Doctor Who ?

Halloween night got little to much fright for us. As I was stepping out of the house to enjoy a night out with friends, I was told that my grandmother (Naani) fell from the bed and has hurt herself pretty bad. So i take mom and rush to Naani's house. She has hit her hit severely and is losing a lot of blood. So we head to the nearest hospital. Little did i know that , this wasn't going to be any sense of relief. Five worried individuals barge in to the hospital, the security for a second thinks as though the hospital is under attack. He doesn't allow all of us to enter the "doctor's area". I decide to wait in the waiting area. There is something eerie about the waiting room at a hospital. 5 mins down, i see mom rushing to me. Thats when i learn that the doctors have refused to admit the patient. There is another doctor about 15 mins drive away. Hoping he would help, we call him ask to be present at his clinic. I am carefully hitting on the gas since Naani is bundled up at the back of my car. Bombay roads are awful. Bumps on the road hurt her wound. Hospital 2.  After a brief argument with the watchman, who wouldn't allow me to take the car into the complex, we placed Naani on the doctors table. Now entering in and out of hospitals is not as easy as it reads. My grandmother cant walk, so getting her out of my car and in to the wheelchair and back with the blood from her wound oozing out was a very difficult task. Doctor 2 says this wound is deep, for which she has to be stitched. My mom wiping her tears asks the doctor . "what about the anesthetist ? ". The doctors snaps back saying "there is no time for that, i have got no provisions. I'll have to call the anesthetist. we got no time". We all knew we had no time. So the weaklings are sent out. i stay. 3 nurses and I held Naani to the doctors table while he stitches her wound. The blood spurts out like a fountain , stains the wall. Horrifying sight.
After two attempts of sealing the wound, the bleeding won't stop. The doctors looks at me and says . " take her some place else, she has lost a lot of blood. she needs a hospital with a blood bank and she needs an ambulance NOW"
I knew it , everyone knew .. there was no time to call the ambulance. We rushed her back into the car and set out to another hospital.  Most of our ambulances in India have the emergency siren going on and are stuck in hours of traffic. Indian motorists do not give priority to fellow humans needing urgent medical attention. Cruel, i know.

Moving on, that night we stepped into another two hospitals and were refused due to lack of medical history with them or absence of blood transfusion facilities. We started out at 10.30 pm on the night of 31st Oct and admitted Naani at 1.45am on 1st Nov. For three an half hours my Naani bled.. she was writhing in pain, a sight so gruesome.. i sometimes wonder how didn't i not pass out looking at all that blood. The back seat of my car had a big pool of blood.

My only question , why cant Doctors be humans first ? I know the world has given us some brilliant Doctors, who are also brilliant human beings. In no way i am generalizing the lot under the same label. Its just why does a bleeding patient is made to run to 4 different hospitals before being treated ?
I understand there are rules that the hospitals have to follow. i now talk as a patient who is in need of urgent medical help and is denied due to some rule book gathering dust.

Moreover, Bombay is not new to terrorist attacks , train blasts and other havoc. The city has been targeted repeatedly by its perpetrators and my heart goes out to those who suffer for no fault of theirs.  At a time of an attack, our feeble Govt hospitals struggle to provide aid to the injured. Literally , heaps and heaps of bodies are piled up , many of those who succumbed to the injury due to untimely medical aid.  The Govt rushes out with the funds to these hospitals but one cannot do much when every second delay may cost a loss of life. What annoys me the most is, while these Govt hospitals staff run helter skelter. cry out for additional supplies & volunteers , just a stone throw away swanky granite marbled , WI-fi enabled , "pay the moolah to get your cold treated " private hospitals would be shooing flies of the premises.

My point here again, Be Human.. I am not saying lets all wear white sarees and call ourselves Mother Teressa, I am not saying ditch materialistic needs and meditate like Buddha.. No. But when a little we do can help  a life in such a substantial way.. then why not just do it ?
why cannot some white collared doctors help out small time hospitals in a time of crisis ? 

Generation Next is shining bright.
With Doctors like Nethra Rao & Paramedics like Eleanor Pittinger .. I have hope. I know there are plenty of good Samaritans who are also qualified doctors who will not disappoint us, human race.

Aaj toh bahut crazy hogaya.. !

"All full , madam", said the burly man behind the low lit counter in a heavy southindian accent.


"what ? not even one room.. all beach shack owners asked us to check Ganesh Cafe. We had high hopes. Please. Single room will also do." I said noticing vibrant pictures of Hindu Gods on the wall and below them tables full of dreadlocks tanned foreigners singing, laughing, drinking and smoking.


"No room, today Saturday.. AAAL FULL(a). Try some other place"


"Please, one room.. where will three girls sleep ?", I said. Referring to 'Damsel in distress' situation works most of the time in India. Indian men like all other men love a good ego boost of helping a woman when she is needy (In most parts of Bihar, she will be molested). However, this holds true for a few people now, and that number is too rapidly diminishing but always worth a try.  He says no and walks away.This time its a firm NO. Why I kept pushing is because, shack owners hold vacant rooms for foreigners as they can charge them more money. I understand that. Everyone works to make more and more money.  They cannot charge us 300% more, we are locals we will verbally bash them.  Hence we are roomlesss mainly because we are brown. Talk abt Racism !
Three girls walk out of Ganesh Cafe disappointed.The feeling wasn't new to us. Some of the shack owners nodded their heads seeing us at a distance. We didn't even have to communicate. Now I'm starting to get a little worried. I search my rucksack for a sip of water. A five hour train journey + 40 mins in a mini van crammed with people double its capacity + a rickshaw ride up the hill + walk on the beach with bags in search of a room in atleast 8 shacks has taken its toll.  Beaches of Gokarna, Karnataka, unfortunately had no place for us to rest for the night.


