and the entrepreneurs so there's so many of course unicorns coming out of sweden you have sports spotify yeah yes and skype and muy young you know candy croft and and these companies they're swedish so these companies were always from the beginning thinking global and that's one thing that we swedes have to a certain extent as a mindset but also uh swedes are well traveled we we we do take the opportunity to travel to see you know other countries uh um we do take the opportunity to um to learn about other cultures as well even in school at a very early age we learn about different you know countries and we even go of course it's a it's a privilege to have that we go to other countries you know for for for um you know educational tours etc and then we learn languages at a very early age we start learning english when we're six uh just before we go to you know first grade and then we um when we are ten we need to pick up one more language we


ten we need to pick up one more language we need to learn either french spanish or german wow so that's like um it also gives us a more international you know mindset when we learn languages and and when we travel but again you know that whole thing also from an entrepreneurial point of view having to think global to be able to succeed is um quite interesting the entrepreneurial standpoint is that the world of startups looks up to sweden for their design sensibilities like the way the products are designed like if you look at spot where it's a very stylishly designed product same with skype same with ikea like so many things in this room that people are seeing on this podcast of from ikea because there's a very strong design actually um why is that like is it something you learn in school like design thinking aesthetics is it a part of your culture i think uh it's it's the ikea also stands a bit for the like the minimalistic so it's like you know it's not


the minimalistic so it's like you know it's not cluttered and i think that's something that also attracts many who might be in a space where it is cluttered you once told me about a very interesting viking custom so traditionally sweden was the land of the vikings and you told me about this event that you guys have in the summer i think or when spring kicks in that's maybe the mid summer yes would you like to share that yeah it's very beautiful i'm actually going now to sweden in a couple of days and then i'll definitely gonna spend uh that beautiful uh festival uh in in stockholm this time and it's uh it's the longest day of the year so it's the solace summer summer solstice summer solstice and um what people do this time is that they dress up in white and they pick flowers and they make you know flower crowns and then we dance throughout the night and it's also the festival of they say when it starts like the fertility so that's


say when it starts like the fertility so that's like the maximum number of babies are being being made and having said that if you don't have a partner what you do is that you pick seven flowers and you put it under your pillow and then you dream about your future husband or wife at night so it's a very exciting day and it's a beautiful festival you must come for it you'll love it i can i intend on visiting sweden this year yeah you want paper to come 24th of june that's like now you're a really nice person cecilia like you're the kind of person who'll always try to make everyone around you very comfortable is that like a very viking culture thing uh because while vikings were looked at as like people who went and conquered other countries there's this whole other side the vikings being friendly and open and i remember once having this conversation with you about how you said that certain elements of viking culture have stayed with like modern day uh nordic countries so


stayed with like modern day uh nordic countries so would you agree well i mean uh thank you very much for thinking that i'm nice um that um you know i hear that from from from time to time that i'm welcoming that i'm you know warm that that you know i let the people in but also i mean so i also really you know resonate with like-minded people and i'm also more open i think with people that i really like um but when it comes back to them being vikings uh uh we were not always the nicest people you know we went to countries and we we you know we didn't do the nicest thing we took over countries and we took over people we took over wives and you know husbands for that matter but what the vikings did though that they were always working together they were working as a group you know there was the men was fighting the women were fighting and they did everything together so they didn't exclude anyone it was always like you know everyone were the same


it was always like you know everyone were the same and maybe then the aggressive warriors are now in uk and russia and all these places and all the nice ones stayed back and yeah we made friends i mean you know we took them back to sweden we stayed with them and then i think we became more uh culturally um open mind um let's talk about india you've traveled around the country so which part of india do you find like very very fascinating um i think all different uh parts have their uh sham but one place that i very much feel at home in is rajasthan okay jaipur udaipur jodhpur i have a lot of friends there i also love to spend time in goa i like the whole vibe there on the beach and use of a place there so so i i just that feels like my second home from bombay and then i like the mountains uh daramshala is also very very sacred and you know i i really like the the energy that is there


i i really like the the energy that is there and you know i've had the opportunity to you know have seatings with the dalai lama and you know that it's just a place that has a special connects and uh how was how was your meeting with the dalai lama it was uh i met him you know a few times now but the last time i met him was on was my birthday about five years ago and uh it was very special we had a good conversation i mean it's a very long story on on you know how that meeting actually happened and why it happened and i think that the two i think we'll have to do like a separate podcast only about that but what was the gist of the conversation like what did he tell you well he told me a couple of teams told me about what i should focus on in terms of what i'm building in terms of why i'm in india you know in terms of my uh opportunity to educate and in terms of the touching


opportunity to educate and in terms of the touching more people around different subjects but he also told me and that i have a third eye so he that i agree with very strongly oh that was special so he kept on like picking me on my forehead and like third eye third eye yeah so that was a special special moment what was his energy it's just like it's just doesn't even feel like you know that he is human you know he he's uh he just puts you also on a frequency um and i give you that as well i just feel so comfortable with you and you because we're just on the same you know frequency and i really felt that when you're with him you just feel so at ease and you're feeling very relaxed and he's also very child alike so you know he's um like a child but still you know 80 85 years i think this year but it's very um easy going and and uh you know have a very guiding strong spirit okay you haven't met him personally


guiding strong spirit okay you haven't met him personally yet not personally but it's on it's in my heart to meet yes whatever yeah put it out there it will happen that's exactly what i understand i wanted to have you know discussion with him with you cecilia like you're just for me in my heart you're not really swedish or indian or anything like that you're just someone i've learned from a lot uh it's it's a big reason i wanted to have you on the show because you've been like an unofficial mentor to me in like some ways uh be it like guiding me in business i remember doing the lockdown i was very nervous about certain things and actually called you yeah i remember those calls yeah and i appreciate those goals you know because you know when you you know ask me questions it also makes me think uh i think it's fine it's very important for mid twenties guys to be mentored by women uh because guys often don't have feminine perspectives about things and


often don't have feminine perspectives about things and was something i was very conscious about uh in terms of i was getting very masculine about my career aggressive and you know not looking at all the possible angles of things and my mom told me you're becoming too much like a guy oh really yeah so um and she's been another mentor but i've had these very key female mentors in my life and you're definitely one of them in terms of just like calming me down or giving me some perspective or even actually teaching me about the tech space about you know what's happening in the world etc uh why don't we talk a little bit about the angel investment space because there's actually a space that you're very actively involved in um and i feel knowing you professionally you get people the right deals so why don't you just talk a little bit about this whole tech startup space in india because someone had once told me that one of the easiest ways to multiply your money is by


the easiest ways to multiply your money is by investing in tech startups but then again it's high risk high reward this is not investment advice et cetera et cetera but cecilia what is this whole tech startup investment space in india like i mean it's very very exciting and i only got into it uh about it's probably about six years ago that i started you know being a techie and you know got into starting the sweden india tech community and get exposed to all these exciting tech companies but um [Music] yes of course it's it's a risk that comes with it but sometimes i look at it like it's not necessarily you know the wealth is not necessarily from the money that you have in your bank is also from the knowledge that you get along the way so when it comes to me and my investments i also go into industries and invest where i don't necessarily know as much about it obviously as the people who started the company because then i learn on the way and then


company because then i learn on the way and then i can also because i have a different mindset than the founders and the rest of the team or the company i can give another uh perspective and another view to what it is you know that they're building um and uh i feel that if you're interested in investing in you know being an angel investor um don't feel that you need to know exactly what's happening in that space if yes if you have a network and if you can connect of course that's what you just rightly said is it's a it's number one when you come in as an angel investor but it's also if you have a mindset and a skill that might be totally different from what this company has that's where you could potentially add um a lot of value how much money roughly in rupees do uh say okay let's talk about just bollywood roughly on an average how much do they spend is it five lakhs is it in like the 25 lakh 35 lakh


is it in like the 25 lakh 35 lakh range i think the average say that a big bollywood personality would invest would be around um around 100 um 100 100 000 that's about 70 lakhs yeah 70 lakh okay uh in the content creation space it's roughly about 10 to 15 lakhs that's what people go for lots of people go for like a five lakh package along with that they put in like deliverables in terms of i'll give you so many videos or so many stories but lots of content creators have started angel investments and and bollywood apparently even bollywood starting a lot of angel investments suddenly yeah so that's where like but that's usually like i would say the ticket size that i've seen of you know the bollywood people that i've connected with various brands but again you know people are obviously in you know investing smaller uh you know ticket sizes into companies one disclaimer i want to put here is that usually with angel investments when you're an angel investor you go in with


