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ನೂರೆಂಟು ಸುಳ್ಳು (nUreMTu suLLu)

You may not be a "Dhrutharashtra", but we want to be the Sanjaya for you!

Thursday, March 29, 2007

When I’m Gazing My Own Navel, Do Other Navels Exist?!

Dear Readers (if there are any still left!),

Off late we have not been able to update this blog. There are many reasons: We still do not have a reliable Internet connection at Noorentu Sullu World H.Q. More than that, the entire staff – all of one person – of our office has been busy with other things. We have been traveling out of the country and have not been able to read some of our favorite newspapers.

One thing that we never fail to do when we are traveling is, visiting the newsstands at the airports. Be they are at the Singapore airport, Frankfurt airport or the JFK in N.Y. It is almost a religion for us. We must have the "ದರ್ಶನ" of what is on display there. While we take a look at pretty much all that is on display, we pay special attention to some of our favorites like International Herald Tribune, The Economic Times and of course The Time & The Newsweek. When we do, we always wonder about the change in "ಅವತಾರ" of some of them. By the time we hop from one airport to the other, they would have taken a new a "ಅವತಾರ" leaving us to wonder whether these are instances of “ಅವರವರ ಭಾವಕ್ಕೆ, ಅವರವರ ಭಕುತಿಗೆ…”

Some of our readers know that we spent a considerable time of our life in the US of A. Like any other country, it has many things to like and many things to dislike. In fact, we – with a libertarian outlook – found a lot more to like than dislike. But, one thing that we sometimes found a bit disappointing was the inward-lookingness (We know that there is no such word!) of the American mainstream media. We wished (and still wish) they took a bit more look at the rest of the world. Provide a bit wider and deeper coverage to things that are happening around the globe. (BTW, this is in no way an endorsement of the Indian news media. In our experience, NY Times, Time and Newsweek have more coverage on global affairs than say Indian Express, The Hindu, Outlook or India Today.)

During one of our travels – last year in Buenos Aires to be precise – we met a gentleman at the airport. During our conversation, he had this question: “When the whole world is against the Iraq war, how come the American people think it’s a good thing?”

There are complex/many answers to this simple question.

If you know us, you know that we always prefer “simple/single” answer to “complex/many”. Call us lazy. Or, whatever.

Our simple answer is here (Thanks to Huffington Post):



The editors of Time and Newsweek think that while their non-American readers must learn about what's happeing in Afghanistan, they think that it is more important for American readers to know about Why Bible Should be Taught in Public Schools and Annie Leibowitz's Life in Pictures.

Tail piece: If you want to read a bit more about American media, you can find it here. BTW, it is written by one of our only one staff.

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