The sixth roommate

(Rated R for profanity and pot)

Over a cuppa joe on a wintery NYC morning, younger bro detailed his new digs to Dad and I. He shared it with 6 others near Coney Island; as a struggler, he couldn't afford a fancy joint in Manhattan or even Hoboken.

It was the 6th roommate that raised dad's heckles. The first few roommates were the standard struggling NYC folks: actors, writers, artists. The 6th roommate came out of the blue, literally.

"And the sixth one sells whips, chains, hancuffs. You know, fetish stuff," bro said.

"Who is fetish?" asked Dad with curious eyes. OK, either Dad was being insanely funny or a geezer from ancient India.

"Dad, you don't know fetish?" I asked.

"Know I don't. Who is fetish?" he asked once again. This comes from a university professor, who enjoys talking stock prices.

"Dad, it's sex stuff. She works at a sex store," bro said, forced to answer.

Dad, a simple man, for a second mulled over Ms. Fetish and her consequences.

"Get out," dad said wryly, looking at his cuppa, ashamed. He pointed his finger to the door, indicating he wanted younger bro out of that apartment.

Bro and I broke out into fits of laughter, believing dad hadn't come to terms with younger bro's adulthood.

"Dad, she's not my bride, don't worry!" bro said, cracking up. "She won't hurt me."

It took a while for dad to get the scene, but he joined us with a laugh or two.

But this isn't the biggest life secret dad will keep.

As a university professor in 1970s Boston, some of his students thought he was a drug dealer and landed up at our home seeking pot. Dad had to convince them that "just because he was funny in class didn't mean he was a drug dealer." He would have kept quiet about this -- Mom forced it out of him during a family cocktail hour.

Anyways, thankfully for dad's vanilla values, bro soon moved to Manhattan over a bagel shop, where he got free bagels and coffee everyday. Gone were the crocodile tears of his youngest son living with a fetish store concierge.

Some watery details

A huge line snaked up to Castro Theater, waiting patiently to see Deepa Mehta's "Water." This is an hour before the show started; we found our spot in the line after walking what seemed like a mile.

Met some new folks; we talked about a peace project taken up by Yumi, a young philanthropist, of getting 100,000 Indian and Pakistani children to write love letters to each other. She did something similar in Darfur, Sudan. But the most amazing Yumi factoid? She doesn't have health insurance, despite all this risk.

Anyways, finally came "Water," that shows how Hindu widows were/are mistreated. Mehta said incensed Hindu fundamentalists destroyed the movie's original set in Varanasi because they conceived it as a potshot at the Vedas and Hinduism.

Angry, she moved ship to Sri Lanka to complete the movie, according to a K. K also pointed out that many movie extras looked unmistakably similar to South Indians.

"Water" took me back to my Indian schooling days, where I learnt that leaders like Gandhi and Raja Rammohan Roy promoted equal rights for Hindu castes. Water digs deeper and explores what seems amiss from those history lessons.

Going solely by the movie, it seems like my Indian history lessons reveal lots of misinformation and cover ups by the teachers. Not for a second do I believe that Maratha king Shivaji escaped from a Mughal sweetmeat basket -- that seems like a legend for children, unless someone proves it to me. Movies like Water seem to break such stereotypes.

Water seemingly lags like Terrence Malick movies, so patience please! If you've reached this far in the blog, you certainly have patience enough to see the 2-hour long Water. I won't reveal any more watery details, watch it if you want more of the interesting movie.

Continuing with teaching, wasn't there a teacher who called Bush a war criminal? In retrospect, I disagree with his teaching style. Fill a child's curiosity with fact, not fiction, misinformation or cover ups like I got sometimes as a student in Indian schools. Some of that information remains ingrained in my head, and I'm still trying to shed it off.

Please settle Kosovo, please

How many know Mother Teresa was Albanian? In Albania, they even have a holiday on Oct. 19 in Mother's memory. While generally known as peaceful people like the Mother, they have rankled up other ethnic groups in Balkan nations like Macedonia and Serbia.

In the 1990s, when CNN was brand new to India, hearing about new places like Kosovo and Bosnia-Herzegovina was amusing. Kosovo rhymed with Laad-vo, a great fatty Gujju sweet. Herzegovina rhymed with "Kameena" (bast***), and I'd look into the mirror and shout Amitabh Bachchan-style: "You Kamina Herzegovina!" Helped me fine-tune the terrible Hindi skills I was acquiring through Bollywood films.

Kosovo's still in the news and now hurting my ear. The 90% ethnic Albanian population in Kosovo believes their land should be freed; the Serbs disagree. Men being men, the Serbs and Albanians picked up their guns to resolve the feud on the streerts. Pristina, Kosovo's capital, turned into a war zone and the Serbs left a trail of destruction on the Kosovars.

Which led to Clinton's and NATO's ravaging of Yugoslavia in 1999, but Kosovars still weren't happy. Yugoslavia was vanquished, but Kosovo was now a state of the new Serbia-Montenegro -- cool name, but Albanians don't really care about names. So the battle continues, albeit political and diplomatic.

Kosovo's new prime minister, Agim Ceku, supports Kosovo's independence and British foreign minister Jack Straw recently said that Kosovo's road to independence is "almost inevitable," perhaps after a pint or two. It's obvious Tony B and his cronies are for Kosovo's independence from Serbia. The macho Serbia is outright denying Kosovo an independent nation status.

