Author: Lavina Melwani

Yes, it’s that time of the year when Asian art takes over New York City and art-lovers from all over the world come to the Big Apple. Just before Asia Week opened (March 13 -21) I spent a day with a group of bloggers and journalists in hot pursuit of hidden treasures.

Spring seems to be in a very confused state of mind. It’s officially Spring today but my backyard is still looking like a beautiful Christmas card!
It’s almost as if Spring decided to go to a masquerade ball dressed up as Old Man Winter. Or is Spring a frivilous kid costumed in winter white for Halloween?
I took a picture for the cool memory of this during the heat and humidity of a New York summer when the blazing sidewalk bites through your sandals and no amount of lemonade can quench your thirst!

Kamal Haasan, the enigmatic actor and director, is coming to New York City and you have a chance to meet him and share his thoughts and ideas.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art invites you an informal talk with one of India’s best-loved actors and directors.

City women enjoy all kinds of fashion – here’s a story about the bindi which has been rural women’s style mantra (as well as cultural underpinning) for decades. Now comes a new twist to it, thanks to city slickers!

What is the Jeevan Bindi? One which saves lives – and here is a thinking out of the box idea from an advertising agency which could have an impact on the lives of women in rural India. Hope that it won’t be a flash in the pan and will become a part of daily life… This from Ecouterre.

‘India’s Daughter’ is banned in India but Jyoti Singh’s story cannot be put under wraps, it cannot be muzzled. It is all over social media, and it needs to be seen and seen by a lot of people, especially the gatekeepers of patriarchy.

What happened in Delhi on 16 December 2012 has come back to haunt people, and to see that justice gets done. It is said that a woman is raped in India every 20 minutes and the time is not for complacency. To those who say the documentary ‘India’s Daughter’ should be banned, there is only one thing to say – watch it and then decide.

Enjoy the joy of Holi, the festival of colors, with this delightful video from Hindustani vocalist Ila Paliwal. This beautiful Indian raga embraces the world with its power of celebration and inclusiveness. Indeed, Holi is increasingly becoming a reason to dance and connect with color in many parts of the world and this video by Bharat Bala shows that dance and music have a way of erasing differences and accentuating what we humans have in common.

Sometimes there’s a film so emotionally wrenching and yet so life-affirming that you just have to see it. Such a film is Shonali Bose’s ‘Margarita with a straw’ which opens the New York Indian Film Festival. In this unusual love story, a middle-class Indian teenager with cerebral palsy longs to experience that most basic of human desires – a love relationship. Sex and the disabled are hardly ever talked of in the same breath, and this brave film takes on this taboo topic

Life has many pressing questions but for Bollywood fans it has to be – which is the greatest Bollywood film of all time? It’s a highly subjective question and there can be no one clear answer but wonder of wonders, 30 Bollywood gurus have come together to agree upon a clear winner! It is ‘Sholay’ – Ramesh Sippy’s action thriller from 1975.
Check out the 100 greatest Bollywood films, according to Time Out.

There’s information overload on the Internet and many great stories are missed altogether! So every week I’ll do a roundup of the must-reads, the controversial stories, and the fun posts that I have found across the Net.

Check this one out! All your Facebook friends – are they really who they seem to be? With photos floating all over social media, how do you know who people really are? What would you think if you found your photo on diverse social media sites with a different name and a different life story?

Imagine entire streets, neighborhoods drenched in color. Imagine people so immersed in red, purple, green and yellow powders that you can’t distinguish one from the other!
Yes, Holi, the Indian festival of colors is here, heralding Spring and the exuberant love of Radha and Krishna in Mathura. There’s joy, playfulness, a reaching out to friends and strangers. The festival has traveled well to America, brought in as part of the traditions of Hindu immigrants. And on May 2nd it’s being celebrated in a free fun festival by a group of young Indian-Americans in Manhattan.

Aasif Mandvi is the quintessential immigrant – he belongs nowhere and everywhere. He has knocked around three continents – Asia, America and Europe – and appropriated a bit from each of his hometowns – Dhule in Gujarat, Brampton in the UK and Tampa and New York in the US. Being brown, being different, being Muslim, he’s had a tough time and so many of us will identify with his story because in many ways it is our story too.

