Films, Friends and A Furball

Phew!!! What a week it has been.... Ever since I read my ambassador's blog about the roller coaster week he had I felt "Wow... Even I want each day to have atleast one key event or experience for me" and Voila...

Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday, each had something in store for me and gave me a piece of films, family, friends, old friends, slightly lost friends, food and ofcourse a furball...



Mom Dad Anniversary   

It all started last Sunday on the 29th of Jan... Mom and Dad's 28th Wedding Anniversary... Since anniversaries and birthday's are like any normal day for mom and dad they were being themselves- Dull and Boring.... Thankfully my entire family.... had decided to meet on that day to have a discussion... or should I say loud discussion about my cousin Ekta's wedding which is scheduled for the 24th of this month... Actually not entire family... My entire family could give the family of My Big Fat Greek Wedding a run for their money... It was just the Bombay Bellongings (The one's living in Bombay) So the loud discussion and lousy lunch (My dad's thoughts not mine... I quite liked it) was followed by a little cake cutting ceremony forced on my parents by me...  All in all it was simple and sweet

Definitely not simple and quite bitter-sweet was a film I saw that evening... The Descendants... and I can say that I lay my Oscar bets on this one for Best Film... There's something about these films on dysfunctional families (All of which are far more wittier than your comic capers) that always fascinates me... Little Miss Sunshine, The Fighter, American Beauty, East of Eden and On the Golden Pond are a few of them that are still etched in my memory... Another one, though not a family, As Good As It Gets is one of my all time favourites...

Clooeney, as everyones been rightly tom toming, delivers his career best performance... But for me Alex and Scottie and Alex's friend Sid were the stars of the show... It baffles me how Shailene Woodley has not been nominated for Best Supporting Actress.. It's unarguable the best one after Octavia Spencer's... 

Just as I was wiping the tears I shed after watching Descendants I get an international call from the States.. A call from Neha... Neha who? My best friend (Yes I have about 3-4 of them)  Neha and I have been friends since school after which she moved to the States and has been staying there ever since... However the seven seas have not been able to change the course of our friendship... Yes it has all it's trials and tribulations... But we just don't let go... We would probably follow each other to hell also... And we would be quite happy there as well as long as we have all the wannas and the bees to gossip about... Neha loves to Gossip, loves to hear all the stories... But she loves to hear them from me primarily cause I have a latent talent of garnishing it with the required gravitas and chutzpah... So anyway... Neha and I had not been talking for quite some time (Just another phase I guess) But she called and we spoke... We didn't speak about why we were not talking to each other and try to sort out the issue... We never do it... We just pick up from where we left... So we spoke and we spoke and we spoke... She also for a change tried to play agony aunt and tried to talk to me about the slight problems cropping up between 'our best friend' Karishma... Normally Neha wouldn't care... But this time she had to... Cause Neha, Karishma and I are like Arjun, Kabir and Imran from ZNMD.  I could write a whole blog about just the 3 of us but I'll save that for later...

After the eventful Sunday, Monday was Nani Day... My nani came to meet me with a lot of food and a big box of Ferrero Rocher's (Which for me qualifies as the day's highpoint)... After Nani left, I joined Mom and Bhabhi for Ekta's wedding gift shopping (Yep preps started the very next day)... We didn't buy anything for Ekta but ended up shopping for ourselves... Bhabhi and I spend money as if we were the Descendants of the Ambani or Birla clan....

Tuesday again Mom and I left for the gift quest and made the necessary enquiries and followed it up by a lunch at Banana Leaf... Mom's favourite cuisine apart from her Gujju food is South Indian... But she doesn't like the food at Banana Leaf... Now you'll have figured out how mom is... So I won't go any further... That evening, after taking my ambassador's opinion (Superb was the opinion), I saw the extremely applauded Game of Thrones...  The opening scene gave me the shivers but I continued watching it and was hooked by the end of it... It's Gory yet Fabulous...

