Class Act

'Real' Kiran Prakash

Kiran Prakash’s class act as Santa Claus (ref yesterday’s post) has earned him high praise from all quarters. A fourth laugh was raised for him after the exercises today for the manner he could get into the skin of the character and keep

Bihari Milwani sits amused as Qadir Bano seeks the blessing
of Santa Claus (a.k.a. Kiran Prakash) for her grandchild

all kids engaged for the entire two-hour duration of the Christmas celebration in the Garden yesterday.
Clearly, nobody had expected him to pull it off so effortlessly. Even those who have been seeing him every morning for years failed recognise the face behind the disguise. Many made “educated guesses” wondering if Santa was someone they knew, but never quite zeroing in on Kiran Prakash.
“I thought you people had got hold of some boodwa (old man) from somewhere and dressed him up as Father Christmas,” said a Garden regular, instantly prompting peals of laughter all around.

Shekhawat (l) still cannot believe his eyes!

“Honestly, I believed you had kept him hidden outside the gate and at your signal, he showed up before us. I saw him getting out of an autorickshaw, but how was I to know he was Kiran Prakash?”
Kiran Prakash, who was present today (without make-up, of course) quietly listened to the compliments, but at this point he too burst out laughing. He had saved a video recording of the event in his mobile and circulated it around among those not present yesterday.

Biscuits  Sharing the remains of yesterday

Barring Laxmi Hadimani, nobody could identify him in the Santa costume and get-up.
Yusuf Rassiwala’s grand-daughters, Mubaraka and Jamila as well as Siba Prasad Maitra’s two sprightly grandsons, Yug and Ziann also came in for much acclaim from those present. By now, Mubaraka has become a club veteran having attended our exercises quite often and even officiating as a judge for our last Sports Day.
But the biggest surprise was Shekhawat’s grandson, Shlok presently pursuing his studies in the U.K. He rarely visits the Club. The last we remember seeing him was as a shy pre-teen, holding on to his grandma’s pallu. Nobody had expected to see him grow into a fine young man, clean-shaved, with an air of authority about him.
This was the purpose of yesterday’s event. Over the year, we hardly get to meet and interact with the kids we hear/ know of and about whom our members are so proud. A Christmas celebration exclusively for children (read grandkids) is just a pretext to bridge this gap. In that sense, we were fairly successful yesterday. Next year we will be still better.

Karun Sharma:
Let me name this event as Get-together of Grands -- grandparents and grandchildren. It was a highly successful event, prompting my grandson, Vivan and son, Madhur to attend. Meeting Shekhawat-ji's grandson was the first time for me. The grandchildren of Yusuf-bhai and Maitra-ji were very active and it was good to connect with other grandchildren too. Kiran-ji handled the role of Santa with authority and ease. We must continue to play the role of Santa Claus in the lives of our friends.

Hussain Rassiwalla
I thank God for blessing me with such good grandparents and all the people whom I have known through my grandfather. I thank everyone for giving me a chance to bring out the real me. I feel very lucky to have such people in my life and I wish that God always fills your life with happiness. I again thank you all for taking the effort to know me better and accepting me as one of you. Thank you very much.

Christmas 2019

OPENING SPEECH: Mubaraka Rassiwala pays glowing tributes to the elders who organised today's function for children

Santa Claus greets the kids

A gift for Vivaan also

Jingle Bells,

Jingle Bells...

Qadir Bano (c) comes with her family 

Yug also takes to the floor 

Ziann shakes a leg

Jamila and Mubaraka Rassiwala

Photo Op: Santa poses with the kids 

Doting grandpa

Selfie with Santa

Husain recites a few couplets

Section of the audience: the three Khans (l
to r) Nahid, Rukhsana and Naseem

Show getting over, Santa is all alone

Mansi has her say...

