BENGALURU : In March 2020, when Anupam Kher landed in India from New York, the actor felt like he had entered the set of Will Smith’s I Am Legend. The start of the COVID-19 lockdowns had left roads eerie and deserted.
It didn’t take long for Kher to get down to business and now, exactly a year later, the actor made his way to namma Ooru to launch his book Your Best Day Is Today, which pens optimistic ways in which one can overcome an unprecedented crisis.
Saturday evening saw the who's who of Bengaluru listening keenly to Kher's writing journey, while he was in a conversation with dancer Madhu Nataraj. This was organised as part of Taj West End's Rendezvous initiative, an engagement series from The Chambers.
The intimate guest list also included chairman of Manipal Global Education Mohandas Pai; Biocon Limited's executive chairperson Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw; Bengaluru South MP Tejasvi Surya and BBMP commissioner N Manjunatha Prasad.
This is far from the actor's first visit to the city and a conversation with him proves that his love for South Indian cuisine runs deep. 'Om Jai Jagadish, the only film I directed, was shot in Bengaluru. I love the city. For me, a city is made by its people and Bengalureans are very chilled and relaxed. And idly, vadae, dosae and biryani are my favourite dishes," he tells The New Indian Express.
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Making a mention of the city’s infamous traffic, he added, "It's fashionable to say that the traffic is chaotic but this problem is for the whole world."
Kher, who is known for his roles in films like A Wednesday and Special 26, believes his work relaxes him more than a holiday, so much so that the actor has not taken a holiday for 36 years. "You take a holiday when you do not like the work you do. To me, acting is like a holiday which takes me to various places and makes me feel relaxed," he says. So how did he manage when the world came to a standstill with the pandemic? "I wrote a book and did two films," says the 66-year-old.
Driven from instances from his own life, the book drives home the message of positivity. The "accidental writer" throws light on how he came up with the title for his book. "When my mother used to drop me at my school gate, she used to tell me 'Your best day is today'. It didn’t matter if I came first in class or not since I took my mother’s words seriously. That is why the book is dedicated to my mother," he says.
The book also refers to how small things can make a big difference during the pandemic. "We got a universal pause. I started noticing the chirping of the birds and I never thought the skies of Mumbai could be clear blue. Actually, the pandemic has given us much more than it has taken away from us," he adds.