Freida Pinto doesn't need to speak to her boyfriend every day.

The 26-year-old actress has been dating her 'Slumdog Millionaire' co-star Dev Patel for two years and though their work schedules mean they are often apart for months at a time, they have reached an "understanding" that their respective careers should come first.

Freida explained: "We've arrived at a situation where understanding is primary.

"Now we don't need to Skype all the time, we don't need to talk every day over the phone. It's just understanding that OK, he's doing a film right now, so today is gonna be a busy day for him, he'll call me up tomorrow..."

The Indian actress - who studied English Literature at university in Mumbai - admits she never felt "satisfied" by academic studies and though she has accomplished a lot, she feels she and her TV presenter sister are a "minority" among their old friends because they are the "least educated".

She told the Independent on Sunday newspaper: "I actually didn't mind school, and I enjoyed university and college. But while that was happening I still knew that this was not satisfying enough. So among my friends' circle, I'm the least educated!

"A lot of the younger Indian generation are either IT geniuses or doctors - the number of doctors I've seen in LA who are Indian is just crazy. So it is a very Common thing. Or an accountant! That again is a very, very big thing.

"So I guess we're just a minority, my sister and I. We were naturally inclined towards not doing anything that was super-academic from the very beginning. We were always interested in performing arts, and media-related stuff."