Meeting saree sakhis in Mumbai: Part 1 , November 2022

 

Our flight to Guwahati was not until 10 pm. Since I had the entire day at hand, I had committed to meeting some friends from the saree group who had reached out to me when they knew I was coming to Mumbai. We were to meet for lunch. I had met Sonali Pradhan in Mumbai last November-December when I was there. She graciously took upon herself this time the responsibility to coordinate and arrange this meet in the beautiful new building complex in Worli where she had relocated earlier this year. I must mention that I was surely impressed by the modern buildings that had sprung up in that neighborhood of Worli changing the old landscape entirely. IKEA showroom and Trump Tower stood close to these Lodha Towers.

About 9 ladies were expected to come that afternoon to meet me. And so they did. I had met Shilpa Joshi, Ameeta Welling and Manisha Borkar Waghmare once with Sonali a year back. But the rest of the ladies were all new to me. Sharmila Barve, Nalini Lobo Dadanchanji, Alpana Paralkar, Sudha Jagdish, and Sarika Karnik Inamdar. They all were really a delightful bunch. We bonded during lunch and after, taking lots of pictures outdoors. After the photo session Sonali took us all to her apartment and treated us to her wonderful ginger lemongrass infused tea. It was an afternoon spent well with saree loving ladies who had this unique and beautiful sisterhood bringing them together. 

My saree that day was a tussar Bhujodi in monochrome that I had purchased almost a year before from Dastkar exhibition in Delhi through online communication with the organizers there. It was sitting in Mumbai for all this time. It is a real beauty.