'Count your blessings, feel gratitude for the medical and essential services providers and police forces who are staking their lives to fight this invisible enemy.'
Swara Bhaskar celebrated her birthday in lockdown when her family and friends came together to shower her with love.
Swara has been spending time with her pets and has been working out her digestive system!
"I am eating like never before!" she tells Subhash K Jha.
You celebrated your birthday on April 9 'virtually' with your friends.
Yes!
My whole family got on a Zoom call. I was expecting that.
But I wasn't expecting that there would be a slide show with photographs of me from my birth to now.
Then suddenly friends started joining in and I was like okay!
Then the elders left and some more close friends joined in, and everyone in their own Zoom chat windows pulled out drinks and the party began!
My sister-in-law Bhoomika Joshi and cousin Veda Shastri had been planning for weeks.
Bhoomika decorated the house.
A friend came up with a fun quiz on my life! Every wrong answer meant a shot of what you were drinking.
Bhoomika and her brother in Delhi and my brother Ishaan in Jakarta had prepared dance performances.
A friend baked a gorgeous cake in the US and symbolically cut it for me.
There were speeches and camaraderie and I felt absolutely blessed to be so loved and valued.
Birthday apart, how is the lockdown treating you?
Very well. In some sense it is an enforced staycation.
I am very lucky to have a safe, comfortable, home with enough supplies for me and my pets.
Luckily, my cook and house help stays in the house, so I am not starving.
On the contrary, I am getting to eat well, which is such a privilege in these times.
I count my blessings and feel gratitude daily.
How are you passing the time?
The major part of my time is tending to my pets, including a rescued mongrel that I adopted just a few days before the lockdown.
My responsibility in household chores is cleaning the cat litter, the dog poop, watering the plants and machine-washing the clothes.
I am wasting a lot of time on Instagram. I plan to be productive and finish writing a script I amworking on.
Is this a time of introspection for you?
This is a time for introspection as well as observation, assessment and understanding.
I am not watching movies at all actually.
I am trying to read and write, if possible.
Are you doing your exercises at home?
Not at all!
The only body part that is working out is my digestive tract.
I am eating like never before!
Perhaps it is stress eating or emotional eating, but it is a no holds barred culinary fest at home.
Carbs, sugar, junk food, it is all on the table!
The sleep schedule is awfully disturbed. I sleep in shifts.
I waste time on Instagram till say 4 am, then I sleep till 7 am.
I walk, feed, exercise and clean my dog, Godot. He is six months old and rather cute.
Then I sleep again from 8:30 am to 1:30 pm.
Your advice to fans, followers and friends?
STAY AT HOME!
Count your blessings, feel gratitude for the medical and essential services providers and police forces who are staking their lives to fight this invisible enemy.
Take this opportunity to connect with your family and friends (on the phone), appreciate those around you, do things in the house you normally wouldn't have time for.
Clean your cupboard, spring clean the house, play board games, read a book and learn to be at peace with yourself.
Use video chat!
Think of this as a break the whole planet is taking together.
And remember, this too shall pass.
