The Desi and the NPR. It is a match made in socialist heaven. Most desis, having grown up and been indoctrinated in India, tend to agree with the basic idea of socialism. They don't principally mind the government running business and interfering in their lives. They are just disgusted by how shoddy and corruption-infested government-run businesses in India are. Corruption, they argue, is India's biggest malady and once that malady is cured, India will become a "superpower".
Of course, they have grown up experiencing the inferiority of government-run businesses. Whether it is their electric companies, landline phone companies, Indian railways, state-run buses or even state-run media outlets like Doordarshan and Akashvani, they all suck.
So imagine the exhilaration a desi feels when he discovers NPR - National Public Radio. Here's a radio station, funded by taxpayers, that is actually listenable! And it seems quite intelligent and serious too. So the desi gets addicted to NPR. He listed to Morning Edition while going to work and All Things Considered when returning from work. At coffee breaks and lunch breaks, he loves starting or entering conversations with "You know, I heard on NPR a while back....".
The first site he checks after going online is npr.org so he can find a link to some story that briefly mentioned India, and send it to all his friends. In fact often, if he hears a story about India, he immediately texts or messages everyone he knows to turn the radio on. He posts Facebook and Twitter updates with NPR stories. On his weekly calls to his parents in India, he raves about NPR and how it is much better than Akashvani. When the local NPR station has a fund-raising drive, he gladly donates a smal amount, and then proudly displays the free gift he got in his office cubicle.
He really really does heart NPR. It makes him feel smart, informed, in-touch and up-to-date. He is convinced that it will help him with women who find intellectuals sexy. Intellect is sexy. NPR is sexy! (In fact, he had even contemplated jacking off to pictures of the female anchors. But then he did a google image search and realized that Renee Montagne and Michele Norris might be great radio hosts, but don't really look jack-off-able. And he went back to his montage of CNBC's Erin Burnett.)
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