Azlam and Falak regale

Sanjiv Yadav recites a poem

GRAND FINALE: Musical Chairs

Cause for Worry

Last minute planning for the Christmas celebration tomorrow

The joy of over-sleeping on a cold, winter morning is simply incomparable. Stealing those extra few minutes in bed -- especially when you are supposed to be up and moving – is nothing short of supreme bliss. After all, stolen kisses are always the sweetest.
Thus, it was quite understandable when people do not turn up to exercise early morning these days. From Razia Khan and Rukhsana Khan to Banoo Apa, Bihari Milwani and Siba Prasad Maitra many were found to be missing in action today. The Garden, in fact, appeared quite deserted this morning because of the sudden winter chill.
But what would you say of the kids we are expecting for Christmas tomorrow? Santa Claus is coming (ref post of December 16) with a bagful of goodies and except for Yusuf Rassiwala’s grandchildren, the

Santosh Tyagi

others aren’t quite sure if they’ll be able to make it to the Garden. Their grandparents are equally reticent, unsure if they’d succeed in waking them up on time.
Zarina Khan however, assured us that she’d manage to wake “at least one” of her grandkids tomorrow. Qadir Bano is also hopeful of getting the “younger one”. Shekhawat though, is “mortally afraid” of entering his grandson’s room as he sleeps with the AC in full blast. Banoo Apa too is not sure. Nahid Khan and Fahmida said that their grandchildren would be away from home with their parents for weddings in the family.
Adding to our concern, our in-house Santa had developed a severe “memory loss issue”. He left home at 6:45 a.m. today and landed at the Garden after 8:00 a.m. He should normally cover the distance by foot in 10 minutes. Strangely, he could not recollect how he lost his way. Worse, he did not recognise anybody in the Club. But Bijoy Gupta consoled him saying that there is no cause for worry. “This happens to everybody who is love-struck,” he said.
Meanwhile, there’s good news from Santosh Tyagi who underwent a knee replacement surgery at Kokilaben Hospital yesterday. According to family sources, the surgery has been successful and she is doing fine now. But she would have to be kept under observation for some time before getting discharged.

Eating Club?

Happy Birthday BIHARI MILWANI -- sixth from left

Zareena (r) presents calendar

In the whole of last week, there has not been a single day when we were not treated to some delicacy, titbit or sweets. From Urmila Sinha’s cut fruits to Banoo Apa’s crunchy biscuits and tea to Vijay-bhai’s chocobars, we’ve had them all... and are still not done smacking our lips.

Flipping through the birthday calendar

Tasty treats have become our way of life.
This begs the question: Have we turned into an Eating Club?
Yusuf Rassiwala hit the nail on the head at the beach party on Juhu Chowpatty last evening when he observed that all we are concerned with these days is eating, eating and eating. “Looks like we are no longer a Laughter Club,” he remarked. “We have unfortunately become an Eating Club.”
It was a cryptic comment on the wasteful consumption during our four-hour outing at the beach where our primary preoccupation was food. We did nothing else than eat. Strangely, this vulgar display of gluttony began the moment we settled down and without a pause or even waiting for everyone to arrive, orders

Everybody received a box of 'coffee fill' from the birthday boy 

started flying thick and fast for plates of pao-bhaji, cheese pizzas, paneer-chilli, hakka noodles… kulfi and pistas.
Like many of us, Shekhawat was outraged and predictably, raised the subject this morning in order to lay some guidelines and bring about a sense of decorum in our obsession with food. This was critical because there are some big events/ treats awaiting us in the near future – Christmas on the 25th, picnic at Borivli National Park on January 5, Sports Day on February 14, picnic at Juhu Beach (not again!) on March 3, courtesy Zareena Khan…
In keeping with the spirit of the times, Bihari Milwani celebrated his birthday by treating us to boxes of ‘coffee fills’ – something unique for many of us. Zareena presented him the birthday calendar on behalf of the Club while we raised the customary fourth laugh and sang the birthday song for our number-crunching friend. He turned 64 today.

Geeta Latte:
Lovely birthday celebration😍😍 !!!

Day 2990

Pic(s) of the Week

TODAY'S BHAJI BY THE BEACH
Photo Courtesy: Many pics are by GEETA LATTE