There's an awe-inspiring collection of South Asia-related links at Frances Pritchett's web page at Columbia University. There are sections on maps, art and architecture, travellers, religion, literature, and her own work on Urdu poetry.
Language Hat noticed my PR work for the word prepone, and has welcomed it, along with the information that it's included in The New Oxford Dictionary of English, published in 1998. I'm very pleased on prepone's behalf.
S. Muthiah, the best and most dedicated historian of the city of Chennai (or Madras, as it was called until a few years ago), wrote in his latest Madras Miscellany column that the Indian railway station with the longest name is in Andhra Pradesh, not far from Chennai: Venkatanarasimharajuvaripeta. (I think peta must mean village, as it does in Tamil, and Venkatanarasimharaju must be a person's name - referring to the Man-Lion avatar of the god Vishnu. But I got lost at 'vari.' If someone could advise me, I'd appreciate it.)
(update: I have been advised that 'vari' means 'belongs to' in Telugu - Thanks!)
Reading this reminded me of the time when I worked as a Staff Assistant at Harvard's Center for the Study of World Religions. I also did some moonlighting, typing theses. One of the theses was about the Alvars, Tamil devotees of Vishnu who went from temple to temple in the 5th to 9th centuries, composing hymns which are still sung today. The Alvars had the most amazing names. They were peppered with diacriticals, because the Tamil alphabet has 5 n's, 3 l's, 2 r's, 2 s's, and long and short versions of a, e, i, o, u. There was a special typewriter for typing diacriticals. When you began to type one of those names you would hold your breath and plunge into it, like diving off a high board. Anyway, my favourite name (without the diacriticals here!) was Pinbalakiyaperumaljiyar - the Devotee of the Lord with the Beautiful Back.
Chennai blogger Aruna found some interesting things in an old cupboard. And Kiruba is having a grhapravesham, a house-warming ceremony. He writes:
An important part of the ceremony is Ganapathi Omam, where the cow's urine is sprinkled all over the house! Normally a real cow with its calf is brought inside the house and everyone waits until the cow natually urinates. Since it'll be a tricky job getting a cow and a calf to climb two storeys up to our home, we settled just for the cow's urine alone !
Two more threats from Hindi movies:
I'll go on pilgrimage, but only after lighting your funeral pyre!
When I'm finished with you, the God of Death will have to revise the whole system of death and rebirth!