Mumbai Diary: Monday Dossier

Sraying mum
Every child has a bad day, but when you are Twinkle Khanna, you manage it with as much ease as crafting a clever line. The actor shields daughter Nitara from press outside a Juhu salon. Pic/Satej Shinde

A truly cool job, this
In true spirit of beating the heat, an ice cream brand is offering the coolest job. As part of a contest to become its "chief tasting officer", the company has roped in city chef Saransh Goila to mentor the participants. All they have to do to submit an entry is record a two-minute video telling the organisers why they deserve the job. Goila himself is an avid ice cream lover and had had five scoops when this diarist reached out to him.

"Ice cream is something that everybody agrees on. I've never heard people say that 'this is a bad ice cream'," he said, adding that 50,000 entries have come in already. "The candidates will come to the factory and learn to make ice cream from scratch and create new flavours. How do you know that hazelnut works with chocolate or walnut can work with coffee? That thought-sharing is going to happen. Something unique will come out of it," he said.

Getting nostalgic

Priyanka Chopra's Met Gala look might have been the talk of the town, but Ayaan Ali Bangash took the opportunity to look back on his youthful days when the sarodist along with his brother Amaan posed for a magazine shoot with Chopra sandwiched in between.

After Bangash posted the picture clicked in 2000 - the year PeeCee won the Miss World pageant - on Instagram, his followers could barely recognise the trio, including actor Karan Vir Bohra. Well, now if only these three did a film together, the picture would make for a perfect poster.

Bridging gaps on Mumbai's Metro

Thousands take the Metro every day in the city. But how many of us are aware of what truly goes behind its making? The Mumbai Metro (MM) handle on Instagram is trying to bridge this gap. Not only does the account curate and post aesthetic pictures clicked around the Metro, but they also organise and live stream performance events by the stations.

On National Technology Day celebrated last week on May 11, they took to social media to post tech facts - shedding light on how the MM has the tightest track curves in the country for a standard gauge track, how its auxiliary energy requirement is met with solar power, and the fact that the premises are equipped with electronic surveillance.

The last post was a call-to-action, asking people to tweet to the MM handle on what particular technology makes their lives easier on the ride. On important occasions like these, we hope more authorities can step it up on social media.

Green goals for the church

Despite the urgency to follow an eco-friendly lifestyle, there are only a few of us who actually implement it daily. Realising the need, the Archdiocesan Office of Environment as part of the Green Diocese Initiative in Mumbai, has organised a six-session certificate course that aims to create ambassadors for ecological change.

The sessions will start in June at Don Bosco AV Hall, Matunga, and will go on until December. With a curriculum that covers spiritual, technical and outreach aspects, it serves as a good introduction.

Breathe easy

This week, dream pop duo Parekh and Singh announced that their Science City tour gigs in Mumbai and Delhi have been cancelled. Nischay Parekh then issued a statement detailing his struggle with performance anxiety and depression.

"Perhaps I'm not supposed to be a live performer. I was afraid of that prospect earlier - now I'm more open to accepting it," he said. Fans have voiced their support on social media, and we can only say - more power to you.

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