The Macedonians don't like the Albanians and its no secret, according to a friend. Ethnic Albanian refugees spilled into Macedonia during the Kosovo war, and their population grew to an extent where they demanded an independent nation.

That pissed off an already angry Macedonian population, which led to a civil war between both groups in 2001. It was stopped after the UN intervened, but tensions are still high.

We all can't be brave like Evel Knievel, so give Kosovo benefit of the doubt, some countries believe. In a proposal to the UN, Bulgaria is going to suggest independence to Kosovars. They realize the ethnic Albanians are volatile and if the Kosovo conflict continues, it could overflow into their country and resultant, spread the chaos, which Bulgaria doesn't want.

Personal thoughts? I don't care, I want my MTV. For Albanians: please, I'm not degrading you. Indians are violent too. We are self-conniving people who watch soap operas where daughter-in-laws fight mother-in-laws.

Drunk clocks down under

Saw this cryptic message on the Windows Update site:

--
Update for Windows XP/Date: 2/28/2006Download size: 479 KB

Australia has changed the regularly scheduled end of Daylight Saving Time in five Australian states from March 2006 to the first Sunday of April 2006 due to the 2006 Commonwealth Games. Install this update to enable your computer to automatically adjust the computer clock on the correct date. After you install this item, you may have to restart your computer."

--

So, well, there you go. Enjoy.

Post-Oscar watch

Crash won the Oscar for best film, but I'm disappointed. The film took a serious jab at every ethnic community but the desis. Why were Indians ignored?

I expressed dismay about Crash's ignorance in an earlier post. Just what do the desis need to do to get Hollywood's attention? Do we need to populate those seedy LA areas with desi inner-city kids? Or move gay Indian goat-herders to northwestern Iowa?

I threatened the Academy that if it gave Crash an Oscar, desis would strike back. Lo and behold, not only did it get the best film, it apparently was the biggest upset in Oscar history.

Hollywood directors, please don't hesitate to poke fun at Indians. Doctors will still treat you, your computers won't crash, and motels will still accept you. Try us out. We don't bite. (Except the proud Punjabis and the Sikhs, those guys who you've stereotyped as bad guys.)

Indians can ignore Hollywood. I mean, we ignore Vijay Amritraj anyways, the biggest garbage producers in the US. But the US-desi film scene isn't any good. Enough of American Chai, ABCD Chai, Green Visa with Chai and other nonsense.

Oh well, ignore the rant. Crash was good and it deserved the Oscar. Next, the Razzies. My vote for worst film: Fantastic Four.

The smell of freedom

On May 21, two new countries may emerge: Serbia and Montenegro. We currently know them as Serbia-Montenegro, a combined relic of Yugoslavia's official vanquishment in 2001.

A referendum in Montenegro will give Montenegrins two options: to remain with Serbia or to break away and go on its own. Montenegrins have to answer "yes" or "no" to whether they want full international legal recognition as an independent nation. Polls show around 40% leaning toward independence, around 30% against it.

The success of this referendum differs between organizations. If 55% of Montenegrins say yes to independence. EU will recognize Montenegro as a sovereign nation. If it falls short, EU will still consider Montenegro a part of Serbia. The U.S. has no rules: they view an independent Montenegro as a fresh chance to establish a Balkan presence, which they lack.

For Montenegro, a poor state with under 750,000 people, EU's non-recognition would be economically devastating. They would be better off merged with Serbia, which is approaching EU integration slowly with help from countries like Germany and Sweden.

Montenegrins are miffed at EU's 55% requirement -- they want the "yes" for independence vote to be 41%. A number of factors can be reasoned for that: Montenegro are concerned that minorities could swing the vote, among others.

Though friendly, they have not much to gain with Serbia, a trainwreck of a country itself. In four years together under one roof, they havent developed much. More Montenegrins believe they'd do better without Serb help.

Anticipating the referendum to be a success, businessmen are said to be scouring Podgorica (pronounced: Pod-go-ree-tza), Montenegro's capital, for business opportunities. Euro is Montenegro's official currency, a big business advantage.

Do the Serbs benefit from Montenegro's independence? No. Serbia and Montenegro have deep historic ties and Montenegro's separation could landlock Serbia, affecting them economically. But the Serbs will retain the important cities of Belgrade and the big cities of Novi Sad (which Montenegro would die to have) and Pristina (atleast for now).

Pristina has caught my imagination in the past. Sitting at London's Heathrow airport twice -- in 1998 & 2000 -- I saw Pristina flights go *packed*. Why would herds of folks head to a place I've barely heard about?

Happens so that Pristina is Kosovo's capital, another state seeking independence from Serbia. The Kosovo-Serbia melee has led to much of Serbia's internal turmoil. Kosovo is currently under UN administration, but the Serbs want it back.

To keep this piece short and sweet, I'll write about Kosovo and their ethnic Albanians later. That's a whole story in itself. It stretches way before genocide and war-crime accusations were levelled at the Serbs, yep, including Slobodan Milosevic.

The Serbs want Montenegro too, but they may fail this time. Montenegrins seem to cherish the thought of full over partial independence. So on May 21, be ready to update your geography books.