Nonstop and back!

I was in Chennai with friends for a celebration that brought many old friends and memories together over delicious food, and the delight of listening to the Gundecha brothers performing for the occasion. What can I say.... by now I think I have established that my heart strings work over time, and so it is suffice to say that back in Chennai with friends (who compound memories that span two decades), made for a blissful encounter.

I stopped over in Mumbai the following evening to catch Nilima Sheikh's beautifully poignant show Each night put Kashmir in your dreams, presented by Chemould prescot. Nilima is a national treasure as an artist, and I wish that a museum or an art patron would acquire the entire show because it is bodies of work such as these that are the art history of our times. What a shame that such opportunities go wasted. Is any IPL cricket team owner listening ?

Unfortunately the hot topic in the Bombay tabloids is the "splitsville" situation between an artist couple. The story doing the rounds is that neither individual is happy over the "sensationalising" of their private lives in this manner. But the lesson to be learnt is that when you believe that being plastered on page three is the ticket to fame, and you connive and cajole and pay your way into this circuit, then this is the unfortunate price you finally pay when your privacy is transgressed upon. Being part of art history is via the quality of work we produce, and this not so young couple are both genuinely good artists whose work does us proud. The only trouble is that they were in such a hurry to "make it big" in Bombay, and perhaps were ill-advised to the methodologies that offer/pronounce "success", that patience was never a sought after module of self governance. I genuinely hope that they both find their way out of this messy situation in a restrained and dignified manner, because washing dirty linen in view of the public will only be a painful legacy for the two of them to live with; and it will not achieve anything other than personal anguish. Privacy is precious, and one should always guard oneself from too much over exposure. But then as is the usual case of stars that blind your eyes in the guise of shutter bugs; sensibility seems old fashioned and caution is the quickest things that gets thrown to the winds at such times!

The highlight of my day in Bombay was the time I spent with Mithun. Time with him is perhaps the most precious for me always. He took me for dinner, and as only he can, I felt the most pampered mother in the universe!

Anyway back at home Begum enthusiastically greeted me, with many meow stories that I am sure translate to how much she has missed me! Of course evidence of this was a chewed up tiny cloth tiger that was recently gifted to me that I discovered under my bed. Oh well, who said anything about a perfect world!