For all those who loved ‘The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel’, there’s more – ‘The Second Best Exotic Marigold Hotel! The joy of sequels can be akin to comfort food – getting involved in the lives of favorite characters once again and seeing how they are all doing since you saw them last. And this one even has that quintessential desi pleaser – a Big Fat Indian Wedding! Dev Patel and Tina Desai – and those powerhouses Judi Dench, Maggie Smith – and Richard Gere too!

The wonderful A. R. Rahman is coming to New York and you actually have the opportunity to meet him in the flesh, hear him speak and ask him a question or two!

The occasion is the world premiere of Jai Ho, a documentary about the iconic musician and composer. He’s won every award there is including an Oscar, a Grammy and a Golden Globe and has legions of fans around the world. So it’s about time his work was chronicled. Jai Ho, which is directed by Umesh Aggarwal, is premiering at the Museum of the Moving Image in New York on February 25.

Who would have thought that the princely state of Awadh exists in Manhattan? The flag of Dum Pukht has been unfurled by Gaurav Anand, a passionate culinary crusader, and the crest of the royal house is embedded right on the door of Awadh on the Upper West Side. This is an outpost of old Lucknow with its famous Galouti kababs, Lagan ki Raan and Kakori Kababs. Recently the Village Voice, the NY chronicle of everything cool, declared Awadh the best new Indian restaurant in New York.

Can biryani save the world? As life-long fans we certainly hope so!

Recently Varli Singh of Diya Foundation for Children and Gaurav Anand and Shagun Mehandru of Awadh came together to host a Biryani Festival, which not only tasted good but did good.So now there’s a way to eat your biryani and have it too! Enjoy a great meal and at the same time help kids in need.

How would you like to hobnob with the ever charismatic, ever friendly President Bill Clinton at a gathering of power people? Meet First Daughter Chelsea Clinton on board the battleship Intrepid? Perhaps rub shoulders with Indian-American business superstars Indra Nooyi of PepsiCo and Ajay Banga of Mastercard? Chat with superstars like Mira Nair, Shabana Azmi or Jhumpa Lahiri? Pose for a picture with Miss America?

If you’re on the gala fundraiser circuit in the US, you would have met them all – and helped raise millions of dollars too…

Do you have a weakness for burgers? What if you could eat the burger – without the bun? McDonalds has come up with a creative idea, substituting the high calorie buns with low-calorie lettuce. Can this work or will eaters get withdrawal symptoms hankering for the substantial, filling bread? Well, this has been introduced only in Australia yet – let’s see how it catches on!
Lettus see!

The images are searing. Images of children who’ve lost their innocence, their childhood in the harsh world of bonded labor. Their eyes stare back at you without emotion, their lips frozen in a non-smile. This is art but art painted with the colors of true life. Each image by British portraitist Claire Phillips is of a real child, a child slave rescued by Nobel Peace Prize winner Kailash Satyarthi’s organization, Bachpan Bachao Andolan. Meet the artist who journeyed to India to document the lives of these children.

Watch out, the wild Gangs of Wasseypur have come to New York and no one’s going to be spared! Anurag Kashyap’s stunning mafia odyssey will hook you, grab you and get you.
It is the very heart of darkness, a revenge saga where there’s no business like the don business and where firing a gun is as normal as brushing your teeth. Every random unknown on a scooter, armed with an AK47, is a killing machine.
As a visitor to Wasseypur, albeit in the theater, you need to have a high tolerance for bloodshed – after a while even your popcorn seems to be tinged with blood.

Farewell 2014! It was the year Madison Square Garden became Modison Square Garden! A collection of the year’s stories from Lassi with Lavina, from politics to art and cinema.
Share a thoughtful, insightful rumination by Sharmila Tagore on women in Bollywood; See the breath-taking remains of ancient Hindu and Buddhist art in South Asia; read the powerful ‘Family Life’ by Akhil Sharma; enjoy the poetry of Meena Kumari; and celebrate the wedding of Kunal and Michael, a uniquely NYC love story. Check out these stories and more!