In the aftermath of the attacks in Mumbai, I hesitated for a while to discuss the details of my experience with too many people since, until recently, I had not told my parents about how I was caught up in those events. As a father, I appreciate that there is no good way for parents to find out that life-threatening harm has befallen their children. But now that I’ve had the opportunity to tell my parents about the experience — in a hopefully comforting manner — I thought it worthwhile to share how many positive things have come out of my being a victim of a terrorist attack.
It was 9:45 PM on November 26 and my colleague Peter O’Malley and I were at the lobby of the Taj Mahal Hotel checking out early to be able to drop off a package to Peter’s friend en route to Mumbai International Airport. Our flight home to Hong Kong was scheduled to depart at 1:50 AM so we had enough time to make the stop.
As I was getting ready to sign the hotel bill, we heard the loud stutter of gunfire around the corner, possibly close to the Indian restaurant where we had finished dinner only 45 minutes earlier.
Apart from the sound of gunfire and breaking glass, the lobby was almost silent. I can only imagine that, like us, others in the lobby were probably deer-in-headlights stunned, just trying to make sense of what was going on and wondering what to do. Reflexively, Peter and I ran away from the sound of the gunfire and into the opposite hallway.
Everything was a blur while I ran in panic, until a burning pain shot through my right side and I fell face-flat. My ears were ringing after registering a single explosive clap. For about a second, I saw a thin young man, face covered, walking slowly past me with some sort of rifle.
I knew I had been shot, although I had expected to be in much more pain than I was. I crawled a few inches and then picked myself up to again run instinctivley toward where it looked safe. I thought I was hit by a pellet gun and that the shooters were pranksters — again, I thought a gunshot should hurt more. But since I felt a burning sensation on my right hip, I looked inside my pants and was horrified to see that around 10 inches of my skin had broken straight open. I saw a stretch of pink muscle exposed where I felt the burning. While I was trying to get my mind around the possibility of having a bullet inside me, I was hurried into a room by hotel staff.
I found around seven people in the small room, all unharmed. Most were hotel security personnel. I showed them the wound, breathlessly repeating, “I got shot.”
One of the men in the room, who looked like a British businessman, told me in a very soft and reassuring voice, “Don’t worry — it’s only a flesh wound.”
“How do you know for sure?”
“You can tell. Don’t worry.”
My hands were shaking as I was typing messages on my BlackBerry to colleagues in India about what was going on and asking them to try to get help. After a few minutes, I began to feel more relaxed in the company of the hotel staff in the room and because I was starting to receive e-mails from my colleagues, including from Peter, who was also hiding elsewhere in the hotel and was unhurt. I began to develop a sense of confidence that the ordeal would soon be over and that I would soon be able to hop onto an ambulance and have myself stitched up. We were still concerned that the gunmen might break into the room and start firing at us and that we were sitting ducks, but I felt that fear evaporating as the minutes went by.
After an hour and a half, there was a knock on the door, followed by someone telling the hotel security people with us that it was safe to leave the room. A tall policeman with a rifle escorted us out of the room. I saw blood and human matter across the corridor where we first heard the gunshots. The hotel staff walked me to an ambulance which took me to Bombay Hospital, around 10 minutes away from the Taj hotel.
I was taken into the hospital’s intensive care unit. Doctors and nurses were all over me and very efficiently sutured me within 20 minutes. To the left of my bed were at least 10 medical personnel gathered around a half-naked man who seemed to be in very bad shape. The room was filling up with people injured from the attacks.
But I knew the worst was over for me and I was safe. I thought that Peter should be out shortly as well.
From the beginning of the ordeal through to when I was being treated, my thoughts were almost purely logistical and self-focused.
“I won’t make it to the flight tonight.”
“What a hassle — I need to get fixed up in Mumbai so that means I get to go home only tomorrow.”
“My company should take care of getting my passport from the Taj lobby after this whole thing clears up tonight.”
I was thinking thoughts of a person who believed he was fully entitled to being safe and unharmed and who regarded getting killed in a terrorist attack as something that happens to other people.