when you're an angel investor you go in with the mentality that if you put money in 10 startups only one is going to take off but that one will probably become at least 10x that's the big hope so say if you are putting in 50 lakhs across 10 startups you're putting in five crores and at least one if one of those takes off you'll make back your money at least and if two of them take off you're actually gonna make more money so that's why it's very intricate as a process you need to do a lot of research when you're going into angel investments but a lot of people to call themselves angel investors and to enter the cool cool kids group they'll just throw their money across blindly do you observe that yeah i know i see that i definitely see that you know people are just like you know jumping into it um but and not necessarily knowing enough about the founder or about the company uh so that's where of course it's good if


uh so that's where of course it's good if you know a little bit about the space that you're investing into because then you can identify more if the company is going to fly or not but i did also earlier say that you know you don't necessarily need to know about it if you really resonate with the company and if you still believe in the product um and the business then you know then then you have an opportunity to also help scale um but i only invest strategically so i only invest when i feel that i can help the company scale i'm not a passive investor so some of the investors i don't know if you know sometimes they go in and you know do they do anything or do they just like do it for the sake of investing and being an angel investor if you re you know proper angel investor then you also ensure that you help the company to grow the one thing about india and twitter india especially startup to attend also talks about this is that we are


to attend also talks about this is that we are a status driven society uh where there are inflated egos and it is about showing off your car and showing off your wealth uh i know the world is as well america is parts of europa but especially in urban india that that culture is a lot more um which is why nowadays it's cool to say that you're an angel investor uh in these societies in these parts of society uh do you notice that do you notice that about indians that it's a lot about oh look at me and my car and my clothes and my uh money yeah but you know i don't think that it's a difference anywhere in the world you know it's the same when you come to sweden we also like look at my car my clothes okay money but i think it's a healthy thing though to you know to talk about your investments as compared to your car and your in your clothes because at least that there is an you know intelligent angle


at least that there is an you know intelligent angle to it so that we come to that state in india i think it's a is a it's a positive thing it inspires others you know even if people don't invest to look at the companies and they maybe think about investments per se uh so um but i do see it of course i see it globally um you're an experienced professional you worked across industries what are the five skills that one needs to actually make money in life according to you and ideally probably could you name five skills that they don't teach you in school or college which you've just learned along the way hmm or five traits you know which have probably worked for you in your own journey of building your career building all this equity wealth etc etc good question number one i would say would be to uh think out of the box and explore new territories because that's often where you have the biggest opportunities and number two would be to nurture your relationships very important you


would be to nurture your relationships very important you don't know when you're going to need one person you know during your journey and so that's something that that i have done and that i continue to do on a regular basis and number three would be to keep inventing yourself to learn new things don't get stuck in like one place and if there is something even though you're not actually are passionate about it you know it could be interesting and good for you to learn about it so that you can make a difference in that particular space as well um number four would be to have mentors i think there's so many people that have of course done many things they've failed and they um you know exceeded and excelled in in various industries so for me uh mentors have been an important part and doesn't necessarily have to be a person that you can actually have your personal um you know one-on-one with you can listen to mentors you can listen to you know podcasts with you know yourself team


to you know podcasts with you know yourself team fairies etc and you can learn so much from them and number five would still be thinking you know ahead of the game and thinking for the future because um you would want to do something that you're proud of um in the future so you know what you're going to tell your you know grandchildren one day that you built so that you did you know how did you contribute to you know positive um climate or culture whatever it is that you feel very strongly for so think long term as well and make things that will make you proud and people um after you proud as well while you put forth a deep mindset i do have a shallow point to add which i really bat for because i see especially indian guys do this wrong they don't focus on presentation they don't focus on how they're dressed they don't focus on the shoes they wear how well they're groomed uh you know in some cases people don't uh really know what to say where


cases people don't uh really know what to say where i'm talking very generally of course it's all mixed and there's some very well spoken indian guys out there but i feel this whole angle have you seen the movie hitch with will smith uh there needs to be a hitch kind of figure which beer by says was trying to do two three years ago who teaches especially indian guys uh how to like present themselves because i've seen that that's a skill that's just i won't say it's gotten me far in my career but it's helped lubricate situations for me you know but i've needed that little extra help in order to be memorable for someone in order to sell something better just being well dressed has helped for example when we started monkey monk entertainment people didn't take us seriously in our sales pitches even though we were well dressed and all so then i kept asking myself okay what's the root cause of this and i figured that they didn't want to work with


i figured that they didn't want to work with younger guys we were 23 24. so it was a little weird for them to just give us a big contract so i started wearing suits for the meetings and everything changed and that's interesting because i also feel of course it's extremely important to you know take care of yourself and you know take care of your presence and be representable you know the way that you look in the way that you talk which you could again learn from a lot of the mentors that you know you could listen to or meet or you know interact with um or observe for that matter but also when i feel sometimes when it comes to like if you're wearing you know if you dress up too much putting a suit on you know trying to do like a sales pitch etc you always also want to stick truly to who you are because if you're trying to be someone else a person like me would totally um you know pick that up okay but yes very important of course


pick that up okay but yes very important of course take care of yourself in the best possible you know possible way and that you know starts off by you know i would say number one is exercising meditating you know sticking to your routine being a nice person got it that sets the tone for the rest of it that sets the tone if you do that automatically i think you you will uh look good and and and be presentable but obviously you know you need to wear something more presentable but having a tie and having a suit um it's definitely not the way to to think about it no not fair about what's behind it yeah i i kind of also meant just get your basics right in terms of dressing like you know focus on clean shoes focus and rely on clothes yeah uh dress appropriately for situations have lovely hair like you um thank you i would say the same word you like uh ev you're such a like presentable person that's that's what like people uh pick up about you


that's what like people uh pick up about you a lot i don't know if you i think you're aware of this you're self-aware enough to like know that well thank you very much i mean don't always look at myself in the mirror and say oh my god presentable but uh i really appreciate when people give me a compliment like like you put thought into it it's a part of the cecilia brand i feel your brand kind of stays with you even based on you know where you go not just digitally but physically where you go you're carrying a brand there so uh something i picked up from you like just observing you how the way you the way you carry yourself plus the way you like treat people around you can i ask you a personal question but you've asked many persons just someone stopping you uh dude looks matter for you at all it does but it's going to be my my you know my companion or you know my better half then looks are you comfortable sharing more


my better half then looks are you comfortable sharing more details about what you specifically look for and it's different for different human beings you know i i think the problem is that i don't have like one type i have many types i'm very attracted to this tall blonde you know like well-built viking men in sweden but um so i don't really have a particular type of such but uh okay cool fair uh like would shahrukh khan count as your type he's not my type he's not your type in terms of looks no why not i don't know what it is but it's not he's not the the but i'm you know there's a lot of people that have actually asked me the same question uh but uh in regards to him particular because i guess you know women fall for him like you know whatever they fall like but he's not my type plus dark hair brown eyes give me some other names i'm not going to give you any more name you go for it you're familiar with


more name you go for it you're familiar with indian actors i will tell you yes no give me five and i would say yes not really really not ridiculous no why not now there's something and he doesn't look uh he doesn't have that masculine energy okay that i look for fair uh see i i what i like about this conversation is i feel fiction and content and films can really take away a subconscious mind so indian men have watched indian films indian women have watched indian films and based on the actors acting in it absolutely we get like attracted or whatever to a particular person in saying that i do think russian is incredibly good looking i don't know if you've seen this movie called but no i haven't but i've seen like the trailers of it and i can see what you're saying when you say that but you know i also met him and and i've seen him you know in real life and probably because i did that before even watching any movie um you know


did that before even watching any movie um you know i have a different uh okay view on him he's a good looking guy but he's not my type okay do you know who akshay kumar is i know who he is yes okay is he your type not necessary i mean he's masculine he has that you know i i give him that but he's not the okay uh john abraham i thought he was my type and he's still you know he's actually the guys that you've mentioned and he definitely has the look um [Music] but god i'm sounding like a very no it's it's okay it's not it's your opinion it's fine people are curious okay yeah okay no but he said yeah we're getting there we're getting closer okay uh ranbir kapoor i like his energy and his fun and everything around it and maybe if i spend some time with him he'll be my type but okay by just looking at him is not necessarily um the one ranveer singh he's cool so he's


the one ranveer singh he's cool so he's your type he's more of my type of the people that you mentioned but i think i'd have to spend some more time with him and i don't know if the pickup unicorn is gonna let's do the international version of this okay i mean i like that okay like the superstar it doesn't have to be i mean i turned quite a few superstars down like without golly and you know shahrukh khan so it's not only that uh tom cruise gloria type have you seen top gun have you seen the new i saw it recently i loved it okay he looks really good for being 59 yeah yeah brad pitt used to be but not any longer after what he did to angelina not necessarily but uh i think also you have like different types in different stages of your life okay so it's not necessarily my time but yeah definitely i mean obviously there is a lot of things around him that this is good so uh what do you mean


