replacing substance with symbols

why can't we be friends now?" he said, holding him affectionately. "it's what i want. it's what you want." but the horses didn't want it--they swerved apart; the earth didn't want it, sending up rocks through which riders must pass single file; the temples, the tank, the jail, the palace, the birds, the carrion, the guest house, that came into view as they issued from the gap and saw mau beneath: they didn't want it, they said in their hundred voices, 'no, not yet,' and the sky said, 'no, not there.' -e.m. forster, a passage to india

for now i knew that everything was happening out there with the same indifference, that outside too there was nothing but my solitude. the solitude which i had brought upon myself and which had become too vast for my heart to take in. i remembered people i had once left, and i didn’t understand how someone could ever abandon another person. –rilke, notebooks

somewhere amidst the grayed and endless colonnades of academe and the mad pursuit of an intellectual life, i seem to have stopped asking myself: why? why am i doing what i do and why am i asking the questions i ask? why am i interested? and this why, the greatest question of all, has steadily grown to become the blackest mote of my eye. so now, on this rainy wednesday morning, i awake to find myself both blind and lost. well, perhaps lost isn't the right word, you're not really lost if you don't have a destination in mind. no, i awake to find myself blind and adrift.

the loss of my interest in religion as an academic subject preceded, indeed anticipated, my current indifference to spirituality. since childhood, religion and spirituality have been the foundations on which i've built my intellectual identity. the erosion of those supports left me grasping at straws, and by the end of the masters program i felt completely enervated, thoroughly eviscerated. so when v. suggested i study in india, i thought i'd found a way to solve my problems. india, oh generous and bountiful india. countless souls have come flocking to you with their ennui and you've graciously granted them each your merciful wisdom--or at the very least, a reality check. but for me, nothing. nothing what-so-ever. your own flesh-and-blood, i wasn't exotic and exciting enough for you, was that it? no inspiration or solace for me, just heightened social anxiety and black cracked soles that would take weeks to heal. i'm sorry that i didn't greet you like an ecstatic stranger or even a long-estranged relative come home. you know how i am, and i'm not like that. don't blame me for seeing past all your colors, magic, and glorious past, for catching sight of your bleakness, opportunism, and ignorance. i still loved you, but i suppose that didn't matter.

and the cracks continued to spread, reaching deeper and broader, a rapidly disintegrating earthen dam. my entire sense of self was coming undone, and there was nothing i could do. nothing but go on, as if nothing was happening, as if the end of the world was not at hand. so i read. i read rilke and saw the bare walls of my rented room undulate into a terrible roaring whiteness that nearly swallowed me whole. i read kamala das and felt my soul struggle to breathe under the crushing weight of my dull body. i read kancha iliah and felt guilty for being a vegetarian. i read gandhi and felt guilty for liking beautiful things. i read emma goldman and felt guilty for being alive. finally, i read e.m. forster and he understood me, but embarrassingly too much. after him, i stopped reading and started walking. restless walking in abids, in the muslim slums, on my building's rooftop. i wanted to leave, there was nothing more to do here. v. was convinced i was depressed, i was convinced i was dying.

cannot stop listening to this song. video is amazing.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6DQyusKTAh4

interviewer: You play a heterosexual man who suspects he has AIDS. Would you be willing to play a gay man who's tested HIV positive?

siddharth: I think we are a homophobic country and I believe the media's insensitive sensationalisation of the issue is largely responsible for this. As an actor I play roles based on reality. Sexual orientation is a natural and personal choice. I see no reason for it to affect my decision to accept a project. I have close friends who are gay, and they are as intelligent and caring as, if not more than, my heterosexual friends. I think it's time we started respecting them and giving them their much-deserved freedom to just be themselves.

siddharth is my fav telugu actor and to hear him say this makes me so happy. he also starred in the hindi blockbuster, rang de basanti.

excerpted from: http://www.hindustantimes.com/StoryPage/StoryPage.aspx?id=1b8e886c-f18d-49ca-b257-807972e3a744&MatchID1=4665&TeamID1=10&TeamID2=3&MatchType1=1&SeriesID1=1174&PrimaryID=4665&Headline=Siddharth+has+no+problems+doing+gay+roles

i just love devendra banhart + natalie portman + hinduistic-y myths + ridic subtitles!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fPU1dtqrtho

<i>kali:  i am kali the destroyer, goddess of change!  the redeemer of the universe!  together we will CRUSH rajah!
devendra:  i love your dress, who makes it!?</i>

oh wow, there is a new impetus to publish sanskrit literary works--in all religions and periods--for a general international readership in english.

