Because today is both Purim and Holi, here’s an amazing “Bollywood” video made by an Israeli arms company to promote Indian sales which they showed on large screens at a recent government sponsored military trade fair in India. What’s the connection to these holidays? Watch the clip and you’ll come away convinced that the people who made it were both drunk and stoned:

Every element of the promotional film is just plain wrong. The sari-clad, “Indian” dancers look all too ashkenaz and zaftig. The unshaven, hawk-nosed, leather-clad leading man appears to be a refugee from You Don’t Mess With the Zohan. Then of course, there’s the implication that the Indian military is somehow like a helpless woman who “need(s) to feel safe and sheltered.” [link]

The whole thing is amazingly crappy from start to finish, not mention the annoying chorus of “Dinga dinga, dinga dinga, dinga dinga, dinga dinga dee.” I don’t get why they couldn’t have hired a real Bolly composer, choreographer and item girls. It wouldn’t have cost them much.

Despite the cheapness of the video, this isn’t some small time company, and they’re not newcomers to the Indian market. It was Rafael Advanced Defense Systems’ Barak SAM missile that was at the heart of the 2000 bribery scandal exposed by Tehelka. Two years ago, they signed a $330 million dollar deal to codevelop the Barak II, and just 6 months ago they became part of India’s biggest defense joint venture with a foreign company.

So why was this video, intended “to help build familiarity between India and Israel and Rafael” [link] both so cheap and so dreadful? My only guess is that they learned from the 2000 arms deal that while symbolic gestures are good, the only thing that really matters are gifts of cold hard cash.

It shouldn’t be any surprise to people that we are ringing in 2009 with another one of these stories. (via RaceWire)

Nine Muslim passengers on a New Year’s Day flight on AirTran were kicked off a flight after others flying reportedly heard remarks about airport security. Because of the confusion, that was eventually cleared up, no one was able to fly.[RaceWire]

What could these “dangerous” remarks be? Did they say one of the handful of words that as brown people we are not allowed to say within a ten mile radius of an airport, including but apparently not exclusively, the following words: bomb, terrorist, Bin Laden, explode, die, Bush, fire, shoe, fertilizer, Allahu Akbar?

Mr. Irfan turned to his wife…wondered aloud where the safest place to sit on the airplane would be — the front? The rear? Over the wing?

But passengers sitting behind them evidently overheard the remark, saw Mr. Irfan’s beard and his wife’s head scarf, and grew concerned…The worried passengers contacted flight attendants, who contacted Transportation Security Administration officials, and soon, Mr. Irfan and his wife were off the plane and being questioned in the jetway.[NYT]

Oh! The trigger word was ‘safest.’ How ironic.

Before long…the F.B.I. concluded that the incident was obviously just a misunderstanding, and told AirTran officials that the family was cleared to travel. But he said AirTran still refused to rebook them, offering only to refund their tickets. The F.B.I. agents helped the family get on a later USAirways flight to Orlando, but those seats cost them twice as much.[NYT]

It took me a while to get to posting this up because frankly, this is a dime a dozen story. In 2008 alone, the Transportation Department reported 87 cases of complaints alleging discrimination by airlines and only four were security related. Flying while brown stories happen all the time. I’m tired of blogging about stories like this and that these incidences are still happening. These stories are a part of our lives on the margin and being brown. I’m not implying that we should stand by the wayside and merely accept the injustice. Which is exactly what Mr. Irfan didn’t do. Instead he got organized.

The launch of Chandrayaan-1, as the vehicle is called (it means, roughly translated, “Moon Craft-1”) comes about a year after China’s first moon mission. The Indian mission is scheduled to last for two years, prepare a three-dimensional atlas of the moon and prospect its surface for natural resources, including uranium, a coveted fuel for nuclear power plants, according to the Indian Space Research Organization, or I.S.R.O. Allusions to an Asian space race could not be contained, even as Manmohan Singh, the Indian prime minister, was due for a visit to China later in the week. (link)

Most of the Times article on the event focuses on the “Asian space race,” between India and China. Some more coverage in the Indian newspapers here, here, and especially here. The ExpressIndia story has the most technical information about the trip I’ve seen:

Earlier in the day, Prof J N Goswami, director of the Physical Research Laboratory (PRL), Ahmedabad, who is also the principal scientist for the Chandrayaan-1 mission, spoke about the possibility of finding helium-3 on the lunar surface. “Although generating power through nuclear fusion of helium-3 is a distant dream, but the possibilities are immense,” he said. The samples brought to Earth by the Apollo mission have indicated that Iron titanium oxide traps helium-3 molecules on the lunar surface, he said.

