"It's become the hottest invite in town," said ace photographer Atul Kasbekar, something of an authority on zeitgeist
>> “It’s become the hottest invite in town,” said ace photographer Atul Kasbekar, something of an authority on zeitgeist. “I’ve never had such swift RSVP responses from guys,” he laughs. Kasbekar is referring to the brunch Vijay Mallya is hosting next Saturday to launch the Kingfisher Calendar 2014 which he shot. Held at the Mallya beach house in Alibag it will be thrown open to guests soon. “A fleet of motorboats will ferry guests to the villa in 30 minutes,” says the swashbuckling cameraman who chose to shoot the iconic project in the beautiful Boracay and Cebu islands in the Philippines.
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Atul Kasbekar with Nicole Faria
For the uninitiated, the Kingfisher calendar is the stuff of male fantasy and a much-awaited annual almanac. Earlier, calendars have featured the likes of Katrina Kaif, Deepika Padukone,u00a0Yana Gupta, Nargis Fakhri and Bruna Abdullah,u00a0So who does Kasbekar, known for his great eye for spotting beauty, put his money on for the 2014 edition.
A model posing for the calendar
“Nicole Faria who is debuting in the T-series film in Jan 2014 called Yaariyan directed by Bhushan Kumar’s wife Divya,” he says, “She looks like a young Bipasha Basu.”
Now you see why invites to the party are so coveted?
Superstar mothers
>> Yesterday, saw us visiting one of our favourite corners of the Universe — Bandra — to celebrate the birthday of an old friend, our very glamorous former colleague Pammi Bakshi (pic below).
It was a ladies lunch, a gathering of her closest friends and as we walked in to Mangiomo, we spotted many familiar faces like Neetu Kapoor, Lally Dhawan, Anu Ranjan, Sunita Kapoor, Kirron Kher, Deepti Sandesara, Anju Mahendroo. We spoke to the lovely Neetu about her superstar son Ranbir. “We catch every film of his and can’t stop replaying his dance numbers,” we said, “But you certainly don’t look old enough to be his mum!”
Neetu blushed. “When we were in London and had gone shopping, people used to mistake me for his gf!” she said. “I got married very early and had my kids right away,” she explained.
Lally Dhawan, Anu Ranjan, Sheelu Mehtani and Neetu Kapoor
We congratulated Lally, who it turns out like us, had been a student of Elphinstone College about her son Varun’s prompt criticism of the SC judgment on Section 377 a few hours after it had been announced on Wednesday. “Yes, it counts for a lot when straight people of stature raise their voices,” said this student of political history.
With Sunita, we chatted about her daughter Sonam’s foray in to short story writing in Khalid Mohamed’s Faction. “Even my son is a writer,” said the proud mum and a student of creative writing from an American university.”
And then looking around the room full of bright attractive women it occurred to us that be-jeaned and toned, svelte and sassy as we appeared, beneath it all, we were mothers — and very proud and contented ones too.
Young girls who’d turned into women and women into mothers. And that by the grace of God, was the natural order of things.
Dishoom, dishoom
>> Oh dear. This high society grandee jeweller whose presence besides top-notch industrialists is a liet motif at society parties, has been the subject of much chatter recently. Videos of him being assaulted by his colleagues outside his place of work to the accompaniment of much abuse and expletives have been flying around Mumbai, creating much embarrassment. The incident occurred last month, when the jeweller was gheraoed by some agitated member of his community over a financial wrangle.
In the clip, the gentleman clearly identifiable, is being assailed, even as his own security men try and shield him from the blows.
What we’d like to know is who is behind the leaked clip and why?
Cutting edge surgeons
>> I was invited to the 33rd meet of The Cutting Edge Symposium which was conducted by Dr Daniel Baker and Dr Sherrell J Aston, both of who have sculpted faces of the likes of Madonna, Sharon Stone, etc,” said the lovely Dr Jamuna Pai, Mumbai’s leading aesthetician and renowned authority on skin care.
Dr Jamuna Pai with Dr Fitzpatrick
“It was a big honour for me to be there as I was in the company of doctors whose books and papers we have learnt our craft from,” said the doe-eyed doctor, known to constantly update her knowledge and technique from the best internationally.
“I learnt from them that in the last decade surgical procedures have increased only about 20 per cent whilst non-surgical procedures have shown phenomenal increase of 5,000 per cent. Also as surgeons they use a lot of non-surgical procedures like fat fillers, hyaluronic acid fillers and Botox to complete and complement their work.”
But the cherry on the cake for Pai was meeting the legendary Dr Fitzpatrick whose work on skin classification and the grading of naso-labial folds (laugh lines) is a thing of beauty and a joy forever.”
“Some of the surgeons had been practising for 50 years and had a wealth of experiences to share,” she said.
A year almost done.
And so on to another weekend and another week that brings the year-end even closer.
Where did it go, this past year, hurtling through the hours,u00a0leaving us little to show for its passing?
I try and recapture the days gone and can grasp at only a blur of faces, a rush of events and a few snatches of conversation.
Am I the only one who thinks that it’s all going past faster than I’d ever noticed before?
Where did the last year go and why?
If someone has the answer to that, send it in, in no more than 200 words.
Let us make a bonfire of memories before 2014’s in! u00a0
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