Lower Castes" in the Washington Post, writer, Emily Wax discussed
Bollywood's struggle with casteism, a reflection of the country's
struggle with this chronic issue.

"Paswan, 33, is a Dalit, a member of India's most ostracized caste.
Dalits are often cobblers, street sweepers and toilet cleaners, but
they are rarely actors in the world's largest film industry. Still, as
he stood that day beneath towering billboards showing Hindi film stars
hawking expensive watches and cars, Paswan decided Bollywood was for
him," says Wax in this article, succinctly pointing out that, "It is
not easy for Indians to shake loose the cages of caste, a
3,000-year-old pecking order in which professions and social status
are inherited like eye color or height. But Bollywood, like Mumbai
itself, is a place where young Indians are increasingly finding
opportunities to reinvent themselves."

If Bollywood is the place to break this norm then so be it. It is not
surprising how many taboos are broken and norms changed by popular
media. If Bollywood can help break the taboos surrounding casteism in
India then kudos to this film industry that is often ridiculed for
their song and dance type films.

According to Wax, "Across India, Dalits and members of other low
castes are struggling to gain access to quality education and
better-paying jobs. The economy is booming, and Indians of low caste
-- often identifiable by their surnames, birthplaces or parents'
status -- want to share in the wealth, or at least the opportunity.
Some aspiring actors from low castes say their confidence is growing.
There is more social mobility than ever before, they say, and
Bollywood is experiencing its share of change."

Read the full article at--
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/04/26/AR2008042602200.html

The Global Village...

"Which company is more "American"—Mumbai-based Tata Consultancy
Services, or Armonk (N.Y.)-based IBM (IBM)? Evaluate the two based on
where they make their sales, and the answer is surprising. TCS,
India's largest tech-services company, collected 51% of its revenues
in North America last quarter, while 65% of IBM's were overseas." --
excerpt from a Business Week article titled "IBM vs. Tata: Who's More
American?"

It never ceases to amaze me how truly global the world is becoming. I
remember studying about Marshall McLuhans concept of the Global
Village during my Masters program in Mass Communications, and it now
seems like this is increasingly happening in front of my eyes.
Centrifugal forces are at work bring ideas, groups and people closer.
However the centripetal forces are doing their part as well, by
isolating cultures, traditions, and concepts further away. During this
process of self discovery, we need to arrive at a happy medium without
disrupting the unstable equlibrium that currently exists in our world.
How are we going to do that, only time will tell!

Read the full Business Week article at--
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/08_18/b4082000234598.htm?chan=technology_technology+index+page_best+of+the+magazine

Collecting Debts From India

A new trend in outsourcing to India is in debt collection says this
article in the New York Times titled, "Debt Collection Done From India
Appeals to U.S. Agencies."

An excerpt from the article --
"Americans are used to receiving calls from India for insurance claims
and credit card sales. But debt collection represents a growing
business for outsourcing companies, especially as the American economy
slows and its consumers struggle to pay for their purchases.

Armed with a sophisticated automated system that dials tens of
thousands of Americans every hour, and puts confidential information
like Social Security numbers, addresses and credit history at
operators' fingertips, this new breed of collectors is chasing down
late car payments, overdue credit card debt and lapsed installment
loans. Debt collectors in India often cost about one-quarter the price
of their American counterparts, and are often better at the job, debt
collection company executives say.

"India will be the only place we grow this year," said J. Brandon
Black, the chief executive of the Encore Capital Group, a debt
collection company based in San Diego. India is the company's largest
operating area, with about half the company's collection force of more
than 300.

Although the stereotype of a collector may be "some guy with chains
and a cut-off shirt," Mr. Black said, collectors in India are "very
polite, very respectful, and they don't raise their voice." He added,
"People respond to that."

Read the full article at--
http://select.nytimes.com/mem/tnt.html?emc=tnt&tntget=2008/04/24/business/worldbusiness/24debt.html&tntemail0=yv

MIT On A Lovely Spring Day...

Picasso On Abstract Art

There is no abstract art. You must always start with something.
Afterward you can remove all traces of reality.
- Pablo Picasso

Indian Tea Goes Digital...

No more catalogs, no mare gavels, no more auctioneers screaming going
once, twice...

