ambainny

It seems ironic that Germaine Greer is supporting a group of Bengali traders, who probably have never read Monica Ali's Brick Lane. They claim the book misrepresents the Bangladesh community in Brick Lane. The book i felt was sympathetic to the community weaving the diaspora with the communities and ties back home. The politics of the community were also well represented with the second generation son who was more politically conservative than the women in the novel. The juxtaposition of the sweat shops in Dacca and London and the women as workers was well described. Rushdie seeems to have stepped into the debate, since Greer criticized him at the time of Satanic Verses, his comparisons are interesting. To read a summary of the whole debate, see here 'You sanctimonious philistine' - Rushdie v Greer, the sequel Guardian letter in support of Monica Ali reopens old feud Paul Lewis Saturday July 29, 2006 The Guardian It began as a territorial dispute between a low-budget film ...

The New York Times is so biased towards Isreal. Saw the headlines about the Israeli air strike on innocent Lebanese citizens including women and children, killing 50 of them. The image on the front page of the NYT was of Lebanese citizens venting their anger on the U.N. building in Beirut. The message, the image conveys is that it is terrorist citizenry going crazy destroying buildings, when Isreal is the one causing destruction. The Reuters report was slightly more balanced. QANA, Lebanon (Reuters) - An Israeli air strike killed 54 Lebanese civilians, including 37 children, on Sunday, prompting Lebanon to tell U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice she was unwelcome in Beirut before a cease-fire. The raid on the southern village of Qana was the bloodiest single attack during Israel's 19-day-old war on Hizbollah. As a wave of anger spread across Lebanon and the Arab world, several thousand protesters chanted "Death to Israel, Death to America" outside the United Natio...

Two good articles in this week’s New Yorker. The first is on the creation of the Wikipedia encyclopedia and how global and accessible it is. It is open to editing and corrections, and has chats devoted to entries in the encyclopedia. The founder Jimmy Wales has only five employees and has no adds for generating revenue on the site. The founder was influenced by the ideas of Friedrich Hayek’s 1945 free market manifesto, “the use of knowledge in society” which argues that a person’s knowledge is by definition partial, and the truth is established only when people pool their wisdom. He was also influenced by the Open Source Movement, which believes that software should be free and distributed in such a way that anyone can modify the code. Since Wikipedia is not created solely by “experts in the field” it is often said to be inaccurate. But last year, Nature published a survey comparing forty two entries on scientific topics on Wikipedia with their counterparts in Encyclopedia Britannica, ...

Meeto's blog . Powerful words and painful memories of a beautiful soul, who was loved and is missed by a lot. I like Kamla's essay on her daughter, and her final farewell to her. Visiting Ven Tenzin Palmo must have been so healing.

  

  

  

  

  

  

  Laila and Amira 

  Shawn Fateh Nihal Angad 

  

Pickled Politics has a very informative and tragic discussion on honor killings in Britain and Denmark. From the Daily Telegraph Miss Nazir, a recruitment consultant from Southall, west London, was murdered in April last year. She was strangled with a silk scarf, stabbed 18 times and had her throat cut. She had argued with her Pakistani family after rejecting an arranged marriage and falling in love with an Afghan asylum seeker. Her two nieces, aged two and four, were made to watch the murder, and were found spattered with her blood. Last week, Diana Nammi, the co-founder of the London-based International Campaign Against Honour Killings, revealed that the number of women seeking help from her organisation had quadrupled over the past year. She said that the women’s desire for independence had caused friction within their families. “The number of honour killings has gone up because more women are realising that they have rights,” she said . … Ghayasuddin Siddiqui, the leader of the ...

It is terrible what is happening in Lebanon. Innocent people are being killed, stranded and a whole country is being destroyed by Israel. Below is a summary of an article by Robert Blecher on the politics of the Isreali attack on Palestine and Lebanon. For many in Israel, and apparently also in the Bush administration, the escalating wars in Lebanon and Gaza are conjoined in a single war against a unified "axis of terror" linking Hizballah and Hamas to Damascus and distant Tehran. By lumping together the different struggles of Hizballah and Hamas, Israel casts resolvable political crises as unfathomable, irrational hatred, in an attempt to justify its massive bombing campaigns. As Robert Blecher argues, the dual conflicts are indeed linked by more than captive Israeli soldiers -- not by radical Islam, but by Israel's plan to "disengage" unilaterally from much of the West Bank to manage its conflict with the Palestinians. With its two-front war, the Israeli gover...

An interesting visit to Lawrence School Ghora Gali by two teachers and some current students from Lawrence School Sanawar. UNFORGETABLE VISIT TO THE LAWRENCE COLLEGE GHORAGALI, PAKISTAN The children and staff of The Lawrence School, Sanawar , Himachal Pradesh visited their sister School, The Lawrence College, Ghoragali Murree in Pakistan. The School was Founded by the same person who started the School in Sanawar, Sir Henry Lawrence who had established 4 schools in 19th century. The first one being The Lawrence School, Sanawar, second was The Lawrence College, Ghoragali (now in Murree Pakistan) , third one is The Lawrence School, Lovedale in Ooty in the south and the fourth one was The Lawrence School, Mount Abu in Rajasthan. The last one stands converted in a Police Academy. 18 children and three Staff members headed by Mr. Rajesh Puri Dean of Faculty of Sanawar School visited the Ghoragali School from 11th of July to 16th of July, 2006 the invitation extended by the Principal of the ...

