Interests:International Travel, Dining Out, High Tea, Reading, Dance, Spanish, Photography, the Internet, Fashion, Bollywood, World History, Watching the Ocean Expertise:Keeping lipstick on while eating and drinking
Sebastian Bach is coming to Barcelona on July 9! HA! Must go! It will be the headliner at a club called Bikini. Rage, it's supposed to be on tour with GN'R (although only Axl and Dizzy remain) but it doesn't look like they are coming... What will Baz be now almost 20 years later?? Must act quickly.... apparently all shows in its world tour are selling out fast! I used to have the biggest crush on him - and we have the same birthday
At some point in the future I'm going to be on a TV show in Barcelona called Duty Free starring the super-famous (although previously unknown to me) Catalan journalist/television personality Xavier Sardà.
They are doing a program about Bollywood and India, and rather than go to Bollywood to film, they were looking for a few dancers here in BCN to do a quick routine they could film and use for the show. Plus they were going to pay 50€. A friend called me up and asked me if I wanted to do it and I agreed. We went to the television studio today, got our make-up done (they made me have super kajal Egyptian eyes), wore our desi outfits and danced randomly to Chaiyya Chaiyya and Rang de Basanti while Xavier, dressed in some random Arab/Aladdin Halloween costume, improvised and danced with us. I messed up every time but kept smiling so bo. In 30 minutes I earned 50€. Not bad.
Will update here if I get some of the footage. In the mean time, some pics:
Yesterday Patrick and I went to see the Hugh Grant / Drew Barrymore movie "Music and Lyrics" (Hollywood movies are like 6 mos behind here...) and it was cute! Basically it's about '80s pop has-been Hugh Grant getting another chance at the music scene with the help of Drew to write lyrics. We both loved the song they played in the titles and of course I dl'd it when I got home! Check it out:
It's been over a month since my last post so I decided it's time to update this, especially since so many fun things happened...
April 3 - my birthday! Even though the weather kind of sucked, I had a wonderful day. Got lots of nice birthday wishes from friends and family, here in BCN and back home, and beautiful flowers from Hrang! To celebrate, after work I went for a free screening of Veer Zaara with a couple friends at fnac and then more friends joined me at an Argentine restaurant for (a late) dinner. Don't remember the name, but it was on the corner of Valencia and Enric Granados... The food was good - had cheese and onion empanadas and a risotto dish for dinner, with a dulce de leche crepe for dessert. Also tried Quilmes (an Argentine beer) for the first time.
Birthday bouquet from Hrang
At dinner - me and Gaurav
Lisa
with Maria
Patrick, Monica (with the Quilmes), and Pedro
April 6-10 - Trip to Belgium! Taking advantage of the Semana Santa / Easter holidays, I met Archana in Belgium and we visited Brussels and Brugge. It was good to see her after so long - since June 06 in KL! We meandered the streets, visited touristy landmarks, took pictures, ate and drank very well (moules et frites, waffles, crepes, beef stew, rabbit with plum sauce, beer...), and enjoyed just generally hulking around and taking it all in. The highlight was the Chocolate Festival in Brugge where we got to sample all kinds of chocolate and chocolate flavoured drinks, ice cream, and liqueur as well as learn about the history and industry. Belgium is a pretty country, we had good weather throughout, and we found it easy to get around (much cheaper if you use trains and buses) - I especially liked Brugge. Thought it was quite charming with its style of houses and canals like Amsterdam and Venice.
Moules et frites at Chez Leon in Brussels
Grand Place, Brussels
Famous Mannekin Pis statue/fountain in Brussels
mmmmm waffles!!!
Chocolate carving on display at the Brugge festival (there were many)
Archana getting a 1:1 demo/explanation of tempering and molds and machinery
April 15 - Bollywood party at Sweet Cafe. This time not as animated with the dancing fobios like last month, but still good fun and definitely memorable... hehehe
April 21 - my much-anticipated Bollywood themed birthday party! This turned out to be a huge success - the best party to date in our place We decorated the house with desi printed stuff (thanks to Arch) and candles, played Bollywood music, ate Indian food and drank chai, dressed up in Indian clothes (at least some of us) or at least attempted to, took lots of pictures and videos, talked for hours and danced the night away! My friends sang happy birthday to me in 8 languages: Spanish, Catalan, English, Hindi, Polish, Portuguese, French and German! It was a great party!
Maria doing my makeup
Adding the finishing touches
Voila!
With roomies Ester and Samantha
More friends L-R: Elena, Cesar, Me, Pedro, Monica, Gaurav, Joanna and Prashanth
Ester and Gaurav
Me and Patrick
Me, Elena, Monica and Laura
Sev Puri appetizers
Dinner! L-R: Chicken Madras Curry, Mattar Paneer, Aloo Palak Jeera Rice in the back
Dessert
Me and Gaurav Dancing to the song O Sikander from the movie Corporate (this was the encore performance)
Doing jhatkas
Everyone on the floor!
