Always At Olive

Malaika Arora Khan and Kamal Sidhu seem to be hanging out a lot at Olive. Consider the two excerpts below:

Another Thursday night in Mumbai, another celebrity-packed crowd at the Olive Bar and Kitchen.

The model-turned-actress Amrita Arora was there, along with her sister, Malaika Arora Khan, the spicy sex symbol of Bollywood. Nearby, the prodigal founder of Hotmail, Sabeer Bhatia, was holding court with several pretty young things in hip-hugging jeans and stiletto heels. Then all heads turned when the television personality Kamal Sidhu sauntered past the proverbial velvet rope, blowing kisses in all directions. [Denny Lee of the NY Times, February 2005.]

And

At Olive Bar & Kitchen, the rubbernecking was so intense that people were in danger of choking on their bruschettas. Was that Malaika Arora Khan, the model and actress? Was she talking to Kamal Sidhu, the television personality? [Stanley Stewart of the London Times, November 2007.]

Note that Stewart doesn’t say he saw Malaika and Kamal, but speculates on it, thus ensuring plausible deniability. Neat.

The two stories are otherwise dissimilar, except for one bit: In the first, Suketu Mehta is quoted as saying, “Every night is a party in Bombay.” In the second, Naresh Fernandes is quoted as saying, “In Bombay, every night is party night.”

Naresh, the editor of Time Out Mumbai, is a friend, so I wrote to him to find out what this was about. While he didn’t remember the details of the conversation, or if it took place, he did quip, “I’m surprised that Suketu and I are so in synch that we say exactly the same things now.” He also mentioned that Time Out Mumbai did not begin “in the hope of chronicling [Mumbai’s nightlife]”, as Stewart claims.

Anyway, if you ever desire to bump into Malaika and Kamal, you know where to go. But please don’t write about it!