Let me tell you a story which takes me back to the year
2000, 17 years ago. I was living in India. I come from Tamilnadu in the South
of India. My university was in Rajasthan in the north-west of India. My
university was in a small city called Pilani. Friends from bigger cities in
India felt trapped in this small city with 40000 people. The closest
civilization was Delhi the capital of India around 6 hours by bus. A group of
five friends from the South of India decided to go on trip. A trip to Simla in
the north of India with snow. I had never seen snow in my life and this would
be a wonderful opportunity to do so. We found a jeep and driver who would take
us to Simla. He was bit of a crazy driver. But sometimes you have to be crazy
to drive the roads of India. We came to the mountains and the way he was
accelerating and swishing left and right felt dangerous. I was not sure if my
driver has a license and if he had ever driven on mountains.
The weather was chilly. We had all the windows closed
tightly. The driver wanted to keep his window open so that he remained awake.
Nobody was complaining about that.
I was listening to music from India’s growing music talent
– A.R. Rahman. The music was calming my nerves. I closed my eyes and hoped for
the best. I heard a screech. It was louder than the music I was listening to. I
felt a jarring turn. It shook me off the comfortable half sleep position. My
senses took a 90-degree turn. I felt a sharp pain in my eye. I felt two heavy
bodies piling on me. Two of my friends were on me. The jeep in which we were
travelling had flipped on its side. There was an eery silence. Then the driver
started moaning – “Mera Haath Tute gaya”, “Mera Haath Tute gaya”. My hand is
broken.
We had to get out the jeep. One of my friends opened the
door which was facing upwards and jumped out of the jeep. I was the third to
jump out. I stood up on the door and looked around. It was dark. There was a
bus in front of the upturned jeep. There was bus behind us. There was also a
car. I saw the mountain to the right. The cliff was to the left. I went on my
knees and jumped down slowly and walked to the side of the road. The fourth
friend, a slim guy who looked afraid was on top of the jeep. He did not bend
his knees. He shouted in fear when he jumped. He hit the road and fell and had
an epileptic fit. A few friends rushed to him. He had passed out. What was the
first aid you give a person with an epileptic fit?
I was watching the scene from the side of the road. The
dark evening turned red. I had a cut above my eye and it was dripping blood. All
my friends were in safety. The driver was still inside the jeep and moaning in
pain. A few guys went to the jeep and put it back on its wheels. They pulled
the driver out of the car.
Somebody instructed us to walk to the public bus behind us.
2 of us friends carried our unconscious friend. A few locals carried the driver
to the bus. The bus conductor asked the driver to take us to the nearest
Government hospital.
I still remember the passengers in the bus. Some had
indifferent faces, they were going home and this detour would take them longer
to get home. Some looked genuinely horrified looking at the driver suffering in
the pain, my passed-out friend and me with an eye dripping with blood.
We reached the hospital. I sat in a corner bench with a
friend. They first went to work on my friend who had been unconscious. They
revived him with a splash of water. Then the doctor checked his vitals and then
put a drip for him to regain strength. The entire team of doctors and nurses in
the hospital seemed to then descend on the driver. He had had a fracture and
the doctors gave him some anaesthesia and fixed his hand. Since the driver had
taken the only operating table, I had to get treatment on the bench.
I do not like blood or syringes. Till this day, I need to
be flat when they withdraw blood for check-ups. The doctor asked me to put my
head on my friend’s lap. He then stitched my cut eyelid. One by one. I still
remember the stitching pulling my eyelid one at a time. He finished. I was
strangely happy that I could still see.
It was late in the evening and we had to stay back in the
village hospital. They did not have enough beds. We had share beds with
friends. We had three beds between 5 friends. The one with the glucose drip got
his own bed. The driver got his own bed. Only then did we notice that the
hospital was housing mentally ill patients in the general ward where we were
staying. I thought this was crazy for a while, but then realised it was Ok. We
were lucky to be treated and have a place to stay overnight and above all lucky
to be alive.
When we got up in the morning, both our friend and driver
needed help. The hospital was understaffed and they asked us to clean the bed
pan of the driver. We were not comfortable till one doctor said would you do it
if it was your dad. One of my friends cleaned the bed pan.
My friend in the glucose drip was looking out of the window
and saw a pig run by very close to his window. Possibly somebody had thrown
food out of the window and hospital not a compound wall might have encouraged
pigs to wait for food. He started shouting “Get me out of here”.
The rest of us had a chat and decided to leave the
hospital. The doctor said that he would recommend us to stay a bit longer, but
if we wanted to leave then we had to give it in writing that we were leaving on
our own will. We wrote that and left the hospital.
We left the hospital and the driver and found a train that
would take us back to the university. I do not what happened to the driver we
left behind. I only hope he recovered completely.
I left India to Germany in 2002. It took me another 8 years
in Germany before I got my driving license.