Arshia Kapadia

Good evening.

How are you doing today?

So, my name is Arshia and I'm made in Bombay, India, where I spent most of my life.

I'm an only child and my mom was a single parent, a teacher.

Ammi had a deep love for life and all the finer things in life.

Her saree collection was absolutely beautiful.

She collected sarees from all over India.

Her jewelry collection was fabulous, much coveted.

She actually had so many incredible pieces that all of her cousins often borrowed some of them and never returned it, so maybe I should follow up on that.

I remember the house was never empty.

She loved cooking, she loved feeding people.

Sometimes people were almost sitting on top of each other, fighting for that last scoop of biryani.

But I think not a lot of people are aware of this, that Ammi had a secret addiction.

She was a lover of lipsticks.

Her eyes lit up like diamonds when she saw a tube of lipstick.

Shiny, creamy, beautiful, glistening, just waiting to be applied.

Her favorite colors were the darker reds, the maroons, the rusts.

Shinier the better, I think was her motto.

But I think what she really wanted and lusted were those elusive foreign brands that we didn't get in India back then.

They came encased in these shimmery golden tubes, and you were dependent on your foreign relatives to, you know, hustle them into the country for you.