Smoke Screens

Today I decided to go to one of my local restaurants in my neighborhood called "Kings Food Factory". This place has traditional Indian food along with some American "comfort" or as it is known here, "continental food". They have air conditioning (a true luxury here) and a full ice cream bar. I also noticed today while I was eating the band Nickelback was playing in the background and thats when I started noticing pictures on the wall that I had not. One was "The King of Music" another was the "King of Kung Fu" (which was Bruce Lee of course). The last one however, is what bothered me not only because it was just plain wrong but because it is one of the only signs of colonialism, besides tobacco use, that I have seen in this traditional and conservative part of India. The title of "King of Comedy" was given to this man:

That's right, Rowan Atkinson. For those of you that are not familiar with the creative work of Mr. Atkinson he is most famous for his British comedy, "Mr. Bean", a tv show that is the modern version of Benny Hill minus the women. Mr. Bean even had a movie come out that was somewhat on par with the "The Full Monty". I know this because "Mr. Bean" was one of my two favorite shows along with the "The Jerry Springer Show" in middle school. Certainly not the so dubbed "King of Comedy"

This got me to thinking though about the other things that I had seen in India that were not wuite what they seemed to be, a smoke screen if you will, so I took a picture of everything I noticed in the half-mile from my house to King's only. In this half mile I discovered:

This clearly is not Atlanta, Georgia or Texas (LPT's hometown). And I am not positive but I do think that Cher has been hiding in India running a hair and beauty spa but I might consult Olivia on that.

Ahmedabad is certainly not a "Windy City" so I do not know what the Sears Tower is doing here but...(you will notice it says Sears Tower at the bottom)

I do not think that this is what he had in mind...

And finally did you know that Obama liked India and their democracy so much that he moved here, because I didn't until today...

So I hope that you have enjoyed this little tour of Western influence here on my street in Ahmedabad and as I have seen more and if there is a request as such, I will post some more.