I am a Bombay girl.

The fun of sitting around Pangong Lake with 40 guys around a fireplace, having a glass of wine... staying in one camp together... that's an experience. Waking up at 5 in the morning, watching the sun come up. You don't do these things in Bombay.

I met my wife in Bombay at an official function. And then we courted for three years. That's a great old term, 'courting.' And we had to do it quietly, of course, because you would know the difficulties one might have with Indian parents. She was advised by her father that people in the West don't take marriage seriously.

More dreams are realised and extinguished in Bombay than any other place in India.

The choking humidity makes amphibians of us all, in Bombay, breathing water in air; you learn to live with it, and you learn to like it, or you leave.

I've been to Delhi, Madras, Bangalore and a lot of other cities, but I have never seen a crime set-up like that in Bombay.

The writer, Ruth Jhabvala, livedin India but was German. My partner Ismail Merchant was from Bombay but was educated in England and he had a different view on the world. Probably they had to contend with some sort of Oregonian-ness in me that they didn't understand and didn't know where it was coming from.

In Bombay people know me as a Rituparno Ghosh actor but Calcutta gives me the comfort zone and that's why I love shooting here. In Bombay, the money is bigger, the stakes are bigger.

My first show was in Patkar Hall next to Bombay Hospital. It was a total flop. I was so nervous standing in front of all those people that I completely froze. I forgot all my lines and the audience booed me off the stage. I realised that day that you have to earn the audience's appreciation. They aren't fools.

Once I wanted to get into films, I took my time about it because when I first got to Bombay, I gave my photos and CDs to all the production houses. But the roles that came my way were the 'typical white girl dancing in the background' kind of roles, which I was not too interested in, or it was advertisements.

When I moved to Bombay, it was very harsh. I was nothing like what I am today. I couldn't speak a word of English. In England, people might be very understanding about that, but in Bombay, they're not very forgiving. 'If you don't speak English, how do you expect to work in Hindi films?'

I'm deeply stressed as a filmmaker, and I know I'm not alone. The censorship crisis, the moral policing, the politics of it has most of us on edge. I'm scared to use certain words: like, if I use 'Bombay,' will there be a problem?

For good or bad, there is a certain level of generalisation when it comes to my work. I want to break that perception. My decision to direct 'Bombay Talkies' or to present 'The Lunchbox' is an attempt to do that. These are the films that gel well with my sensibility, and it's unfortunate, it's not the perception out there.

Muslims remain the most convenient target for prejudice in a city like Delhi, which is far more ghettoized than Bombay or Bangalore, for example.

The theme of 'Bombay' will make you fall in love with it again and again.

Roja,' 'Bombay' and 'Dil Se' weren't planned as political films. It was a phase India was going through and these things affected me and found their way into my work.

The National Stock Exchange was strongly opposed by Bombay stockbrokers and captains of industry. I thought some competition is good. The exchange has given a very good account of itself.

I think Calcutta is that kind of a market that if you are a Delhi or a Bombay designer, they feel they are being shortchanged and given stock that isn't fresh.

'Salaam Bombay' didn't put a halo on the poor. Instead, it said that they will teach us how to live.

'Bombay Boys' is among my favourite movies and my favourite performance of myself.

There are so many films which are my favorite in 100 years. There are legendary films like 'Bombay,' 'Dil Se,' and 'Guru' as I liked Abhishek Bachachan's performance in the film.

These are stories you hear... of people sitting in a mall and being spotted, and you think it will happen to you. And when you're fresh off the boat, and new in Bombay, you want those kind of things! They are magical fables. You want to, somewhere, be a part of it, something people will read about. But reality is different.

Everybody I meet is a star. In Bombay it is crazy and even TV has become so big that there are just too many stars and there is too much greed for that little space on the newspaper.

Cinematically, anything like 'Khawto' in Bengali cinema hasn't happened. Yes, you get such films in Hollywood, a few in Bombay. In Bengali literature, you get such stories in the works of Samaresh Basu and Buddhadeb Guha.

Delhi gives you a lot of love. Bombay people don't care much because it's usual for them to see a TV serial guy or a movie actor.

'Bombay Velvet' is my most romantic film, it's my 'Titanic' or 'Gone With The Wind.'

In Bombay, people usually tend to cast you in roles that you've played before. Even though they may consider you to be a talented actor, they just think it's 'safer' to have you play the same kind of roles over and over again.

Salaam Bombay' and 'Monsoon Wedding' are the two Mira Nair films I go back to.

As a child I played cricket as a hobby. Once you started playing for your school, you became more ambitious. You reckoned you could play for the state. Then you started to think about the country. But it happened so quickly for me, I started playing for the school at 13, for Bombay at 17, and at 18 I was in the Indian side.

When I wrote the song, I had the sea near Bombay in mind. We stayed at a hotel by the sea, and the fishermen come up at five in the morning and they were all chanting. And we went on the beach and we got chased by a mad dog - big as a donkey.

When I did musicals in London a number of years ago, I was in a workshop scenario for a year or more with 'Bombay Dreams.'