Asia’s richest businessman Mukesh Ambani of Reliance Industries has a special place in his heart for his hometown Jamnagar in Gujarat, India. Despite his insane amount of wealth, $113 billion, as per Forbes, he hasn’t forgotten his roots (it is also his mother’s birthplace and where his father began his entrepreneurial journey). The fact that his youngest child, Anant Ambani, has also chosen the destination for his fantastic pre-wedding festivities shows they favor the town that houses Reliance’s Jamnagar Refinery, the largest oil refinery complex in the world.
In late 2021, the magnate did the unthinkable by splurging more than $100,000 on two rare olive trees for his expansive estate in Jamnagar. Expensive they are but the quality that appeased the entrepreneur is that these two rare olive trees between 170 and 200 years old are known to be luck-giving trees. They are also fabulously long-lasting, a thousand years at least which is a lot of prosperous centuries for the centibillionaire and his family.
The ultra-expensive olive trees were imported from Spain as this variety is not grown in India, and with money no object there was nothing standing between the trees and their billionaire owner. Bringing the high-quality forestry home was quite a feat. According to The Hindu once the olive trees were imported from Spain they were transported over 1,800 km via truck to the nursery. Packed carefully in polythene bags, with speed maintained, no more than 30 km/h, the trees took five days to cover the distance.
At the Gowthami Nursery in Andhra Pradesh, the olive trees were tended to by a dedicated team of six people for two years before reaching their final destination in Jamnagar, trained to acclimatize to the Indian climate. The team that raised them had to ensure soil health was optimum and that the trees did not grow over 12 feet.
Per Indian media, the transportation cost of the fortuitous olive trees was $4,000 but a cost justified when each tree costs a whopping $60,000, and provides a billionaire businessman with endless luck.
Antilia, a home fit for India’s uncrowned king and his family-
The Mumbai residence of Mukesh Ambani and his family is a $2 billion, surreal edifice that can put even royal residences to shame. How many monarchs and billionaires can boast homes that stand 27 stories tall, featuring a 168 car garage, a staff of 600, a snow room, an ice cream parlor. Antilia is built on an area of 400,000 square feet, so there is room for a lot more, and a lot more there is. The 178-meter (570-feet) tall home designed by architecture firms Perkins & Will, and Hirsch Bedner Associates, also features a grand ballroom, movie theater, and several lounge rooms.
The mansion has no less than three helipads, a massive temple that can fit 50 people, wine tasting rooms, and withstand an earthquake of magnitude 8.0 on the Richter scale. The home includes a spa and a yoga center located at the dedicated health and wellness level. “It’s a modern home with an Indian heart,” Nita Ambani told Vanity Fair. “We made our home right at the top because we wanted the sunlight … so it’s an elevated house on top of a garden.” The family occupies the top six floors of this architectural anomaly.
