Saks Hair and Beauty, Bandra

            I visited Saks Hair and Beauty Salon in Bandra earlier this week and I am glad I did so. My hair got just the right pampering it needed. I was also lucky enough to get my hair done by Stewart Harland, International Principal Hairstylist. He quickly analyzed my frizzy, damaged hair and suggested that we work to get them more hydrated as that is what is needed during this hot Mumbai Summer.

The place is calming and they make sure they give you a good treatment and you walk out all smiles :) :) :) isn’t that what you we all look for anyway?

Stewart explained me each step and how it will benefit my hair. It has been over a week now and my hair still feels so good. They are a lot less frizzy and feel super soft.

He also gave me a small tip at the end which would make my curly frizzy hair more manageable.

I walked out with a big smile on my face and a new found love for my hair.

Vikas Khanna’s Shaken & Stirred - Book Launch

He walked in with grace and confidence that captured everyone’s attention in a heartbeat. The book launch was at Foodhall at Palladium in Lower Parel. The front row was captured by all the foodies who had followed him for a long time; they were so star struck that some of them had an almost dreamy expression on their face.

After a bit of chitchat and a little introduction he went on and told us that this was his 20^th book and that his 21^st wasreleasing soon. He told us about his first book which was self published and how he struggled with accent and with pronouncing the ingredients right when he first came to India to work for MasterChef India.

He then quickly whipped up some mocktails and all this while actively chatting away with us. He made cooking so interesting and fun that me, who can’t even make decent Maggi, wanted to start cooking.

This book Shaken & Stirred is a dazzling collection of non-alcoholic drinks. From delicious teas to refreshing slushies and classic drinks, Vikas guided the audience on how to create unique and exquisite drinks that would keep their guests satisfied and have them coming back for more.

“I’m touched by the love & affection that the Foodhall customers gave me today and this is exactly what keeps my quest for undiscovered flavors. The versatile recipes in Shaken & Stirred allow you to play with your imagination, while keeping the pure flavor and wholesome goodness of the ingredients intact,” said an elated Vikas Khanna. 

Trained at the Culinary Institute of America, Vikas Khanna runs the upscale restaurant Junoon in Manhattan. Having started a catering company at the age of 17 in Amritsar, he has been regularly featured on various international television shows such as Gordon Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares, Masterchef Australia and The Martha Stewart Show.

As the session came to an end he signed the copies of his book and then posed calmly for Selfies (This is a must these days)

Mother’s Day Giveaway! - Jabong.com (Closed)

With Mother’s Day just around the corner  http://www.jabong.com and I decided to make the day a little more special for you guys.

All you have to do is go through  http://www.jabong.com and tell us what would you like to buy for your Mother this Mother’s day. Share the picture with us using the #MothersDayWishlist

One lucky winner wins a gift voucher worth INR 1000/-

The contest ends on 12th May 2015 at 11pm.

Rules –

Comment below and tell us what would you like to buy from  http://www.jabong.com  for your mother this Mother’s Day.

OR

Share a picture on Twitter or Instagram using #MothersDayWishlist and also tag me using @PoojaMahimkar  so I get to know.

And that’s it, Good Luck :D



The winner is Aditya Raut.

First Autograph

      It was back in 2002 when Band of Boys first released the Meri Neend Song. I got to know that they were launching / performing (I don’t really remember what was the event, it was ages back guys) at Planet M in town. Excited I told my mother to take me to the event. We reached and it was super crowded. I was surrounded with college going students and people who were really into music and I instantly felt out of place. As soon as the event started and these guys started performing my awkwardness turned into awe.

         
   Once the performance was over, I mustered up some courage and went to the host and asked her if I could get their autograph. Sensing my nervousness she smiled and took me upstairs where the band was waiting. I still remember I was so nervous; I was so close to passing out. Heart pounding loud, hands cold with nervousness and with a lump in my throat I went up to them and asked for their autograph. I think this is what happens when one gets star struck. They were super nice and signed my book immediately. As I turned around and started going downstairs there was a big smile on my face.

          
  I needed this experience to understand that they are as human as I am. I never got star struck ever again and the fear of approaching someone and talking? Gone!

I was prompted to do this blog after the following incident.

Time To Act

            I am sure you all have already noticed the rising temperature in the city. It’s just April and it is already unbearably hot. I just dread to think what the coming days have in store for us. It’s not just about going out of the house, staying inside is also not as cool as expected.  I was just thinking about it today and reality hit me, till now, talks about global warming and how hot our planet is getting was something I would read about and then forget about it.  However now it just petrifies me.  