See the first performance of the dance here (kinda hard to hear the sound though...):
April 23 - Random fact - today is Sant Jordi day, which is basically the Catalan version of Valentine's Day. Sant Jordi is the patron saint of Catalunya. Some background info:
Sant Jordi was a Roman and christian military man. Because he was loyal to his faith, he was tortured in the reign of the Roman emperor Diocleciannus, around the year 303. One of the legends attributed to Sant Jordi, and the one that became quicklier popular, explains that a dragon frightened the people in a town. In order to calm the dragon, they had to give him a lamb and a maid chosen at random. One day the King's daughter was selected and she was carried in front of the dragon. Sant Jordi, miraculously, saved the princess maid and defeated the dragon. The maid, the King and everybody were converted to the christian faith.
AND
The main event is the exchange of gifts between sweethearts--men give their novias roses, and women give their novios a book to celebrate the occasion. Roses have been associated with this day since medieval times, but the giving of books is a more recent marketing ploy. In 1923, a smart bookseller started to promote the holiday as a way to honour the nearly simultaneous deaths of Miguel Cervantes and William Shakespeare on April 23, 1616. Barcelona is the publishing capital of the Spanish-speaking world and this heady one-two punch of love and literacy was quickly adopted.
On Bacelona's principal street, Las Ramblas, and all over the city, hundreds of stands of roses and makeshift bookstalls have been hastily set up for the occasion. By the end of the day, some four million roses and 400,000 books will have been purchased in the name of love. You will be hard-pressed to find a woman without a rose in hand, and half of the total yearly book sales in Catalonia take place on this occasion.
And while La Diada de Sant Jordi is not an "official" holiday, most romantics ditch the office to stroll the beautiful streets of Barcelona and to take in the sultry springtime weather. Love is definitely in the air, but even if you don't have a novio to smooch on a park bench there are still plenty of things to see and do.
Last Sunday I went to the Bollywood party at Sweet Café. Since I didn't go last month, I was looking forward to the party, and brought along some Spanish and Portuguese friends who were curious to see what it would be like.
Bollywood parties are usually the same scene anywhere you go, in any country. I am so used to them that I didn't realize how *different* they might be for the average newcomer.
The beginning started off relatively low key with people coming in, meeting up with friends, getting drinks and enjoying the music. There was a big projection screen with various Aishwarya videos set to Bollywood and Bhangra music spun by the DJ. After the first hour, everyone gathered around to watch three dance performances which were pretty entertaining and THEN it was open dance on the dancefloor.....
The handfull of desis present took the lead and formed a circle and started to get down. The non-desis, slightly uncertain of how to dance and/or in awe (or fear) of the overzealous fobs, didn't get into the groove right away. Some of them couldn't because there just wasn't any room since the fobs were going out of control and all over the place. I then realized that this was probably a very different scene than what most people present were used to. I predicted everything that would then happen, and everything came true (of course) -- and then some!
My predictions:
There would be at least one turbanator and he would go crazy at the first bhangra song. - check
At some point during the night the turbanator would be on the shoulders of another dude. - check
2 or more guys would stand on one leg, in Karate Kid crane position, and move in circles. - check
Someone would be in the center of a circle on his knees while a group circled around him, kinda like snake and snake charmer. - check
Knight Rider bhangra song would be played. - check
Arms and legs would be flailing about and drops of sweat abounding. - check
Other (funny) things which happened:
It was some girl's birthday, so all fobios busted out in "Happy Burd-day"
When the song "Chunri Chunri" came on, these guys (no girls) were dancing together and one had a shawl wrapped around the waist of another who was face to face with him, and the holder of the shawl kept shimmying the shawl side to side. In the image below, imagine that the hula hoop is a shawl being held by another guy, and that the girl is also a guy:
Later during the same song, the shawl was then put on top of those guys' heads and they were still face to face, this time dancing closer. Don't know what was happening chunri ke neechhe...
One guy danced 90% of the time to "Koi Kahe Kehta Rahe" doing the same step that they do in the movie to the line
Hamaare liye hi to hai aasmaan aur zameen, with arms outstretched and jumping up and down.
All in all, I had a lot of fun, and so did my friends. Can't wait for the party next month!
hehehe
We decorated the house with desi printed stuff (thanks to Arch) and candles, played Bollywood music, ate Indian food and drank chai, dressed up in Indian clothes (at least some of us) or at least attempted to, took lots of pictures and videos, talked for hours and danced the night away! My friends sang happy birthday to me in 8 languages: Spanish, Catalan, English, Hindi, Polish, Portuguese, French and German! It was a great party!