that this is good so uh what do you mean different types and different stages of your life never i think you have that i'm just you know you know really uh digging into this now but i think um everyone changes right you know the way that they are the way that you know they they um move things that they do um some people age well some people don't depending maybe on them taking care of themselves if they you know drink too much or take too much drugs etc they might have looked fresh and energetic in the 20s but some of them when they're in their 50s they'll look really worn out yes and i don't like that because that's you know showing that you didn't take care of yourself and i like people to take care of you would be my type really yeah you're very cute you're like smart cute you know happy good energy treat people right um so the personality is like much more important basically that's what i'm no you don't think that you look good i


no you don't think that you look good i don't think about it in general but i know i look good enough to build a good brand i have real okay so i trained tanmay but from aib back in the day yeah i used to be his trainer and i had a very functional way to look at uh my career so my instagram used to i started was a cooking and fitness channel okay it would either be cooking photos or videos or it would be this is how you do a bicep curl and i never thought looks for a part of it and then when i went to his house he used to hang out with these comics and if you hang out with enough stand-up comics you realize that um they roast each other but they never roasted me and the way to roast me was a you're such a cute looking guy you could steal my girlfriend and that's why i began thinking that okay maybe i look maybe above average and all that so because i was like an engineering grad


all that so because i was like an engineering grad you know so you don't really think about these things and i was too motivated about doing something with my life uh so tanmay told me that listen you look good you look different market that make that a part of your brand so then to be experimental i started clicking good photos and putting it up on my instagram and those photos are doing way better than the cooking videos and the you see yeah but uh so i that's how i figured and i i don't you know i'll tell you what i think i'm aging very well because i'm very very focused on my meditation and the yoga and i'm 110 certain that both help you reverse age absolutely yeah you're also into yoga and meditation right i am [Music] why have you experienced this this so in in the world of like yoga they call it having paige on your face page means um how do you explain like energy yeah uh like right like a glow which i said huh which


right like a glow which i said huh which i said no but you have it as well but the glow is like you know it is visual but it's also something you feel from the person and you have that a lot which is what i said about yeah yeah absolutely no this is a this is a good one so i think you know definitely yoga meditation you know um gives you that glow and people with that glow so even if they're really good looking if they don't have that glow have you met people like that yeah i meet so many people who are really good looking but but not the glow you know they don't have the spark again you mentioned some names you know good-looking dudes but do they have the glow not so sure it comes from a place of being happy on the inside have you had any spiritual experiences in india um i would say even coming to india was a spiritual experience itself okay you know i often think about why i ended up here and i


often think about why i ended up here and i encounter you know different interesting how do i put it people gurus um animals um all the time so uh i'm not necessarily like stuck to any religion or any guru or anything and such but the way that i come across different people um and yeah i definitely have a lot of spiritual experiences but i'm not sure exactly what to put a finger on but of course i mentioned about the dalai lama uh you know sad guru um i've met you know spent a lot of time in in rishikesh with you know sadhus and um what was that what was that like the rishikesh experience beautiful i i i love to go there and you know just be there and speak to to to to sadhus and to just like meditate and be by the ganga and you know go for the different um you know ceremonies and i've done some trainings up there in um in everything from like tibetan singing balls and i've done the different i've


singing balls and i've done the different i've done my reiki courses in in rishikesh what's the most beautiful place you've seen in your life wow that's a that's a tough question you know i've traveled the world um [Music] but the most beautiful place is probably the place that comes back to me um frequently it kind of stays with me and is always in my heart and that's a place in the north of sweden um i have a little house by a lake where there's no other houses it's just my house the lake and the forest wow and it's a very peaceful serene um special place and i'd love to to take you there 100 like i'm just visualizing it and i see why you would say that knowing who you are as a person i've known you for three years but over the course of this podcast i felt i got to know you much more deeply so see it so cecilia aldney thank you this was a super fun episode uh for me it was just getting to


fun episode uh for me it was just getting to know a dear friend of mine and someone who taught me like a lot without knowing that they've taught me a lot so thank you for everything thank you same to you i've been on a few shows but this is by far the the nicest interaction that i've had thank you cecilia so that was the episode for today i feel like as fantastic as our country is in terms of perspectives the one thing we kind of lack as a society is that we don't have a very very conversational culture in english i feel that when it comes to hindi there's a lot of conversationalists out there but as for the english conversationalists there's honestly not that many and this is coming after more than 200 podcasts recorded by us in the english language so at this point i want to feature stories from swedes and americans and africans and people from all over the globe cecilia's podcast was only the first international flavored podcast of this new


only the first international flavored podcast of this new season of trs there's a lot more coming your way so keep following us but make sure to follow us on spotify because every episode is available on spotify 48 hours before it's available anywhere else in the world lots more coming your way on trs do drop your suggestions are there other foreign nationals in india that you'd like to see featured on the show let me know right now in the comments we will see you soon [Music] you


and i remember my nani saying it that if she's getting so many offers why is stopping her if she wants to try it out because i was telling them give me two three years let me try this out if not i will do the ias exams i will do the i will do whatever it is that and grandmother was like yeah just give her that time and she just told don't you trust your upbringing i went through cancer in 2018 and i was on fourth stage my doctor said 30 chances that you will make it and i wanted to beat him up i must tell you you know very rarely do i record an episode after which i feel like i've had a crush on my guest and this sonali being the episode was just like that very heartfelt conversation i think you're gonna enjoy it i'm not gonna talk too much about her or the episode in the intro what i will say is that trs is a spotify exclusive so make sure you follow us on spotify every episode is


make sure you follow us on spotify every episode is available on spotify 48 hours before it's available anywhere else in the world this episode was very wholesome very heartfelt very emotional and i hope you enjoy it as much as i enjoyed recording it thank you enjoy the episode [Music] [Laughter] it's begun oops this is how podcasting is welcome to the ranveer show i'm so excited to be here i'm very excited to speak to you uh lots to ask you about okay but first i just want to ask you how you're doing lately i'm doing well and i'll tell you why i'm excited i'm excited because one you have my son's name but the other thing is that i find this so interesting the podcast and and what you put out and i find it so interesting the way you do it the topics you choose are very very interesting so i have been in this uh logged on i have been i suddenly you popped up on my timeline and i thought beer biceps was a


on my timeline and i thought beer biceps was a very interesting uh name and i got attracted i started following and seeing what you do and i really found it very interesting thank you i feel very validated right now because uh i used to watch a lot of camastique at home and uh okay a lot of difference between sleep and who and what you do on beard biceps but anyway it's okay you did yeah i like the show yeah and my mum is a very big fan of you so yeah she say hi to her yeah i will this is the highlight of her week knowing that her ranveen but but you are a very likable person honestly like i'm i'm just sitting in front of you and i'm feeling such positive energy you should not ask my mother my mother-in-law and my husband and my son this question okay maybe they might find actually maybe we should ask them and maybe i'll get some uh truth out of it dangerous no no you're a very like warm personality that's that's


you're a very like warm personality that's that's what i'm sensing now so right before we started recording you said that you're probably feeling uneasy something's up it's because i wanted to say this you're so nice genuinely thank you like i feel i feel very comfortable uh speaking to you and often that's not the case on the podcast especially when yeah yeah yeah because we've had like army kernels we've had like these uh very eccentric scientists sometimes they all come here yes do you feel an energy in this room no but it's so cool yeah i'm glad okay but the fun to be able to do i mean it's such fun stuff and to make i mean that's your uh career i would say it's it's just amazing to be able to do this yeah i mean for me i would have never imagined having this career option i mean it was just it didn't exist at that point of time but how amazing is it to be able to do this yeah it's the power of social


able to do this yeah it's the power of social media as a power of youtube and uh you know this whole podcasting thing i started very randomly but now it's replaced my need to read books i still read a bit but because i'm getting to talk to so many people about such deep stuff i i get what you're saying it's it's really unfortunate the book thing is going but i have to confess do i run a book club but i have to confess it is getting harder and harder to read books even for you you've read all your life yeah but it is getting harder and harder to read it why why do you say that uh because you know you're getting so much more out of the uh look like audio books when i'm hearing uh something i can i can be doing something else so just being able to do two things you know we are losing that at least i am i feel i'm losing that capacity to be able to do just one thing at a time and just being