"India's tea markets are going digital," says an article in the New
York Times. "Just as electronic trading rocked the floors of the New
York Stock Exchange and the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, the move to
computerized auctions promises to turn the tradition-bound world of
tea traders upside down. While tea growers and large multinationals
have welcomed the promise of computerized trading, many small tea
brokers fear an electronic exchange will mean the end of their
livelihoods. The government body that sets the rules for tea sales in
India, the Indian Tea Board, sees electronic trading as a way to help
planters who have been hit hard by low tea prices for much of the last
decade. Electronic trading is supposed to result in fairer prices and
lower transaction costs."

What has been going on since 1861 will change now , hopefully for the
better, in the tea state of Assam. According to the New York times,
"The main advantage of the computerized system, according to the Tea
Board, is that buyers can bid from anywhere, without having to be
physically in the trading hall — or even in the same city where the
tea is warehoused. "That means buyer participation will be more,
competition will be more," said H. N. Dwibedi, a consultant who has
been advising the Tea Board on computerized trading. "Greater
competition ensures that the true price is discovered."

India's previous attempts at automating tea trading electronically
were unsuccessful, hopefully this time around, things will be
smoother, more to ensure fair trade for the tea traders and to revive
the dwindling markets.

Read the full article at --
http://select.nytimes.com/mem/tnt.html?pagewanted=1&tntget=2008/04/22/business/worldbusiness/22tea.html&tntemail0=y&emc=tnt

The Taj Mahal

Lonely Planet author Sarina Singh gives an interesting tour of the beautiful Taj Mahal.

Outsourcing Stress

The nature and being of Indian Society has changed drastically over
the last few years, there is no doubt about this. For those of us who
visit every other year we see the rapid changed fast forwarding in
front of our eyes with every visit. Each time I visit, I notice the
latent stress that did not exist several years ago, when life was more
laid back and priorities were very different. Today, everyone is more
preoccuped with work, managing dual income households, where money is
not the issue but time is.

I saw this article in the Chicago Tribune, and I felt that it was
right on. Read this excerpt below.

"After two years working nights at a U.S. company's computer call
center, Vamsi knew it was time to quit when his 6-year-old son brought
home a school portrait he'd drawn of his father, asleep in bed.
"He was asked to draw a picture of his mom and dad, and he drew me
sleeping. That's the only way he ever saw me," remembers the
31-year-old, who like many southern Indians goes by only one name. "He
never saw me doing anything else."
Indians may have taken over three-quarters of the world's call-center
jobs, but they've also taken on the stresses of those jobs: weight
gain, depression, boredom and, often, relationship troubles."

Call centers are just one example of an industry that is catering to a
different part of the world. So many other sectors are in the same
boat. Friends and family that live in India, maintain the same hours
and schedules that I maintain on the east coast. I can see the stress
that this puts on their family life and their personal relationships.

With stress come otehr problems such as substance abuse,increasing
divorce rates, unstable children and the list is endless.
"A study last year in the Indian Journal of Sleep Medicine found that
40 percent of call-center workers surveyed smoked, compared with 7
percent of a control group, and 36 percent had more than two alcoholic
drinks a week, against 2 percent of the control group. Another 27
percent of call-center workers also reported using sleeping pills or
other drugs, often in an effort to combat the sleep deprivation that
nags overnight workers," says the Tribune article.

Read the full piece at--
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/chi-india-stress_nu_goeringapr20,0,6517218.story

Aditya Mittal - Like Father, Like Son...

"Aditya Mittal has spent a decade helping his father build the world's
biggest steel company. Will he take the top slot? Or could worries
over nepotism make him prove himself elsewhere?" asks an article in
the Times Online. The UK based paper has done a nice interview with
the son of Lakshmi Mittal, the UK based steel magnate.

An intriguing look into the life of a boy who grew up with a silver
spoon, yet one who seems so capable, level headed and down to earth

Another excerpt, "Aditya Mittal nods. "You hope one generation learns
from another's mistakes. I am my own man. So long as I am doing what I
want, and it works for him and me, it's perfect."
That trust was fostered by an upbringing where Aditya stayed close to
his father's side, visiting steel plants with him, living near the
business in Indonesia where Lakshmi started his operations.
Unlike many entrepreneurs' children, he never lost his father to
business – he was taken along for the ride. And Lakshmi, say those
around him, is good at making business fun.
But father-son bonds make family-owned firms difficult for everyone
else, not least colleagues and other shareholders. Can it be a
meritocracy? Is that why he calls his father Mr Mittal?
Aditya grins. "Well, I could hardly call him Papa in the office, could I?""

