Team Verve Salutes The Women Who’ve Stood By Them: Here’s To ‘The Best Friend’

A revolution long in the making has been reignited in a new avatar only recently. A time when women are looking men squarely in the eyes as if to say ‘bring it on’. A year that saw #MeToo and #TimesUp morph from ordinary words to statements that will go down in history. Closer to home, live-in relationships have been legalised as of April and the triple talaq has been banned, emancipating women of these problematic societal shackles. The Chinese Zodiac might as well give up their twelve-year cyclical calendar and, going forward, call every year the Year of the Woman. In our (Em)Power Issue next month, we will be lauding women whose stories of breaking barriers are inspiring and empowering  — a former FBI agent-turned-teacher, a skier and a firefighter being a few — alongside recognising a new generation of fearless, driven women.

As relationships between women become even more important and necessary, Team Verve takes this opportunity to honour the #WomenWithVerve in their own lives who have impacted and encouraged them even if in the humblest of ways — a best friend that stayed by their side during their wedding, a yoga teacher who healed more than just their body, an aunt who goes beyond the call of duty for her niece.
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Faye Remedios, 35 – Associate Features Editor

Most people who have experienced it will agree than shifting schools when you’re still a child can be traumatic. So there I was a newcomer with a serious chip on my shoulder and some massive apprehensions to boot. My first days at my new school? I hated it. Until I met Melissa D’sa, a girl with the most spunk and sass I’ve ever seen, and right there the seeds of a lifelong friendship were sown. Even at the age of 12, Melissa possessed one rare quality at that age (in fact, at any age, I am beginning to realise) of having absolute, utter confidence in herself. This has allowed her to sail through tough times in both her life and career, and it is this sense of resilience that has enabled her to be a woman who can achieve just about anything she puts her mind to. This also happens to be the quality I admire most about her. As for the rest, she is still neurotic, dramatic, generous to a fault, honest (more so than needed at most times) with a wicked sense of humour.  The other constant is her sense of loyalty and the fact that from that day at school to now, when she stood up next to me as my maid of honour at my wedding, she has always had my back. And from coming out for long walks even though she hated them to sitting with me at a coffee shop talking about everything to nothing at all, little has changed. To the girl who is the only one in a sea of 500+ friends I have on my Facebook account whom I would call when the chips are down, I am forever grateful.

Next: Tina Dastur