do just one thing at a time and just being okay with just being there's just so much around us that you you know getting all excited about it and then you want to you want to try everything so i get what you know the kids today are feeling i i get what my son feels i mean it's like you know at one point when you wore a watch and you it was i i can see that you still wear a conventional watch but it's like when my son would see these thing but what's the point of it it only shows time and does nothing else so we are looking for multifunctional and multifunctionality with everything now and i think that's what is happening with our devices with our books and i i don't think it is good or bad i just think it's different um speaking about different uh how old is your son he's 16. okay so he's a teenager and you've seen his mind evolve into becoming a semi-adult yeah i think teenagers the point where he


semi-adult yeah i think teenagers the point where he hates it when i talk about him in public what's up ranveer we're gonna talk about you now uh i i think teenagers today are way more intelligent way more informed uh a little kind of they have some negative elements also in their life a lot more like the amount of social media they were exposed to as kids i definitely feel they're way smarter than people my age were when we were that age but they better be smarter look at the amount of things they get at their fingertips i mean it's so much more easier so but there's also like these anxiety issues and all that with teenagers off today see everything has its pros and cons mmm yeah i don't i don't know how to look at that but do you feel this generation's like a lot smarter he's technically gen z right your son now listen you have too many of these i think boomers millennials got us what all there's so many names i don't know


what all there's so many names i don't know all the names so i don't know which generation he belongs to but uh i when i look at uh what they're doing right now it's just that the information is literally at their fingertips for me if i was interested in a topic you know understand the topic you go to libraries you find the books and you then you realize somebody else has taken that book or that you know magazine whatever you want to uh get so you're waiting for it so the waiting period for with the topic that you needed information on was months before you could actually probably write say if you're writing an essay on a topic it took a while you know by the time you went through encyclopedias or you went through various articles and stuff like that to get uh understand the topic and now it's literally a days matter and you can look at various points of view and get all the information and uh you know you can move on so uh there's a information overload i


move on so uh there's a information overload i feel um so you're 70 is born and you're a 70s kid i want to ask you about 70s kids in general how are they evolving right now with their kids becoming teenagers do you evolve through your kids yes like alone i think goalie and me do definitely and uh i'm the old-fashioned one in our bit uh the goldie is very young and that's it goldie is my husband by the way so he's very uh young and uh you know looking forward to the new things and he's always been there so i think he and my son have a better equation in that sense i'm a bit technologically challenged it's not the right word anymore because uh that was old me i used to be challenged and i had no option but to you know understand tech when you can't survive if you don't understand tech but it's a struggle for me how did you guys meet you and your husband on sets okay yeah i was


you and your husband on sets okay yeah i was shooting for my first film called naraz with the maishvatas the director and we were shooting in chennai and goldie was starting a film with bhatsa and he had come there for story sitting he and his sister i think 18 year old 17 18 year old goldie about 19 year old his sister and they were he'd lost his father early so he they started the they were completing and had taken the production um on so yeah he'd come in there and i was reading my book and i found this really annoying chap who kept finding a chair next to me or moving the chair next to me and asking me what are you reading why are you reading oh my god that's a lot of food you eat you're just trying to strike up a conversation and i was like stop it but that's how we met so how did you get then i did that film eventually the film that you'd come there i did that and yeah so from there from


there i did that and yeah so from there from knowing it was a professional relationship to being friends to best friends to me wanting to kill him when he wanted to move from best friends i'm like i have very few best friends i can't ruin this and he's like it's not necessary that it will be ruined but yeah i'm glad i you get the chance do you know what the friend zone is it's like when it's usually girls who friend zone guys so if a bestie is trying to take the relationship to the next gear uh the girl will say no no you're just my friend uh so you were technically trying to friendzone your future husband yeah i didn't succeed how how did he succeed already not get friends you know he kind of uh every day that i would go to the to the studio he had suddenly his one of his closest friends was oh i mean i'm going in that direction so he would be driving with me and then later on i realized that it was well


and then later on i realized that it was well timed so that he would sit there and very casually talk about the amazing things about goldie it was well timed and all the way i was shooting at famous studios so all the way from uh lokhanmala when i would drive to famous studio he's like i'm heading into town because i've been i'm working over there kind of a zone i have something happening over there so for the next 10 15 days there was this friend of his who would keep he would drive me there or drive with me there and yeah it worked so the friend helped yes okay have you seen zoning didn't happen then have you seen kalona saif ali khan pretty sinter khan and they're in it right i'm so sorry but i haven't seen it yet um i did okay that was a brain fart i'm sorry i'm very aware that you were in cologne oh i remember everything about your character you're the cardiologist who pre-presented thinks is uh the


the cardiologist who pre-presented thinks is uh the the wife but she's not uh so in kalwana who basically says unfriend zones himself yeah so is that what goli did that means in today's language it would be he unfriend zoned himself and definitely kind of yeah it moved forward okay so then yeah we dated for a while and then uh um yeah and then it was it was never like uh uh are we going to be together forever kind of his own it just was so understood no hold on let's dive back in a little bit how did how did he unfriend zone himself i told you how just the just the friend helped yeah i think that was one of the zones and i actually don't remember exactly what all he did and i don't think i want to know it also because it's lovely that he made the effort okay and uh for me it was uh you know it just reached a point where uh look i can't imagine not waking up next to him


i can't imagine not waking up next to him let's put it that way and that i think kind of sealed the deal okay you know this whole friend zone concept comes sort of from the world of evolutionary psychology they say that um so speaking from an evolution perspective um it was always like the males who had to like really fight to earn a relationship and the women had like a plethora of options so a friend zoning equation is very natural according to evolutionary psychology for women you're basically seeing that uh i this dna do i want no for my yeah correct it's it's exactly that it's it's like when you study the animal okay i like this dna so he showcases intelligence that's how he broke the friend zone because you're a reader i'm sure you look for like intelligence i think he showcased his sensitivity and i think he is an amazing uh um i think he's been brought up around really strong women and uh i love the way he understands and you know it sounds


love the way he understands and you know it sounds very trite when you say like oh he respects women i mean everybody is supposed to but there is a certain amount of uh let me say that as an actor who has a certain image to have a boyfriend who was comfortable with you stepping out going to a party and never like you know looking and saying oh you know you're looking really good do well or whatever i think that for me was though was the trick you know because it was never like i don't think you should be going here i don't think you should be it was never that even today when i when i'm getting to work you know for years now goldie has been telling me that you know soon the way you are working you will enjoy today you will enjoy the stories that are being told you will enjoy the people who are in the industry you know i know how what used to frustrate you and you will really enjoy it why are you not working so


will really enjoy it why are you not working so he has been the single most uh biggest push behind me getting back to work always so that is the character that's what it is about him to be comfortable in his own skin where he is able to say that respect me as an individual and what i do and be okay with the what it is and it's not easy to be okay with that and i don't mean it just for the men i think even for a women when they are when they are uh in in relationship with actors it's different actors are a bit wayne there's a lot of attention that's coming your way you're dressed a certain way and they are looking at you in a very um i had an image also with it was it was the body and you know the look so it was a certain kind of image for him to be really comfortable with that to understand the inner me and understand what is the genuine me and what was the image to be able to differentiate that


what was the image to be able to differentiate that was very important i mean i didn't want to be with the person who was in love with the image i needed a person who knew me though the real me and that was important okay i'm just gonna i'm not gonna keep any filter okay i'm gonna be like very transparent with you you're like an incredibly attractive human being in all ways okay so uh right now you're married and you're very famously married but before that did you get a like tsunami of guy attention before yeah i mean yeah of course so what was that like for you in and your mind like how did you segregate because i'm sure a lot of men would have just wanted to uh get to know you for the status of getting to know you so many yeah so that was that okay and you were very young like you were very young when i was very very young uh i think but uh um so they were i think when i look back now and now i'm


i think when i look back now and now i'm able to analyze what happened to me and when i look back there were two three things that played in my favor i would say or you know kind of was my just kind of guided me onto a certain path so because there are always going to be choices and eventually your life is that you know it's a sum total of what are the choices that you've made so today when i look back uh see first of all when i uh for me as a obviously now when i look back there was always the looks so my mother has never let me stand in front of the mirror for too long if you spend more than five minutes you know you gotta whack and you say like come on move on it's what is inside and then now when i look back i understood it was kind of like you know underlined and kind of uh made sure that it was uh filled into my head that what is inside you matters and you know the outside looks go


inside you matters and you know the outside looks go and what is inside is what remains so that i have to hand to my mother you know subtly this was something that she just brought me up with and obviously for a mother she was seeing that she has a she has very good looking daughters and so this for her was a very something that she really kind of put us through the ringer where this was concerned so one was that second thing was when i started working the fact that my you know it was something my family doesn't come from this it was unheard of it was like you know what is this work what is she doing and i remember my nani saying it you know we in marathi we call we call them aji and she telling my parents that if she's getting so many offers why is stopping her if she wants to try it out because i was telling them give me two three years let me try this out if not i will do the is exams i will do


