I had planned a small post-dinner meeting with Neil, Shubhra and Suketu to discuss some of the new scripts for the Bright Biscuits ad film. Apparently Neil and Shubhra had worked with one of my ideas to come up with what they thought was a blockbuster script and I couldn’t wait to hear it. I tried to imagine what the script would be like; the idea I had shared with the team had involved showing a series of sticky situations in different settings where the protagonist would beat the odds by munching on a Bright Biscuit and getting a smart idea to deal with the problem he or she was in. I had also wanted the ad film to have a funky, comic feel and not a serious tone.

‘Squeeze mee!’ Someone yelped in my ear and I looked up to see that the lovey-dovey couple had made the transition from aqua to terra firma and had now positioned themselves bang in front of me. They were both generously proportioned, having been blessed by Mother Nature rather abundantly in that department and the husband now held out a chubby hand to me with a digicam in it.

‘Can you take our picture, please?’ he asked with an ingratiating smile as his wife dissolved in fits of giggles beside him for some weird reason.

‘Sure,’ I gave a sigh of resignation. ‘Where would you like me to take it?’

‘Oh, right here!’ the husband replied excitedly and squished himself down on the recliner next to me. His wife arranged herself with great decorum on his ample lap and clinging to each other they looked up at me with large frozen smiles. I hoisted myself off the recliner with another sigh, adjusted the settings on the digicam and took a snap.

‘Here you go.’ I handed the camera back to the husband and was about to sit down again when I noticed him shaking his head in disappointment.

‘No, no, no!’ he said, as I looked at him in puzzlement. ‘It’s all wrong! The light is all wrong! Can you take another one? Please?’

‘Huh? Oh okay, sure.’ I got up again and took two snaps this time so that there wouldn’t be any more retakes, but the husband was having none of it.

‘No, no, no!’ he said again, more vehemently this time, and stood up to show me how the filtering of light was not effective enough, thereby failing to flatter the exquisite cheekbone definition of his wife’s face.

‘Look, dude,’ I snapped. ‘Maybe you should just a hire a professional photographer to take your blasted snaps.’

‘Maybe I can help,’ said a familiar voice before I could elaborate further on exactly what I thought of people who ruined other people’s peace with their fascination to have their mugs photographed. I turned around to see Yudi standing there, grinning. He shot me an amused smile and took the digicam from my hands, asking the couple to relax and get comfortable. Then he took a series of photographs, quickly and efficiently, like a total photography pro, even making a few funny quips that made the wife dissolve into more fits of giggles. ‘Okay, one last snap!’ he finally said, aiming the camera for the final shot. ‘Say cheese, guys!’ The husband put his arms around his wife—an admirable achievement considering her girth—and they looked at Yudi and giggled self-consciously, their chins shaking in unison like multiple layers of jelly. Yudi clicked away and handed the camera with a flourish to the husband who immediately began ooh-ing and aah-ing over the quality of the snaps.