Merry Christmas (last week) and Happy New Year’s (this week)! In this
week’s blog we will get to Christmas, to some unique shopping, and some
sightseeing (in that section, the Hank William’s lyrics that is the title to this blog entry
will make more sense). And (for the last time I hope) medical care in India. It
seems to becoming a pattern but I will bat lead-off and Rae will be clean-up.
Tuesday was Christmas Eve but for us it was S-Day – the day I got my
stent removed. The plan was to be there at 9:30 (second procedure of the day) get
the stent out, be discharged by noon and get on with our day. Well, the first
part happened: we were there at 9:30 but things kinda went downhill from there.
First, when we reported to the area we had been instructed, nobody knew
anything about it or what to do with us. After a few phone calls, they found
out they were to show us through their department to the emergency room, which
is where outpatients check in. Checking in there, after a few minutes we were
told that our procedure had been delayed: it would not be until at least noon,
maybe 12:30. They had my cell number so we went to find a more comfortable
place to wait.
About 12:00 I got a call from the admin for our surgeon.
“Where are you?”
“We’re here in the hospital.”
“What? At Apollo?”
“Yes, we’ve been here since 9:30”
“Oh, okay.”
She then hung up before I could get any other information. So, we
decided to go across the hospital to the doctors’ office area to see what she
could tell us. She was on the phone when we got there. She made eye contact
with us and held up a finger, as in wait one minute. When she got off the
phone, she said, “The procedure is delayed. It will now be at least 3:00. If you
want to leave, that’s fine, just be back by 3:00.” We had a few things we
wanted to pick up for Christmas so we ran to Lajpat Nagar market to pick those
up and have lunch.
We were just wrapping up when we got a call from the hospital asking
where we were. We told them we were on our way back; we had been told we could
leave as long as we were back by three. The person on the other end of the line
seemed none too happy but said we should check in at emergency as soon as
possible. We were there before 3:00, checked in; and after 15 or 20 minutes
told we should go to the cashier to pay our down-payment. That done we returned
to the emergency room; waited another 15 to 20 minutes until we were shown back
to a room with a bed, a couch, and a TV. I was told to get into a hospital gown
and they would be back. The good news was the gown was large enough. Well the
top was, the bottoms were a size too small but compared to the alternatives I
experienced the prior week this was at least doable. The bed in this room wasn't any longer but the mattress was quite a bit more comfortable than the one during my last visit. Which makes
perfect sense since this was just a temporary room to transition in and out of
surgery. Why have a comfortable bed where people are, you know, going to stay
for a few days.
And then we started to wait. And wait. And wait. And wait. The good
news is after an hour or so, they brought in a remote so we could watch some TV
so Rae and I didn’t just have to sit and look at each other. Finally, at about
7:30 pm they came in with size 7 flip flops so I could walk into pre-op and
then on to the operating room. They draped me so I couldn’t see what was going
on. The doctor gave me some play by play but I won’t go into all the details. I
will say, once we actually got started, it took about 10 minutes. The doctor
asked me, “How was that? Not too bad?” As I told him, it was not the most fun I
ever had, but it wasn’t too bad either.” None of it was particularly comfortable
but there was only one point the pain was bad enough I thought maybe a sedative
in addition to the topical pain killer wouldn’t have been a bad idea.
Anyway, they cleaned me up and rolled me into post op. Lying there
surround by others who were recovering from much more serious operations and
the results of the needed anesthesia for those operations, I thought: I need
to get out of here. I sat up on my gurney and said to the recovery room nurse, “You
know, I feel fine. Can I go back to my room now?” She just smiled and kept
writing in the chart she was working on. I am not sure how long I would have been
there but Dr. Taneja walked by, saw me sitting up in my gurney and asked the
nurse why I hadn’t been taken back to the room. This prompted a bit more
action. She brought out the ever popular size 7 slippers and asked me if I
could walk. So I walked back to the room. I sat on the bed for a few minutes
and said to Rae, “This is crazy. Let’s get out of here.” I went to the restroom
and made sure the equipment all worked (a requirement before being discharged);
dressed; and walked out to nurses’ station, and asked when I could leave. She
said the final bill should be down in 45 minutes and to please wait.
I won’t go into a blow by blow and step by step description of what happened
over the next two hours but suffice it to say it took me not only threatening
but attempting to leave against medical advice (only Rae kept me there) for
them to get their act together and get us discharged. I think they thought, “What’s
the hurry? Stay. Have dinner. Relax. We have plenty of time.” I don’t think
they had any appreciation how little I wanted to be sitting in the hospital on
Christmas Eve. Anyhoo, no harm; no foul. 13.5 hours later the 10 minute procedure
was done and we were home. As I said at
the start of this blog entry, I hope that is the end of our interaction with
Indian medical care.
