The Other Side Of Vikas Khanna

As one traverses the path of leading a successful life, there comes boundless difficulties and failures and yet one carries on with a ray of hope. At one point we come across “someone special” who ends up changing the attitude and transfuses positivity. The words touch your heart and their magnetic aura gives a new meaning to your journey and shows you the path. Maybe you too have come across such incidents or have met “someone special” who ended up influencing or touching your life and awakening cosmic consciousness. . It has definitely happened with me; however I will share my story later. Today, I am referring to a celebrity whose 3 restaurants in New York weren’t successful and yet he continued with a ray of hope and then he met “someone special”. While this celebrity was experiencing complications in his professional carrier he came across someone, in the very nick of time, who showed him the power of the word and directed his life in the path Gratitude and Humility.
We are talking about the famous celebrity -  Chef Vikas Khanna who says that his life changed completely after meeting HH Dalai Lama in 2006 when he was going through his lowest phase of his professional career and somehow he got chance to meet HH. Everything changed for him. He says “ HH Dalai Lama touched and  healed me so much and he said “ Discover food through culture”. That is when the journey of Vikas Khanna started and he spent more than year traveling Bhutan, Burma, China, Tibet. He spent time with Dalai Lama, chatted with him endlessly and discovered some of the lost cuisines. He wrote his book “Return To The River” which is perhaps the first book on beautiful and rich culture of Himalayan region.Last week I got chance to meet him at Bloomsbury publication office over an  informal chat where he was talking about his experience with HH Dalai Lama and the book “Timeless Legacy“ . This book is about those 80 questions that he had asked the holy monk during the time he spent with him. He shared his experiences at length and also few interesting elements about HH Dalai lama. He shared that Dalai Lama loves mangoes and doesn’t prefer spicy food. When someone once asked Dalai lama about his cooking skills, HH Dalai Lama said “I am very bad at cooking but would love to learn from Vikas”.
The book which is published by Bloomsbury publications is releasing this week and you will come across some beautiful and interesting stories too!I must say that this was one of the most interacting session with Chef where he spoke about his life ( less focussed on food) – A welcome and enlightening change!