Brunch 04 08 2013 by Hindustan Times

WEEKLY MAGAZINE, AUGUST 4, 2013 Free with your copy of Hindustan Times

Do You Know Yourself

indulge

VIR SANGHVI

What makes a polo T-shirt?

In love and don’t even know it? Never have enough money? Work-life balance tilting the wrong way? Take our expert quizzes to find answers to all these questions and more...

SEEMA GOSWAMI

Is a post-baby bump so bad?

RAJIV MAKHNI

What’s wrong with Made In China?

B R E A K FA S T O F C H A M P I O N S

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The Brunch Bollywood Collector’s Edition is now online! We’ve uploaded the ebook version for those of you who haven’t yet managed to get their hands on the magazine. Log on to hindustantimes.com/brunch or just use the QR code below!

This special issue brings you the top 50 Bollywood stars of today. We also got very interesting people from the film industry to talk about them, and we have exclusive photographs by Mumbai’s best photographers as well! Here’s an excerpt: by KABIR KHAN

Photo: RAKESH SHRESTHA. From the Brunch Collector’s Edition

The fairest of them all...

How to QR: Download a QR code scanner app on your smartphone or tablet. Hover it over the QR code below and you’ll be transported to this beautiful magazine!

ALSO ON STANDS! GRAB IT FOR R100 ONLY!

had not seen much of Katrina Kaif before we started working on New York. Adi (Aditya Chopra) introduced us... A strict, 100-day non-stop schedule isn’t easy, but she managed it with élan. Katrina is one of the top actresses of Hindi cinema. She is the only actress who reads her scripts in Devnagari and not English... she also learns every one else’s dialogues, so as to not make any errors while filming... She is best when she isn’t playing the diva. Let her simply wash her face and turn to the camera and we’ll see lightning. AVAILABLE AT LEADING BOOKSTORES AND NEWSSTANDS

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Rules Of The Game by Shantanu Argal

GIVE ETIQUETTE A CHANCE We’re set to become the world’s biggest smartphone consumers. But it’s a pity that our 800 million (and counting) mobile phone connections haven’t been accompanied with good behaviour in cell-phone usage...

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Clueless monkeys unable to feel vibrations on silent modes or comprehend what one is saying at the slightest hint of static. ■ Older folk accustomed to booking trunk calls in the ’80s and yelling about the recent passing of a relative. ■ Hormonal teenagers who sincerely believe the entire planet needs to listen to that new song and then hear them talking ALL ABOUT it.

PROBLEM: Reaching out for the phone as soon as it rings, beeps or buzzes. The Google Glasses experiment proves that the desire for constant connectivity isn’t going away anywhere. Words of wisdom: when at a party, put away that phone and engage in a real conversation with a real human being. You might just get laid. PERPETRATORS The 18-to-35 urban demographic. So you and me, basically. ■ Hormonal teenagers, again. They’re responsible for everything, even those solar storms.

PROBLEM: The

art of typing without looking at the screen – while driving, talking or walking down the road. Impossible as it sounded a few years ago, people now manage Swyping on their touchscreens without so much as a glance. But, when your fingers are moving at warp speed, PERPETRATORS it seems a little creepy ■ Text-junkies aka He/She that you are Who Must Not Be Called. looking else■ Middle management in where. MNCs. Replying-to-emailbrings-promotion.

EDITORIAL: Poonam Saxena (Editor), Aasheesh Sharma, Rachel Lopez, Tavishi Paitandy Rastogi, Mignonne Dsouza, Veenu Singh, Parul Khanna, Yashica Dutt, Amrah Ashraf, Saudamini Jain, Shreya Sethuraman

AUGUST 4, 2013

DESIGN: Ashutosh Sapru (National Editor, Design), Monica Gupta, Swati Chakrabarti, Payal Dighe Karkhanis, Rakesh Kumar

Photos: THINKSTOCK AND SHUTTERSTOCK

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Cover design: MONICA GUPTA and PAYAL DIGHE KARKHANIS

PERPETRATORS The nouveau riche. ■ Children, they figure out smart-phones faster than us.

PERPETRATORS

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PROBLEM: Frowning at dumb-phone users. It is not necessarily a financial constraint that makes people opt for the sasta-sundar-tikau cells. Some of us choose to inhabit the real world much more than the virtual one!

