The glamorous film star, in New York for a new project she’s working on these days, sits down for a heart-to-heart on the meaning of life and why it’s important tocleanse it of everything toxic and artificial.
Meeting Meera in New York was delightful. The first thing I noticed about her as I walked into her friend Hamid’s famous Vidal Sassoon salon in mid-town NYC was her warm and very welcoming nature. Here, at the salon, Meera was getting her hair done for an upcoming surprise movie project she’s working on these days. She immediately ordered some hot tea for me on that cold snowy day and we began chatting.
I was surprised to discover that Meera has been a US national for almost 12 years and Long Island, New York is her second home, where she lived for almost a decade. She had taken the subway to the salon and seemed very comfortable with her subway routes and directions. There were no airs, frills, or fancies about Meera Jee.
I asked her when she had arrived in NY and if she enjoyed the snow storm that we got yesterday. A simple question like that took a mystical tangent and Meera at once turned to her spiritual side.
“Travel doesn’t excite me anymore; it’s part of my job and is more fatigue than fun,” she said. “I can go wherever I want to and whenever I want to. My final destination is my grave. There is no existence beyond that. The reality is that no amount of money, fame, or success matters because we all ultimately go in our graves. I believe in enjoying life fully and spending all my money without saving for rainy days. Death is on my mind all the time, ever since I lost my 21-year old brother in a car accident in New York 15 years ago.”
At this point, Meera got teary eyed, then wiped her tears and continued.
“It’s okay and normal for tragedies to happen in life. The important thing is to react to tragedies with strength and courage and to learn from them. My learning has been to enjoy each moment and each day and not to make this world my permanent home because it’s not. Meditation brings me peace. I do however love the simple American life where everyone works hard, is self-made and not a burden on anyone. I made my own breakfast, washed my dishes, and took the train into New York City this morning and loved every second of it. The $13 train ticket was the best purchase I made in NYC so far! No issues of maid/driver dependency and I’m enjoying my independence while here.”
It seemed like New York was one of Meera’s favourite destinations.
“For me NYC is the best!” she agreed wholeheartedly. “LA is next in line. Italy is a close contester and Lahore tou phir Lahore hai.”
Now that we’ve talked about death, let’s talk about life, I said, steering the conversation to a happier place. What does life mean to you?
“Life is about staying positive, not judging anyone and enjoying life to the fullest and appreciating Allah’s blessings,” she said after some thought. “Look out on the street – there are all kinds of people walking around and no one cares about what the other is wearing, where they are going, who they are going with. That right there displays a true progressive society. Educating one’s self and self-motivation are strong elements of life and of ensuring progressive future generations. I don’t believe in inheritance; it enables people to become lazy and encourages families to fight and disunite. Health is very important to me. I eat healthy and exercise a couple of times a week. Respect is crucial in life – in my field, unfortunately there’s no respect. Even after working in the film industry for so many years, I feel there is no respect for an individual. There is plenty of love and respect that I receive from my fans. I love my fans and they are the ones who motivate me. However, respect is missing from the industry. People are more prone to making fun of us and criticizing us rather than encouraging us.”
“But life for me is about being independent, strong and generally happy,” she wrapped up my question. “Living in the moment and living for the moment is key. Everyone comes and goes. Life is too short for negativity.”
How do you spend the rare and precious free time you get in your super busy schedule, I asked her? Meera has been busy with a project that she was unable to talk about at the time.
“Spare time is rare yet very valuable,” she said. “My ideal way to spend that time is to have messy hair, no make-up, be in pajamas and be a bum all day. There are days when I don’t want to speak to anyone.”
I’m sure your fans would love to know what motivates you everyday?
“My dear fans!” she exclaimed, with genuine love for her fans. “They are the best and they are a source of motivation for me every day. I like to make them happy and I like to make people laugh. I crack jokes and make fun of myself to make them laugh. They laugh but they also love and respect me. Industry people just laugh at me and that’s hurtful. However, to each their own. I don’t care that much and don’t care about my image at all. I am not answerable to anyone but my God. You know people talk about royalty and upper class and nonsense values like that. To me royalty is not having properties, businesses, etc. Royalty is about mannerism. Being sensitive to other peoples’ feelings and not hurting people intentionally is true royalty. Living in big houses is not royalty. But that class is slowly dying. I get inspired by people who perhaps live in small houses but have big hearts.”
Turning to the lighter side of life, I asked Meera about the pressure to look good and glamorous all the time and the fact that people were getting all sorts of artificial injections/fillers, botox, even surgeries to look perfect. How did she deal with all that pressure?
“I believe in eating healthy and feeling healthy,” she replied. “I am inspired by Hollywood actors where they are proud of their wrinkles and their wrinkles tell their life stories. We need to embrace our wrinkles – I do! They are part of my personality and as an actor I need to show different expressions. Injecting fillers etc. would kill my expressions and I do not want that. I am strongly against slimming pills, artificial foods, and also against artificial people and celebrities (pun unintended).”
I had a great afternoon getting to know Meera. As I was heading out, she asked if I was hungry and we decided to grab a bite. Even before heading to a nearby restaurant, she stated that we will go only if we pay for ourselves. I said sure but we will have to follow the same rule when in Lahore! “Lahore mein yeh nahin chalay ga!” she said playfully.
– Eemaan Samdani is a US based Digital and e-commerce senior consultant for a fortune 500 company in NYC and can be contacted on eemaanasiddiqi@gmail.com
