Yasmin’s story of Meeting Raja Hasan in New Delhi
Yasmin - THANK YOU VERY MUCH!! We really appreciate your efforts. Thanks especially for writing a detail summary even though you had a very tough schedule. You sure have made a lot of souls very happy! WE LOVE YOU and God Bless You Always!!
Well guys, I am finally writing as promised. As I wrote earlier, I was in Delhi a couple of months ago, to attend the weddings of a ‘few’ family and friends.
The first wedding was one grand affair with the celebrations going on for four full days. Well, it was on the Mehndee ceremony of this wedding (24th December 2008 to be precise) which was held at this fancy hotel in Delhi, that I met Raja and Himani.
As I entered the hall, I couldn’t help noticing how beautifully it was decorated in the color green. All the women present there, were flaunting their exotic ensembles, some of them dressed in beautiful green ghararas, while others in sparkling green saris. The gorgeous looking young bride, the center of attention, was dressed in a heavily embroidered green silk gharara and some beautiful ancestral jewelry. She was seated on the stage surrounded by all her pretty, young friends and classmates who had specially flown from the USA to be with her; my 19 year old niece being one of them.
Amidst all this festivity, an announcement was made to proceed to the dining hall for dinner. As we reached the dining hall, my friend beckoned me to join her at a table which was right in front near the stage. “Oh God,” I thought, “the music will surely be deafening.” As we were enjoying our sumptuous Moghlai dinner, a gentleman announced that the dinner would soon be followed by an evening of fun and entertainment by none other than the famous Sa Re Ga Ma Pa duo- Raja Hasan and Himani Kapoor. Immediately I turned to my sister and asked, “Sis, did I just here the name Raja Hasan?” “You bet you did Appe,” was my sis’s gleeful reply. It seemed too good to be true! Suddenly my cell phone rang, and I thought “Oh great!” I stepped outside in the hallway to answer my call as it was too noisy inside. After finishing the call, I looked up and guess what I saw. Raja Hasan was standing at the far end of the hall, talking to some guy (his manager I suppose). “Excellent opportunity,” I thought, and walked straight up to him. He looked up at me and smiled hesitatingly. I began with, “Raja, do you remember me?” He thought for a second and suddenly his eyes lit up with excitement and he very happily replied, “Han han, aapse mai miami mein mila thaa, right, aur aapne meri tasveer bhee banaake mujhe dee thee. Sach mein, wo tasveer aaj bhi mere kamre mein tangee hui hai.” Sach or no sach, Raja, but at least the poor guy was trying so hard to please me. Then at length we talked a little and I mentioned that my husband and children had decided to stay behind in the USA, as their last college semester had been very hectic and all of them were quite tired. Hearing this, Raja very charmingly blurted out “Aunty, mai bhee to aapka beta hoon.” “But of course Raja,” I replied. “MashAllah mere do bete hain. Ek USA mein aur ek tum ho.” This seemed to please Raja a lot and he grinned happily. I also told him how last year, Manish, Jugal, Padma, Mao, mein, Raffu, Amrita, etc., etc. had voted for him continuously. Hearing Padma’s name, he went on to explain how he had spotted her car on the busy Bombay highway. He also mentioned how Padmajee was a very sweet lady. “Han Raja,” I readily agreed. “Padma bahut achi hain.” I was about to leave when someone mentioned about taking a picture. I immediately fished out my digital camera, and in a second Raja had jumped forward and given a perfect pose with Himani and me (Himani had joined us later). At this point I would like to mention that Raja is an extremely jovial and fun loving guy and he never misses an opportunity to laugh loudly, even on the slightest pretext.
Now, for all the young ladies on this forum who wanted to know how Raja looked. Well, the first thing I noticed immediately was his weight. He had lost quite a bit of it and was looking very trim and fit. Oh yes! He has grown his curly black locks again. He was wearing this fancy black embroidered jacket and black pants. His pointed shoes also looked very stylish.
Back at the hall, dinner being over, everyone was waiting anxiously for Raja. Finally he came bounding on the stage like a young prince and immediately started singing. He belted out one amazing song after another, driving the crowd into a frenzy. Finally, nearly everyone was on the dance floor grooving away. I, however, was quite content to sit on my chair, listening to Raja sing and watching the crowd dancing crazily. Finally, one of my friends managed to drag me to the dance floor where I joined my sister and the rest of my friends. Seeing me on the dance floor, Raja gave me a big smile, as if saying, “That’s good Aunty. Finally you’re dancing too.” He did mingle with the crowd, talking to people, joking with the bride’s parents and other ladies. Soon he was hot and sweating and took off his jacket.