Drop us a line at:

PROBLEM: Creepy photographers trying to take your picture. Without a doubt, this is the most severe offence on this list. Just in case you didn’t get it, do not take pictures of strangers! ABSOLUTE NO-NO! Bad dog! And you there, stop with the ‘selfies’. Want to see how you PERPETRATORS look? Find a ■ Perverts that mirror! Psst, need your picyou look like ture to look at shit without while they er… Instagram! bash the bishop, spank the monkey, polish the sausage, ‘Haath Hi Mera Saathi’. Feeling a little nauseated? ■ Girls with floppy hair!

brunchletters@ hindustantimes.com or to 18-20 Kasturba Gandhi Marg, New Delhi 110001

On The Brunch Radar by Saudamini Jain

Breaking Bad final season in a week! (We do hope they all hug it out in the end!) ■ Black-and-white photos (Independence Day is around the corner, we’re going to be flooded with those) ■ Reading manuscripts ■ Daydreaming about Al Pacino ■ Dirty Pictionary ■

The Indian rupee ■ Blaming “love affairs” for rising crime in Uttar Pradesh. Good going, National Crime Records Bureau ■ Salwa-al-Mutairi, the Kuwaiti female politician thinks sex slaves should be legalised so “virile” men don’t engage in “forbidden sexual relations.” Dafuq? ■ If you haven’t read the paper in more than a week ■ India has one of the slowest average Internet speeds in the world ■

SHOVE IT

PROBLEM: We all know that song. It’s on TV, radio and all the clubs. It is also the blaring ringtone on the Metro/local. Badtameez Dil is making us badtameez! You might have an extraordinarily loud phone, but that’s hardly the sort of thing you need to put on display. Funnily enough, the ones with the loud ringtones are even louder when they answer the phone!

LOVE IT

FOR ADVERTISING ENQUIRIES, PLEASE CONTACT National — Sanchita Tyagi: sanchita.tyagi@hindustantimes.com North — Siddarth Chopra: siddarth.chopra@hindustantimes.com West — Karishma Makhija: karishma.makhija@hindustantimes.com South — Francisco Lobo: francisco.lobo@hindustantimes.com

PEOPLE

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Lessons In Good & Evil

US-based writer Soman Chainani strikes gold with a Hogwarts-inspired fantasy series by Anirudh Bhattacharyya

HREE YEARS ago, a young New Yorker was ensconced in Mumbai, working on a script for a Yash Raj production that he was also to direct. The proposed film, Love Marriage, was to be Bollywood’s first English language film, though steeped in desi masala. However, those were tough times for the studio and a decision was taken to postpone production of that movie. Not quite a fairy-tale ending for the debutant filmmaker, but it did prove to be the beginning of another.

HOGWARTS WITH A TWIST

Thirty-three year old Miami-born Soman Chainani then focused on another project that he had been contemplating for a while, a fantasy. As a trained filmmaker, celluloid was the medium he presumed apt for that tale. However, Jane Startz, producer for films like Ella Enchanted, convinced him that his vision would translate best in print. Within a month, based on a 50page proposal (and with Startz’ mentoring), he had several offers from publishing houses before snagging a six-figure deal from HarperCollins for a three book series starting with The School for Good and Evil or SGE. Earlier this summer, just as the first novel zoomed into the New York Times bestsellers list, Universal procured the rights to make a film based on it, for a nice seven-figure payment. Startz will be producing the movie, while the author is working on the screenplay. Chainani has reason to feel like a million dollars, and more. That’s a pretty nifty twist in the tale, as Chainani says in an interview: “If I’d made that movie for Yash Raj, this series would never have hap-

pened because I honestly think that would have been it.” The idea for the series has its genesis in a class Chainani took while studying English Literature at Harvard University, where he wrote a thesis on “why evil women make such irresistible fairy-tale villains.” That Harvard course stayed with him. “The fairy tales we studied were the original stories and they were so grotesque and scary in their tone. I’d grown up with the Disney movies. So, I was fascinated by that gap, that kids 200 years ago were being told these horrific stories about survival and then, the stories we grew up with were the sanitised versions of these stories. The idea of doing a fairytalebased book that was more true to the originals stuck in my head.” Chainani went on to complete a Master’s in Fine Arts from New York’s Columbia University, specialising in film. He made the short films, Davy & Stu and Kali Ma, before the Yash Raj opportunity presented itself.

Universal has bought film rights for the book for a seven-figure amount

AT A BOOKSTORE NEAR YOU

The School of Good and Evil (left), the first novel in Soman Chainani’s trilogy, is almost like a big Bollywood film, “It has romance, action, adventure and magic,” he says

ROLE REVERSAL

SGE is a novel targetted at tweens and teens. One of its protagonists Sophie, blonde and green-eyed, believes she’s destined for the School for Good, while Agatha is aggressive, perfect for Evil. But, once they’re whisked off to the school, Sophie finds herself at Malice Tower 66, where required reading includes How to Cook Children (with New Recipes!), while Agatha finds herself at Purity Tower 51, at sessions on etiquette. The subversive role reversal was calculated, as Chainani says, “I thought what would be more universal than taking this blonde princess that Disney has built into an empire and deconstructing her.” Chainani, who once assisted director Mira Nair, was exposed to Indian mythology and “Ramayana video-

tapes” while young, and there are echoes in the first novel, including the appearance of Ravana in the School for Evil. “Anyone who likes Bollywood or understands Indian mythology will see references all over the place.” His father, originally from Mumbai, is an immigrant who owns a real estate business while he describes his native New Yorker mother as the “family caretaker”. While his mother was crestfallen when the Yash Raj project fell through, SGE has more than compensated for that. “She was just rooting for me to have an audience,” he says. Success with SGE, though, comes with a downside: No time to date. “I’m still very much single. It’s hard to date when there’s so much pressure on you to deliver,” he says. brunchletters@hindustantimes.com