Definitely worth a read at--
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/natural_resources/article3778499.ece

The power of a brand..

Jhumpa Lahiri is no doubt a fantastic writer. What is even more
powerful than her writing today is the "brand" that has encompassed
her work. Lahiri is now one of the most powerful brands in the
literary world. Her book is now on the New York Times bestseller list.

"Lahiri, an author in the literary genre, has become so popular that
Knopf has reportedly printed 300,000 copies of her latest book,
similar to the amount of copies printed for books by popular fiction
authors like John Grisham," this is from a piece that I wrote for Idol
Chatter.

All the reviews of her latest book Unaccustomed Earth have been
fantastic, taking a powerful writer to even more heights, than she
could have ever imagined. Perhaps the only review that is critical of
her work with surprising logic is the one at www.Desicritics.org says
"Reading the collection of short stories by Jhumpa Lahiri in
Unaccustomed Earth is like unwrapping layer upon layer of a much
anticipated gift only to find a mundane trinket in the end. Lahiri
seems to take perverse pleasure in playing bad Santa who stuffs the
stockings of her readers with coal, when in fact she could have easily
gratified us with eight beautiful presents. I am not entirely sure why
she would want to do what she does with unerring success story after
story. Is this by design or an unintended consequence?"

Read the full review at --
http://desicritics.org/2008/04/20/114322.php

Read the Idol Chatter piece about Lahiri becoming a pop-culture icon at--
http://blog.beliefnet.com/idolchatter/2008/04/jhumpa-lahiri-a-new-pop-cultur.html

Some glowing reviews and interviews with Lahiri can be read at the links below--
http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200802u/jhumpa-lahiri
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/04/books/04Book.html?ref=review
http://www.tnr.com/politics/story.html?id=b458594b-ac96-4572-8b8b-bedcd27bbf5e
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=89236881

Bollywood Arrives In Pakistan

"Indian movies were banned in Pakistan in 1965, after the two
countries fought a war. Crippled by poor production and, more
recently, undercut by a burgeoning market of pirated DVDs, Pakistan's
film industry appeared to be on the verge of extinction. Box office
sales dwindled, and more than 600 movie theaters closed.But since a
government decision in February to lift the ban on the screening of
Indian movies, the ailing industry stands poised for a rebound," says
an article in the Washington Post.

"Race" a racy new Bollywood movie was screened in Pakistan, a delight
to many young Pakistani's who are craving Bollywood films. One common
interest between the people of Pakistan and India, that should
definitely be taken advantage of.

An excerpt from the Washington Post article --
It's 12:30 p.m. and dozens of people are lined up outside the Cinepax
movie theater, waiting in the unforgiving heat for their first glimpse
of one of Pakistan's few multiplex cinemas. About 100 yards away, four
towering columns mark the spot where a former prime minister was
hanged years ago, casting a long shadow over the theater grounds.

Inside, a slice of America with Bollywood flavoring beckons. Ice-cold
air conditioning blasts across the spotless, polished marble floors of
the five-screen multiplex. The plush purple stadium seats are slowly
filling up, while an Indian raga plays loudly on the sound system.

Mushtaq, a 24-year-old telecom worker who lives with her parents in
Peshawar, can barely keep still. In a few minutes, she will see her
first Indian-made movie -- a slick thriller-cum-pop opera called
"Race," about two pretty girls, two rich brothers and a triple
double-cross at a highflying racetrack in South Africa.

"The moment we entered the theater," Mushtaq says, gesturing toward
two friends at the concession stand, "we thought we'd never seen
anything like this. There has been nothing like this in Pakistan --
that's why we had to come."

Read the full article at--
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/story/2008/04/20/ST2008042001910.html

Wear a Pancha Kachcham - wikiHow

Wear a Pancha Kachcham - wikiHow

Outsourcing Scientific Discoveries

An article in the New York Times titled, "How Scientific Gains Abroad
Pay Off in the U.S." asks the questions, "AT a time of economic
belt-tightening, might cheap science from low-wage countries help keep
American innovators humming?"