Finally after some time, my sister and I decided to leave (an hour early) because the next morning we had to catch an eleven o’ clock flight to Lucknow.
Now guess what happened the next morning! As we reached the airport, my sister who was sitting on the other side of the car, suddenly said, “Apa, is that Raja Hasan?” I looked out and sure enough it was Raja, dressed in an orange jogging suit. He was dragging his suitcase behind him and walking with his friends. “Raja mian,” I called out loudly. Hearing his name, Raja turned and seeing us came running to our car.
My sister and I got down from the car and both of us started showering Raja with our blessings as he patiently and gratefully looked on, smiling as usual. Now our Raja’s twinkling eyes do not miss much, and I noticed with great amusement that he had immediately cast a quick glance at my pretty young niece who was still sitting inside the car.
As I’m usually nervous about missing planes, we bid Raja goodbye and got busy with our luggage. Once inside the airport, I noticed that throughout the various procedures, Raja was walking just a few feet behind us, sometimes talking on the cell phone etc. etc., but all the time being extremely calm and composed as he is such a seasoned traveler. I, however, was busy checking my luggage etc. etc., so I could not find the time to talk to him again.
Well guys, I have written more than my share. All I can say is that after dressing up every day for nearly two weeks for all those weddings, I have completely sworn off makeup and dressing up and I feel so happy and relieved!
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Yasmin api… what a beautiful narration… it was awesome reading your meet with Raja. It felt like I was just there standing and witnessing all this. You have a brilliant way of telling things… God bless you!! and love you very much!!
I am very happy that Raja remembered and had such a fabulous memory of Miami. and the way he came towards your car at the airport was sweet.. keep it up raja….God bless You!!
Padma…. congratulations darling… Raja remembers you so well…. i am so happy for you :o)
wow…. feels great after reading… now am getting back to my work…. take care all and keep smiling… love u all!!
padma…. you owe us a treat dear
Thank you so very much for the beautiful write-up Yasmin. It’s almost as if I’m meeting Raja…. hehehehe
what a beautiful narration yasmin. i enjoyed each and every moment of your meeting with raja hasan.
very beautfiul writing Yasmin Aapa .thank you so much.its because of friends & fans like you , we are able to know so many interesting incidents involving Raja hasan .
YASMIN thank you soooooooo much for taking the time out of your busy schedule and updating us!!! Im soo happy you got to spend some time with Raja and bumped into him again the next day…..and special thanks for remembering all of us here at rh.com:) We love u dearly!!!!
Padma, its soo sweet Raja spoke soo nicely of you (although we already know how wonderful you are)…it tells u how much he genuinely likes you!!! Congrats
Wow….thanks yasmin for sharing your experience. I am telling you, jabh Khuda deta hai to chapar paad ke deta hai…MASHALLAH…..Congrats dear
wow indeeed great to know that Raja said such nice things. Thanks all my friends for congratulating me. I am so happy.
and Yasmin great job at narration, me too almost felt as if I was physically witnessing all this. Also sad that we cant see your face in the pic but you really look amazingly lovely and your clothes look so beautiful, love the colour and standing inbetween two people clothed in black and other dark colours makes its vibrancy stand out even more. Could you send some more oics of you where we can see your lovely face yasmin?
also really felt compelled to mention, from no angle do you look like an aunty!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr Raja!!!!
And Raja does look rather dishy as well. Great.
Love,
Padma
and yasmin thanks so much for speaking abt me to raja and especially for mentioning Manish’s name because my fervent prayer is that Raja acknowledges Manish’s crucial role in shaping up his success. Really, only then will I consider that justice will be done. I have also always tried to make him understand this fact. It was really very kind and thoughtful of you and I appreciate that. Dont much care abt me but care a hell of a lot for manish’s work to be recognized by the man who matters.
OMG Yasmin ji .. This is AMAZING…Thankk youu soo much for sharing your experience with uss….i totally enjoyed readingg it…you’re soo luckyyy .. you met him at the ceremony …and then bumped into him the next day…wow…its just so amazing..congrats to you..loveee you!
