The Radio Interview

This morning I was at the studio of Radio City for the interview. I met Vasanthi, the host and the producer, Preeti. They asked me if I wanted coffee or tea or badam milk! I politely refused saying my mom had made some awesome filter coffee and I did not want to ruin the taste. Vasanthi remarked that maybe I knew about their vending machine! I said that even my office had the same lousy contraption.

Since I did not start right away, I waited for sometime and chatted with Preeti about Manju in particular and life in general, about running, etc. I did get Preeti to read Manju's profile in IIMPRINTS, the batch memoir. She was fairly touched herself and mentioned the encounter of a friend of hers with adulteration in Rajasthan.

And then the ebullient Vasanthi said I could go into the recording studio. The first thing that hits you when you enter is, is that it is so bloody small for something that produces so much music! We started off with an introduction to Manju as I knew him. I also talked about what the idea behind my message on the bandanna was . I had a list of songs we knew Manju liked and had taken it. Sadly 2 of the 5 were in Tamil and the 5th, Kandisa by Indian Ocean was not available. So we could play only 2 of the 5, I would have wanted. The good thing is that I had carried IIMPRINTS. So when Vasanthi asked me what Manju was like, I did manage to read out an excerpt from what was written against Manju's entry. We closed out with a song.

Vasanthi managed to record the entire interview and gave me a tape. I shall try and convert that to mp3 soon and get it uploaded somewhere. It should be 10 MB, since the interview was about 10 mins, although I was in the studio for about 30 mins. And when
I left, Vasanthi made one valiant attempt to be the gracious hostess and get me drink the output of the vending machine. Today was not the day for the machine. I met Cindu, the hostess of the matinee show, on my way out. Also witnessed some yuppie talk between Vasanti and someone outside the studio, during the show, when they were comparing the color of their denim and what not (until today, I had only heard this high energy exchange every morning on radio)! I guess the energy level is needed to run a 4 hr show.

My mom cannot stop calling me Dharmendra after hearing it close to a dozen times on radio today! It sounds so weird! Somebody stop her. Its driving me nuts.

I am really happy that this went well and the entire interview was about Manju. Thanks to Radio City once again and all involved in making this possible, incl. Sweety who painted my bandanna in the 1st place.