Introduction to the Clay Sanskrit Library
By John Clay

The great national epics of India, the Maha·bhárata and the Ramáyana, reached their definitive form around the beginning of the common era. By their authority and comprehensive character they dominated Hindu literature for several centuries, as familiar episodes and themes were reworked. But Buddhism and Jainism developed their own literary traditions.

From early in the common era, a vast creative literature of novels, short stories, plays and poetry began to develop. Some took their subject matter from the national epics or the Buddhist scriptures, but many other sources also provided inspiration.

This new literary culture was vibrant and vivid. The dramatists wrote plays about palaces full of dancing girls, and gardens where peacocks screeched at the approach of the monsoon and elephants trumpeted in the stables, eager for combat or mating. Courtiers intrigued for influence and promotion. Merchants set off on their voyages with sadness at separation, and returned with joy and vast profits. The six seasons spun by at breakneck speed. Lovers kept their trysts in the cane groves down by the river. Holy men preached that worldly pleasures were worthless, and often were exposed as hypocrites.

This second flowering of classical Sanskrit literature lasted for more than a millennium. We shall bring to a worldwide audience the entire text of the two national epics, and fifty or more titles from the heyday. We hope that readers will find much to enjoy.

see what's made the new 'sanskrit canon' [and what hasn't!]: http://www.claysanskritlibrary.org/index.php

copped these two links from some blog associated with the nyt.

yeondoo jung- korean artist who takes photographs inspired from the drawings of children. really cute.
http://www.yeondoojung.com/artworks_view_wonderland.php?no=88

steve schofield- british (?) artist who takes photographs exploring the strained dichotomy between american mass culture (and its mass subcultures) and the american idea of individuality. this is a series of british people dressed in american "costumes" as "expressions of the individual."
http://www.steveschofield.co.uk/gallery_lotf.html

a journal dedicated to charting the growth and availability of global luxury brands in india: http://indianluxist.blogspot.com/

Chicago was the gay capital of the country even before San Francisco and New York became coastal meccas for the gay community, and by 1970 had ninety gay bars most of which were controlled by the Mafia, and this control existed at least well into the 1980s.

for more details check out the history of gay bars in chicago. this website is also awesome because of the many links the author has posted. you can find details on the history of gay bars in nyc, la, milwaukee, boston, etc.

why are there so many white boys in drag who talk like black women on youtube? what kind of a messed up trend is this?

witness:

jefree star: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M-Gw5xTxF80
chris crocker: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lXufzaRnN8w
sharaloid: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4XGaMa3UD_Q (this guy actually puts on blackface sometimes)
emanresu18: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H7uUSXanJus

i've made a muxtape like everyone else (in new york & san francisco).
really awesome songs for the spring storms: LEBENSRAUM

featuring!
thao nguyen & the get down stay down
los campesinos!
these new puritans
tokyo police club
stars
patrick wolf
foals
small sins
beirut
bon iver
wye oak
cloud cult

i've been drinking a bottle of naked juice for breakfast every morning for the last few weeks. i assumed, for some reason, that it was extraordinarly healthy. but today, out of sheer boredom, i decided to look at the nutrition facts on the bottle (green machine). and man was i in for a shock! one bottle is actually two servings. this means that every bottle you consume will give you:


280 calories
56g of sugar
22% of your daily carb requirement
NO fiber (i don't get how this is possible!?)

that is an ungodly amount of sugar and carbs. i think if you are actually health conscious, it is better to just eat a fruit and take a multivitamin pill. to top it all off, after a brief online search, i realized the company had been acquired by pepsi co. in 2006. so you're not even supporting a small independent company anymore.

naked juice is junk food.

i am such a bad worker. i spend a huge chunk of my workday looking at blogs, facebook, and online window shopping. i could at least use this time to write letters. bah. there are too many amazing t-shirts on threadless to be zoomed in on.

i went thrifting this weekend, on the hunt for a few birthday gifts. i had okay luck with that, but check out these awesome owls i bought myself!



i found the gandhi postcard-portrait at a ridic tourist shop in hampi and salvaged the cigar box from a dumpster a few years back. these are a few of my favorite things (in my room) (at the moment).

a while back, i went with erin and kev to be an extra in cloudcult's music video for their new single, everybody here is a cloud. the video makes winter look so mystical and charming. check it out, i'm sort of in it a lot for an extra! i'm wearing a turquoise coat and a black hoodie and i have really doofy short hair.