Padma….Congrattttsss to you as well…love you!
same here sadia love you too.
yasmin has your face been deliberately occulted???
but dont worry from the rest that can be seen i can imagine how beautiful you must be.
and my belief is that inner beauty is what gets reflected as outer beauty because if there is no inner beauty outer beauty fails to impress over a period of time since it is but a shell.
mmao is also so so so beautiful and raffu and i am sure each and every member here is.
Yasmin aunty…..It was a pleasure to read your experience!!
Thank you very much for sharing this with us
Yes i agree with Padma…u dont look like aunty.. though we can not see your face, I can tell you are young
Raffu my dear, I was so happy you liked my narration about my meeting with Raja. Thank you so much!
And please don’t worry about not having returned my call. I know how far you have to drive to work. Even at my place, once my husband gets home I get really busy. So maybe one of these days when he’s working late I will call you; for I wanted to talk to you about something. Is it ok if I call you around 9 PM Eastern Time on a weekday or a weekend? Let me know. By the way Raffu, I love all your articles on this web site. I haven’t written anything for a long time though. Keep up the good work dear. Allahhafiz.
Padma, thank you so much for all the lovely compliments you have paid me! It is really so very sweet and kind of you. Now I know why Raja remembers you so fondly.
And you’re right about my sari color. It does stand out in the picture, even though I was one of the few people not dressed in green that day. When in Delhi, I had thought about contacting you but this visit of mine was so hectic that I finally gave up the idea. Thank you once again, bye my dear!
Zahida, thank you for liking my write up. And you are so right about it being Allah’s will; for each of the three times I met and spoke with Raja, I did not have to make any effort at all! It all happened so smoothly, Mash’Allah. By the way, I love all your ziggies. You are very talented indeed!
Amrita my dear, thank you so much for appreciating my efforts to describe my meeting with Raja. I am glad that my narration made so many people happy. It was just a small contribution on my part. You guys, however, do so much for this site. I salute to you all.
Shobha dearest, Shashi jee, Ahmed mian, Sadia beta, and Avantika darling, I am extremely happy that all of you enjoyed my narration and said such positive and sweet things about it. Thank you so much! Like I wrote earlier, it was my duty to share this experience with all of you, for I know how eager Raja’s fans are to get any news about him. Besides, you guys contribute so much to this site in spite of your busy schedules. Hats off to all you guys!
@ Yasmin
and to all my friends here
Please guys if you ever happen to come to Delhi do do do do call me. I ll give you my tel no if you ask me for it ok? I am quite impatient to meet up after all the lovely moments that we share on a day-to-day basis.
and Yamin you should not be thanking us lovely lady, we should be doing so ok?
Take care all,
Padma with love
yes yasmin jee ..Padma is rite. we shud be thanking you….so thanks a lot for taking a little time out of ur busy schedule and narrating us the beautiful incident.
Thanks yasmin for the detail.
you are truely fortunate that you met Raja but many of people like me are still waiting to met their DREAMBOY.
yasmin api… thanks so much for writing a personilized message.. that is soooooooooo sweet of you. actually my side things are getting soooooooooo hectic due to my moving back to India on May 31st and i work in new york so by the time i go home, its 7:30/ 8 pm. as t he time is approaching faster, things are getting crazy. but i would love to listen to you and will call you this saturday around 1 pm eastern time. hope that time is okay or else i can call earlier or later. God bless you Yasmin api… may he always keep you healthy, wealthy, happy and fill your life with love and laughter. amen!!
zillions of love hugs and kisses,
raffu
Raffu my dear,1p.m. eastern time is just fine.If you are busy, then i will call you.I hope and pray that all your packing goes smoothly.I will really miss you though. Please don’t stop visiting this site.Khudahafiz.
Hospitalized to manage pain. My niece, knowing my interest in music and the magicians who never fail to surprize you, handed me the laptop, and I learned about Raja Hasan, the charmer, the honest God fearing man, with a big Taweez hanging from his neck singing, Mauli, the innocent and naive girl whom I would like to protect, Gulzar Gi’s beautiful daughter paying tribute to Amanats’s singing her father’s written song,; the producer,,jeans and jacket and immense energy to search for good and serve it.
A man with positive energy and immense warmth.
I am an old man. The few I mentioned above, I would like to meet and know them. This is the first time that I have ever written to a movie star or singer etc. I would be grateful if an opportunity opens the door to know these magicians. Please repond
Mansoor