INSPIRATION FROM INDIA Born in Mumbai and raised near Miami, filmmaker-turned-author Soman Chainani is rooted in desi sensibilities Mythology of Kali: I’ve always been entranced by the idea of feminine “rage” embodied in the divine. I interpreted the myth in my thesis film. Panchatantra: I used to read these stories in comic book form as a child in Mumbai. the tales of animals find re-

AUGUST 4, 2013

flection in The School for Good & Evil Ramayana: The mix of action, romance, adventure, and magic offered an epic much bigger than we see in the Western tradition. I felt like I could replicate this multidimensional ‘feast’ of

genres in The School for Good & Evil. The Gita: I used to take classes as a child in Miami dedicated to studying the text. What I love about the Gita is it continually suggests that we don’t know what is ‘Good’ or ‘Bad’ in life, until we have context that is only given with the passage of time – which obviously is a crucial theme in the novel.

C OV E R STO RY

This Sunday, find yourself, get a grip on reality, look into your future and take a good look at your present with our expertled quizzes. Sharpen you pencil and find a quiet spot. Your time starts NOW! by Rachel Lopez rachel.lopez@hindustantimes.com Follow @GreaterBombay on Twitter

WILL YOU REGRET TODAY’S

HEALTH DECISIONS?

QUIZ 1

1. You’re looking at the beverage menu. You order ■ Orange or carrot juice ■ Diet Coke or something with aspartame ■ A smoothie ■ Coffee with one teaspoon sugar ■ Hot chocolate 2. Gym trainer’s advice: which one makes sense? ■ A protein shake after your workout ■ Egg salads and soy milk are good for you ■ Be on the treadmill for a hour. You only burn fat after 45 minutes on it ■ Women should avoid weight training because it gives them manly biceps 3. How often should you take a break? ■ Every 90 minutes. A 10-minute break helps ■ A month every three months ■ Anytime you find it all getting a bit much 4. When it comes to sleep… ■ You aim for eight hours, even if it’s 3am-11am ■ So long as you’re peppy the next morning,

a few hours of sleep skipped is no issue ■ You need coffee to wake you up. We all do ■ An extra-soft mattress means better sleep 5. Why are you interested in yoga? ■ You want to lose 10 kgs without a sweat ■ You can do 20 suryanamaskars without harm ■ It can balance hormones and offer vitality 6. Which of these is the fittest? ■ The passive smoker ■ The happy vegetarian ■ The naturally skinny one ■ The one who has a light lunch, and pigs out on dinner 7. Which nutrient are city folk likely to be deficient in? ■ A high standard of living means all nutrient needs are fulfilled

AUGUST 4, 2013

Photos: SHUTTERSTOCK

Or are you looking at a fit future?

■ Vitamin D or any

of the B vitamins ■ Proteins ■ Calcium

8. What can you do to feel better instantly? ■ Breathe slowly and deeply, like on holiday ■ Kick off your high heels ■ Stretch in your chair ■ Have any green juice, cucumber, celery etc. 9. What will up your chances of having kids in the future? ■ Carrying your cellphone in a bag, not back pocket. ■ Ditching crotch hugging jeans for a comfort fit ■ Switching from laptop to tablet ■ Ensuring that you heat food only in micro-wave-safe plastic 10. No time to gym. The best Plan B? ■ Brisk 15-minute walk three times a week ■ Train for the marathon ■ A dance class

In collaboration with Eefa Shrof, celebrity yoga, wellness and lifestyle consultant, Mumbai. Eefashrof.blogspot.in

ANSWERS

1. Coffee is safe if you have one a day. Everything else is full of sugar caffeine or aspartame. 2. Egg salad and soy milk help. Shakes are better preworkout. Long workouts cause burnout. Weights make women’s bones stronger! 3. Take those 10-minute breaks. And a regular holiday. Forced inactivity will not help you fight stress! 4. Eight hours, but turn in earlier. Pep does not indicate rest, coffee means you aren’t rested enough and a soft mattress will ruin posture. 5. Yoga really balances your hormones. But it’s not a slimming tool. Surya namaskars can go wrong too. 6. Sorry! All answers are wrong. 7. Sun-avoiders lack Vitamin D. Vegetarians lack B vitamins. Many Indians are protein deficient. Skip greens and you skip calcium. 9. All good! So start now! 10. Walk or dance. Unlike marathon training, you’ll build endurance too.

C OV E R STO RY

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ARE YOU

PERFECTLY MATCHED?