The Indian government has banned Blogspot, Typepad, Geocities, and other major web domains justified as an anti-terrorism strategy. Apparently some people involved with banned groups like SIMI have been using blogs to communicate, and the government has instructed the nation's ISPs to ban those sites, which host thousands of Indian blogs. See more information on Amardeep and Amitava's blog and here and here and here and finally here

Am in Atlanta..so cannot write much, but did see these articles that i thought were worth reading. Check out this article from my cousin Sanjna in the NYT Also this article by Robert Fisk in the Independent 07/14/06 "The Independent" -- -- All night I heard the jets, whispering high above the Mediterranean. It lasted for hours, little fireflies that were watching Beirut, waiting for dawn perhaps, because it was then that they descended. They came first to the little village of Dweir near Nabatiya in southern Lebanon where an Israeli plane dropped a bomb on to the home of a Shia Muslim cleric. He was killed. So was his wife. So were eight of his children. One was decapitated. All they could find of a baby was its head and torso which a young villager brandished in fury in front of the cameras. Then the planes visited another home in Dweir and disposed of a family of seven. It was a brisk start to Day Two of Israel's latest "war on terror", a conflict that uses so...

Shocking to hear about the bomb blasts where, 183 people died and more than 700 were wounded when seven coordinated blasts ripped through commuter trains and stations in Mumbai, India's financial hub, on Tuesday July 11th. On behalf of Citizens for Justice and Peace, noted activist Teesta Setalvad has released a statement that says “Terror, especially in the name of faith, defiles faiths and creates deep divides among people. This is the greatest challenge for us. Not to fall for the deep design of the terrorists and maintain peace and harmony at all costs. Do join CJP’s campaign for calm, harmony, solidarity and hope. ”Donations can be sent to Nirant, Juhu Tara Road, Juhu, Mumbai – 400 049. (Ph: 2660 2288 email: cjp02in@yahoo.com) Here is an article in the Guardian by Salil Tripathi Bombay can take it It will take a lot more than a few bombs to silence the joyous cacophony of India's greatest trading city. Salil Tripathi July 12, 2006 01:10 PM | When the Reader's Digest...

I watched football for the first time, and enjoyed it quite a bit. I was supporting Brazil, the magic of Ronaldino, the infectious smile of Kafu. Then i saw the superb passing of Zinedine Zidane was was amazed at his talent. The final between Italy and France was exciting until the headbutt by Zidane that changed the whole complexion of the game. Now that we are hearing about the reasons of why he reacted the way he did, a context is emerging. The Italian Marco Materrazi's constant taunts, cursing his mother and family, calling him a terrorist is unacceptable. I don't agree with how Zidane reacted, but i strongly feel that action needs to be taken on Materrazi. We were taught while growing up that winning was not everything, how you played the game, displaying good sportmanship was more important, than the final prize. The Italian win needs to be rethought, they won the cup, but did they play a good game, the answer is no. Winning at any cost is not acceptable. The means are ...

  

  

Saw The Devil Wears Prada this week. The hall was packed, and their was a palpable excitement with a real mix of people coming to see it from anorexic thin N.Y. women, to older couples and even large groups of middle aged women. A friend said it was already becoming a gay cult classic movie, with it's emphasis on fashion and bitchiness. The movie is based on the book by Lauren Weisberger . The story centers on a small-town girl Andrea Sachs (Anne Hathaway), who gets a job working in New York City for Runway fashion magazine, where she has to cope with a high-powered, dictatorial editor, Miranda Priestly (Meryl Streep). Her experiences while working with the control freak Meryl Streep ranged from bizarre requests, getting a copy of an unpublished Harry Potter book for her twins to getting her a hot breakfast before she got to work. The language was witty but ultra bitchy. Look below for a sampling. Miranda Priestly: The details of your incompetence do not interest me. Andy Sa...

Here is a response to Nitin's comment. The New York Times Magazine had a long, detailed article on the massacre and the investigation by the journalist Barry Berak after the killings. It's very clear who committed the massacre and who covered it up. Also I dont think the analogy of a few bad elements justifies the human rights violations committed by the Army and Millitants. I think the "go ahead" is given by the high command on the top levels of both the army and the militants organizations and the jawans and the jehadis carry out their orders. A Kashmiri Mystery To understand why the world is terrified of India and Pakistan going nuclear over Kashmir, consider the Chittisinghpora massacre. Everyone knows who did it, but no one can agree on an answer. By BARRY BEARAK Nanak Singh survived the Chittisinghpora massacre; his son and brother did not. Photograph by Raghu Rai/Magnum, for The New York Times. -----------------------------------------------------------------...