the music vid:
http://www.rollingstone.com/blogs/breaking/2008/04/post.php

if you haven't heard of them, this is their myspace (they're really good!):
http://www.myspace.com/cloudcult

in her autobiography, living my life: part I, she notes:

america had declared war with spain. the news was not unexpected. for several months preceding, press and pulpit were filled with the call to arms in defense of the victims of spanish atrocities in cuba. i was profoundly in sympathy with the cuban and philippine rebels who were striving to throw off the spanish yoke. in fact, i had worked with some of the members of the junta engaged in underground activities to secure freedom for the philippine islands. but i had no faith whatsoever in the patriotic protestations of america as a disinterested and noble agency to help the cubans. it did not require much political wisdom to see that america’s concern was a matter of sugar and had nothing to do with humanitarian feelings. of course there were plenty of credulous people, not only in the country at large, but even in the liberal ranks, who believed in america’s claim. i could not join them. i was sure that no one, be it individual, or government, engaged in enslaving and exploiting at home, could have the integrity or the desire to free people in other lands.

incidentally, wikipedia tells me that the spanish-american war of 1898 lead to the american acquisition of the philippines, guam, and puerto rico.

i spent new year's day reading rilke's the notebooks of malte laurids brigge. here is an excerpt i had written down on a receipt and only just rediscovered, i'm still sighing over it:

the city is full of people who are slowly sliding down to their level. most of them resist at first; but then there are these faded, aging girls who constantly let themselves slip over without a struggle, strong girls, still unused in their innermost selves, who have never been loved.

perhaps you want me, lord, to leave everything behind and love them. otherwise why do i find it so difficult not to follow them when they pass me in the street? why do i all at once invent the sweeetest, most nocturnal words, while my voice tenderly stays between my throat and my heart? why do i imagine how i would hold them to my breath, with unutterable caution, these dolls that life has played with, flinging their arms open, springtime after springtime, for nothing, and again for nothing, until they grow loose in the shoulders. they have never fallen from a very high hope, so they aren't broken; but they are badly chipped and already in too poor a condition for life to care about. only stray cats come to them in the evening, into their rooms, and scratch them up in secret, and fall asleep on top of them. sometimes i follow one of them for a couple of blocks. they walk along past the houses; people keep coming who hide them from view; they vanish behind them and are nothing.

and yet, i know that if someone tried to love them, they would weigh upon him, like people who have been walking too long and have to stop. i think only jesus could endure them, who still has resurrection in all his limbs; but he can't be bothered with them. only women in love can seduce him, not those who wait with a small talent for loving, as if with a lamp that has grown cold.

oh yeah, and check this out: just how dirty was that unprintable auden poem? the best american erotic poems from 1800 to the present is a pretty interesting collection, definitely worth a flip through at your local bookvendor!

yesterday my mom told me, in her typically smug way, about this funny/sad phenomena in the bay area. many desi people who come to the US think that buying land in this country will somehow make them a "part" of america. and so, one of the first things that many of them try to do is acquire property as early as possible. this was true even in my parent's generation. but the new wave of software and tech immigrants who came during the dot com bubble took it a step further and purchased enormous mansions in the exurbs and luxury suvs. many were making more than 100k and it was quite easy to get housing loans back then. so why not, right? well, as the economy sagged and the dot com bubble burst, many of the new arrivals were laid off and had to scramble to find work in order to retain their H1b visas (to stay in the country legally). those who managed to stay were hard-pressed to maintain their new american lifestyles. consequently, the subprime-foreclosure crisis has hit them hard. in the past few months there has been a mass exodus of desis from the bay area. i guess they just pack all their stuff up, park their luxe cars at the airport, and get on the next flight back to india. it took awhile for people to figure out what was going on: the airport staff was perplexed by the tremendous number of unclaimed luxe vehicles and and the neighbors of these bankrupted desis didn't understand why there were suddenly so many abandoned homes in their genteel cul-de-sacs.

here's a related article: ( foreclosures come to mcmansion country )

during one of my many conversations with vimala, i realized that one of the key catalysts for westernization, or "internationalization" as the indian press calls it, in south asia is the returned diaspora. specifically, those people who lived abroad for a few years but never renounced their indian citizenship. many were tech and software workers in the US during the late nineties and early 2000s. this demographic, at least in hyderabad, madras, and bangalore, has probably been the single biggest force in orchestrating and popularizing the development of mall culture, multiplex style cinema halls, starbucks style coffeeshops, eating out regularly, fast food, pub culture, super markets, and the like. they became acculturated to certain western consumer and lifestyle patterns and insisted on retaining them in an indian context. and since these people are often viewed as being wealthy, educated, and cosmopolitan by indian society in general, they have wielded an immense cultural influence on the middle and lower-middle classes. the same lifestyle that is criticized and challenged by so many in the US is now being adopted and instituted at an alarming pace in the indian metros as a benchmark of "modernity" and "progress." a fact that is sad yet inescapable.

