On his honeymoon in Hawaii (in 2001), Neil ran off to the links, leaving hisunsuspecting wife Kruti at the pool. The second time, he brought her along, only to haveher videotape every stroke of his. "So that he could analyse his shot over and overand over again," recalls Kruti, with the tested patience of a golf wife. "It waseither his shot or his putting or how far he was driving."
Neil was also a profoundly generous man. The 25-year-old consultant was compassionatetowards the homeless in a city where it’s possible to simply go about your ownbusiness. It was in this spirit that Neil’s family and friends created the Neil G.Shastri Foundation. For an upcoming date, the foundation has managed to combine twoseemingly incongruous qualities of his—golfing and compassion—by organising acharity golf event. This comes on the heels of another event the foundation organised: theNeil G. Shastri Ride for Love.
A foundation is not an easy thing to pull off. There is a good deal of fund-raising andlegal work involved, and should you relax at any point of time, you only hurt the name ofthe person you originally sought to preserve. But the payoff is considerable. More thanthe good deeds that are performed, it is a way of saying that the person who died isactually quite alive, and that everyone will remember who he was.
"Talking about him helps. You never will forget," Kruti says, pointing atherself, "but you also don’t want other people to forget." So what will shedo on September 11? "It’s not a day that will just come and go," she says."It’s adding salt to the wounds but I realise it’s important to observeit." But one thing she is sure about. "I won’t have television on thatday."
Neil was working for Cantor Fitzgerald on the 103rd floor when the first tower was hit.When he last spoke to Kruti, she said he complained of breathing difficulty. We are seatednear the window of a Starbucks coffee shop on the Upper East Side of Manhattan. It is aSunday morning; people are lazing about, reading the papers. Kruti is in the process ofshifting to a new home. She had been staying with her parents in New Jersey for months,and finally decided it was time to get her own place, an apartment in Jersey City that sheis in the middle of painting.
"It’s difficult because it’s a first step, one of many," she says."But at the same time, it’s good, it’s positive."