Goswami said he-3 content is very low. For every 100,000 helium-4 molecules, there is only one helium-3 molecule on the lunar surface. Besides, the scientific community is yet to simulate the conditions necessary for nuclear fusion. But, if Chandrayaan-1 is able to locate probable areas for finding helium-3, that in itself will be a very big achievement. It will help eliminate the two stages of producing deuterium from hydrogen and then producing helium-3 from deuterium, he added. (link)

Though I can hardly claim to be an expert on the science, from what I’ve been reading I’m skeptical at the outset about the search for uranium or helium-3 on the moon, mainly because I’m not sure what they would do with these materials even if they were to find some — build a lab? Bring it back? (Can anyone find more detailed accounts regarding the specific scientific goals for this mission? What exactly is going in Chandrayaan-1’s various payloads?)

One could argue — and I’m sure some will — that it’s hard to justify spending lots of money on a mission to the moon, when India obviously has lots of other issues to contend with right now.

I can see the objections, but I still think it’s pretty cool. Events like this can have huge symbolic significance, and I hope the launch tomorrow goes well. [UPDATE: It did. The rocket is supposed to reach the moon in fifteen days.]

Indian aviation just can’t seem to catch a break. First there was a story about the number of pilots who get grounded because they are have had too much to drink:

Around 50 pilots each year in India are being grounded because they had consumed alcohol before taking a flight, the country’s civil aviation authorities said Tuesday… Civil aviation rules specify that pilots and cabin crew cannot consume alcohol 12 hours before taking a flight… India is one of the fastest growing aviation markets in the world with dozens of new airlines competing with each other everyday, often resulting in pilots forced to fly at short notices. [Link]

Notice that this is meant to be a positive story. Even if pilots are boneheaded, they’re getting caught before they get into the cockpit. If they’re actually catching all the tipsy pilots (and that’s a big if), then oversight authorities have done their job well.

However, there’s no good way to spin this next story other than to point out that at least nobody got hurt:

An Air India flight headed for Mumbai overshot its destination and was halfway to Goa before its dozing pilots were woken out of a deep slumber by air traffic control, a report said…

“After operating an overnight flight, fatigue levels peak — and so the pilots dozed off after taking off from Jaipur,” … The plane flew to Mumbai on autopilot, but when air traffic there tried to help the aircraft land, the plane ignored their instructions and carried on at full speed towards Goa. “It was only after the aircraft reached Mumbai airspace that air traffic control realised it was not responding to any instructions and was carrying on its own course,” the source said.

Finally air traffic control buzzed the cockpit and woke up the pilots, who turned the plane around, the report said. [Link]

Air India has strenuously denied the story, saying that it was merely a communications glitch:

“The report is absolutely incorrect, devoid of facts, misleading and irresponsible. It is a figment of imagination,” Air India spokesman Jitender Bhargava told AFP by telephone from Mumbai. [Link]

Note that a shutdown in communication still doesn’t explain why the pilots neglected to land the airplane as they were supposed to in Bombay. At best Air India is saying that its pilots simply … forgot, and there was nobody to remind them. Maybe they had a bit too much to drink.

In a rather surprising move, British Airways announced this week that it will no longer be serving beef aboard its (often Hindu-filled) flights in economy (a.k.a. “cattle”) class:

What will become of me now? What will they pay me in if not in beef?

British Airways has ditched beef for economy class passengers this summer in an attempt to appeal to a more international passenger base.

The familiar cabin crew inquiry of “chicken or beef?” will not be heard in economy after the airline ditched the national dish in favour of what it calls a lighter, healthier option.

Critics will suspect that the relentless pressure to cut costs that all airlines are facing is behind the move, although BA said cost was not a factor…

“We can only serve two options and beef and pork obviously have religious restrictions,” the spokesman added. BA’s second-biggest long-haul market, after transatlantic routes, is to India. [Link]

As might be expected, many Brits were not happy about this. For one thing, what the hell are all the Beefeaters going to do?

The decision to scrap the nation’s favourite fare was described as a “great shame” by the English Beef and Lamb Executive, formerly part of the Meat and Livestock Commission.

A spokesman said: “It is regrettable that Britain’s flag carrier is not proposing to serve Britain’s national dish.

“It is a meal we are rightly proud of. Roast beef and beefeaters are symbols or Britain used to promote tourism.

“Our beef is also much in demand overseas. It is predominately grass fed and highly praised for its flavour. [Link]

Like many desis, I love me some deals. I know I am playing into stereotypes here, especially because I am Gujarati, but come on EVERYONE likes good deals. The enjoyment for me isn’t just finding a good deal, but the whole process: it is the hunt, the chase, and the glory in opening the mail and finding that rebate check that you thought might not ever come. Suffice it to say, I spend a good percentage of my time on the internets perusing some favorite deal sites.

