I met two celebrities and watched six movies this week!

Wow, this week was quite hectic, full of exciting events and firsts for me! And on top of all of that, I also had the flu and missed two days of work!

So, it all started on Monday, when the President of Zambia, Mr. Levi Mwanawasa, paid a visit to Seattle. He was here along with his cabinet to sell Zambia as a foreign investment destination to the US. I sat about five rows from the podium and got to see up close what he had to say about Zambia. Overall, it was an interesting talk, and it was nice to see that this President has done more good to the country than any of his predecessors. According to President Mwanawasa, Zambia is now a prime destination for western foreign investment for many reasons. New business friendly laws including an initial 5 year tax-free incentive, improving infrastructure, good climate, an English speaking population, and most importantly, peace and stability make Zambia attractive to foreign investment. Zambia has an abundance of arable land and irrigation water supply, exquisite wildlife, and precious metals and stones making commercial agriculture, tourism and mining as viable industries for foreign investment. I think that the case was compelling and President Mwanawasa ended the talk hopeful to see his American friends visiting Zambia in the near future.



On Wednesday, I attended the opening ceremony of Tasveer's 4th Independent South Asian film festival, where Salman Ahmad (of Junoon fame) performed songs from his latest album and showcased his latest documentary. Tasveer's festival is free this year and that made it an easy decision for me to attend. I watched the first 2 of the 6 movies I've watched this week. I also bought a raffle ticket that night and low and behold, I actually won a copy of Salman's latest album! I got Salman to sign my copy, shook his hand and ended the night with a free dinner. Talk about being pampered! After I came home, I read up on Salman Ahmad and realized he is quite a big celebrity. Junoon sold more than 25 million albums and Salman has played at the UN General Assembly meeting. I felt special. To turn things upside down though, the little devil in me actually suggested that I sell the signed copy on ebay for a handsome profit. My conscience is preventing me from doing so thus far!

Then, on Friday, I went back to watch two more movies at the Tasveer festival. After the movies, I ate more free food and called it a night. Yesterday, I went back to the festival, watched 2 more movies, exited mid way from the second one which turned out to be rather horrid, and expected more free food. However, my luck wasn't as good as it was the previous few days so I went out for dinner with some friends and finally had to pay for dinner for the first time in many days!

So, there you go. I met two celebrities and watched six (free) movies this week AND ate lots of free food :)