Nerve Endings Firing Away

(image courtesy: Nilesh)

Update: Instapundit readers, also check out DesiPundit – showcasing the best in the Indian Blogosphere.

Welcome to the Bharteeya Blog Mela. There were many personal posts this week but since I think they enrich the blogosphere, I haven’t left out any. Without much ado, enjoy the Mela:

Friedman vs.Friedman? Ramnath reminds us that markets are levelling our social structures in a way that no government intervention can ever dream of. Anand begs for a little openness in society and seeks to encourage curiousity and questioning our age-old traditions. It has been tried before, my friend; you just have to be persistent and patient. Lavi is justifiably miffed over media bias in depicting a violent week that claimed many lives around the world; unfortunately not all made news. Let us begin at home; Indian lives are just as important. Ask Lt.Kranthi, who chose to go to IMA, Dehradun instead of chasing dollars in his American dream. Terrorism and money laundering make great bed partners; Aaman Lamba reviews The Washing Machine. Lets spice up things a bit, lets talk about breasts. I’ll let a woman do the talking instead, she knows better. Charu broadens the issue by mentioning three separate incidents that have shaken and stirred her.

Cinnamon cover the highs and lows of her academic life and the ensuing experiences that shaped her life. She made it through just fine; like everyone else seems to. The blog world is going crazy, now even Salman’s shirt has a blog as “it” narrates the ever-so amusing Sidhu’s Sidduisms taken to an extreme.

Most of us live in cities and seem to love them. Akshay has ‘trivial’ thoughts on Pune that include a formula for calculating the rickshaw fare, the terse local newspaper headline, and Maharastrian pronunciation. Talking of trivial matters, Gawker rightly names his nomination, “an exercise in verbosity” – a tale of his lost beeping watch. The city tales never cease to amaze. Veena shares her love for Chicago; but she doesn’t mention deep-dish pizzas. Talking about city life, Ram takes a look at the public train systems in Las Vegas and Mumbai. He prefers amchi Mumbai trains anyday. More on cities, in a much better format. Rakesh and Vikram have made a short film on NYC street food vendors.

Twilight Fairy is a model world citizen as she narrates her incidents of mistaken identities. Will some MNC now please sign her up for their advertising campaign; she seems to have a global face. Mistaken identities seem to abound. Mistaken academic identities get you a front row seat in a bus but you are punished appropriately with an inquisitive co-passenger. Talking of academic misfits, Govar would like to see integration of regional culturalism in business education. I agree; after all, understanding people you seek to provide for is the core of any business. Not understanding a different culture and actually joking about it can have serious consequences apart from hurt feelings. But does humor lend certain liberties that otherwise would be termed as racism? However, would you be offended if you tooth suddenly started talking? Nilu and his blog conspire to put “words in his mouth”.

Sunil has had some unpleasant incidents in college regards the caste system in India. Damn! no matter how much progress we make, the caste system never seems to leave us alone. Academic woes abound on blogs, Ankit is angry that the board examiners aren’t doing a great job and we can’t do much about it. The Board earns almost a lakh simply because we don’t trust them.

Saket instead decides to chill with an Bollywood action flick, Dus and actually ends up enjoying the movie in spite of all regular Bollywood norms. However, award ceremonies are a whole different matter altogether. National Awards, the last bastion of credibility in Indian filmworld disputably awards Saif Khan. Arnab is amused and pissed.

That concludes the Mela. Hope you haven’t lost your twin here. Drop your nominations at AnarCapLib for next week’s edition.