Closing Remark Rupert Morris    

We have been remembering the remarkable lives of Mala Trivedi and Nazy Mozakka, so cruelly cut short when they should have continued to do their invaluable work at Great Ormond Street, and continued to brighten the lives of their husbands and families. Without them, life will never be the same.

 This has been a harrowing occasion for many of you, I’m sure, particularly for their closest family.

 Our ceremony is almost over, and in a short while you will have to emerge into the autumn evening and get on with your lives as best you can. The wounds of this tragedy will take many, many years to heal – and for some of you, they will never heal fully. But today you should feel proud of Nazy and Mala, proud of everything they were and everything they achieved. In the years to come, you may well feel that your own lives are the richer for having known them.  I’m now going to read a poem by Christina Rossetti that I believe both Nazy and Mala would have endorsed.

 Remember me when I am gone away

Gone far away into the silent land;

When you can no more hold me by the hand,

Nor I half-turn to go yet turning stay.

Remember me when no more day by day

You tell me of our future that you planned;

Only remember me; you understand

It will be late to counsel then or pray.

Yet if you should forget me for a while

And afterwards remember, do not grieve:

For, if the darkness and corruption leave

A vestige of the thoughts that once I had,

Better by far you should forget and smile

Than that you should remember and be sad.

 On behalf of Nader and Ashok and their families, and Great Ormond Street Hospital, thank you all for coming. When you leave this hall, you are invited to walk next door into the Brockway Room. where you can continue to share your memories of Nazy and Mala over a drink. Now Phillip Bonhoeffer is going to play the Giga from that same Bach Partita,  and I’m going to ask Nader and Ashok and Saba and Saeed and Kunaal, when they are ready, to lead us out of the hall. Our final thank you should be to Mala and Nazy, for showing us all how to live.

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