Last week we posted about NBC’s upcoming sitcom Outsourced, in which an American goes to work in India and makes fun of their funny names. A reader named Sumit responded with a link to one of the funniest Indian-related sketches I’ve seen. This comes from an old BBC show named Goodness Gracious Me that was known for turning Indian stereotypes on their head. Watch what happens when an English guy named Jonathan shows up to work at an Indian company:
Seeing this reminded me of the name I was given in our Delhi office. Not that anyone had any trouble pronouncing my name, but my coworker Dipankar insisted that if I was going to work in India, I needed to have a proper Indian name. None of this American “Dave” nonsense. He studied me intensely for a moment before announcing to the office that I was henceforth rechristened as “Dev Prasad.”
The name stuck. That’s what half of my coworkers still call me.
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Clicking around Youtube to find more from Goodness Gracious Me, I came across this sketch, which is even funnier than the last one.
And this one is just weird.
Thanks for the lead, Sumit! If anyone else has any other Indian-related comedy bits to share, please post in the comments. Russell Peters, perhaps?