Answer these questions honestly (no one’s judging... except us, of course!) and see how you fare at the end 1. I’d rather be with one who doesn’t love me than be alone. ■

YES

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2. I’d feel the same about my partner if he/she was homeless, jobless or obese. ■

YES

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QUIZ 3

3. I can go for weeks meeting no one, interacting with just my partner. ■

YES

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4. I’d feel a huge sense of loss if they left me. ■

YES

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5. I enjoy couplehood more when I’m thinking of my partner than being with them. ■

YES

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6. With my partner, I don’t have to pretend to be

anyone else.

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YES

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7. If it’s not big, crazy, traffic-stopping, it’s not love. ■

YES

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8. If we fight, both try to get things back to a happy level, regardless of whose ‘fault’ it is. ■

YES

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9. His/her few rough edges will get sorted out after we wed. ■

YES

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10. It’s possible to have problems and still be a good couple. ■

YES

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11. If years later, you’re passed over for the kitchen, the kids or a book, it means that the love is gone. ■

YES

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YES

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13. I veer between thinking my partner is awesome, until a slipup. Then they’re totally horrible. ■

YES

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14. A partner is a person with their own problems. Not a solution to your problems. ■

AUGUST 4, 2013

YES

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YES

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16. Love means never having to say you’re sorry. ■

YES

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17. Great couples have great sex all the time. ■

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YES

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18. Love is being swept off your feet, feeling like you’ve won the jackpot, every day. ■

YES

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19. My partner is an escape route. They’re why I feel better about my family, my money, my career. ■

YES

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20. A soulmate is one who is a naturally perfect fit for me without either of us trying. ■

12. Most people can’t find love because they’re looking too hard for it. ■

15. The best thing about a partner is that you can forget the pain from the past.

YES

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In collaboration with Sadia Raval, psychotherapist, counsellor and founder of Inner Space Counseling and Assessment, Mumbai. Innerspacetherapy.in

ANSWERS Hope you responded like this 1-14: NO to odd-numbered questions. YES to even-numbered ones. 15-20: NO all through. Sadia Raval finds that the most common problem with couples is that they stop demonstrating their feelings after a while; that they expect a partner to fill a void that should really be filled by loving oneself first; and they mistakenly believe that a successful relationship is one without problems – all issues that counselling addresses.

C OV E R STO RY

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ARE YOU HEADED TOWARDS Photos: SHUTTERSTOCK

BANKRUPTCY?

Bad at maths, good at shopping, addicted to fun and allergic to finance jargon? Let’s see if you still make good money decisions

■ Spend it all. A bonus is a

1.You’re 35 and haven’t bought a house yet. All is lost? ■ Yes, if you have no substantial savings either ■ No, if all your money is in a set of investments ■ No, if you spent your money honing your skills 2. Have a home? How do you view it? ■ It’s an asset that makes me wealthy ■ It’s a roof over my head ■ It’s keeping me from the good things in life

QUIZ 4

3. Considering a cupcake /tech start-up and financing it too. Good plan? ■ Yes, if you have no loans and no kids to spend on ■ Yes. The only way to succeed is to risk your own savings ■ Yes, but only if you have the energy and stamina for a 24/7 job 4. The economy sucks. How do you identify a good cost for your struggling business? ■ You pick only what gives assured returns ■ You see what you can trim without it affecting your product or service ■ You drop whatever needs training or input 5. What should you do with a bonus? ■ Spend 20 per cent and invest the rest or use it to pay off a loan

surplus, don’t add it to an existing financial plan ■ Save it all. A bonus was earned just like the rest of your salary

6. Should you ask dad for financial advice? ■ Yes. He knows you best and is on your side ■ No. Unless he’s a financial planner ■ No. You’ll just end up with outdated advice, stuff that works for his needs, his dreams 7. You’re 23, fresh into the workforce. What do you put your first earnings in? ■ Tax saving. It’s your biggest priority ■ Assured, low gain investments. Little income deserves little risk ■ A mix of old and new investment products 8. How often should you look at your finances? ■ Daily. The market changes every day, no? ■ Never. You’re a long-term investor ■ Half yearly is enough 9. What’s the best way to deal with a loan or an unpaid credit card bill? ■ If you can’t afford something, why borrow in the first place? ■ With an EMI that is less than half your income ■ Borrow as much as you need for now. The economy will sort itself out

AUGUST 4, 2013

■ Neither. First make money then worry about it

10. Does age or sex matter when managing money ? ■ Yes. A kid with pocket money knows nothing. Adulthood brings wisdom ■ Yes. Men who deal with men in finance get better at money management

In collaboration with Vishal Dhawan, founder and chief financial planner of Plan Ahead Wealth Advisors. Planahead.in

