Looking back …

Iqbal Ismail

On the 19th December my dear old friend,

 Iqbal Ismail, left this world.

I found out when I saw the announcement his son, Solu (Sulaiman), sent me and phoned to ask me why I was not at the funeral. I said I hadn't known - I don't read the newspapers anymore - and had just heard it from him.

Nuzhat and I rushed over to his place to meet his wife and the children and grandchildren. We talked of old things, our lives together, our school-boy links, and more. I'll write a blogpost about him soon.

We got to talking about my being at the National Medical Centre for the time that I had my rather severe heart-attack and was treated to a quadruple bypass. Iqbal had walked in with the owner, a friend of his son Solu, and I was introduced to the hospital team as the owner's friend. I was given a luxurious treatment after that.

(Ardeshir Cowasjee died there; Sabeen Mahmud was dead when she arrived there after being assassinated; my dear friend Dr Shamim Ahmad died there while I stood next to him; and Iqbal died there, too.)

Sabeen & I at NMC

On my way back home I looked at my medical records out of sheer curiosity and found this piece of paper inside, written by Sabeen who handled the medical accounts while I was at the hospital. She was methodical in most ways that I am not (although my wife is good at these things, she wasn't in the right frame of mind at that point). Here is the sheet:

Miss you like crazy, Sab!

(… and all the others, mentioned, too!)