not i will do the is exams i will do the i will do whatever it is that but you know i'm not this is the age i still have the time let me try it out and uh my uh grandmother was like yeah just give her that time and she just told them that you know you haven't you given her don't you trust your upbringing was the question she asked my mother and that is what it was and uh when i went on sets and especially when i started doing movies i mean there were mothers coming in with the other lead actresses and stuff like that and my mother never came with me there was a point when i said you know you know maybe i'll be more comfortable it's very it's a very weird place to be i'll talk about that also but uh but for my when i asked my mother that will you come with me she said i have a younger daughter at home and if you went to work and you were working in an office i wouldn't be sitting


were working in an office i wouldn't be sitting on that next desk you know so you would be doing that alone so you're going for a job do the job come home i'm here at home waiting for you and that is what it was i went for a job and i came home and when i came home i had to do my chores make my bed do whatever it was i had to do it and the reason the discomfort was also at that point of time the only other woman on the set was my hairdresser there were no other women on the set other than the lead actress and her hairdresser so there were no other women so you know then the mothers came into play and all that so that kind of i wanted that uh discovered now had my mother not given me this kind of freedom so any time when you're like you want to maybe that will be fun and i should do it and then you just think that my god my mother's given me so much of leavi i don't


mother's given me so much of leavi i don't think i can do this to them you know what will my father think and just out of respect for them it stopped me from trying various things or doing various things or you know just help me with the choices that i made so i think these are the now when you look back these were the things that you know kind of uh helped me make my choices so speaking about that time period um what was 90s bollywood like as compared to the film industry now because you hear a lot of stories all sorts of stories in terms of star power was even more back then because there was no social media um you know stories were different narratives are different the way women were treated was very different so what was that but you know look i'm an outsider okay totally an outsider i have nobody that i know in the film industry today if i have family in the industry i made it you know i we we met when i started working when i came


we we met when i started working when i came in i knew nobody i had no idea i was not trained for the job and when everybody says oh my god what was it like but i think i had the best time if you ask me that is this the best thing that happened to me yes hell yes it was the best thing that happened to me i've met some wonderful people on the way so i think the choice is always with you and so when people say oh my god this is the industry and outsiders i don't get it i am totally an outsider till today if you meet my parents they have no clue about the industry till today most non-filming so you know what are we talking about i think it's about life any any kind of profession you go into it's the choices you make don't start putting what the choices you have made and nobody's i wouldn't blame anybody for the choices you make you know it's it's like i said it's it's


know it's it's like i said it's it's your upbringing or maybe upbringing is not the right word but you know circumstances and hey you made a mistake or you feel today that you made a mistake that's the way you learn and that's the exactly the way you grow so that's part of life and don't blame it on somebody else um you know say yeah okay yeah i could have made a better choice but i did and you know what lesson learned move on from there today i can put out what i want to and it is understood as to what i am but if what i want to say doesn't interest the person who is interviewing me then that never came out so there was a very uh there was a definitely a biased in uh narrative that would come out and uh so that was different about it also while there was uh the way the acting was concerned uh slightly over the top was uh what was in so uh yeah uh the roles were like that and but


uh yeah uh the roles were like that and but at the same time the naras which i did zakham that i did was very much like i think the acting you see would be very much okay for today major saab if you see del jale it was not odd so i think there was there was uh there were different uh uh flavors i would say but limited because you know you were releasing a movie in single screen so you needed to tick certain boxes i think with the coming of multiplexes it started getting better and now with the odt platforms and you know just the the it's it's just like a boom and things have just kind of uh it's it's just like completely different and it's fabulous but yeah that was the difference so i'm a 90s kid and the narrative that our generation is given about the 90s is that it's not going to be a pleasant one it's it's that there was a crime angle behind films like dao de prime was involved in cinema and the


dao de prime was involved in cinema and the d gang generally had some role to play is that true like was there any kind of underworld element so you know uh now when i uh look at it uh say my husband goldie his father came in from punjab and started the production house so our production house must be at least 40 years old today and even at that time this conversation would go on and there were enough uh clean finances who dealt with and were financing films that were clean and that's why you would have certain production houses and families who were dealing with certain kind of people so yes definitely you heard about it and there were certain people who would be dealing with it in 90s also this was a factor and i would say that not just in film industry there would be these factors in most of the other professions that you would see it in also uh there was still you don't have an but it was not like a formal industry status so definitely there was a


a formal industry status so definitely there was a lot of unregulated finance coming in so which would mean that there would be a lot of uh different kind of uh i mean you will understand that more so you can't regulate where the finance is coming from and banks are not going to give it to you so that you that limit was there and so i wouldn't say that i wouldn't blame somebody for that uh where i was concerned or there were times when uh the moment you would know that oh this looks a bit dodgy i've tried tried and stayed away i mean at that time now when you look back though a lot of times the excuse i would give is oh i'm shooting for a movie in the south so i can't make it like a party or something yeah so you will see that i never really kind of went for that so how could you tell that it's seeming dodgy like from the vibe yeah okay you could make out because uh and i i i


you could make out because uh and i i i don't know that is how that's the way that i looked at it also if you uh i mean uh once i started dating goldie i mean you know if i say this you will ask more questions and which i will not answer but uh i think where uh the the old film production houses were there they knew which were dodgy and which were not okay it was something that you grew up with as family as they knew it like uh his mother would know it her father was in movies too so you just knew like you would know you know you know if your family is in a to your family of doctors you know the reputation of okay this doctor is a dodgy one or this one is a very good one or not in the same way because you're in that profession for generations you know it so i think that kind of you know uh fell into place so yeah there was a lot of that at that point also i mean there have


of that at that point also i mean there have been times when um if i'm supposed to do a role it's just been given away to somebody else because somebody has made a call and they said that what can we do we needed to do it um and this would be possibly people who associated with darker elements no you know you can't i mean there are there were times when uh everybody is not necessarily associated with them but there are times when you don't have a choice okay and you know uh so there have been times when it has been like oh i'm ready to go for the shoot and i didn't know i'm not in this movie anymore heartbreak oh my god etc etc there have been times when uh a co-star or a director whom i'm working with has called up and said i'm really sorry but i have this pressure and i can do nothing about it and i understand that also so it was not like it was oh my god we are going to do this but sometimes even if


we are going to do this but sometimes even if they didn't want to do it there was no choice and like i said that till you don't regulate the industry you're always going to have these elements in it and so it's you know they've taken very long to give us the industry status and i think there's always been some sort of a stepmotherly treatment where our industry is concerned we had someone called shivanandan on the show he's one of those legendary ips officers in india so he said that the 90s generally all over india especially mumbai needed a kind of cleanup yeah so the police force actually got together got more organized and that's why from around 2000 onwards you saw a lot lesser crime yeah and it's very interesting that he said that because if you look at it 90s definitely that clean up as you said and that's why you had all those films that ram gopal varma made or you know what was the shootout at wadala and all of those movies came


shootout at wadala and all of those movies came out after that you know which which kind of spoke about that time period and uh now when you look at it uh you know whether where you saw the amazing police officers who were part of that and now you have stories coming out about them so uh who is good and who is bad you can never really say because as time goes and i i see from the books that you're a lover of history and you will see that as time passes and when you look into history suddenly what at that period you thought were the villains or the heroes might just not be the villains and the heroes so i just feel that you know especially when you like history and you it becomes very clear that there are no villains and there are no heroes it's just circumstances you still read a lot right i try to okay what have you been interested in lately oh lately uh on my book club the you know the reason i started the book club was


you know the reason i started the book club was that i fell in love with the fact that social media can be so amazing so though i was very like keeping away from it for the longest time but when i did get on to it i found that very amazing and i thought how could i use it in a positive way and for me that was to form a book club and connect with the community and we have a very thriving community in sonali's book club and so the book right now on the book club is uh i forgot the name i think it's the war in uh december it's the night it's on the 1971 war it is by ks nair and it's on indian army and their role during the 1971 war and as as it is said uh that if you actually look back it is the so-called just war the last so-called just war in the world where there was you know the army has gone in for a justifiable reason and done something after that you see any war there's


and done something after that you see any war there's a spin on it and here that you could put a spin on this one so uh i thought it was very interesting and i thought that this book dealt with that part of it and i'm really looking forward to reading it because i've been busy with the show that i'm coming out with now i've not had a time to i put it on the book club and before we have the conversation i really want to kind of go and read it but i've not had the time to start it but once i started then like the social circle in your life your friends are they also from the film industry or it's from like not all of them i have yeah not even goldie is for that matter he has been in this industry for generations but both of us have equal amount of friends if not more friends who are not part of our industry what are conversations like in your friends circle honestly like you're you're in like a very nice part of mumbai and you