       

     Little changes in our daily life can really help a lot and if more people start doing it, I am sure it is going to bring about a major change. I am just listing down a couple of things that would actually make a big difference.

            Reduce, Reuse and Recycle

            Recycling is cool these days. Use products which can be reused or recycled. There are a lot of DIYs available online so make use of it. Reduce consumption of things which are not eco friendly.

            Walk, Cycle or Carpool

            Using personal car leads to a lot of pollution.  Walk if that is possible, cycle should be another good option. If the commute is long then carpooling is a good option. We anyway are so stuck up with work and our daily routine, carpooling will help you interact with new people and grow your social circle.

            There are a few carpooling options in India. However if these don’t work for you, try to find people at your workplace who travel on the same route and you can then carpool with them.

            Carpooling options - http://www.carpooling.in/search/regular/in-Mumbai

           http://smartmumbaikar.com/

            Switch OFF

            My mother does this and trust me it feels good. After dinner she used to switch off all the lights in the house and then sit and catch up with all her TV shows. With all the lights off, it used to feel cooler. So when not needed, switch off the lights. Make it a habit to switch off all the lights before leaving the room.

            Get off junk mail

            Do you receive a lot of junk mail? Unsubscribe and subscribe to their online version. It would save a lot of junk at your house and also help lessen the use of paper.

            Rain water

            Although it is not monsoon now butthis is something to keep in mind. When it rains, collect the water and then use that water for routine uses. Watering trees, washing the dishes, mopping the floor etc.

            Cloth bags are your bae

            Always carry a cloth bag with you when you go shopping. I keep a cloth bag in my purse all the time! Avoid using plastic bags. These days you get cute cloth shopping bags with quirky quotes and prints, it’s fun to use them.

            Gardening or House plants

            I know that most of us don’t have enough space for a full fledged garden but you can have some indoor potted plants. I recently bought a cute plant pot online; it has really inspired me to plant some indoor plants in the house.  If like me, gardening is not your thing, try to make it fun by using bring colors and quirky pots.

            CFLs

            Replace your normal light bulbs with CFL lights. They consume a lot less energy and are comparatively cooler than a light bulb.

            Plan your errands

            Drive according to the speed limit, it would help save a lot of fuel. Also plan your daily tips, try to cover up as much work possible. It would help save a lot of fuel and would also help you finish week’s worth of work in a day or two.

Studio NH 47, a Bangalore based band, has created a video and song for Earth Day that falls on April 22nd each year. Green Yatra, an NGO dedicated to conservation and protection of nature, is supporting the effort.

Long Distance Relationship Chronicle – Time Difference

             Time difference is another complex thing, although luckily here the difference is just of 1 and a half hour but it still becomes difficult to manage. By the time he is home from work and done with dinner and finally has time to speak to me, it’s already bed time here.

            I really am amazed by people who are able to sustain a relationship where the time difference is more than 5 hours. It just means that one of them has turned into a zombie/vampire and is up at odd hours.

            

My Choice?

            It’s funny how people are so quick and inconsistent about their views these days, thanks to Social Media people are able to express themselves however the sad part about this is that sometimes people express without thinking.

            Let me go a little off topic, I am so fed up with ScoopWhoop and BuzzFeed articles on my timeline and those over the top headlines stating that THIS IS THE MOST AMAZING/TERRIFYING/UNBELIEAVABLE THING ILL EVER SEE! I have stopped checking out those videos and articles but this My Choice video was shared by almost all my friends along with praises of course. So I saw the video, and honestly I liked it. Yes I was a little weirded out when she said that sex outside the marriage line but didn’t bother about it, it’s her choice right?

            Two days later the same people who were all praises about it were talking ill about the video. I honestly found it very funny. Looks like a bandwagon effect, doesn’t it?

            People need to understand that it’s all just PR! The bandwagon effect needs to stop and people need to make an opinion for themselves than just follow what others are saying.

Here’s the video, in case you don’t know what I am talking about

PS – Notice that the Red dot is repeated in this video and in Deepika Padukone’s upcoming movie Piku. Coincidence? I don’t think so. 

Long Distance Relationship Chronicle – Day 1 Ends

            Day 1 was so longgg.. I mean really! If days could feel so long without him I wonder how 2 years are going to turn out. It wasn’t even like we weren’t in touch; we were constantly in touch sharing every small aspect of day. I realized that now that we were apart wewere sharing more about the happening of the day compared to the time when he was here.