But while I like finding good deals, one of my pet peeves is really poor customer service and the feeling that I have been taken advantage of. So when I was visiting one of my new favorite deal/consumer rights blogs, The Consumerist, (part of the Gawker family of blogs) I was a bit dismayed to hear the tale of our desi brethren, Mahesh, who reported on his parent’s really poor experience on United Airlines.

Mahesh’s parents flew from Omaha, Nebraska to Colombo,Sri Lanka, but at LAX, United Airlines (UAL) refused to honor their tickets, saying that they had not “been approved, authorized and authenticated.” The family ended having to pay $2860 extra to complete their journey. Apparently, Sri Lankan Air Lines, a United code-share partner, could not find the reservation Mahesh’s parents made. Mahesh wrote three letters of complaint to UAL and so far his parents have only received two $300 coupons in return. When Mahesh scoffed at the sum, United wrote, “our policy does not permit us to respond with the generosity you had anticipated. (link)

It seems that instead of writing letters, which I am a big fan of, now when desis are wronged, we blog. So as a good South Asian, Mahesh has started his own blog detailing his battle with United Airlines’ Customer service at evilunitedairlines.blogspot.com. His story is really messed up and I hope the airlines eventually do the right thing and refund the extra three grand his recently operated-on parents had to hand over to get home.

Chiraag from Pardon My Hindi recently posted a video onto YouTube of his harrowing experience flying Air Deccan (via BoingBoing). Says Chiraag:

I dug up this video I shot back in December ‘04 when I was aboard an Air Deccan flight from Bangalore to Mumbai. Looked out my window and what did I see, A group of guys repairing the wing with some sort of muthafcukin’ duct tape. There’s some more repairs to the left of the one they are working on with what seems to be the same technique. Crossed my fingers, tossed back a shot of Black Label, and stayed on the flight. [Link]

Honestly, I probably would have reacted the same way, sans Black Label. It looks like a typically desi “Kam Challao” scene - equal mixtures of ingenuity and utter disregard for the principles of safety, like a bus patched together with baling wire, careening down a Himalayan road.

However, looks can be deceiving. This isn’t a 19th century desi solution, it’s a thoroughly modern one. As the comments on Turbanhead reveal, that isn’t duct tape it’s “Speed tape” - it’s specially formulated for use on airplanes (and racing cars and possibly even nuclear reactors). Those employees were actually doing what they would have in any first world airport!

“What you see is the perfectly safe and legal application of some heavy-duty aluminum bonding tape, called “speed tape” in the mechanic’s lexicon. Depending on what a plane’s maintenance manual stipulates — according to the dictates of the FAA — certain noncritical components can be temporarily patched with this material, embarrassing as it sometimes looks. It’s extremely strong, durable, and able to expand and contract through an extreme range of temperatures…” [Link]

Here’s a similar story of a passenger freaking out after watching the application of speed tape on a plane in Seattle.

Poor desi aircraft workers - even when they’re using the most expensive, cutting edge products, we still suspect them of cutting corners and endangering our lives.

Back in the day when your humble servant was but a wee lad, we lived in France with one extended family to visit in the United States and another in India. That made for a lot of intercontinental travel, and since we didn’t have much money, we tended to go for long stays and travel by the cheapest means possible. The result is that I achieved a lot of early experience flying on disreputable airlines. In 1973, my dad took me for my first visit back to India; Iraqi Airways was our carrier. Twelve years later, I traveled solo on Syrian Airlines. There were some sinister looking Syrian security personnel watching us as we boarded in Paris and aboard the plane. But that probably helped keep us safe. At the layover in Damascus airport I remember big empty halls and lots of pictures of Hafez al-Assad.

But the single worst passenger experience was circa 1978, on Aeroflot. Flying from Paris to Moscow was no big deal; a relatively modern aircraft, on time, quick. There was enough business, cultural and diplomatic activity between the Soviet Union and Western Europe to warrant decent service. The Moscow-Delhi leg was another story. Almost everyone on the plane was someone trying to get to India cheap — mainly backpackers and families like us — and our comfort and care were not major corporate priorities. That Ilyushin was one loud-ass aircraft and falling apart inside and out. The food was unspeakable, but the flight was long, and people ate. Mass nausea ensued, and long lines began to form in the aisles toward the rear of the plane. As I recall, we were sitting back there and the aromas were quickly getting nasty.