in like a very nice part of mumbai and you know there's like an educated friend circle that i'm assuming you have i'm sure you have uh what are conversations like that because i feel covert has made everyone evolve yeah i'm noticing online that everyone's very into geopolitics right now because of what's happening in the russia ukraine situation so what do you guys talk about whatever is happening around so current affairs definitely uh then there are times when we talk about the state of the industry as in our industry and what is happening there that could be a conversation what is coming out what is new uh then there is what books you are reading what shows you're watching what movies are being uh what are we doing with the kids and you know that's a huge uh thing because a lot of our friends which are uh who are our age have kids our age um it's a journey and suddenly i mean i would say parenting always has been you can't like you know it's it's


has been you can't like you know it's it's not a mold and you know you can't pick up and say that oh this is what was done for my first child i can do the same for the second it doesn't work like that because every child is different so and in these times when there are so many more challenges which we don't understand or know anything about or there is nothing that you can fall back on and say that oh let's do it like that it's not it's so you know so somewhere we as parents kind of hang on and hold on to each other and say what are you doing what are you doing how is it going and kind of learn from it and so that is something that you discuss yes my son is a 16 year old so colleges what are you going to do what are the further studies like so yeah these are all the topics and books yes of course books okay right you said something about using the power of social media i feel people who can actually


power of social media i feel people who can actually utilize social media well are people who have a story and uh i i mean i've been waiting to speak to you about this yeah uh it's what happened to you in 2018 uh it's the whole experience with cancer and i'm sure you get asked yeah a lot about this in interviews and all that but i also feel um that somewhere maybe maybe i'm sorry if this might offend you in any way maybe it happened to you so that your purpose becomes spreading a positive message oh my god but you i i don't think that offends me at all i don't mean to talk about it i think it's so true because you know everything happens for a reason but having said that i would say social media for me i started i got onto it much before my uh cancer diagnosis i started the book club much before that so i started using it in a different way uh earlier uh but thank god i was on the uh that i


but thank god i was on the uh that i was on the social media when this diagnosis came i was uh shooting for a show i was in right in the middle of a talent show and definitely so you know how talent shows go every week you're shooting and every week a new episode is coming out so suddenly if you disappear i mean there would be a lot of gossip about it there would be speculation about it and i just didn't want gossip and speculation around why i was not there so it the idea was to kind of put it out in my words as to what was i going through and how was i going to deal with it what were you going through like when like were you in pain like how did you even figure that this is happening what i can say is that it was a shock it was definitely not something uh that one expected i mean i got up thinking that it was a dream and what a bad dream and it's going to be okay to realize


dream and it's going to be okay to realize it was not a dream so you're going through all of that and literally by the fourth day from the time i came to know i was already out of the country and there was this whole my life left behind it always kind of triggers this off a little bit sorry about that no that's but yeah you just left a whole life behind you in four days you were gone so it does give you a perspective and i think it gives you a lot of clarity so i think that's exactly what happened to me so when you said that it's not offensive at all because what you said is so true because going through something like this gives you clarity it gives you uh so what are we giving if i've got a second chance what have i been given the second chance for and it's it's very lovely to say oh my god i've got a second chance i'm going to change the world but you've also gone through something


to change the world but you've also gone through something where you realize i don't think i can change the world and so for me to understand the fact that i might not be able to change the world and i don't think it is possible for any one person to do that what i have understood from this is that i need to do what i can in the world that's around me even if it is two people and let me just focus on that so i'm no longer you know or for that i i'm no longer feeling bad that i can't go out there and you know say hey this is you need to do this this is so wrong no i don't want to shout about it i want to be i just want to whisper to people around me there's one or two who can hear the whisper because that's what is going to make the change and that's what is in my hand because i'm a speck i understand i am the speck in this universe a speck can do


the speck in this universe a speck can do a speck full of work and that's all i want to do so that's what i have understood so it's not some earth shattering thing at all it's something as simple as that you're like a really incredibly strong lady and that's what i sense from you like right from time i met you outside like there's just a lot of strength in you and not related your cancer i think in your personality um i do have to ask you though um when you when you're going through it and i'm asking you this because you hear a lot of narratives about having cancer but i think the only people who have the truest narratives are the ones who've gone through it themselves is it a lot of uh mental toughness that it takes to get yourself out of there is like is it all in the mind are you supposed to visualize healing are you supposed to think of healing like how do you pick yourself up from your lowest


like how do you pick yourself up from your lowest point i think rather than it sounds very strange but uh survivor i fought it toughness you know these are the terms that you normally use with uh with you know diseases of surviving something i think for me as i look back now i rather than these strong tough words i would say acceptance is the right word for me the day i accepted the fact that yes this was happening to me this was the reality of my life now and then i could find a way to move on but till you keep fighting something until you don't accept it you're never going to be able to move on and i think that applies i went through cancer in 2018. but look at what we've gone through in the last two years what i went through the whole world the whole planet has gone through that there's not a single person here who's not gone through something like what i have gone through so i think uh maybe to before covid we could


so i think uh maybe to before covid we could have spoken about me having gone through something and there were some people who have gone through it but i think after kovit you me everybody has gone through this and we all have to just accept the reason i'm asking you so much about cancer and i'll give you the honest content creator narrative if we just bring on a regular cancer survivor it may not even get hits and if you bring on someone like yourself who's had a famous life people suddenly listen i agree with you and sometimes i ask a lot of actors on the show about what they think the purpose of their life is because every profession has some purpose associated with it and i ask the same question to sports people sports people often say inspiration actors also say something similar that it inspires people but i feel but with your life specifically where i mean maybe maybe this had happened to you to highlight the journey and so highly i i agree with you totally when you say that


i i agree with you totally when you say that you know uh because when i when i put the uh you know the tweet and on social media when i put the message out i thought that was it i'm gonna put this out message out shut it down he'll get ready see what is happening go through this journey uh what happened was that we had literally like a tsunami of messages that came back and the the the clear thread through these messages was of uh immense amount of people who had gone through this and you know what hit me was the fact that you think you know the world and you know you know general knowledge and you know what society is going through i had no idea that so many people go through cancer i had i who i'm exposed to the world is educated thought that oh it happens to some people and i realized that it's not so rare it has happened to so many people so why was it not spoken about and i realized that it was just


not spoken about and i realized that it was just never spoken about and we had so many people writing in saying how they haven't shared it with their families or with their mothers or with you know and how they were spending that time alone and here i was sitting there my family next to me my friends all coming up for me and i said oh my god look at what they're losing out when you don't share it you're losing out on all the love that you're going to get and that's when we decided that you know we'll talk about this journey and i didn't want to talk about it in oh how sad it is of course it is you don't have to say that but you know what there is more to it than just being sad and ill and i'm not going to lie about how tough it is but i'm not going to be i don't want sympathy for it and i do not want pt for it it's so negative and it's so non-constructive you know you


negative and it's so non-constructive you know you just doesn't there's nothing you can build from that so i just wanted to tell the truth about what it was in a normal way without being whiny about it because that's not me and i don't want i don't think that's the way to deal with it also so that's how the journey of me starting to talk about it started and i remember while i was there goldie sent me um this uh a picture of a headline from a newspaper and it was i think it was one of the financial or economic kind of papers you know in which the headline was that how the testing rate in india for cancer you know the markers that you test for cancer markers had gone up since i started speaking about it and he sent me that picture and he said that babe this is what it is and you know you need to speak because this is the change and you know we need to talk about this so don't feel that oh my god you know because


so don't feel that oh my god you know because there are times i'll be very honest with you because there are times from the line that i am in there were people who did ask me that oh what is the mileage you're getting out of it and so there would be times when we would we have had this conversation when i would say that you know goldie it's going to look like i'm am i does it look like i'm selling this what is happening and you know that when he sent that and he said you know just stop that thought don't think about it there is always going to be somebody who is going to find uh the way you deal with it in in a different way and that's their point of view you know why you are doing it and just keep doing what you're doing because it makes a difference and that's what it is it is something as simple as that and uh yeah from there if you see i i don't think that's what it is i think that matters that


that's what it is i think that matters that what you said when you have a celebrity as it is like as people like to say though i don't think that's a very good term to describe anybody but yeah if that's what it is and if my voice can be heard because i am a known person then this is definitely something this is a narrative i would want to talk about um i heard you say in a conversation with someone that there's parts of you that it also takes away does like a situation like that feel like an internal kind of purge also yeah other than the fact that quite actually and physically parts of my organs have been taken out yes it feels like i'm you know things have been taken away physically but yes uh on a more serious note mentally also okay it does take away uh certain parts of you and it gives you some other parts when i saw you outside um okay the thing is with the podcast i have to really gauge my guest a lot before


