See, my building, its name is Nehru Nagar -- it's very apt. In fact, it is probably the happiest building Manmohan Desai would've been proud of. Ever since I was born, I have lived here we have a Muslim, a Catholic, a Parsi, a Sardar, a Punjabi neighbour. We also have a South Indian, Maharashtrian and Sindhi -- all castes and communities, including me who is an outcast, living in this building.

And ever since I was a kid, I've been the naughtiest child in the building and grew up in everyone's houses. Literally. Till today if there is no food in the house, dal or roti or kukad wouldarrive. My sister cannot cook the day she cooks I have to run to Thomas Cook, Thomas Cook County Hospital, I mean. Till today, I call chicken `kukad' because I have grown up in a Punjabi atmosphere.

See, there is a very great film maker O P Ralhan who has two brothers -- one is Gopal who lives bang outside my house and the other, Shyam Ralhan, who also lives in the building. Both these guys are very nice people, both of their daughters are my rakhi sisters. This building believes in keeping Indian culture alive -- things like pairipona, and doing bhaiyya, didi and uncleji still happen. In an atmosphere like this, every other girl was supposed to be your sister. Not for any other reason, but if you see the girls in my building you would want to make them only your sisters.

In the middle of all this I had the upbringing by my mother who used to teach me very strict English -- where you have to know your vowels, learn pronunciation, etc. But I used to get "tuitions" frommy neighbours. Specially Gopal uncle who used to teach me English words like `jam' as J-A-A-M (a drink). And in school I used to say,"Today, in the morning, for breakfast I had tea, bread and JAAM."

Once he told my mom, "Bhabhi kahan ja rahe ho?" My mother said, "Mein to film dekhne ja rahi hoon, Meena Kumari ki Pakeezah." "Accha, accha Pukkejah phillum dekhne ja rahe ho. Phillum ka kya hai woh to Ardu mein hain. Aur adhi se zyada janta to Ardu ka kunoon (kanoon) nahi janti hai."

Then there is his brother. Shyam Ralhan saheb. He is a director of films. One day, all of us building kids were playing in the compound and we heard S H Bihari -- a lyricist who has written hit songs like `Teri meherbaniyan' and `Pyaar jhukta nahin' -- call out to Shyam Ralhanji. He went on and on shouting, "Main kiya Shyam Ralhanji!" Everybody could hear his voice but Ralhanji was not responding. After about two minutes, he gave it a thought and called out, "Main kiya DIRREKTURR ShyamRalhanji." "Hanji," came the instant reply.

So great was his `director' fixation that when we used to run to the booze shop to pick up a quarter (kaartar), for Shyam Ralhanji we would have to get only Director's Special. At a building meeting he once got so carried away that he said, "As a direkkturr, I want to ask, `Mere kacchon pe terrace se pani kaun dalta hai?'

See, in our building all of us also got formal training in bad words. Because of some neighbours. Mr Diwani, our Sindhi neighbour, was a very unhappy man. He used to keep beating the watchmen and cursing them. I remember, once I asked my mother the meaning of a word, and got slapped. I was just seven years old.

Then, on the other hand, I had all these very proper Parsi relatives who used to say, `speak in English'. So I was very confused about banu to kya banu? J-A-A-M banu, ya direkkturr Shyam Ralhanji, ya sirraf gaali sunne wallah gurkha? So, I decided to become a mixture of all this, and I became aTV host.

The names of the people haven't been changed to protect my innocence.