Mumbai Diary: Sunday Dossier

Hasta La Vista, Baby

With her kids in tow, Sunny Leone welcomes the paps while her husband Daniel Weber seems to have had enough in Juhu on Saturday. Pic/Satej Shinde

The Masters rocked 25 years ago too

Australia's ex-captain Kim Hughes with VJ Ruby Bhatia. Pic/Mid-day archives

Quite interestingly, the Road Safety World Series T20 event for veterans which ended prematurely due to the Coronavirus outbreak, was held exactly 25 years after another veterans gig - the BSI Masters Cup - in March 1995.

The then matches evoked huge interest and cricket fans grabbed the chance to watch some of the greats which they had seen and not seen in their prime. For example, they had watched Kim Hughes and Vivian Richards but hadn't set eyes on South African icons Graeme Pollock and Barry Richards, so the Brabourne Stadium turf was heaven to the enthusiasts.

The final was a repeat of the 1983 India v West Indies World Cup finale and although the Richards-led Caribbeans won easily, Dilip Vengsarkar, the man who had missed out on being part of the 1983 final playing XI, lit up Brabourne with a magnificent display of strokeplay. Vengsarkar stayed unbeaten on 105 in India's total of 251, which proved insufficient for India as Gordon Greenidge buried the ghosts of his disastrous 1983 final by plundering a fine, match-winning 114. Incidentally, there was no Balvinder Singh Sandhu inswing to trouble him in 1995.

Sweet victory

Rachel Goenka, restaurateur and founder of The Chocolate Spoon Factory, has won the Gourmand World Cookbook Award for Best in World- Pastry and Dessert for her work, Adventures With Mithai (Harper Collins). If all goes well, the ceremony is likely to be held in Paris this June. "It feels surreal. For a book on redefining mithai to be recognised at the highest international level, is a proud yet humbling moment," said Goenka.

With love from grandma's kitchen

We all would remember Meri Awaz Suno, the Star Plus music talent show from the 1990s that was directed by Ratna Rajaiah. Around the same time, Rajaiah also began penning a column for mid-day that was an irreverent take on anything and everything. That's when the writing bug first bit her. Rajaiah will now be releasing a brand new edition of Secrets from the Indian Kitchen (Westland Books), originally published in 2009, with 11 new chapters.

"Over ten years ago, I used to write a column for another daily, which was about new age living. At the time, everyone was talking about going back to their roots. Many of my pieces too, revisited ancient wisdoms like Ayurveda, yoga, spirituality and traditional food," recalls Mysuru-based Rajaiah. The first book was an extension of some of her foodilicious columns. The new edition is no different. Rajaiah once again goes down memory lane, to rediscover the superfoods in her mother's and grandmother's kitchens.

In the nick of time

THE Consul General of The Netherlands, Guido Tielman, assumed his post in the Mumbai office in 2016, but continues to remain his staff's sweetheart even in the fourth year. The Consulate's Twitter handle posted a trivia recently on the Dutch word niksen, which means the art of doing nothing.

The post read: "What is niksen? Hint: It is a soft skill that we noticed our Consul-General is especially well-versed in. Especially on a Friday." While Tielman, known to be a sport, laughed when this diarist spoke to him about him pulling a niksen every Friday, he said, "I think it is a characteristic Dutch trait that we run an office that is not hierarchal. While all our functionalities are different, we are all equal. So yes, I do share a great rapport with my employees. When we need to work, we never shrug off our responsibilities. But now with the coronavirus situation, we are all on our toes at the office, so niksen is a bit difficult."

When Bollywood and LA decided to collaborate

A few months ago, this diarist apprised you about the growing friendship between singer Armaan Mallik and LA-based, Bombay girl Natania Lalwani, who is also a singer-songwriter. We also wondered out loud if they were planning to work together and if Malik was going to come out with an English song. Well, you heard
it here first.

Malik has been signed on by Arista Records for his first English single, Control. The song which he has written with Lalwani, will be out on March 20th. As Lalwani said in an Instagram post, "I met Armaan Malik 2 years ago at a random movie theatre in India and we decided to get together to write... I am so lucky to be part of telling your stories to the world." Malik also thanks Lalwani on his feed. We are looking forward to hearing this one.

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