At the end of the 40-minute interview, I had managed to utter only 10 sentences. Jalpa Parikh, director of Centre Point grinned and admitted, ?Typical of me. I've an enormous capacity to speak. My husband keeps telling me to remain quiet for some time in the day.?

There was a dreamy look in her eyes as she spoke of her husband. ?I knew my husband since childhood. But we lost touch. We again met after a gap of 11 years when I had come down from Mumbai to Jamshedpur to meet my grandparents. It was a long-distance relationship. I came down to meet him only once in the two years of our courtship. However, he visited me several times.?

Despite the bliss of happy domesticity Jalpa never intended to sit at home. ?The first day after marriage I followed my mother-in-law, Smita Parikh, the woman behind Fortune Hotel Centre Point, all over the place. In fact so interested was I in doing something constructive with my life that I started working even before my honeymoon?.

And work, she explains, did not have any fixed parameter. ?I had an international degree from IATA in travels and tourism, a three year diploma in sales management and advertising and had done my internship with Lintas, Mumbai. I not only helped my mother-in-law with the hotel business, but also tried to assist my husband in his Hyundai, Mahindra and Yamaha car and two-wheeler delearship business.?

The past couple of weeks have been hectic for this lady what with the launch of the City Caf?, Centrepoint?s latest gift to the city. ?I have been involved with almost every minute detail about the cafe, right from deciding the menu to planning the logo and advertising. In fact now that the food trials are on I?ve eating all the time.?

?Are you a foodie?? I asked. ?Ah, absolutely,? she winked. ?I can eat through out the day and not feel an iota of guilt. I love all types of cuisine. There have actually been times when I?ve had a bowl of sprouted moong for lunch and felt happy about it the entire day!? Moong? For lunch? I gasp. ?Yeah. And sometimes just plain dhoklas.? Seeing the dazed look on my face Jalpa must have realised that I was wondering whether City Caf? would offer moong and plain dhoklas for lunch! She hastily produced a menu card and pointed out to an item, chicken junglee?. ?That is a favourite. Mom?s recipe.?

And while on the subject of favourites, Jalpa confesses she has a ?thing? for sitcoms. ?Basically, I need to have my two hours with the TV and more often than not, I end up watching either reruns of Friends or of Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi.

?What about shopping, the perennial disease women suffer from?? I asked. ?Oh yes. Show me one woman who does not like shopping. I still remember how my mother-in-law chuckled when on a holiday in Spain I insisted on buying a T-shirt from a roadside stall for a mere $3.?

As I shook hands and bade Jalpa good bye a thought struck me. ?If there is one thing you could change about your life what would that be?? I asked. Nothing. Life is perfect,? smiles Jalpa

Jasmeeta Dubey