Archive for September 18th, 2011

The Ugly American Turns Beautiful

18/09/2011

Outsourced - A great source for cultural awareness

Outsourced
By R Richards
Says one movie critic about the movie Outsourced, “It does for cultural differences with humor, what ‘Crash’ did with intensity and violence.” I found it to be a wonderful treatise on the Ugly American turned good. Using the metaphor of outsourcing, Yankees are forced, through humor, to reassess the American way of life.  According to United States Government Accountability Office, about 28 percent of the U.S. population has a passport, and the main character in Outsourced is no different. But he eventually awakens with his first trip to India to learn not only about a rich country, but about himself.  See this movie.

Outsourced is a modern day comedy of cross-cultural conflict and romance. Todd Anderson (Josh Hamilton) spends his days managing a customer call center in Seattle until his job, along with those of the entire office, are outsourced to India. Adding insult to injury, Todd must travel to India to train his new replacement. As he navigates through the chaos of Bombay and an office paralyzed by constant cultural misunderstandings, Todd yearns to return to the comforts of home. But it is through his team of quirky yet likable Indian call center workers, including his friendly and motivated replacement, Puro (Asif Basra), and the charming, opinionated Asha (Ayesha Dharker), that Todd realizes that he too has a lot to learn – not only about India and America, but about himself. He soon discovers that being outsourced may be the best thing that ever happened to him.

See the Trailer

Outsourced debuted with its world premiere at the 2006 Toronto Film Festival, and following a successful run at festivals around the world, ShadowCatcher Entertainment, the production company behind Outsourced, has chosen to distribute the film independently in select theaters around the US and on DVD

New Hydroponics: Urban Vegie Gardens

18/09/2011

Is the Future Hydroponics?

O’Hare Aeroponic Garden Provides Fresh Produce to Airport Eateries
From: Chicago Department of Aviation
The Chicago Department of Aviation (CDA) and HMSHost are pleased to announce the grand opening of the O’Hare Urban Garden, a cutting-edge, environmentally friendly aeroponic garden located in the mezzanine level of Terminal 3, G Concourse.
“On behalf of the City of Chicago and Mayor Rahm Emanuel, we are delighted to open the world’s first airport aeroponic garden at O’Hare and invite passengers to take a few minutes to visit the calming garden and learn more about this unique and earth-friendly type of gardening,” said CDA Commissioner Rosemarie S. Andolino. Read the rest of this story…

Editor’s Note: It seems the Juice Plus company is behind this technology, (or at least has marketing rights) and will be rolling it out to distributors sometime in the next year. While I’m not a huge fan of MLM companies, (Juice Plus says it’s not multi-level) I have been taking Juice Plus for years, so expect their Hydroponics to be something worth looking into.