Amid this scene, the air hostesses, who had until then treated us with glacial Slavic/Soviet neglect, suddenly ran down the aisles toward the back, agitation on their faces, and yelled to the people in line:

“You sit! You sit! Pilot say, airplane TEEPING!”

Ah, travel tales. Well, this joyous experience is what comes to my mind as I learn from the BBC, through a kind tipster on the News tab, that

An Indian-born businessman has purchased a private central European airline for an undisclosed amount.

Harjinder Singh Sidhu, who lives in UK and is a British passport holder, bought Air Slovakia, a small privately owned airline based in the capital, Bratislava last week, it has emerged.

His son, Riqbal ‘Rocky’ Singh, told the BBC News website that his father wants to transform the 60-employee Air Slovakia into a “Punjabi experience”.

This newest terror alert and the ensuing security lockdown has come at the most inopportune of times for me. Tomorrow morning at 8a.m. I have to catch a flight to Charlotte, North Carolina to attend my friend Seema’s wedding. First, let’s take a quick look at what I cannot bring with me:

Advice if you’re flying:

1. Liquids are banned from carry-on luggage and cannot be taken through security checkpoints. That includes drinks, toothpaste, perfume, shampoo, hair gel, suntan lotion and similar items. Drinks purchased in the airport cannot be carried onto flights.

2. Baby formula and medications will be allow but must be presented for inspection at security checkpoints.

3. All shoes must be removed and placed on an X-ray belt for screening.

4. Passengers are also asked to arrive at least two hours early to allow for additional screening.

5. Passengers traveling to the United Kingdom should contact their airline for information about any extra security measures or precautions that might be required. Laptop computers, mobile phones and iPods were among items banned on British flights. [Link]

I’m a 30-year-old single male. There are fewer opportunities for me to meet eligible women (according to my parents). A desi friend’s wedding is supposed to be a money venue. But just look at my predicament. I cannot shampoo my hair (hotel shampoo doesn’t count) or apply even a modest amount of styling gel to my hair in order to achieve that proper look between sophistication and slackerdom. Even worse, without my contact lens solution I will have to keep my contacts in my eyes the entire weekend, which will in turn cause me to spastically blink (to prevent the increasing dryness) every time I go to talk to a girl. Even if I make it this far, who will want to talk to a guy that hasn’t been able to brush his teeth because his toothpaste has been confiscated? I didn’t even mention the lack of shaving cream (stubble makes me look like a terrorist) or the lack of aftershave lotion that will make my face itch and burn all night even if I use the hotel provided shaving cream and blade. Also, wearing a suit makes me sweat, a fact that will be obvious since I won’t have any cologne to mask the scent.

From our News Tab we learn that one of India’s Top Guns was flying high over the skies of Pune earlier today. The 74-year-old Indian President APJ Kalam demonstrated why the chicks still jock him. Check out the pictures:

“I am so going to get in the pants of that hottie Kelly McGillis tonight.”

It is amazing to me that five years after 9/11 the airlines STILL don’t have their acts together in preventing racial discrimination by their aircraft crews. The latest comes from the Bay Area:

A Muslim father and son from Hayward filed a complaint with the U.S. Department of Transportation this week, accusing airline attendants of booting them off a flight because of their appearance.

Fazal Khan, 59, and his son, Mohammed Khan, 28, boarded a United Airlines flight from Los Angeles to Oakland on Jan. 31 wearing traditional South Asian tunics, white skullcaps and loose trousers. Both men also have long beards…

[Shirin Sinnar of the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights in San Francisco] said the Khans do not know of anything, other than their attire, that could have agitated the female flight attendant, who apparently expressed concern to the terminal crew about their presence.

“When they got on the plane, she helped them with their bags. That was their only interaction,” Sinnar said.

Sinnar said the two men boarded the flight with no problems. They had been sitting on the plane for about an hour before they were ejected.

Mohammed Khan was sleeping and sometimes reading the Quran, she said, while the father was relaxing awake. They were heading back to Oakland International Airport from a trip visiting family members.

The plane eventually moved down the runway but returned to the terminal as airplane staff announced mechanical difficulties, Sinnar said.

An airline customer service representative walked onto the plane and asked the Khans to bring their carry-on handbags with them and return to the airport terminal, Sinnar said. [Link]

Next comes the most incomprehensible part. You would think that two people that aroused enough suspicion to be kicked off a flight would at least have their bags removed from cargo. Not so in this case. The Khans were placed on the next flight to San Francisco but their bags (minus carry-on) continued on to Oakland aboard the original aircraft:

After escorting them out, the representative was “sympathetic” but said they could not return because the flight attendant was not comfortable with them on board, Sinnar said…

“The strange thing is no one took the bags off the first flight,” Sinnar said. “If there was any thought they were a security risk, certainly their bags should have been removed…” [Link]

Straight-up racial discrimination. The father and son say they were humiliated and will be suing Utah-based SkyWest who were responsible for staff on the aircraft.