While outsourcing is the name of the game, to cut costs and increase
growth, it has been widely adopted in various segments of
manufacturing and industry. "Americans have long profited from
low-cost manufactured goods, especially from Asia. The cost of those
material "inputs" is now rising. But because of growing numbers of
scientists in China, India and other lower-wage countries, "the cost
of producing a new scientific discovery is dropping around the world,"
says Christopher T. Hill, a professor of public policy and technology
at George Mason University," says this article in the New York Times.

Another excerpt from this article--
"We shouldn't fear the rise of science in Asia and other poorer
countries. We should figure out how to take advantage of it," says
Patrick Windham, a lecturer in technology policy at Stanford and a
former staff member of Congressional science committees.
Optimism about scientific globalization is a wrinkle on the familiar
story of outsourcing. Just as United States companies have contracted
out physical production, they can do the same for scientific "goods,"
which range from formulas and ideas to the results of experiments.
In the short-term at least, higher spending on scientists by India and
China could create a glut of them in these countries, driving wages
down further and making the costs of acquiring science even lower.
"Science is the ultimate global activity," says Richard B. Freeman, a
labor economist with the National Bureau of Economic Research. "You
can outsource research."
Mr. Freeman, among others, questions whether there is a shortage of
scientists in the United States. He cites evidence suggesting that
American dominance in science will decline over time and that we
should worry less about purported shortages at home and more about
"developing new ways of benefiting from scientific advances made in
other countries."

For a while now, the critics were wary of this, of innovation moving
away to these fast growing economies of China and India. Lack of focus
on immigration policy, and increase in Reverse Brain Drain, add to
this phenomenon of outsourcing innovation and scientific discoveries,
but as the article says either way it seems like a win-win situation.

Read the full article at --
http://select.nytimes.com/mem/tnt.html?emc=tnt&tntget=2008/04/20/technology/20ping.html&tntemail0=y

Empty Bellies In India Add to Global Hunger

Effects of the global food crisis are rippling across the world. Each
time I see wasted food at restaurants and homes, I think of how many
mouths this food, that just got thrown into garbage, might have fed.

The New York Times has been publishing several articles and editorials
on the subject of hunger and the food crisis. Todays paper carries an
article titled, "Across Globe, Empty Bellies Bring Rising Anger." The
article features examples from several poverty stricken nations, real
life people who are struggling to eat, and do not know where their
next meal will come from. The photograph itself is an eye opener.

An excerpt --
"The rising prices are altering menus, and not for the better. In
India, people are scrimping on milk for their children. Daily bowls of
dal are getting thinner, as a bag of lentils is stretched across a few
more meals.
Maninder Chand, an auto-rickshaw driver in New Delhi, said his family
had given up eating meat altogether for the last several weeks.
Another rickshaw driver, Ravinder Kumar Gupta, said his wife had
stopped seasoning their daily lentils, their chief source of protein,
with the usual onion and spices because the price of cooking oil was
now out of reach. These days, they eat bowls of watery, tasteless dal,
seasoned only with salt."

We only hear about India and China being the economic boom towns. Very
few speak about the majority in these fast growing economies who are
struggling to put food on the table everyday. The more we become aware
of issues such as these, the more obvious are the misplaced priorities
of many governments and policy makers.

Read the full article at --
http://select.nytimes.com/mem/tnt.html?emc=tnt&tntget=2008/04/18/world/americas/18food.html&tntemail0=y

School Cricket League in New York

Samira Nanda of Reuters reports that New York City is the first school district in North America to start a school cricket league.

The Road Not Taken...

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I--
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

Robert Frost, The Road Not Taken
US poet (1874 - 1963)

Read the full poem at --
http://www.bartleby.com/119/1.html

The Million Dollar Dagger

Reuters reports that, "A gold encrusted dagger once owned by the Indian Emperor Shah Jahan who is famous for building the Taj Mahal could fetch $1 million at an auction in London. Shah Jahan's gold encrusted dagger was bought by a collector for less than a thousand dollars and is now expected to fetch up to a million dollars."

Earth has a twin?