Hanging with indian celebreties
From Mo:
So, a couple of weeks ago, our team was taken out for a stylin lunch at the Taj Cormandel, to the most expensive, poshiest restaurant in Chennai: Southern Spice. It specializes in all the cuisines of Southern India. The dinner was served Thali style, with little bowls full of diverse dishes on top of silver plates shaped like banana leaves to the sound of live carnatic tabla, sitar and flute players.
We learned partway through dinner that a very famous Kollywood (the Tamil region's answer to Bollywood) actor/producer was dining in the restaurant. His name is Prakash Raj and he's been in well over 60 movies. He is renown for playing terrible villains. We inquired with the hotel if we could meet him, and he came over to our table to say hello on his way out. He is, of course, the dude in the middle. The woman to my right is Melanie, and the other woman is Wendy. They are both expats that are here with me. To the right of Prakash Raj is Rejesh and to the left Bala, they work with the vendors that we are working with.
From Brand:
Just before they went to Test Match, the Indian National Cricket Team was staying at our hotel. For those of you who don't know, Cricket is a huge deal in India. Imagine Hockey + Baseball in Canada or Football + Baseball in America, and then take the best and greatest of the sport and make them a single team that will defend the very honor of the nation.
Needless to say that security was pretty high at the hotel for their stay. Even more so because of the bomb scare with the South African team in Sri Lanka about three weeks before. There were guards with machine guns at every entrance to the hotel, and anywone they didn't like could be stopped, searched, and refused entry at any point. However they never even looked at us, no matter what outlandish things we were doing or saying. I walked in and out of the hotel one day wearing a Freddy mask, and the guards just thought it was funny.
Whats more the cricketers thought we were cool and or funny. While they would often flee from the local crowds that gathered to snap them they would hang out and talk with us in the halls or on the elevator. Mostly they seemed to enjoy being able to talk to people who didn't know or care who they were. So I got to have short conversations with Robin Uthappa, Rahul Dravid, and Vikram Singh.
Then one night while the Bell folks were at work I was hanging out with Nat, the wife of one of the Bell folks who had become my breakfast buddy. She was getting a kick out of all the publicity going on, as the media was there to do a press conference with the team. I laughed and said that I should challange them to a grudge match with the American Cricket team -- whom neither of us thought even existed. I mean really, who has heard of the American Cricket team? Nat then got this idea stuck in her head and began to encourage me. Those that know me know that this is a bad thing. I'm crazy on a normal day, I do not need to be encouraged. So I put on my Superman T Shit, a crazed look, and we head out.
So out we go, past the guards who do not care, and right up to Rahul Dravid and Greg Chappell. Greg shakes Nat's hand, looks at me and says, "Can I help you Superman?"
"Yes" I reply, "You can rise to the inestimable challange of facing the American Cricket team in a Grudge Match! Do you think you can possibly beat our formindable force?"
At this point Rahul starts to laugh so hard I was afraid he was going to hurt himself. Greg, on the other hand, just looks put off in that way that only someone trained in British public school can look and says, "Yes. In fact we did just last season. Badly, in fact."
With that someone from the press takes a picture of me and Greg, and then the team is hustled off to the airport to go get ready for their next test match. I was left sucking air, and turned to Nat and said, "Why didn't you tell me America had a cricket team?"
"I didn't know they did!" She says in her French Canaidan accent, "They must really suck."
I've looked it up online since then. They do suck. So me challanging Greg to the match was about like someone asking if the Clippers could be the Lakers in a grudge match.
So far as I know I didn't make the papers. I was hoping to, but it didn't happen. Ben later suggested that I would have had I only challanged them to a grudge match with the Kryptonian Cricket Team.
Ah well, you only get the best lines after the fact.
So, a couple of weeks ago, our team was taken out for a stylin lunch at the Taj Cormandel, to the most expensive, poshiest restaurant in Chennai: Southern Spice. It specializes in all the cuisines of Southern India. The dinner was served Thali style, with little bowls full of diverse dishes on top of silver plates shaped like banana leaves to the sound of live carnatic tabla, sitar and flute players.
We learned partway through dinner that a very famous Kollywood (the Tamil region's answer to Bollywood) actor/producer was dining in the restaurant. His name is Prakash Raj and he's been in well over 60 movies. He is renown for playing terrible villains. We inquired with the hotel if we could meet him, and he came over to our table to say hello on his way out. He is, of course, the dude in the middle. The woman to my right is Melanie, and the other woman is Wendy. They are both expats that are here with me. To the right of Prakash Raj is Rejesh and to the left Bala, they work with the vendors that we are working with.
From Brand:
Just before they went to Test Match, the Indian National Cricket Team was staying at our hotel. For those of you who don't know, Cricket is a huge deal in India. Imagine Hockey + Baseball in Canada or Football + Baseball in America, and then take the best and greatest of the sport and make them a single team that will defend the very honor of the nation.
Needless to say that security was pretty high at the hotel for their stay. Even more so because of the bomb scare with the South African team in Sri Lanka about three weeks before. There were guards with machine guns at every entrance to the hotel, and anywone they didn't like could be stopped, searched, and refused entry at any point. However they never even looked at us, no matter what outlandish things we were doing or saying. I walked in and out of the hotel one day wearing a Freddy mask, and the guards just thought it was funny.
Whats more the cricketers thought we were cool and or funny. While they would often flee from the local crowds that gathered to snap them they would hang out and talk with us in the halls or on the elevator. Mostly they seemed to enjoy being able to talk to people who didn't know or care who they were. So I got to have short conversations with Robin Uthappa, Rahul Dravid, and Vikram Singh.
Then one night while the Bell folks were at work I was hanging out with Nat, the wife of one of the Bell folks who had become my breakfast buddy. She was getting a kick out of all the publicity going on, as the media was there to do a press conference with the team. I laughed and said that I should challange them to a grudge match with the American Cricket team -- whom neither of us thought even existed. I mean really, who has heard of the American Cricket team? Nat then got this idea stuck in her head and began to encourage me. Those that know me know that this is a bad thing. I'm crazy on a normal day, I do not need to be encouraged. So I put on my Superman T Shit, a crazed look, and we head out.
So out we go, past the guards who do not care, and right up to Rahul Dravid and Greg Chappell. Greg shakes Nat's hand, looks at me and says, "Can I help you Superman?"
"Yes" I reply, "You can rise to the inestimable challange of facing the American Cricket team in a Grudge Match! Do you think you can possibly beat our formindable force?"
At this point Rahul starts to laugh so hard I was afraid he was going to hurt himself. Greg, on the other hand, just looks put off in that way that only someone trained in British public school can look and says, "Yes. In fact we did just last season. Badly, in fact."
With that someone from the press takes a picture of me and Greg, and then the team is hustled off to the airport to go get ready for their next test match. I was left sucking air, and turned to Nat and said, "Why didn't you tell me America had a cricket team?"
"I didn't know they did!" She says in her French Canaidan accent, "They must really suck."
I've looked it up online since then. They do suck. So me challanging Greg to the match was about like someone asking if the Clippers could be the Lakers in a grudge match.
So far as I know I didn't make the papers. I was hoping to, but it didn't happen. Ben later suggested that I would have had I only challanged them to a grudge match with the Kryptonian Cricket Team.
Ah well, you only get the best lines after the fact.
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