We did get home in time to have a wonderful Christmas Eve video conversation
with Emily, Kai, Grandma Whyte, and sundry folks that were at the Whyte House.
It was not the same as being there but it was fun. We got to see Kai open his
present from Nana and Papa, which was fun. It was even more fun to watch him
interacting with his cousin Kenneth. Needless to say, after a long day full of
adventures (and a few pain killers, in my case) we were ready for bed. Sometime
after 1:00 AM we crashed.
If Christmas Eve was atypical, Christmas followed that same pattern. I
started the day with a pain killer and then we had great Skype sessions with
Brendon and Rachel’s and Ben and Becca’s families, who had been together for
Christmas Eve dinner. Then we connected through Facetime with Sarah and Jeremy
and their family. (Yes, if you are keeping track, three different video calls;
three different technologies. That’s just how we roll.) Other than those calls,
and exchanging the small presents we gave each other, mostly what we did was
rest. Quite exciting, we are!
I have said before (and I think I have written this in the blog too)
that we are blessed to be in India at this time. Just a few years ago we would
not have had the degree of contact we’ve enjoyed. Being away from family and
friends is hard; at times like Christmas it is even harder. But to at least be
able to see people, and watch the interaction of everyone while we were talking,
was a great blessing. We are planning on being back home next year for
Christmas (and Quincy’s baptism). We look forward to that. This year’s
Christmas was far from typical but still contained the essential elements:
family, gifts (both material and spiritual), good food, love, warmth, laughter,
and reconfirmation of the birth of our saviour. That will do.
Here’s Rae.
Well, this really was a far different Christmas than we’ve ever had,
but I will say that if I was going to spend Christmas with only one person,
Phil would be that person. That’s as
long as I get to at least Skype, Facetime, or Google chat with our other family
members. I won’t say I didn’t miss
everyone because I did, but technology certainly does make life so much
better. I’m continually amazed at how
much each of our grandchildren have changed and grown since we left.
I know that some of you are on Facebook with me so you got some updates
thru the day on Tuesday as we spent our day at the hospital. For those of you who didn’t have that
pleasure, I will just say that after that experience I hope I never have to go
to the hospital, and will do whatever I can to avoid it. I’ve given Phil strict instruction that if my
choice was hospital or death, just let me die.
It was a frustrating day to say the least. A total exercise in dysfunction.
Thankfully the hospital thing is behind us and Phil is feeling much
better, so time to get out and see a few of the sites. Phil had been told about some furniture
places that are located by his campus.
They have antique, antique replica and new furniture. Given my interest in interior design, I’ve
been a bit itchy to go there and check it out.
It is far from glamorous, but I really enjoyed it and have my eye on a
few things. This place had at one time
been very large and full of shops. At
some point the government stepped in and closed a large part of it and put in a
park. The businesses have managed to
cram a large amount of furniture into a very small space. There are no walls or roofs, (just some
tarps) and the stalls are narrow and deep.
I know that I could go back many times and still miss so many of the
things that are buried there.
The government might have thought a park was a good idea, but the
furniture businesses had other ideas and now the park looks a lot like a junk
yard. There are piles of trash, but also
piles of furniture, and I do mean piles. In the “park” and at the end of each
stall there is furniture that is being sanded, refinished and restored. Just about every direction you look there is
someone sanding and restoring something.
Words hardly do it justice, so we are adding a few pictures to help
paint the picture. It is amazing to me
how they take these piles of junk and turn them into something that someone
wants to pay money for. I know I enjoyed it more than Phil did, but he was a
good sport and I had a great time looking at things and envisioning them in different
settings.
After furniture shopping, it was time for lunch at a Punjabi restaurant
where we enjoyed some Dahl Mahkhni, Chicken Tikka and naan, some of our favorites.
Then,
it was off to see Lodhi Park which is probably Delhi’s equivalent to New York’s
Central park. It is a large park with
walking trails and lovely gardens and open lawn areas. There are no businesses there, but there are
three different tombs. As we walked thru
the park we thought about our daughter Becca and her friend Starla when they
went to Europe together. They came home
talking about the ABCs of Europe, “another bloody castle”. Well, we have the ABTs of India, “another
bloody tomb”. It will be interesting to see how many
pictures of tombs we have in our blog by the time we leave India. We have also included some pictures from the
park. Hope you all enjoy the pictures of
our ABTs.
Namaste.
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