Kiss in Venice

Satyajit Ray and some of the people attached to his unit went to Venice in 1957 to attend the International Film Festival where Aparajito (The Unvanquished), his second film, was screened in the competitive section. One day Ray was sipping coffee at a Venice café along with a friend, Shanti Choudhury. Suddenly a journalist sitting near them remarked aloud, “The lion roars.” Neither Ray nor Choudhury could make anything of it. Then a female journalist came on and began asking Ray about his background and works. Surprised, Ray asked why she was asking all that. She then informed him that Aparajito was going to pick up the ‘Golden Lion of St Mark’, an award, at the festival. Choudhury was so excited that he rose to his feet and planted a kiss on the lips of the journalist as soon as she broke the news. Back home, Ray remarked to a friend that Shanti Choudhury had learnt to kiss girls the way he kissed the journalist in Venice during his long stay abroad, but “we shall never be able to do so as we were raised in this country (India).”