Native festival in foreign land

We celebrate Diwali, Independence Day and Republic Day here at Purdue every year. I believe this is the case with almost all universities in the US. All these celebrations are, without exception, peaceful and do not cause any problems to local residents. We do not go around asking others to come and celebrate festivals with us, but if others are willing to come and join us, we welcome them. Again, I believe this is a uniform pattern in nearly all U.S cities and universities.
However, when I hear Raj Thackeray spewing his venom against Biharis for celebrating ChhaT Pooja or against UP guys for celebrating UP Diwas, I can feel nothing but anger for the man. I am almost certain that these celebrations do not disrupt normal life in Mumbai any more than bomb blasts, encounters, marriages and sundry other activities do. For that matter, I am sure that it does not cause more inconvenience to locals than festivals like Navratri (The large scale Garba-Dandiya version of which is essentially Gujarati in nature), Tazia processions during Moharram, Durga Puja and the biggest of them all (for Maharashtra, i.e.), Ganeshotsav.
Pray tell me Sir, are you going to support the Americans if they go around bashing Indians for celebrating their festivals and national holidays?

For God's Sake

Sake as in say-k, not saa-kay as in Japanese Rice Wine.
Stereotyping, as in a Jew distributing pamphlets about Islamists wanting to kill everyone. Shahjahan built the Taj Mahal and he was one of us? who us? Us as in Pakistani us? No Us as in Muslim us...and that Muslim us is as Indian as he is Pakistani.
Indian Guy screwing the pakistani over.
9/11 apparently bullshit. And what really did happen, might you enlighten us?
Deen mein Jabardasti nahin hai!!!Awesome!!!
Poorly edited... poor scene transitions etc.
Kashmir, while not mentioning the Uighurs and the Tibetans and the Tamils.
More importantly, whatever has been said, is reportedly true.
Why would a Pashto mullah quote Iqbal? Weak argument, but still, I wonder if that were possible.
Are pakistani flags displayed so prominently in courts?
Racial Profiling and radicalism....do not go together. they are poles that feed on each other, good contrast. one guy does the crappy stuff while the other pays for it...good concept.
Feel bad for Mansoor.
The daleel about music is wrong theologically, apparently it isn't saaz, but soz .

Wrote this a long time ago, after watching Khuda Kay Liye, for some reason, didn't publish this post

Praising 'The Raj'

This article in the newspaper Slimes, sorry, Times of India, made me wonder, when o when, willst thou cease to crap, o Times?
I knew that TOI had gone degenerate, but I did not know that they had taken to being apologists for Raj (If-you-are-a-northie-then-f.o) Thackeray.
Are the editors at TOI napping or what?

Sock in the plexus

It is one thing to read news sitting in a office cubicle, occasionally being affected enough by it to say, 'man that is bad'. It is a completely different feeling when the subject of the news is someone you have interacted with, even if briefly, someone whose kin you've been in close interaction with over a considerable period. Someone you didn't think could do what he/she has.
Such news comes and knocks the wind out of you. You get the feeling you are mindfucked because nothing in the world can explain how a person having a similar (economical) upbringing, similar opportunities, similar surroundings can do something unspeakable.
You hope that further investigations reveal that the person is not guilty as charged, has no hand in any of the said dealings. You hope. But something inside tells you it may be futile hoping.
Damn, again.

The Times of Chindhiaan

The decline of the Times of India from a bastion of solid journalism to a glamor selling, advertisement focussed newspaper is well known.
Their online edition, on the whole, was reasonably free from the above mentioned problems till some time back.
In the recent past, however, the online edition has introduced a section, wherein supposedly hot pics of celebrities are linked to. The site they link to, is called, well, what else, hotklix.
Now I'm sure that the guys responsible for getting this article online, and their bosses, know where these clicks lead onto. Which begs the question, why is a leading newspaper in India, getting away with linking to sites like 'masalababes--the hottest indian female celebrties', or 'xboards.us' which I am sure host illegally, the pics of leading film actresses. Why do they need to do this? People interested in watching Kim Kardashian's rear, or fashion disasters or even wardrobe malfunction can look for these things on the internet. That's why they have Google, retards at TOI...don't you get it?
Why waste a link on such trash, why not put it to some better use? Seriously.

Bell Labs kills basic physics research facility

This article mad me sad.
Not a nice way to start a weekend.
Woe betide!!!
Hark back to the summer of 2002, when a first year engineering student, studying for his Engineering Mechanics exam sees an article in an electronics magazine about this Mecca of Innovation, this former Shangri-la of the Sciences...this likeness of the all powerful mythical heroes of yore that inspires awe and at the same time humbles you.
Wonder struck, this student thinks to himself, won't it be wonderful if we get to work here, to interact with the some of the best minds in science, both basic and applied (though he didn't know it wasn't true anymore, even then), be a part of a wonderful discovery that impacts the world significantly?
Some things are never meant to happen, or so fatalists would like to believe.
Alcatel-Lucent claim that they will be focussing instead on networking, communication and nanotechnology.
The last term has become such a cliche that I'm guessing few know what they're talking about when they use that term anymore. How is one going to do nanotechnology without focussing on basic semiconductor research, the backbone of the promised nano-revolution? Are these guys instead going to do soft matter research? But doesn't that still fall under basic Physics? Does that even make sense? Are they anything but stark raving mad? Am I anything but? Are short terms gains the only things that matter?
Damn.