alright. i am finally bored enough to write in this thing. i don't know why, but i have been in an anti-journal slump ever since i returned from india. a few weeks ago i was walking out to my car when i was doubled over by a terrible longing for hyderabad. for a few short minutes, the suburban minnesota sky was cloaked by that same heavy blue velvet which swaddled the old city at night...and i felt a familiar rush of warm night air rushing across my face. the smells of jasmine and red dust, of course they were imagined, mingled in the pervasive miasma of diesel exhaust. when i reached home, i took out my hyderabad diary and looked through a few entries. i smirked at the yellow pickle stains that haphazardly adorned its pages and picked out the dried jammi leaves from dassera that had fallen into the binding. i don't think i can really say i enjoyed living in india. those six months were a very trying and challenging time for me. but i do have to say that it was also an incredibly fertile time in my life, both intellectually and emotionally. i didn't come any closer to figuring myself out or resolving any identity issues, i certainly never "found" myself in india. but i do feel more secure in myself, more centered and grounded.

reading journals always makes me sad though, because they remind me of just how poor and corrupt my memory really is. some people say you should live for the experience, the moment, the feelings, etc. but what good is all that when you're just going to forget them anyway? there are many instances where i've done things i haven't really wanted to do "for the experience." and where does that get me? i read my journal five years later and think, "oh yeah...that was fun?" but then there is the real tragedy of forgetting your friends, who you thought you could never live without, one story and inside joke at a time.

i didn't get into columbia, which was the only other serious contender for chicago. so i've decided to accept chicago's proposal. i'm pretty devastated that i won't be able to live in new york, but i think i can still work something out. maybe some kind of a semester exchange? i also found out that the south asia department at chicago is setting up an exchange program with hebrew university because of certain research ties. there is a famous telugu scholar there, so i might go study with him at some point. in jerusalem! two weekends ago i went to chicago with my family for spring break and to look at housing options. i do not want to make the mistake of living in hyde park again, if i have to live in chicago then it is definitely going to be in a more happening area. the trip was fun enough, we did what we always do in chicago--grocery shopping on devon, visited some temples, and ate at all the indian restaurants. i did convince them to break routine for once and visit the art institute though. and my dad actually bought me a membership without any prompting from my side, how randomly generous.

the indian government's steady departure from its previous "moral high ground" foreign policy is really disturbing. it is clear that india's first diplomatic priority has become, above all else, to cultivate economic relationships. first it remained silent during the burmese agitations, and now it has actively collaborated with china to repress the protests by tibetan refugees within its borders so as "not to embarrass beijing" (bbc).

the pew forum on religion and public life recently released a study on the "u.s. religious landscape." the study aims to trace the various trends currently present in american attitudes toward religion and their intersections with various sociological demographics like race, class, gender, etc. it was a broad survey of 35,000 people, of whom around 250 identified as hindu, and one of the biggest such studies to date. the website presents the information very clearly, with all sorts of pictures and graphs, and makes it very easy for the reader to draw all sorts of conclusions.

i've compiled and listed their statistics on hindus in the u.s. and placed the national total (NT) in brackets right next to them for comparison.

90% of hindus marry other hindus

84% of hindus were raised as hindus (NT 72%)

88% of hindus identify as asian, 5% as white, 4% as mixed, 2% hispanic, 1% black

61% of hindus are male, 39% female

48% of hindus have a post-graduate degree (NT 11%), 26% a college degree (NT 16%)

43% of hindus make $100,000 or more (NT 18%), 25% make $75-99,999 (NT 13%), 15% make $50-74,999 (NT 17%), 10% make 30-49,999 (NT 22%) and finally 9% make less than 30,000 (NT 31%)

so, according to this study, hindus in the u.s. have the highest childhood retention rate, the highest intermarriage rate, are the most educated, and the overall wealthiest (though there are more jews in the $100+ category at 48%, jews only have 12% in the $75-99 category). basically hindus are a super rich clique. similar religio-cultural patterns, though to a much lesser degree, are visible among jews and eastern orthodox christians.

i think that the small number of people in this study has drastically skewed the results. i am confused as to whether this study is limited to u.s. citizens, or if it simply interviewed anyone living here--in which case this would explain the huge gender, educational, and income imbalance (via the h1b visa). i also wish this study would have noted what percentage of the hindus actually grew up (or had some significant socialization) in the u.s. this information would have provided a much more accurate picture of hinduism as it exists and is developing in the u.s. it is very difficult for me to believe that the intermarriage and childhood retention rates are really as high as they claim or that hindus are as wealthy or educated. i mean, 48% have a post-grad degree? that is like 1 out of two hindus...come on, i know we are a well-educated bunch but that is ridiculous.