i have to really gauge my guest a lot before starting so that i can know how to navigate oh you had one of the most piercing uh gazers like uh in terms of you you were just like it was it was a very strong case that's what i'll say and uh yeah and i had a lot of i knew exactly how the podcast was gonna go and it was going to be positive that's what i felt okay uh when i said that you're one of the most positive people i've come across i genuinely mean that yeah but you know i have my moments and days off where i feel that gosh uh is it even worth it i mean why have we been doing this but uh yeah i i definitely go through those periods there's no doubt no two ways about it uh the trick is to not stay in it for too long because the moment you stay there and then it's a rabbit hole and you know you just go down that and it's very difficult to climb


go down that and it's very difficult to climb out of it so the idea is to catch it quickly and you know kind of pull yourself out and it's not easy it's definitely not easy i mean it's very easy to sit here and say that oh pull it out do this it's not easy i'm feeling really bad i made you cry like oh please um i'm actually very embarrassed about no no no no it's like come on yeah you don't know you don't know how much strength you're giving to like so many people out there there are intending to but if you can get strength out of it great can i ask you one last question about it yeah of course uh what does chemo feel like when it's happening in your body um is it is it very uncomfortable like what does it actually feel like because that's what a lot of people fear specifically about getting cancer like if if someone gets to know that they have cancer they think automatically oh my god i'll have


cancer they think automatically oh my god i'll have to go through chemo and then there's all these other narratives about alternative therapies and all that also coming out the chemo is as scary as they feel it is i mean i don't think i would want my i don't think i have enemies but if i had an enemy or if i'd hated somebody else i don't think i would wish that on to them also it's really uh it's it's not nice okay i think chemo is uh i mean the treatment of chemotherapy is worse than the disease itself but uh the fact so i was at fourth stage you know i had reached because it had metastasized and i was on fourth stage when i went uh my doctor said thirty percent chances that you will make it and i wanted to beat him up i must tell you why you wanna be there like what the hell do you mean by that you know i was so angry when you said that and i left from there


angry when you said that and i left from there and i mean today i love that surgeon of mine and you know and everything but that was the first time i met him and when he said that i if i i wanted to whack him literally like what the hell do you mean by that uh we just moved uh i mean we just gone in for the treatment we were taking that and then we realized that okay this is what it's going to take so we need to look for places to stay when you've gone for treatment so we've gone so unprepared over there so good he's like okay you're in the hotel room and i'm gonna go and look for the look at the apartment says i'm not gonna sit alone i'm coming with you he's saying you know how are you gonna do it i said i'm coming i'm not sitting alone at the end of the day at the on the watch i saw that i had walked nearly 10 kilometers you know in looking at places


nearly 10 kilometers you know in looking at places going with him you know because it was just the two of us with whoever i realized i had walked 10 kilometers that night when i sat in the room and you know goldie was so exhausted with everything that was happening in the running around he was passed out and i just couldn't sleep i was sitting in that window and i saw the sun coming up and i remember clicking the picture i've said this before in videos i remember clicking that picture and sending it to my team i have a great team and you know i love my girls because they've been with me for years and they're lovely but sending it to them and saying that switch on the sunshine and that's where it came from i said hashtag switch on the sunshine one day at a time this is it i'm not going to cry anymore i'd spend that night crying saying why me how could this happen and i said this ends here with this sun coming up


i said this ends here with this sun coming up i'm not going to look back on this this is what it is i move on from here we are going to look at it in a positive way i think this is happening to me because i need to learn something and i am going to rather than waste my time whining and hence missing out on the fact that i need to learn something out of it i'm not going to waste my time on that this has happened to me because universe is teaching wants to teach me something i will not say a lesson it sounds very like a teacher no i think i need to learn something maybe it's a pattern i need to break i don't know what it is but universe is trying to tell me teach me something i think i'm going to be uh i'm going to say that i accept this i x i'm not going to fight this i accept what has been given to me and i'm going to try and see what i can learn from


going to try and see what i can learn from this and that's how this journey started it's an honor just speaking to you and it feels incredible hearing your story from your voice i'm so happy that i can say it this way because like i said definitely for us in 90s one i didn't have this perspective on my life and to what was going on i have also grown and also you know with this uh people also say that now because you know from the time i started doing reality show it was more of you don't get lines so it was suddenly they were seeing me as me kamastika doom which you saw which you mentioned was the younger me because when i did by the way when i did chemistry at home i just finished i was at the peak of my career in the industry everybody thought i was mad i'd lost it why was i doing television but when i heard the show i enjoyed i i liked it so much and see that's what it is that


it so much and see that's what it is that you know what is it going to be is this what you're going to keep running behind here's a new opportunity and you know like make the most of it and goldie was like he had a take on it and he and he said that i think you should do it you there are so many things that you say no to certain people you don't want to work with like we discussed those possibilities were there in the industry so here there was a new way very corporate very this thing everything is a check and that's been going to be given to you and it was a new medium in that sense coming out in a new way so yeah i tried it and it was the best one i i suddenly reached people's living rooms and suddenly that kind of gave me a new lease of life never thought that would happen but it did happen and they saw a different side to me which was not um ever like um um i don't think


was not um ever like um um i don't think film magazines ever showed that science so yeah but it's the age of podcasts and social media yeah and uh realism yeah uh what is this next phase uh for you like how do you look at this phase of your life now you know for me when i started doing movies i did it for the paycheck because my family was going through very tough times and i needed the money and i needed to pay the rent and etc etc you know how a lot of people have been through that and it's everybody has their own struggles and they're different types of struggles just because you need to pay a payche rent and all is not the only struggle in life they're different types of struggles so i would i'm only saying this to say that you know i think we need to respect everybody's struggles but yeah that was my thing and the reason i was doing this was oh it was i wouldn't have made this kind of money in any


wouldn't have made this kind of money in any other profession and that was the idea to do this what i didn't expect was that because again like i said young naive and you know you were just walking around the clock where i could pause when i had my child when i looked back and i said oh i need to be here and you know so for me it was always like seven to eight years of your child when a child is born is when your eq and iq 80 of it has formed only 20 happens after that so as you know for seven eight years i want to be around you know so if i'm not there then goldie would be around we were very clear about wanting to be there and so then uh when i did the the judging and the talent shows that i was doing it came closest to going to office in my kind of career it was you know so i was not doing fiction at all because it was uh i didn't have i i wouldn't want to go for


didn't have i i wouldn't want to go for outdoors and you know when you prepare for a role and i just didn't have that bandwidth um but what this illness has done is that when it made like i said i mentioned the word earlier the clarity and i think for me the clarity that came in was that i always said i don't miss it i'm not so interested in it it's okay i can live without it what i realized was that today if i had a choice to choose other professions i just can't come up with any other profession because frankly there is no other place i would rather be and just for me to accept that and then say oh my god if that is the case i have just given up what i really love doing for so many years so it was like a wake-up call that what the hell am i doing and because even if i try i can't seem to find another profession and when you're working since you're 15 or 16 you're a working girl you


you're 15 or 16 you're a working girl you can't not work and sit at home i needed to work and then i realized this is the work that i like but it took that for me to for me to realize that i actually did without realizing it i had fallen in love with the profession which had happened to me by accident so to now that i realize it i want to enjoy this journey this time round i want i'm getting a second chance at it i want to do fiction i want to act i want to be in front of the camera but i want to enjoy the journey i want to enjoy the process and i want to learn because there is so much to learn i came in here so unprepared and i remain unprepared so i think this is the phase of my life where i prepare a little late probably but at least it's better late than never at least i get a chance to prepare for this profession that i have realized i love so that's why now


i have realized i love so that's why now i'm i'm going to be coming on with this uh show interesting show because again there were a couple of things that helped me um i wanted to play the a my age and i wanted to go beyond just looks i have nothing against the looks thank god i had the dna and i got the looks and i'm happy to be glamorous i think it's fab to be glamorous and i don't think just great roles are only when you're not looking glamorous i mean come on why shouldn't you look good i enjoy that also so i think the show that i'm doing called the broken news uh on z5 it kind of ticks all those boxes for me and uh so i'm very very excited about the show it'll be good we're all looking forward to seeing you in screen again yeah yeah and i would love to know what you think about it yeah 100 especially where news is going all over the world i won't just say in india yeah i'm