But as I was resting in a hospital room watching the news, the real nature of the events of the evening started to become clear. Terrorists were attacking multiple locations in Mumbai. Dozens of civilians were being killed and wounded. Blasts were heard from the Taj and the Oberoi. Police and counter-terrorist personnel were killed by the terrorists. Peter was still in the hotel after several hours. Very slowly, I realized that what I just emerged from was a massive and violent terror operation executed by well-trained individuals.
I couldn’t sleep. I was monitoring the BlackBerry for updates from Peter who was growing increasingly concerned.
3:00 AM… On the 11th floor of Bombay Hospital with only a few other patients, nightshift nurses, and hospital staff… Very dark in the corridor… Peter was still in the Taj…
I fell to my knees and broke down in the middle of the dark and empty hall. For the first time that night, I realized that I was supposed to have died but did not. I was grazed by a bullet from a gunman standing only a few feet away from me. Why had the bullet not entered my body? Why did the gunman not finish me off when I was crawling helplessly on the floor and there seemed to be no one else in the corridor? Why were help, safety and reassurance so easy to find? Why was I able to flee the hotel so quickly and so safely?
The realization of the events that surrounded my own experience had crushed and humbled me. Without doubt, I knew that God was pulling an all-nighter beside me.
Concern among our colleagues for Peter grew to near panic as Peter reported loud explosions and gunfire where he was hiding. Soon a fire was burning above the Taj. We were fearful when Peter had gone silent for some time. We felt a rush of relief as we saw an e-mail from Peter saying, “Thank you for your prayers. I am on a bus to the ‘other Taj’ [the Taj President Hotel].” Peter was safe after close to seven hours in the hotel.
Weeks after the experience, we continue to reflect upon the events and the more I try to process what had happened, the more I am convinced of the grace we experienced. For example, had Peter and I not planned the errand to his friend, we would have stayed longer in our room at the Taj, and our fate would have been completely different. Taking into account that the siege lasted three days, the situation at the Taj being one of the last to be resolved only underscores how advantaged we had been.
I am recovering very well. The doctors who look after my injuries couldn’t stop telling me how fortunate I am. One doctor said that if a person really had to get shot, this is exactly how one would want to get it. I got it on the right hip. Just a few inches to the left would have either shattered my hipbone or severed my sciatic nerve, in both of which cases I would no longer be able to walk with my right leg or might even have become paralyzed. Considering that I was hiding for another hour and a half before making it out, a bullet penetration might have meant that I would have bled to death.
I have been, by any standard, a mediocre Christian at best — and even that’s a stretch. But I now have a renewed sense of thankfulness and of being truly blessed and looked after by God. There is no other acceptable explanation for my survival. I refuse to devalue the experience of grace by attributing the outcome to “luck.”
I can’t claim to have a full understanding of the meaning of the experience, and I probably will only be able more deeply to appreciate it over time. But as I think back at my broader set of life experiences, I find it impossible to say that I am “extrapolating a trend from a single data point” when I say that I have been touched by God’s grace. In retrospect, it is now clearer to me how God has taken an active role at every stage of my life, in big and small ways. This is the message that I hope to be able to share with my family, friends and others, particularly those like me who are mediocre Christians but have a desire to become better followers of Christ. I am confident that if you think about the most important moments and turning points in your life (childhood, school, family, marriage, kids, work, etc.) and are truly honest with yourself, it is difficult not to realize God’s active presence and grace.
Following the experience in Mumbai, I think I am better able to see God in the good around me: my children’s faces, the love of my family. I think I can see Him a bit more clearly when I witness and remember random acts of kindness, such as those I saw from strangers during the Mumbai attacks.
It seems that the major challenge is to be able to see, trust and follow Him even when the signs of His presence are not as obvious. I’m referring to the small day-to-day things that annoy or bother us and the real problems that confront us. Particularly in these situations, an even more important calling seems to be to live in such a way that others can see God through us. That’s the daunting part. But perhaps, by living life better one day at a time, we can begin to amortize our appreciation for the boundless grace we receive throughout our lives.
