Lassi with Lavina was featured in Global Glam, a lifestyle magazine

Like hundreds of fans, I’m headed out for the AR Rahman show tonight. Will have a report for you tomorrow. Meanwhile some Rahmanisms to keep you going!
I recalled a very different, calmer afternoon with Rahman several years ago when I was doing an interview with him for Beliefnet, the spirituality website. It was a one-on-one with the maestro in his hotel room and his staff had placed an Indian lunch for us on the table. Learning that I was fasting on that day, Rahman himself disappeared and returned with a glass of orange juice which he silently placed before me. Such is his empathy for other people.

When Bhairavi Desai met President Barack Obama on the receiving line at the Administration’s first State Dinner at the White House, she introduced herself as the director of the New York Taxi Workers Alliance. Obama smiled his high voltage smile and bending down, confided: “I was an organizer too!”

“It was such a thrill to hear him say that – it was such a nice endorsement of my profession,” recalls Desai, who is a fearless advocate for the rights of New York cabbies. She and co-founder Javaid Tariq were both guests at the glittering dinner with celebs and politicos, a party which possibly America’s entire population wanted to attend but to which only 320 guests were invited, not counting the gate-crashers Michaele and Tareq Salahi.

Riveting.

That’s probably the word one is searching for when asked about the new face of Pakistani art which is now being shown in art centers internationally. For a country in so much pain politically and socially – not to mention economically – Pakistan is surprisingly on top of things where art is concerned.

“Michelle Obama and Oprah Winfrey were just four feet away from me – and it was the most amazing moment of my life till date because I was singing for Michelle and Oprah and everyone in that room was a celebrity.”