            Still haven’t got used to this feeling. My brains still makes plans and then realize that he is not here. I tried Google hangout but something is off with the connection and the video chat lags a lot, have downloaded Skype but I am not really very familiar with it. It is scary how much we are dependent on technology now. I wonder how people in olden days handled long distance, staying apart for days and months with nothing but just occasional letters to communicate, it must be difficult. 

            I am actually scared how these days feel so long.

YouTube Fan Fest India 2015

            I was devastated and very upset last year when the event first happened in the city. I so wanted to go, I tried everything to get my hands on the tickets but somehow I was just not destined to go there. It was a feeling that something you want is happening so close to your house and still you can’t go. A friend had also suggested gate crashing the event, but that was impossible right?

            A similar fate followed this year, before I knew it the tickets were sold out, didn’t win anything in all the contests that my favorite YouTubers were hosting. It was again so close to my house that it really felt irritating that I was not going. Then one of my friend told me about one contest that this lady was hosting on twitter, it was a lazy afternoon and I decided to try my luck one last time. I even messaged him that I don’t really think I’ll win anything. The contest began, I answered all the questions and at the end of it all I got a tweet from her saying that I won!!!

            I checked, then double checked and then triple checked if this was really happening. Details were exchanged and boom! there was a couple ticket in my inbox.  Upon reaching the venue we realized that we had actually bagged a Special Guests tickets and that we were sitting upfront! It really was a dream come true.

            In all this excitement I had almost missed on one little email sitting right in the bottom; it was an invite to the YouTube Creators Academy which was happening on the day after the Fan Fest. The mail mentioned that all the YouTubers (also the ones I was star struck by) were going to attend this event. The Creators Academy was super good! I’ll do a different post on that.

Kehte hain agar kisi cheez ko dil se chaho ... to puri kainath usse tumse milane ki koshish mein lag jaati hai

            Well what can I say? Mr. Shahrukh Khan was indeed right! After a year my wish came true, after a year something that I really wanted was turned into reality.

            The fest was amazing! all the performances and acts were so amazingly planned out and it really was an experience!

I even vlogged at the event, Please check out my video 

END THE RED STAIN

           Ladies, how do you feel during that time of the month? I am sure it’s not exactly something enjoyable. I was talking to a 40 something lady and she shared that when she was my age talking about periods or PMS was not so easy, even amongst girls. It was taboo of sorts. She was actually surprised to witness how causally we girls talk about it now. We don’t even shy away from letting people know that we are PMSing and thus mood swings are to be expected. However such is not life everywhere, even in today’s world.

Couple of days back I got to know about the ENDTHE RED STAIN initiative, here’s a short brief about them -

We are raising awareness on rural women menstrual hygiene with our initiative "END THE RED STAIN".
88% women in rural India cannot afford sanitary napkins 81% rural women resort to unsterilised cloth, sawdust, leaves 30% girls in rural India have already dropped out of school after menstruation

The story behind it:

Mrs. Bharati Idate has been producing high-quality, compostable and affordable sanitary napkins called ‘Care Taker’ for rural women in Maharashtra especially post delivery for over a decade. She lives in a famine stricken village called Vita, in Sangli district of Maharashtra and has founded the Bharati Mahila Audyogik Sahakari Sanstha Limited.

The initiative got my attention immediately; imagine if you have to go through your periods without the sanitary pads! Honesty I can’t even imagine how tough that would be and to believe that certain women are already living that life is horrifying.

They also made a short video on the same 

You can access Bharatiji's crowd funding campaign here:bit.ly/affordablehygiene

 ABP Mazha, Maharashtra Times and DNA has covered her story to make her endeavor known to many in Maharashtra and help her to raise the desired funds to help many other women like her. The links to the coverage are as follows:

ABP Mazha coverage: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IHEFgRSnX0U

Maharashtra Times coverage:
http://maharashtratimes.indiatimes.com/articleshow/45926487.cms

DNA coverage:  http://www.dnaindia.com/lifestyle/report-international-women-s-day-special-how-one-woman-is-making-menstrual-hygiene-affordable-2066904

            

What’s in my Bag + Giveaway

Hey guys,

I am doing a giveaway on my YouTube Channel. Check out the video!

I am giving away Khadi Travel Kit, it has Shampoo, Conditioner, Facewash and
Mosturiser. It also has 2 soaps – Neem Tulsi and Sandalwood.

