The sun’s shining, it’s 80 degrees outside, and your fingers are itching for a mint julep. What better way to spend a lazy afternoon than on your porch or at the lakefront with Radiostan for company? If you haven’t podcast or streamed any shows lately, check out the latest episodes and music at www.radiostan.com.

For Episode #26: Finding Your Bliss, I spoke with writer and actress Meera Simhan and director Shishir Kurup about their play Miss India America, a coming-of-age comedy about growing up in Southern California and finding your voice. Miss India America comes to Chicago July 14-17 at Theater Wit.

For Episode #25: Deep Space Utopia, I interviewed Pushkar Sharma and Sathya Sridharan, two of the three members of the thoroughly entertaining Brownstar Collective about their unique mix of theater, comedy, and verse. If you’re going to be in NYC on August 14, get tickets to their Unification show at Nuyorican Poets Cafe.

For Episode #24: A Messy Democracy, I talked to the new alderman of Chicago’s 47th Ward, Ameya Pawar, about youth, change, and running against a powerful political machine.

For Episode #23: Soul Food, I spoke with journalist, mom, and cookbook author Anupy Singla about home cooking, smelling like curry, and enticing kids to eat their veggies.  You can find her new book, The Indian Slow Cooker, at your local bookstore or online.

As always, email me at tina@radiostan.com if you have questions, comments, or story ideas.

by Aparna & Lakshmi

Here’s the deal Andrea Miller-–we’ve read your “advice” for the non-Indian on how to date the Indian in the Onion Huffington Post.

We have thought about it–-since you’re so good at giving out free advice, we thought you would appreciate some as well.

1. When you describe a diverse and rich culture by reducing it to beauty, Bollywood, and bhangra, you minimize the realities and complexities of our people’s existence in a way that can only be described as racist and, well, ignorant. Don’t get us started on how you have homogenized 1 billion people into a fun-loving accessory for Joe/Jane Smith.
2. Consider it passe that you have to reference the Kama Sutra several times while talking about dating Indian people. I mean, really?
3. Most Indians are innately gracious , social creatures? You know, the British thought so, too, and we all know how that worked out for them.
4. A hubby is not a hobby-–we know that can be confusing sometimes.
5. You clearly do not understand your privilege here. An article that puts out a few ridiculous points to snag us simpleton Indians is both frivolous and damaging. Some of your readers have been commenting on your piece and wondering why we should be upset by what is clearly such a positive portrayal. Here’s the deal-–you don’t get to minimize my existence to some cute yet exotic sound bites. I don’t care if you think this is a compliment.
6. India Does Not Equal Bollywood, and if you believe that, we’re not sure what else you could believe.
7. On the bright side–you talk to cabbies. Sadly, you think they all speak Hindi.
8. You’re clearly embarrassing your own kind–we like the plain and simple STFU advice being doled out here.
9. Okay–some clearly fall into the SRK loving category–we’ll give you this.
10. Racism is racism. AND stupid (even well-intentioned) ignorant opinions can also be racist.

Have you seen this ad? I think it’s kinda hilarious.

The ad seems to be unique in its cultural representation. Is this a sign of a new wave of South Asian-ness integrating into the mainstream?

Last weekend was, like, the best ever. Thanks to quick-thinking SAPAC friends, a few of us got tickets to see the one and only Aziz Ansari. He performed in Chicago on Saturday, February 27, for a DePaul University show. It was a surreal experience to be surrounded by college students and watch him live with a full house. If you missed his recent Comedy Central special, “Intimate Moments for a Sensual Evening,” you can rent or buy it. They may re-air it too.

Although I was wearing my bling, hoping the fake crystals would catch his eye, I don’t think he noticed me in the center section, last row of the Mezzanine level. I was too lazy and hungry to stalk him afterward, or before at the airport/hotel/street, so our destined meeting was postponed.  This may not seem like a big deal for kids these days, but when I was in college, we didn’t have no South Asian comedians performing to sold out crowds. Aziz is my hero.

Dan Levy opened for Aziz. I enjoyed Dan’s trash talking about Canada and his tale of receiving hate mail from vampire fans due to a moment of mistaken identity (he shares the same name with a Canadian MTV VJ). There are reviews out there from other college comedy shows with Aziz and Dan, done in a Top 10 list style.  But I thought of doing my review in a Top 10 style BEFORE I even found those other ones. So, here’s my original review idea: since Aziz likes Top 10 lists, I’ll do one for his show.

Top 10 jokes/parts I loved from Aziz’s comedy show at DePaul (not the best list):

10.  R. Kelly. He felt compelled to talk about R. Kelly since he was in Chicago. We appreciated it. RAAAAAAAANDY loves R. Kelly.

9.  Rudeness. He doesn’t like rude people. Especially on airplanes with puppies who are mean to old people. They deserve to have their puppies killed. I totally agree.

8. He wore a suit. This is not a joke, but is good for taking up space at number 8. I like that he wore a suit. It was hot, and professional.

7.  Texting and pizza. Something about him ordering a pizza, girl not responding in time to his text invite for a pizza party, and how she missed out on a totally awesome pizza party. Keyword for me in this joke was pizza. I love pizza parties.

6.  Darwish. One of my two favorite cousins of somebody else (in this case, Aziz Ansari). I follow him on Twitter.* Darwish is known for his musical insights, specifically in hip hop, which led to his “battle” with Kanye.

5.  Harris. The other one of my two favorite cousins of somebody else. I also follow him on Twitter.* Harris is known for his insights into being awesome (because, like me, he loves Jack Bauer), and his expertise on Cinnabons. Loved Aziz’s impression of Harris eating Cinnabons.

4. RAAAAAANDY made an appearance, along with his crazy dance moves. I love those dance moves. Out. Of. Control. Check out the new single from his upcoming mixtape, “AAAAAAAANGRY.”

3. Racist/Rude Eastern European customs agent in Toronto. Aziz did a spot-on accent and shared how he explained to her what “shooting movie” really meant.

2.  Racist Star Wars fan. Is this an oxymoron or too good to be true? Great joke–don’t want to ruin it for you here. You will have to go to an Aziz show to hear it!

1.  Looking up random things on the Internet. Talked about how he spends a lot of time searching online for random information that takes precedence over doing work. Sound familiar? One of his favorite things to read are Top 10 lists. Doesn’t matter the topic. Like a 21-page Top 10 list about the most popular racial slurs for practically every ethnic group. One of his favorites was “apple.” No, Aziz is not a racist! Of course, Aziz made it clear before joking about slurs that he’s not racist, and this is part of a joke. I couldn’t find a 21-page list, but here’s one. Enjoy.

*As of March 3, 2010, Harris has about 2,000 more followers than Darwish. Harris’s first tweet was “eating macaroni.”  Heavy stuff. They are in a battle of wills for total domination on Twitter. Follow Harris or Darwish or both.