1. Any of the answers is correct! House-less at 35 isn’t so bad if you have a nest egg or invested in yourself. BPO kids who bought a home in the 2000s now struggle with loans. But ones who put their money in bettering their skills are rising higher and are prepared for home ownership. 2. If you won’t sell, your roomy new flat isn’t an asset. It’s just a roof. But it still spells security – so try not to view it as your life’s ball-and-chain. 3. Don’t think you’ll do better if it’s your money on the line. But yes, invest your own money only when you have already secured the future of those dependent on you. Above all, don’t invest money (anyone’s money) if you can’t invest time and energy too. 4. All correct decisions! Advertising is an assured return in a down economy since there’s less competition. Work from home and save on office rent. And use slow business time to hone skills, staff or products. 5. Of course a bonus is a welcome surplus. Of course

you’ve earned it. But don’t go to extremes. Spend some on yourself today and allow the rest to cushion you tomorrow. 6. Dad, alas, doesn’t know best! You may get outdated advice, follow his illinformed decisions and aim for his dreams, not yours. Unless he IS a financial planner! 7. Mix investments early when you have the rest of your life to recover from a setback. Tax saving is only part of the game – prioritise wealth building as well. 8. You wealth doesn’t change drastically from day to day. And don’t invest itforget it. Twice a year is good – you escape shortterm tensions and are still connected to your money. 9. By all means borrow, but make sure you can pay it back comfortably. EMIs should not be more than 40 per cent of your income. 10. Lies, all lies. Kids should know how to manage pocket money. Women are often better at managing resources. And you should take care about every rupee you make, every step of the way.

ANSWERS

indulge

HOW THE VEST WAS WON

We all know what polo shirts are, but we forget that they are tennis shirts invented by René Lacoste. Can the French reclaim a shirt that has now become an American classic?

MARK OF A BRAND

The symbol of the crocodile was one of the world’s best-known logos, turning up on T-shirts, shoes, colognes and sports equipment

Photo: GETTY IMAGES

Vir Sanghvi

rude fashion

HEN DID we start using the term ‘polo shirt’ in India? I was trying to recall when the phrase passed into the vernacular and my best guess was that it happened some time in the early 1990s. And even then, it was a linguistic transition brought about by the power of a single brand rather than the influence of fashion or even of the sport of polo. Until that point we used the term ‘polo’ to refer to a roll-neck shirt or sweater of the sort that was often called a ‘turtleneck’. (Fashionistas will tell you that a turtleneck starts slightly lower down the collar than a polo-neck but most of us could not really care less about the difference.) The polo shirt (as we now know it) went by a generic. It was just a Tshirt. And in that era, T-shirt meant a casual sports shirt that did not button all the way down the front. The term had not yet come to mean – in India, at least – the sort of shirt we used to call a singlet or even, when I was at school, a Vishwas Banian. My guess is that current usage for T-shirt and polo shirt both owe something to brands. It was The Gap that popularised the use of the term Tshirt for its signature garment in the late 1980s. And as far as we in India were concerned, the term polo shirt only came into popular usage thanks to Ralph Lauren. In the mid to late 1980s, floods of fake Ralph Lauren shirts reached India by way of Bangkok and nearly everywhere you looked men were sporting a motif of a polo player on their left nipples. The real thing was still expensive (in the days before Lauren started making cheaper versions in Bangladesh for his outlet stores) but given that the fakes looked convincing enough, few people bothered with the genuine article. So, when people talked about a polo shirt, did they mean one that was made by Ralph Lauren’s Polo label or were they using a generic term? I was never quite sure.

Then, in the 1990s, Lacoste arrived in India – the brand has been here for 20 years, making it one of the first fashion companies to target India. I knew Lacoste, of course. The symbol of the crocodile (or alligator as they sometimes called it in America, much to Lacoste’s annoyance) was one of the world’s best-known logos, turning up on T-shirts (okay, I am sorry, polo shirts), shoes, colognes (made originally by Jean Patou for Lacoste) and sports equipment. But I never really thought too much about whether there was a real Mr Lacoste and whether he was connected in some way to the crocodile or the polo shirt. In Paris, a few weeks ago, for the celebration of Lacoste’s 80th anniversary, I finally learned the truth. René Lacoste was a famous French tennis player, who captained the country’s Davis Cup team and who was given the nickname ‘The Crocodile.’ While playing tennis, Lacoste used a crocodile motif, designed for him by a friend, on his blazer. He was also the first man to popularise the wearing of short-sleeved T-shirts during tennis matches, because the formal long-sleeved white shirts that were traditionally worn on the court were much too hot for him during the summer. Lacoste single-handedly changed the way in which players dressed at Wimbledon and in the 1930s, he began commercial production of the tennis shirts he had popularised. Naturally, he called the company Lacoste to cash in on his celebrity and he used the crocodile logo (remember this was long before

PURE BLISS

Felipe Oliveira Baptista (above) is the new creative director of Lacoste and has given the brand the edge it lacked ‘CROCODILE’ MAN

