Whole and complete
BENGALURU: Hola ! I’m in such a great state of mind that I actually contemplated addressing you guys as ‘dearly beloved’! This week was full of love, miracles and the utter joy of being surrounded by family and friends. I have often travelled to this city that I love, on work, for pleasure or just to connect and do a bit of ‘tafri’ (local slang for aimless wandering). Without exaggeration, Mumbai has always given me a great sense of security, has enveloped me with the respect of my peers and has widened my horizons both culturally and intellectually.
I took my greatest ‘leap of faith’ here, by becoming a performing artiste, shunning my staid profession of practising law, with my friends cheering me on. I remember having my children in quick succession. Imi and I moved into our own (considerably) smaller home in a building teeming with young adults and young kids. There I met my ‘earth-parents’, the renowned author and filmmaker Saeed Mirza and his exuberant better-half, Jennifer. This amazing couple taught a restless young professional, who hated her job to be in sync with life.
I learned that if I loved what I did…then sustenance would follow. I used to see Saeed whistle as he walked to his office teeming with writers, intellectuals, film and script writers and actors and I wanted in! In fact, that is where I first met Mr Shahrukh Khan earnestly pouring over a script that had him in the lead role as a newbie. Many years later when I worked for his productionhouse I reminded him of all the lights he had broken in our compound playing cricket with the children! My husband and I are both byproducts of comfortable homes. We were Pali-Hill brats and quite unabashed about it.
Our friends were current heart-throbs on the silver screen and having them as your classmates was a common occurrence. I am happy and proud that the both of us broke away from a predictable road and pursued alternative and fulfilling careers in the city of my birth…Bangalore. My life abounds with the presence of Cancerians and Leos in my life. They form the bulk of my family and ‘friends like family’. Now another one has been added to our midst.
The most important and youngest member of our family. She arrived sandwiched between two important birthdays but managed to be born on my dearest friend Simran Chandok’s special day! As I anxiously waited for news, in the very same hospital that my daughter was born, I must admit I felt overwhelmed. When I met with the doctor (the son of my gynaecologist who delivered my daughter), both our eyes glistened as there are some things best left in the unsaid. Like his father before him, he continued the tradition of giving me ‘the greatest gift of all’! My son celebrated his birthday in between all the excitement of having a new ‘littleperson’ in our lives.
We went to the ultimate in Italian cuisine, Romano’s at the JW Marriott, Sahar. Both the ‘dishy’ chefs, executive chef Dane Fernandes and chef Emiliano Di Stef, anotheir Italian chef-de-cuisine met with us and personally curated a lunch from their new menu. To say that the meal was stupendous would be an understatement. The service and the meal and the attention to detail was ‘favoloso’. The GM Kunal Chauhan was a Bengaluru-boy after all… We were born to be real, not perfect.