Part 22
When I woke up I was in another world. It was a world of pains, strange feelings, more pain, indignities and pain killers that did not seem to work. Birgitta was staying with her cousin of a cousin and came to see me every day. I was very glad that no-one else saw me in this state. I was not a happy person for a week or more.
Eventually things got a little better and I was able to start moving around. Then came the further indignity of a plastic bullet placed somewhere that had not existed when I came here. I was not at my brightest for another week but, as the bandages were removed and the swelling started to go down, I became used to the new weight on my chest that had feelings and also the need to wipe when I peed. Birgitta had arranged it so that when I did leave the clinic we went to a wellness spa where we spent the next week being oiled and pampered. I think it did her some good. I knew that it improved my outlook on life.
The day we left there to go home we both looked, and felt, like a million dollars. I could now wear a fitted dress with a bit of genuine cleavage showing and did not need a gaff any more. The dress she had brought for me was almost a mini and I needed to spend a half an hour getting used to the heels. She drove us home and Aganee welcomed us back into the house with a nice cup of tea and a cupcake. She told me that Janet would be coming around soon as she had a bit of news for me and that Gaurav was coming to tea. I wondered what he would think of me now!
When Janet came in she took one look at me and came over to give me a hug. “Whatever they did, it suits you” she said and we all sat around the kitchen table while she gave us the latest news, seeing that I had been out of the loop for almost a month. What had happened was that the reworked Anudeep album had been released in India in December and taken off like a rocket. They now planned to put out the unreleased one at around the same time we would release it here. This had created a swell of interest and his agent had insisted that we all need to be in India for at least a week for interviews and to make a video clip. That shouldn’t be too hard, I thought.
My diary had already been filled in for me. We would go to India in the middle of March so that I could be home for the wedding. The whole band was going and she told me that Damini and Balnoor were now up to speed with both albums and ready to take in new things if needed. She then gave me a piece of paper that listed my income while I had been away and I nearly fainted. On top of my usual base rate I had been getting my share of the record sales. The first Four Winds one was doing very nicely with the fado one starting to bring in some more. The Dhawanee album was returning a good percentage but the Indian one was adding quite a bit to my bank every month. I now didn’t need to marry Gaurav for his money, just for his love.
She then told me that all members of the band were now full-time musicians and had been able to spend most days getting better at their craft. They had also been putting down an album of our more western songs that would only need me to go into the studio to cut an overdub track. Other than that, she had been resisting any requests for us to play locally. “As far as I am concerned you are recording artists now and the only way you will play live will be concerts or for charity. Four Winds are doing more work and I have put together another mixed gender band to do receptions. They are not top notch like you but can provide the music as needed. We do not accept sangeet bookings now; that last one was just the last straw.”
That evening Gaurav fell in love all over again when he saw me. I apologised for not seeing him for some time but I had ‘womens troubles’ that needed to be fixed. He told me that whatever they had done to me, it made me look like a new woman. Little did he know how new this woman was! We did spend a bit of time away from the family to catch up on our kissing technique and discussed our wedding plans. I asked that we not go away as I would consider my first week in his apartment would be like a holiday. He said that he had wanted to take me away somewhere exotic and I told him that I would be in India with the band a couple of weeks before our marriage. He said “I know, Balnoor was full of it before he left. I was devastated because he was getting to be a good department manager. He had lots of ideas and one of them was that we should do a local radio advert. I am seeing their people tomorrow.”
When he left to go home I felt as if some part of me had gone with him but I knew that one day I would reunite with it so felt a bit better. Over the next three weeks I divided my time between the two bands but all of it was in the studio. I did the overdub tracks for the next Dhawanee album and worked with the Four Winds on a new one that was mainly some more blues and love songs, many I had to learn as they were new material from Alans’ friend.
Tom was turning people away as we were using the studio so much but he didn’t mind as he had never had an international hit recorded there before with another expected later in the year. One session that wasn’t with either band was to record a thirty second commercial for Gaurav with me singing the jingle and Balnoor playing the violin. I didn’t think that ‘Enhance your house with Hi-Jet’ was the best line I had ever heard but he did pay up front and, when I heard it on the radio with Gaurav himself doing the speaking part, it sounded pretty good.
When it came to the time to fly to Mumbai there was a pretty big crowd of us in business class. There was me, Husnia, Damini, Jenianna, Kajari, Tavleen and Balnoor. Then we had Janet to look after our business; Guptar and Birgitta had decided to come along to see some relations and to look into import possibilities and Aganee came along just for the experience. As we were waiting to board she told me that she had not been home for forty years and expected it to be different but was looking forward to seeing what Bollywood was all about.
When we arrived at the Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport Mumbai we could see that something was happening at one of the terminals as there was flashing police car lights and a lot of people. When we got to customs they told us to wait in a side room after we had cleared and then Anudeep and his agent came in, along with a bunch of women with beauty cases. Anudeep gave us all greetings and his agent asked that the band members take seats as his girls needed us to look as if we were ready to step onto the catwalk that was Bollywood.
We all got a make-over on the spot. Even Balnoor was made to look more regal. The others were kept back when Anudeep walked in front of us into the concourse. I had seen news pictures of pop stars being mobbed but this was something else again. There must have been thousands there waiting for us to come out and it was pure bedlam. Anudeep took my arm and led me into the throng and we were touched and stroked by those closest and the noise was tremendous. I hoped that his agent and the others were looking after our bags as it would have been impossible to withstand the onslaught carrying a suitcase. Eventually we made it outside where a large coach waited for us and we all breathed a sigh of relief when we got in to rub the parts of us where we had been pinched. Even Balnoor had seen his share of admirers by the way he rubbed his butt. The rest of our party, along with the agent and the beauticians made it to the coach and I heard the luggage going in the bins.
We still had to stand and wave to the crowds and the police cleared a path for us and the driver took us through the crowd of fans. Once we were clear of the airport Lajpal, the manager, stood up and welcomed us to Mumbai. He told us that what we have seen today was what he and Anudeep had been experiencing since the latest album hit the shops and the airwaves. He told us that although Anudeep was revered with his music in the past, this album had lit a fire under the traditionalists as well as a lot of the younger set who had become bored with rap and American music.
He surprised us all by telling us that after Janet had sent him a copy of our first Dhawanee CD, he had requested the master and that our humble little effort was already in the top twenty and moving quickly. We were to expect what we had been welcomed with, or more, as we stayed here. That being the case, instead of his original plan for us to stay in a good hotel in the city, we were now going to be at one that was inside the Bollywood studios that had been built to house the film stars. The interview would now be filmed on one of the sound stages and he said he was sorry that we would not see a lot of the city during this stay but may get to see more when we come back for our tour.
Janet said that the tour was being talked about only but Lajpal told us all that the tour was already in the planning stages and that it would be the whole lot of us that would be touring at home and would start two weeks after we finished there. It would run for at least three months to make sure we covered as much of the country as we could. That looked like it would make the rest of the year now pencilled in, not only for us but for the Four Winds as well.
He apologised but said that the need to strike was while the iron was hot and that were the hottest items in India at this point of time. There was another big crowd at the gates of the Bollywood studio so we had to stand and wave as we went slowly past while a decent police force kept them at bay. I had to smile when I heard guys screaming “I love you, Geet” as we went by but actually laughed out loud at one sign. I pointed it out to Balnoor and he had to sit down because it was hoisted by a bunch of very good looking girls and it said “Marry us, Balnoor”.
Marianne G 2021