The famous French tennis player, René Lacoste (left) was given the nickname ‘The Crocodile’ and used a crocodile motif, designed for him by a friend, on his blazer most fashion houses used any logos at all) to remind customers of his nickname. Why then, is the shirt he popularised called the Polo Shirt and not the Tennis Shirt? Well, because Lacoste got the idea from the shirts used by polo players. In the 1960s and the early 1970s, before the designer boom had begun, the crocodile shirt (not necessarily called a polo shirt at the time) became the shirt of choice for rich white kids in America, especially in the WASP (White Anglo-Saxon Protestant) enclaves of the East Coast. In Peter Benchley’s early 1970s bestseller Jaws, the police chief (a poor boy) is admonished by his mother for trying to keep up with the rich boys with their alligator shirts. Similar references to the upper-class nature of the crocodile shirt crop up again and again in the popular literature of the period. I’m not sure that the Lacoste company, still family-run in those days, recognised the value of their shirts or the snob value of the crocodile but many American designers did. Ralph Lauren based his empire on shirts inspired by Lacoste and replaced the crocodile with his own logo. He also had the smart idea of playing up the rich-guy associations of polo, a sport most American knew nothing about. By the early 1990s, America was awash in Ralph Lauren Polo shirts and though the Lacoste version remained the old-money staple on the East Coast, its allure faded when you moved away from Martha’s Vineyard or Nantucket. For newly-rich Americans – and soon, for buyers in emerging markets – Ralph Lauren’s Polo shirt represented designer chic. My guess is that because Lacoste has always been a successful company with a healthy bottom-line, it lost sight of the need

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Photos: COURTESY LACOSTE

to sell the luxury dream. Other brands stole away the top-end of the sportswear market (Tommy Hilfiger, Burberry, etc.) and Lacoste became a hardy staple rather than the symbol of affordable luxury it should have been. All that may be changing. Last year, one of the biggest stories in the fashion press was the messy takeover of Lacoste. The battle tore apart the Lacoste family, pitting father against daughter and ended with control of the company being wrested by Switzerland’s Maus Frères. (The Maus brothers then proceeded to take over Gant as well.) So, Lacoste now has a new management team that is determined to reposition the brand. José Luis Duran, the new president, told me that the company would refit its shops (at present they are sterile and look downmarket), redo its shop windows, revisit its advertising strategy, sharpen its product line and “tell the Lacoste story again”. Duran meant, I think, that unlike many luxury brands with an invented past (Ralph Lauren, Burberry and Thomas Pink), Lacoste has a genuine heritage as the brand that popularised the first polo shirts and as the traditional favourite of old-money sporting types. What does that mean for the Lacoste designers? How can you refashion a brand whose entire presence is associated with a single product: the men’s polo shirt? The irony is that design has actually been one of Lacoste’s strengths. Christophe Lemaire, who was the company’s creative director for many years, was one of Paris’s hidden gems. Two years ago, Hermès lured him away to replace Jean Paul Gaultier and since then Lemaire has flourished at the label. His successor, Felipe Oliveira Baptista is at least as talented as Lemaire and his creative work is outstanding. How he will fare in the brave new Lacoste which is set to go the Ralph-Tommy route is not clear (he was appointed before the new owners took over) but Baptista has given the brand the edge it lacked. For the 80th anniversary, Baptista suggested to the management that the cutting-edge British commercial artist (famous for his record covers), Peter Saville should be charged with reinventing the crocodile in a series of limited-edition polo shirts. Saville’s variations on the logo have been so daring (sometimes the crocodile is just a doodle) that the experiment calls to mind the work that Takashi Murakami and Stephen Sprouse did for Louis Vuitton over a decade ago. All of this augurs well. We now live in an era where nobody is as ignorant as I used to be. Everybody now knows what a polo shirt is. Lacoste just needs to remind us where the shirt came from and to tell us what they’ve done to update it – a route that Louis Vuitton took with such success in the 1990s. But can the French really reclaim a shirt that has now become an American classic? Is there room for the original in a market that is dominated by Ralph Lauren and where polo shirts are no more than billboards for screaming logos? Go to any upmarket Indian mall and you will find that the merchandise that moves the fastest – at Tommy, Hackett, and other brands – is the logo-driven polo shirt. Is the subtle crocodile logo up to the loud competition? I guess we will find out in a couple of years.

