Close to the Taj Hotel

Ravi Nischal called us last night.

Ravi and I studied together at Woodstock School. Ravi works at the Taj Mahal Hotel in Mumbai.

I had found out from Melvin - an employee of Taj who went off duty at 8 PM on th 26th night - 1.5 hours before the firing and hostage taking started - that Ravi was not seen for some months. Melvin thought he may have been transferred to another property or that Ravi had resigned. That was some comfort for me.

Till the phone call, though, I was waiting for the death-lists to be published in the papers to be able to check if Ravi's name was there.

His call - blessedly! - ended that.

Ravi is in Delhi and has been on a short term assignment there for some months. His wife Shruti and their 9 year old daughter live near the Taj in Colaba. They are safe. Ravi is safe. A big sigh escaped my lips.

Ravi knew 5 of the 10 Taj employees that are known to have lost their lives in the carnage. Death is very close to us all at a time like this. But so is life. Blessed life.

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Another survivor is our friend Robert Stephens. Having lost a close friend while he was studying at Virginia Tech, Robert had a number of very, very close encounters with the Mumbai carnage. Read more about it by clicking: here.