world i won't just say in india yeah i'm very curious to see what a show like that brings maybe we can do a recatch of that yeah sure for sure we'll talk about it after you've seen it then cool oh actually maybe not dangerous no no that's okay that's what podcasts are for you supposed to like talk about topics that mainstream media can't so i i don't want to talk about but you're so real we gotta we gotta put the realism out then okay i wanna say a couple of things at the end of this episode um every human has two lives and the second one begins when that human realizes that they only have one so oh my god yeah so it it kind of summarizes it needs to be made into a plaque yeah and i need to put it up yeah and a lot of the things you're saying echo that same thought it does and the second thing i really want to say is that i think you would be an incredible writer as well so


think you would be an incredible writer as well so uh i tried writing a book i didn't enjoy the process so okay uh and um honestly it just it's a very lonely process yeah for sure and you know right now the way i am what i've been through i don't want to be alone i just want to be surrounded by people i i want to be surrounded by life i want to feel alive because it's so scary to not have it that i just want to surround myself with it yeah any signing of notes at the end of this episode after giving out all this inspiration and good evidence oh my god didn't intend to uh i didn't intend it to be inspirational but if it does i'm so glad because we all look for inspiration i feel in you know and i think i am inspired i mean i would say that i'm inspired by you i love the fact that you know what you're doing you know like like a podcast putting you know you you


like like a podcast putting you know you you what what you what you want to think about what you you're actually making made that into a profession i think it's so inspirational to be able to do that i'm sure when you started there must be a lot of people who said that yeah you know and but you did it and you persisted and here you are today so i think that for me is inspirational so i don't think you need to be looking up down or whatever is just around us the inspiration and i think for me uh today's generation and what i see in in youngsters today is so inspirational and so much to learn from that i want to surround myself with that and keep learning well it's the power of that's all that's right i remember that i don't think i'll forget it always uh felt like you were really just don't want to know how old you were no no no fair didn't want to know okay but when i used to watch you in kamasi gado my


i used to watch you in kamasi gado my thought even though my mind wasn't completely developed then was that this is such a warm human being and that thought got validated now with a completely formed mind you're like a really warm positive human and uh there's been a lot of purpose behind everything that's happened in your life though a lot of things have been situational um i've done a lot of podcasts to know uh who the real ones are versus the ones who are pretending and uh really yeah and you are like the top of that list of real ones like uh there's no pretense there's just good energy so really thank you for being on the show thank you i hope you had fun i did i hope you did i did i did like uh i just i wanted to speak to you for a very long time yeah so today was a tick mark off my list that's what i'll say how's the experience for you it's good good i enjoyed it i it was a good conversation


i enjoyed it i it was a good conversation and i enjoy good conversations yeah i'm glad so now they've been there we've got to have our stations are sorry to interact but no you know conversations are two-way street now yes this wouldn't happen if it was i was not getting it from you okay i i hope that uh you if you enjoyed it from especially the inputs from my site what i will say is that because you're a reader you have 20 more podcasts in you so i'm looking forward to hosting you again sometime done i would love to in fact i think that because i see books and you enjoy uh doing that maybe you should and you do a lot of geopolitical stuff which is very interesting you get very interesting people on your things and you know the insights are very interesting so maybe the book that is on my book club right now maybe you should do something with that yeah with my book club yeah 100 i'm happy to always we need to save the reading culture


happy to always we need to save the reading culture i know in india especially absolutely uh all i'll say is they don't make them like you anymore thank you so thank you for being on the show thank you thank you thank you for making me feel so special all of us all of us were pumped about this so we had to make you feel special thank you thank you so that was the episode with sonali bendrey i feel the best podcasters are the ones who are also leaders and she's a big reader of books she's a big accumulator of knowledge and that's why it was such a pleasure speaking with her she had a wide perspective about a bunch of topics and i sincerely hope she returns on the runway show for an episode where there isn't much of a time constraint where it's a more free-flowing conversation because i also feel the best of sonali bendrei is yet to be seen by the indian internet her new show the broken news is now live on z5 so go and


broken news is now live on z5 so go and check it out right now i'll link it down below and also remember to follow us on spotify every episode is available on spotify 48 hours before it's available anywhere else in the world randy and the team we'll see you soon [Music] you


[Music] this particular episode was made primarily for international audiences i promise you when it comes to world war two you won't find such a comprehensive podcast on the internet this man's knowledge this man's know-how and just the amount of data he's able to retain in his own mind we have spoken about the chronology of world war ii but we've also gone on a lot of deep tangents we've brought in conspiracy theories we've brought in a sort of dissection of the world wars and we've spoken about the modern day geopolitical impact that the two world wars had on our planet remember to follow us on spotify where spotify exclusive which means that every episode is available on spotify 48 hours before it's available anywhere else in the world this is abhijit chavdra with his commentary on world history [Music] mr chavda welcome back to the ranvi show thank you very much always great to be with you we've been creating some super hit podcast off late uh the center around geopolitics a subject that


late uh the center around geopolitics a subject that the world needs to know more about primarily because traditional news media hasn't been reporting geopolitical news the way it should be i feel a big section of the world has to enter the world of podcasts the world of twitter to get the information but i also feel to truly understand geopolitics you have to understand the history of the world which also allows you to kind of predict the future a little bit but let's begin by talking about world war ii specifically for the modern day geopolitical scenario do you feel that that event those uh few years were kind of impactful for the rest of the century very much so because the events of the of the two world wars they set up this the geopolitical chess board for the cold war to ensure so everything that we are seeing today in the world is a consequence of what happened in that 30-year period in which you had the two world wars which i actually called the european tribal wars including


which i actually called the european tribal wars including technology like even yes what what domains kind of got affected other than just geopolitics our technology uh really shaped up in this period because when world war one started there were weapons available at that time itself that had never been used before so it was all new technology they were using at the time and it took them some time to get used to it and to figure out how to use it then you had the advent of chemical weapons a horrible thing then airplanes in warfare first it was used for reconnaissance then they started equipping plates with machine guns then bombs and all that so all of this took off tanks were first introduced in world war one and so much more and a lot of these wartime technologies eventually translate themselves to become everyday technologies for mankind see any technology typically is first used by the military and then there are spin-offs of those technologies that have uh civilian applications so typically the military in any country is is using


so typically the military in any country is is using technology that's 20 years before it it comes out into the civilian domain the reason i bring up technology so early in this podcast is because i think our entire generation takes technology for granted uh it's it's so much around us but uh we don't understand the impact that those years had because our generations have never actually faced a severe world war yet yet i say yet with a lot of caution i think the last episode was about world war three and it's possibilities um we'll talk about that probably in the next episode we'll address this whole world war three angle again right now let's get back to world war two the 1930s or as far back as you want to take it where would you start this whole world war two story so yeah the last time we spoke about ukraine i went back 2000 years so let me not do that this time i will go back to the 19th century so world war one so i call these two


century so world war one so i call these two wars the european tribal wars that's what it's european conflict you know old historical grievances and all that spilled out and it kind of engulfed the world but it was primarily caused in europe and the causes were european so uh there were two wars the first war was called the great war and then you had the second great war which they now called world war one in world war ii so world war one happened in uh began in 1914 so to understand the causes you have to go back in time right let's go back at least 50 60 years so uh europe has always been a place of great conflict always there's always been these conflicts between various uh kings emperors and all that so typically conflict goes back the root cause of conflict is territory its power so historically europe has been a feudal place feudal lords ruled various dominions in europe and the power it came from land they


in europe and the power it came from land they owned vast tracts of land and the real power came from the agriculture that happened in this land so they had complete control over agriculture this is before the industrial revolution so the great lords the great kings emperors they would own massive amounts of land and everybody who lived on that land was was present and they would pay taxes to these people in in in the form of typically agricultural produce or something else so that is where and they had armies to control these people so and previously they also had slavery so historically that was the source of power of the great lords and kings and emperors then the industrial revolution happened and then what happened is the entire society changed uh the power in the money the source of wealth became industries and most of the industries were concentrated in the urban centers so then the peasants were incentivized to move to urban urban centers new rich people came up and the old


urban centers new rich people came up and the old power structure was kind of uh shaken up and that caused a lot of conflicts who did the industries sell to all the rest of the world the industries were about creating uh new technologies and they would typically sell it to armies to the people okay right to the people and people want things like light bulbs or whatever i'm just giving a random example but lots of new things came up transportation steam engines uh cotton producing cotton in in in a industrial manner in a mechanical manner instead of doing it by hand so that also i mean people need these things right in the past peasants were very poor they used to wear ragtag clothing now they also aspired to wear good clothing and all that so you could produce that in in a cheap way and sell it to peasants and make money out of that and that sort of thing so the society society changed because of all these massive changes that came about due to the