Ralph Lauren based his empire on shirts inspired by Lacoste and replaced the crocodile with his own logo

CHART TOPPER

As far as we in India were concerned, the term polo shirt only came into popular usage thanks to Ralph Lauren (below)

Photo: GETTY IMAGES

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Rajiv Makhni

DMIT IT – whenever you hear the phrase ‘Made in China’ about an electronic product – you immediately conjure up an ASSEMBLY LINE ART An art hub, the Dafen Village on the outskirts of image of a cheap, plasticky, poorly made, extremeShenzhen is a must-visit for the art aficionado ly ugly and a very shabby product. Despite the fact that China is the world’s factory, despite the fact that every luxury brand gets almost their entire line a 13-megapixel camera. Pretty high end specs and made in China, despite the fact that the biggest tech apparently will be released at a very aggressive manufacturers including Apple and Samsung exist price in India. But that wasn’t the main reason for and are profitable today due to their China me to be here. Show me how this is made! outsourcing business model – the China tag is still MEGAPOLIS: As I was being driven to their synonymous with ‘won’t last a week’, the copycat factory in Dong Guan (also famous for being China’s kings and the emperors of crappy products. Hub for Gentlemen’s Clubs) my mind was still DOUBLE SHOCK: When I was invited to visit conjuring up images of thousands of underage China to take a look at how a mobile phone is made children, huddled over rickety wooden tables, from scratch – I was doubly surprised. First, because toiling away under a naked light bulb, each holding Chinese assembly-line factories and sweatshops a screwdriver or a soldering iron, horrible sweaty don’t ever allow journalists or TV crews inside. conditions – jamming together phones, one screw Second, exposing your entire line-up of manufacat a time. Boy was I wrong! turing is like giving away all your trade secrets to This was a state-of-the-art 3,30,000 square-yard competitors. Well, if they wanted to commit industrial centre with 48 fully automated robotic business (suicide in Mandarin), who was I to Surface Mount Technology (SMT) lines, manufacargue? Off I went to Shenzhen; the onetime sleepy turing floors that make every single component little fishing village that in a few years has been conin-house, assembly lines that span all categories, verted into China’s all-new mega industrial hub. design and R&D centres at every level, stringent OFF TOPIC FOR A MINUTE: Every time I go to China, quality checking testing zones at each stage and 6,000 I discover one non-techie thing that blows my mind and workers that have apartments at the factory premises makes my jaw drop. This time was no different as even before itself (including supermarkets, banks, basketball courts and I got my first look at a giant factory of mobile-phone making, I saw other facilities). a giant factory of art. I will admit, I am a recent art convert (for the TWO HUGE QUESTIONS: The amazing thing isn’t how most part I still don’t understand it, find most of the people involved different this is from my original thoughts – but the precision and in it to be very pretentious, but have been very drawn to the crescale to which this was built. These are mega enormous factories ativity and beauty of it all) and had already set up to go straight and the one I went to is just an example of thousands of others that from the airport to Dafen Village on the outskirts of Shenzhen. dot the Chinese landscape. Just how does any country hope to comInside this very laidback art centre are about 5,000 painters, pete in the long run with capacities and economies of scale like this? 3,000 sculptors and about 2,000 other skilled artists that are hard And what happens if the numbers and quantities that these factoat work. To take art, a very individualistic passion and skill – and ries can generate are no longer in demand. It’s a huge double edged convert it into an efficient, highly organised, perfectly tuned sword that China brandishes right now and just like the saying goes factory is China at its core best. This one little village is – a double edged sword can cut deep both ways – including the one currently exporting 60 per cent of made-to-order art to who swings it. the world! 60 per cent! CHINA V/S CHINA WAR: China’s giant mobile-phone GIONEE E6 GIONEE WHO?: Truly humbled and suitably awestruck, manufacturing capabilities also brings up a fascinating The E6 will be I moved back to my core – tech. First up was the launch released at a very future scenario for India. Almost all these top-tier mobile of the very phone that I would be shown being manufac- aggressive price manufacturers were the original equipment makers for all tured from start to finish. The Gionee E6. Yes, I thought in India Indian mobile brands. This is where your top-of-the-linethe same thing too. Gionee? What is that and how do you but-priced-so-well mobile phone was made and brandeven pronounce it? And for those in India who have heard ed with an Indian name. Today, the likes of Gionee of the brand, the first reaction is always – ‘Oh no, anothand almost all others have sprouted new er Chinese knock off brand trying to sell in India’. Well, aspirations; they no longer want to be the silent in China I was to learn how the dynamics of brand manufacturer. They nurse ambitions to be a huge recognition change. brand name of their own, forcing Indian brands to Gionee (pronounced JinLee in China and JoNee in switch to second tier manufacturing companies. the rest of the world) is the No 2 brand in terms of So starting now, Chinese brands are going to go open market sales, right after Samsung. And they head to head against the very companies they were sold US$ 2.5 billion worth of phones last year. And making phones for. This starts an enthralling new the E6 was their top-of-the-line flagship phone. The war – a China v/s China battle of epic proportions E6 is a great-looking phone, full unibody design, a – which is a battle I will take you through next week, five-inch One-Glass-Solution Full HD 1080p AMOLED in Part 2 of my China adventures. display, a pixel density of 441ppi, runs on a 1.5 GHz Rajiv Makhni is managing editor, Technology, NDTV and the anchor quad-core processor, is super thin at 6.18mm and has of Gadget Guru, Cell Guru and Newsnet 3

techilicious

AUGUST 4, 2013

Photo: ARIJIT SEN; Location: LE MÉRIDIEN NEW DELHI

“Most guys are clueless. But you’re not most guys!”