Wednesday I saw the over rated (That's what I think) Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy... It crawls in slow motion really.... I had to like take regular breaks in between...  In those breaks I saw the 100th episode of Gossip Girl and was quite impressed... Thankfully, the much needed drama, plotting, scheming, confrontations and cross-connections were back... I really thought Gossip Girl was losing its sheen... But I guess they saved the drama for the 100th.... Ofcourse the revelation of Gossip Girl was the icing on the cake... In the Tinker Tailor breaks, Karishma and I decided to meet for dinner and sort out our ever cropping issues... I called Radhika who also had the same issues with Karishma as well... We went to our regular joint Some Like it Hot and spoke... And we spoke and we spoke and we spoke.. And we ate and we ate and we ate( I just love the food there). By the end of it all issues were forgotten except the one that we all want to forget.. Or rather want Radhika to forget but can't get her to do so... We came up with a crackling solution and now are waiting for the execution...

Thursday was couch potato day... I saw an Iranian film, A separation, and I feel it is by far the film of the year for me... I have always thought the background score of a film really helps accentuate and elevate the proceedings but this film shattered my myth... It was sans background music but the visuals and screenplay were so strong that it had me completely sucked in...  A Separation was followed by a nap which was followed by 3 more episodes of Game of Thrones

Friday seemed like a re-run of Monday with Mom, Bhabhi and me Mall-Trotting for the wedding... The highpoint of Friday was Al Pacino's Scent of a Woman which had me hooked on from the word go...

Saturday was A Better Life... What a film and what a heart wrenching performance by Demian Bichir... In the evening I was forced to go by mom for our building's annual society party... What seemed like a "oh god why do I have to do this" affair turned out to be "Wow I'm glad I did this" affair... There was nothing spectacular about the party... But just the fact that I could catch up with the people who have seen me grow up brought a smile to my face... Ofcourse I spent all evening with my childhood friend Ayesha who is one of those very few people who can have me in splits... Just talking about the fun we used to have whether at home or in school got me all nostalgic... After the party I went to WTF lounge to meet my gang of girls who were playing an explicit game of "Never Ever." Shachi was as usual high on breezer and made some not so shocking revelations... After WTF we went to Ashini's house... And we spoke and we spoke and we spoke... Or should I say... Bitched... Bitched and bitched....

Yesterday seemed like a normal Sunday... Eating,  Watching K3G and sleeping... But just when Kajol was going to say "POOOOOOOOOO" Ashini pings me to come down to my building lobby... After lunching at Some like it Hot (For which I was not invited) SHE AND T came to meet me... (I felt like a dessert which they wanted to smack on after lunch) 

Meeting T and Ashi yesterday was by far the biggest highpoint of my week... It was not we... I spoke and I spoke and I spoke.. About all the things that were troubling and bothering me for the past 10 days... Things that popped up many introspective questions as well as some shadows of self-doubt.... I was looking (not asking) for reaffirmation and I got that and much more from them...

From heart to heart we went shop to shop looking for a bag that T could carry to office... We went to the UVS mall at Infinity and found a bag that loosely matched what T had in mind... It was a brown bag with a liitle bit of fur and furball hanging from it... That's when Ashi did the naamkaran and named it The Furball.... We were all sceptical about it and hence decided to look elsewhere...

 With that intention we looked everywhere and ended up buying pants and shoes for T who considers herself a fussy shopper... But Ashi and me turned it into the most fun shopping expedition for her and she picked up almost everything we chose instantly... Pants and shoes on board but no bag... So we decided to go to Lokhandwala and look... We looked but we could hear someone calling us... It was Furball (She had become Bagwati for us)... Her haunting memory didn't let us buy anything and sucked us back to Infinity... I immediately picked her up and gave it to T... But the shadows of doubt came back and we got thinking... In the interim I saw a subtle shimmer pink dress and put it on T to see how it looked... And man it looked niccceeeeeeeeeee.... Ashi asserting pink is not T's thing brought her the same dress in black... She tried but refused to show us... We urged and she finally emerged... BOOMBATTTTTTTTTTT...... Ashi was flipping and I was tripping... T turned into a smacking dessert... We urged her to buy and boy did she comply... T finally bought her first dress ever... And we can't wait for to wear it and tear the other girls down...

Inspite of the drab Zee Cine Awards, it was the perfect Sunday, A perfect round-up to the perfectly seasoned week... T and Ashi gave me the re-affirmation and re-assurance that I was desperately seeking... ofcourse in return I had to give them the goss that I had... What was the goss... That's a secret I'll never tell... XOXO....