See related post: Fear of flying

Yesterday I brought you the story of the competition between airlines in India to have the hottest stewardesses. Today, a blockbuster deal was announced that will put even more attractive, svelte bodies in the Indian sky. Well…at least they are more attractive to this Aerospace Engineer . Boeing announces:

At a signing ceremony held today at Air India’s headquarters, Boeing [NYSE: BA] Commercial Airplanes President and CEO Alan Mulally and Air India Chairman and Managing Director V. Thulasidas formally announced an order agreement for 68 airplanes. The order, placed with Boeing in December 2005, is valued at more than $11 billion at list prices and deliveries are scheduled to begin in November 2006.

Air India’s order consists of 23 777s, including eight 777-200LR (Longer Range) Worldliners and 15 777-300ERs (Extended Range), and 27 787-8 Dreamliners. Air India Express, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Air India, will receive 18 Next-Generation 737-800s.

Here is the sugar in the coffee:

Civil Aviation Minister Praful Patel said the US aircraft maker had agreed to spend nearly two [billion U.S. dollars] on reciprocal deals.

‘Boeing has a counter-trade… amounting to (1.9 bln usd) over the next 10 years, which would mean that Boeing will buy from India a range of goods and services,’ Patel said.

The aircraft maker will also spend 75 mln usd on training pilots and another 100 mln in maintenance and repairs to the aircraft, he said. [Link]

So basically Boeing gets a huge contract from India, and in return outsources some of its production line there, which will result in a very positive economic impact. I hope some of you purchased Boeing stock before the closing bell. PRI’s Marketplace has a nice audio summary of the specifics.

Last month the BBC had an article about the stern warning issued by Air India to its cabin crews:

India’s state-owned airline Air India has threatened to ground its overweight cabin crew unless they shed their excess pounds over the next two months.

Some 10% of its 1,600-strong cabin crew are estimated to be overweight or suffering from obesity.

S Venkat, Air India’s general manager public relations, told the BBC that the airline would strictly implement the directive.

“We have a tolerance limit that cannot be exceeded,” he said.

Although the Air India Cabin Crew Association welcomed this decision, they didn’t say anything about the fact that the “tolerance limits” were different for men and women. Quite simply the airline wants hot stewardesses in order to compete in the always cut-throat airline business (see the Kingfisher Airlines picture on the right). Want more proof? Check out the BBC’s most recent report (quite humorous) from freezing cold Delhi:

Delhi can be mercilessly chilly during the opening weeks of January.

Central-heating devoid houses constructed to withstand the furnace-like temperatures of high summer seem more like well-upholstered cold rooms…

So imagine my surprise the other afternoon at finding my favourite outdoor swimming pool absolutely teeming with glamorous young people, in what looked, from a distance at least, like a cross between spring break in Cancun and a Mumbai movie premier.

Swimsuits, stilettos and Speedos abounded. [Link]

An Air India flight Monday from L.A. to Delhi turned into a comedy of errors which delayed the passengers by two whole days (thanks, Saheli). First day, a tire blew out on takeoff:

As the plane took off, Gursharan said, it shook after a tire burst, startling passengers. The Boeing 747-400 flew over the ocean and circled, dumped fuel and then returned for a bumpy emergency landing. The landing gear dug into the runway, leaving a 7,000-foot-long field of debris that took 40 employees hours to clean up… [Link]

And the Concorde proved that runway debris is murderous.

… the teenager and his family turned on the news to see footage of their plane landing amid a shower of sparks… Airport officials said the pilots made a wise choice to take off, explaining that, if they had aborted, they might not have had enough runway to stop the heavy, fully fueled aircraft. [Link]

Next day, different plane, an engine problem led to a minor passenger revolt:

Flight 136 pushed back from the gate… 2 1/2 hours late… one of the four engines was malfunctioning… the flight crew didn’t provide more detailed information, passengers said, leaving them trapped on the packed jumbo jet for about five hours… Finally, Wenz, the professor, said he just walked through a door that attendants had opened. He climbed down the stairs and off the plane to wait on the tarmac. Other passengers, he said, followed. [Link]

Taking a Delhi-to-Chennai train would’ve been faster than this flight. Last year, an Air India crew forgot to drop landing gear. So if you’re flying Air India, here’s a cheery thought: it may not be Jet Airways, but it sure beats Aeroflot.

Related posts: Air India more efficient than ever, Open skies and Air India