Thanks for your responses — and thanks Amitabh for the congrats too. As you can see, my new job’s keeping me very busy during most of the week

Anyway, earlier today I finally had a chance to write a post on SM about my own thoughts on the conflagration currently surrounding “apni Shilpa”, which you can read here on Cicatrix’s thread if you’re interested. Take a look when you have some spare time; I obviously had a lot to say, but it covers many of the issues concerned from a British (and British Indian) perspective.

Cheers again, and I hope you two are doing okay.

Ms Shetty has bonded very well with Jermaine Jackson and Dirk Benedict — the latter of whom has got a major crush on her, and he doesn’t even hide it — but she’s had to handle a huge amount of blatant bullying from some of the English female housemates, a great deal of which has obviously been driven by racism (including mimicking her accent behind her back in an exaggerated Apu/The Simpsons way). The boyfriend of one of the so-called “celebrity” women — who is also currently in the house — is also alleged to have called her a “paki” when his girlfriend’s mother was evicted last week; it was captured on film although the word itself was bleeped out during the later transmission. Other incidents include the now-evicted mother repeatedly mispronouncing Shilpa’s name (and claiming she couldn’t pronounce it), and subsequently repeatedly referring to her as “the Indian” in a disparaging tone whenever she discussed Shilpa with the other housemates.

I recommend you check out the show’s discussion forums for more details; it’s all generated quite a lot of controversy and in some cases calls for the programme makers to intervene.

No, it’s because she hasn’t met me yet

Okay folks; I am about to start a new job and I won’t be allowed to access the internet for non-work purposes, so this will be my last post during the weekdays. I will, however, do my best to visit SM during the weekends, especially if Anna has another one of her excellent 55Friday threads.

Thank you all very much for your daily company over the past 16 months or so; the discussions have been enlightening, thought-provoking, sometimes very funny, occasionally infuriating, but always stimulating. I hope I’ve been a positive contribution to the blog, and my apologies if at any point I’ve inadvertantly offended anyone. In any case, I’ve greatly enjoyed the debates with everyone here and hopefully I’ve made some online friends too.

As mentioned, hopefully I’ll be able to drop by during the weekends, but in the meantime I just thought I should give some advance warning of my impending disappearance so that people don’t think I’ve suddenly walked out of SM in protest at something, or (more likely) the Mutineers have secretly done another one of their transatlantic hit-jobs

Shilpa’s obviously very uncomfortable indeed about the whole arrangement and has been visibly upset several times because of it.

By the way, along with the other handful of people left in the “luxury accomodation”, she’s up for eviction this Wednesday unless a sufficient number of the public vote to keep her in. The celebrity with the fewest votes will be kicked out.

So if you feel like supporting our desi sister, you can cast your vote by phoning 09011 32 33 14, or by sending an SMS with the word “Shilpa” to 84466 (the latter may need an international dialling code as the prefix if you’re SMSing from outside the UK, I’m not sure. Same for the phone number).

Back on topic:

They had a reshuffle in the house yesterday where 8 housemates voluntarily transferred into an adjoining, and significantly dodgier, “servants’ quarters”, with the intention that the 3 remaining celebrities would be treated like royalty by them.

Sounds a bit too much like India.

best body? hm. i am thinking that is open to huge debate.

Well, it’s the whole tall svelte leggy thing. And apparently she does pursue a particularly gruelling fitness regimen.

lack of gym facilities?

While exploring the new BB house, she found out to her delight that it includes various keep-fit equipment and was actually the first person to stumble across it, immediately proclaiming her delight. Some other housemates proceeded to check it out and were pleased too.

and they mentioned the possible issue for her in India due to the rooms being shared accomodation, with men and women rooming together. (gasp)

Well, Shilpa hasn’t made a big deal out of it. She did mention that she may end up sleeping on the floor, desi-style, because she has cervical spondylosis and she’s finding her bed to be too soft.

My prediction is she’ll be a disaster on British TV just as Aishwarya was on American TV.

Not necessarily. Well, not yet, anyway. The general consensus of the British public is that she’s a beautiful woman and quite elegant & poised, and seems to come across as a very nice person. The BB cameras in particular seem to be regularly zooming in with lingering closeups of her face even if she’s just quietly listening to other housemates chatting to each other off-camera. And apparently, one of the other housemates who she has bonded with — a recent Miss Great Britain who was stripped of her title for posing in Playboy — is quite jealous of Shilpa because of her looks. No genuine bitchiness towards her so far, though; the rest of the housemates have been extremely nice towards her.

They had a reshuffle in the house yesterday where 8 housemates voluntarily transferred into an adjoining, and significantly dodgier, “servants’ quarters”, with the intention that the 3 remaining celebrities would be treated like royalty by them. It appears that they all selected the lucky 3 on the basis of them having the highest status in the real world — Shilpa was one of them, along with Jermaine Jackson and a famous director called Ken Russell. So that’s an interesting indication of how they view her.

Big Brother has an absolutely huge viewing audience in Britain, so it’s a reflection of how established and high-profile South Asians are in this country for someone like Shilpa to end up being on the show — and, indeed, for the term “Bollywood” to be met with recognition rather than confusion, although of course Shilpa herself wasn’t really familiar to people outside the British desi population.

Until now, of course. Miss Shetty is suddenly very famous indeed in Ingerlaanda