What I do in a day & BW: Devdas & Jodhaa Akbar

With the antique collection we take a garment out of it's muslin. We vacuum the inside and outside (one person holds there fingers over the vacuum so the garment doesn't get sucked up and vacuums while the other makes sure all the crevises are open). After we vacuum the thing we put it on a dress form, describe it to Jaynne Anne, who puts it in the computer, I take pictures of the front, profile, back and details, then we find a box to put it in. We find the appropriate layer to put it in (based on type of textile) and put down a sheet of acid free paper. We stuff any sleeves or shoulders, put down cushions of paper where we need to fold the garment, tag it, cover it, shut the box, put it away w/ a sticky not reminder that we need to print a label and put the box away. That's how we preserve our antique collection. It's actually pretty fun, when I'm not drunk w/ exhaustion. Did you know that the dust on a garment can be more harmful than bugs? b/c the dust a) attracts bugs b) has acids that eat away at the material.
BW:
Are you kidding me?! Devdas, starring Shah Rukh Kahn, Aishwarya Rai and Madhuri Dixit. Devdas (Kahn) returns from a ten year absence to his childhood sweetheart Paro (Rai). There marriage isn't allowed so she marries and he becomes an alcoholic. A famous courtesan, Chandramukhi (Dixit) falls in love with him and tries to nurse him through is love pangs.

Not going to lie, I didn't like this one AT ALL at first. Granted the costuming and dancing are magnificent, Madhuri Dixit is killer, but Paro and Dev act like stupid tweens and in the first 2/3 they're completely unlikable, but not in a good way. I just wasn't able to empathise and understand why they did the stupid things they did. Of course Chandramukhi is the whore with a heart of gold whose life sucks. In the first 2 hours nothing really happened, basically what I said above. The last hour was pretty great though. Somehow I suddenly felt sorry for everybody instead of just rolling my eyes out of my head over all the melodrama ("I'm an OCTOROON!" but not in a good way Genevieve). It was just a very self destructive film, and yet I cried at the end. The opposite of a lot of Bollywood movies I've seen, it was slow at the beginning and picked up at the end. Overall though, absolutely beautiful. I think I cried at the end b/c of the ridiculously amazing billowing sari.

Jodhaa Akbar
The Moghal (Muslim) emperor (Hrithik Roshan) in the 16th century marries an Indian (Hindu) princess (Aishwarya Rai). Of course there is intrigue and falling in love and 3 1/2 hours of Hrithik Roshan being ridiculously good looking. The production value was FANTASTIC. We're talking like 1000 extras in one song! Since it was period, well more like since it was Bollywood, the saris were magnificent, the extras were dressed to the nines and all the men wore hats that looked like marshmallows. There were elephants and pretty pillows and bangles and so forth. The story was good, the love story was excellent, Jalal (the emperor) was vituous to no end. Of course it was a good movie, but I found myself not liking it as much as I should. It was almost TOO epic. I'm really leaning more towards the Rab Nes and Swades-es of Bollywood I guess. I love the real life (Martha would put quotes here) stories that break into song more than the epic romances recently. SRK in Swades and Rab Ne just strikes a lovely chord with me, not that I don' t greatly enjoy 3 1/2 hours of Hrithik.