To win this, all you have to do is comment and tell me what is that one thing that is always
in your bag.

Rules –

1.      Comment and tell me what is that one thing that is always in your bag.

2.      Like the video and Subscribe to the channel.

3.      Share it and tag me in the post.

4.      Follow me on Twitter and Instagram

Twitter - https://twitter.com/PoojaMahimkar

Instagram - http://instagram.com/poojamahimkar

Google+ - https://plus.google.com/+poojamahimkar

Pinterest - https://www.pinterest.com/poojamahimkar/

                                       

I will randomly pick a winner.

The giveaway ends on 31^st March 2015

The HDMI Chronicle

Every Indian is familiar with the word “Jugaad”

Wikipedia defines Jugaad as - Jugaad (alternatively Juggaar) is a colloquial Hindi-Urdu word that can mean an innovative fix or a simple work-around,^[1] used for solutions that bend rules, or a resource that can be used as such, or a person who can solve a complicated issue. It is used as much to describe enterprising street mechanics as for political fixers. This meaning is often used to signify creativity to make existing things work or to create new things with meagreresources.

One such jugaadhappened to me the other day (unintentionally)  for a few weeks now, my HDMI cable wasn’t working. I tried removing and attaching it again, didn’t work. I checked various YouTube videos and followed the steps to the tee, that too, didn’t work!

Annoyed, I gave up.

Few daysafter that, I again tried using HDMI. The above drill was repeated, then it dawned on me that maybe it is something to do with softwares. There I was, Goggling up various softwares and hack, nothing worked!

Frustrated and tired and annoyed I sat down with the HDMI cable. The first thing that came to my mind was Bajaj Scooter. It is said that back in the day, if your Bajaj Scooter doesn’t start then you should tilt it from side to side and it would work.

As this brought a smile on my face, I without thinking just blew into the HDMI cable. Something told me to try it again after blowing into it. Well, guess what! It worked!

Moral – Sometimes you don’t need all difficult and complicated things, a simple something can do the trick.

As we did talk about Bajaj Ad, I am linking it here. So nostalgic!

Self Defense Tips also Happy Women's Day!

Happy Women’s day!

I however don’t really feel very great about this day now, it gave us a chance to celebrate our womanhood. However, with things that are happening around us, I really don’t think that celebrating it is of any use, not that I am ashamed of being a woman but I, like all other women, hope that things were better.

I was in a conversation few days back about women safety and a friend pointed out that when a woman is being eve teased none of the spectators come to her rescue. Another friend argued that “Why do you need someone else to come rescue you? Rescue yourself girl!”

She continued, “Imagine you are in a bus, and you have a knife in your hand. Do you think anyone who even bother coming close to you?”

Now I know this is a little extreme, but she had a point.

Yesterday, I went to the Indiblogger’s Meet. They had a self defense workshop planned, it was very helpful! I am just mentioning a few pointers that may come to your rescue ( I hope you never have to use them )

Self Defense Tips –

1-     Carry Pepper Spray or other self defense object ( I know this is obvious, but there are still many people who don’t carry it. It could really be of use )

2-    If you don’t have Pepper spray thenuse your deodorant, it would be enough to distract the attacker for a few seconds.

3-    Everyday objects like a Pen, Pencil, Hair Clips, Keys and Comb etc can be used to stab the attacker.

4-    RUN! Yes, just run!

5-    SHOUT! Sometimes the alarm causes the attacker to run away.

6-    Use apps that make a loud noise.

7-    Use your palms to punch his nose, imagine you are throwing something and sit just as hard.

8-    The attacker generally expects you to be scared, attack back.

9-    Use your nails, head, and foot. Keep hitting

10- Kick on the knee, it is one of the delicate part to hit.

11- If the attacker approaches you from behind, use your heels and stamp on his feet, kick him, use your head and push backwards so as to hit his face/nose.

12-  fhe is holding you from behind and you can grab his pinky finger, then grab is and pull it backwards. It would free you immediately.

13-  If is holding you from behind, use your elbows to hit him in the stomach of groin.

14-  If  the attacker is strangling you then hit his adams apple and the hollow between the collar bone, it will immobilize and suffocate him immediately.

15- Keep in mind that the attacker is not expecting resistance, he think he is way powerful than you. Surprise him, attack him.

If you want to do a Self Defense course you can contact Sanjay at 9769950284.

You can also check out my vlog -

PS – if you know any other tips then please comment below so we all learn a few more tips.

Image Source - Google