The Ultimate Style Guide For Men

(And a few lessons from life) from actor Arunoday Singh, our favourite new guy on the block by Saudamini Jain A man’s got to do what a man’s got to do. Then, there are things a man’s really got to do Take a lot of showers. (I use good ol’ Pears. It smells great.) More soap, less cologne. Clip your nails. Think about what to wear. You know what looks good on you. Buy more than one tie. Own a dark blue suit. You can wear it anywhere. Invest in cuff links. Drink a lot of water. Yoga works. Read. Often. Imbibe it all. Get smarter, talk smarter.

Clothes that always work

Jeans and T-shirt. They always work. This [he points to himself – look at photo above] is how I usually dress to work, to a date, or to a party.

You need three kinds of shoes Regular black shoes, brogues and running shoes.

For those who like to dress up

Buy as many vests as you can. They make all clothes look great. How do you choose the right manbag? Don’t. Unless you’re metrosexual. Then, you’ll need a lot of things to fill it with! Photos: THINKSTOCK

If I didn’t look the way I do... If I was short: I would wear only darker solids. If I was fat: I would not wear stripes, no polka dots. And I’d hit the gym! If I was lanky: I would never have to worry! The best kind of body – everything looks good except very large clothes... Why do they do that? If I were a woman: I’d wear one of those nice, long flowy skirts. Or a sari.

TWO LESSONS FROM LIFE #1 It’s good to be Google-able [The top Google result for Arunoday Singh is ‘Arunoday Singh topless’] There’s more to me than my chest! I have a ferocious mind. I’m good at my job and I’m articulate [He is, very.] But well, it’s better than having no Google search results.

#2 It’s great to be strong I worked as a bouncer in New York. It was great money – $300-400 a night. So, was bouncing at these clubs the best part? I met Gisele Bündchen! Another time, I served Al Pacino a drink at the VIP section. [Lots of bouncing jokes in our heads!]

Pssst… Watch him next in Ek Bura Aadmi. As usual, he plays a bad guy. Not so usual, he plays a bad boy from Uttar Pradesh in a film about power politics in the hinterland saudamini.jain@hindustantimes.com. Follow @SaudaminiJain on twitter

AUGUST 4, 2013

WELLNESS

twitter.com/HTBrunch

MIND BODY SOUL SHIKHA SHARMA SPICE OF LIFE

Turmeric prevents wrinkles, scars and other signs of ageing spine and eases joint pain.

GOTU KOLA

AGEING Donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t let ageing bog you down. Challenge it head-on with these age-defying herbs and watch yourself get younger and fitter

This herb is frequently used in tonics that improve memory and extend longevity. It assists in healing wounds, improves mental clarity, and strengthens varicose veins. It is very easy to consume gotu kola. Just brew it like tea and drink it once a day.

MILK THISTLE

Since the liver is the seat of metabolism and detoxification, it has been given a special place in ayurvedic, Chinese and traditional systems of medicine. The liver performs many roles, including the processing and filtering of medications and environmental toxins. Silymarin, an active ingredient in milk thistle, stimulates liver cell regeneration to help the organ rebuild after it has been damaged.

GEING IS a natural process. Your body faces degeneration year after year. To look and feel younger, most people spend a lot of money on lotions, potions, pills and WONDER HERB creams. But you can achieve Ginseng tones muscles, TULSI An antibacterial, and also restores holistic wellness by just vitality and virility antifungal and including these herbs in anti-inflammatory your diet. herb that has been used extensively GINSENG to fight cancer and prevent This herb tones skin and muscles, diabetes. Tulsi can be taken as a improves your appetite and decoction. digestion, and even restores vitality GINKGO and virility. There is a lot of scientific research TURMERIC to support the claim that ginkgo This bright yellow spice has a increases blood flow to the brain. wealth of benefits. Turmeric Research also suggest that ginkgo protects the body from tissue-damcan help people with Alzheimerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s age and prevents wrinkles, scars, disease and other forms of demenand other visible signs of ageing. It tia, and help you become sociable also has the ability to potentially and alert. ward-off degenerative diseases.

ASHWAGANDHA

It is a widely known as a youth-enhancing herb. Ashwagandha also supports the immune system. It calms the nerves and reduces anxiety and stress. It boosts energy levels and fights chronic fatigue. It also strengthens the WONDER TONIC

Drink gotu kola like tea to improve memory and extend longevity

CELERY SEEDS

Ayurvedic practitioners use celery seeds extensively. Studies reveal that celery seeds prevent arthritis and gout (inflammatory conditions often associated with age). It is easy to include these seeds in your diet. Add a teaspoon of whole seeds in a cup of boiling water, let it cool and consume twice a day. ask@drshikha.com Photos: SHUTTERSTOCK