While the nation goes into deep meditation for the first ten days of Ramazan, 11th roza onwards sees a flurry of social activity emerge, building up for festivities around Eid ul Fitr. Ramzan is usually a busy season as films begin gearing up for Eid release, fashion gets a welcome spike thanks to men and women who just have to shop for iftar parties, suhoors and eventually Eid events…it’s happy time all over!
Wajahat Rauf, whose upcoming film Chhalawa starring Mehwish Hayat, Azfer Rehman, Zara Noor Siddiqui and Asad Siddiqui is up for an Eid ul Fitr release, hosted a Games Night at his place last night. It turned out to be a fun way to host a media junket for his film’s promotion, as there were as many cameras as there were people. My main objective was to get some 121 talk-time with the super busy Mehwish Hayat, who has been very hard to get hold of lately.
Azfer Rehman, Shazia Wajahat, Mehwish Hayat and Wajahat Rauf
In my quest to find Mehwish, I walked through Wajahat’s gate to find Adnan Shah Tipu and Ali Hamza playing table tennis right at the entrance. Adnan Shah Tipu, of course, is in the film but he’s also super popular these days because of his character in Suno Chanda. Stepping into the house, I found Mehwish getting photographed and looking every bit as bad ass as she actually is. Mehwish, over the years, has gotten a reputation of being a fun, fearless female (as Vogue would put it) and she makes one wish there were more like her in the industry. “Does it look like I care?” is a caption she often gives on her Insta posts and she later spoke about how she deals with incessant trolling.
Zara Noor Abbas, who’ll be making a big screen debut with Chhalawa, with her husband and co-star, Asad Siddiqui
Mehwish and I sat down for an interview (which you’ll get to read in Instep on Sunday) but there was a lot of mingling before and after. Wajahat Rauf and his lovely life Shazia were playing perfect hosts, making sure the table laden with goodies was continuously restocked. There is no limit to how much people can eat between iftar and sehri. Azfer Rehman was sporting a youthful new haircut and looking good. Zara and Asad were getting photographed together, making one wonder how much of their real life chemistry will reflect on the big screen.
This has to be said: Mehwish Hayat was kicking ass in Mortal Kombat until she lost to Adeel Hussain. “I beat her as a semi clad Amazonian warrior,” he laughed at his game persona.
Syed Jibran and Adeel Husain
Who else? Syed Jibran and his lovely wife came and obviously got comments on his character, Sahir from Ranjha Ranjha Kardi. I spotted popular YouTuber Junaid Akram and Shafaat Ali, who also interviewed the cast. Yasir Hussain had apparently come and left early; it would have been nice to have caught up with him. I also bumped into Mansha Pasha just when we were leaving; mental note to call her for a post-Laal Kabootar chat!