Seven years back my chaddi buddy shifted to another state to pursue a career in Medicine, I had plans to visit her ever since. A plan waiting on my to do list for years never really materialised until last week.  A part of me thinks of the 2012 end to the world and is slowly but surely scratching of items of my long bucket list. Either way, I am going to benefit from it, my pockets.. not so much.
This winter when I visited Bombay, I had decided, I am visiting her (Bappi Da) in Mangalore. Hence a three night trip was planned. I got to Mangalore after a 6 hour wait at the airport. My 9 am flight got cancelled (they hate me) and the next one was at 1 pm, which got delayed by an hour..LUCKY ME.. One of those days when you buy a novel and finish it too.

Wannabe Doctor

I spent first 24 hours in her city, exploring a Doctor's life, watching her drive like a maniac *proud*, learnt hospital intern gossip, giggled at dental mentals, drank Nandini Lassi and other local delights, witnessed a man being stitched in the Casualty Ward after a RTA (Road traffic Accident) as blood oozed out of his wounds, pleaded a cinema manager to let us watch a south indian film that had started an hour ago (permission denied),battled lizards, and walked in Hospital premises confidently pretending to be a Doctor. Also learnt that she is the gang leader of her Hostel and everybody pays respect to her while passing her room each time. Gang-leader, purely due to her kindness, willingness to help, and her impeccable comic timing. Little do the girls know that, BAppi books train tickets, as its her favourite pastime. If there is one thing, besides Sorority life she LOVES, it has to be the drama and tension of being wait listed on Indian Rail website. Indian Rails are not like any other. One has to be on it, to believe it.  

sail away..

Thereafter, Bappi Da had planned a trip to Gokarna, 380 Kms away from Managlore, train tickets were booked.. return wasn't.. and no accommodation. Being a regular at impulsive trips, my dear friend assured me that we will find a place to stay without any effort. WRONG !!


Walking on the beach barefoot, sweaty, tired, in search of a room at night time would not be regarded as without any effort.  I looked ahead, only two more beach shacks to go.  If not those, we had two options
a) hire a rickshaw and go 3 kms into the city to find a place
b) hold on to our bags and sleep on the beach


Option A was out of the question, we didn't travel all this way to stay in a place where we couldn't hear the waves hit the shore! Then Option B it is !

 Palace de Gokarn

We walked in to the next place, it didn't even have a board.There was power cut and the place was dimly lit with candles one on each table. A young girl walked out, serving food to her guests. We asked for a room, At first she said no. then went in to ask her parents. The three were running helter-skelter to complete orders. Each member of the family spoke to us for not less then 3 seconds, they would run back to the kitchen and wander around like headless chickens.. The Tandoor Grill had pieces of marinated chicken.. and i was getting hungry.  They hadn't said a flat NO to our faces, well maybe because we couldn't see their faces in the dark and 3 seconds and swooosh the person is gone. If not this one, there one just one place remaining. I sent the other two to check for any vacant rooms in the other shack remaining. I stood there like a rock, not wanting to budge as i had seen a glint of hope. The father stood at the grill outside the shack. I started pleading him to give us a place to stay. There was a point when i was down on my knees with my hands joined on eye level to the tandoor grill. Black bits of the grilled meat flew everywhere around me. This was a serious moment hence we couldn't capture it on our cameras. However, we have a mental picture engraved in our minds.  He said that the place is full. We could sleep on the floor in the restaurant area  with four others who had decided to stay there (yay). All that he would provide us is a straw mat to sleep on. A lot of other shack owners had offered us a mat to sleep on the floor, however this one felt safer as it was family run.  We agreed. After a little of coaxing, the young girl (the most co-operative) told us to wait. And a few minutes later escorted us to a room. We had struck gold. Prison cells in most countries would be better decorated ! It had a cement concrete bed and a 2 inch think mattress covered in a faded old bed sheet, rusted fan and no power supply. But it felt like, it was a Palace. It cost us Rs 300 for the night, i.e about GBP 3.00 for the three of us ! WOWZA..  Rooms like these make great stories. We chucked our stuff in the room and ran to the beach. Most of the night was spent eating and lying under the stars *priceless*. A group of foreigners lit a bonfire and one of them played the guitar as we stared at the stars..

Kudle Beach

Gokarna is regarded as poor man's Goa.. I must say, the rich are missing out on something spectacular. This place boasts virgin beaches, picturesque locales and beach shacks/huts that are more like home stays managed by one or two people. The facilities are basic. By saying that I'm being modest.  However the place is breath taking. Especially if you have friends that make you love life more, then you would never want to be back.  

Mint Tea Magic

The shore has a cafe after every few yards. Each one is decorated with Indian handicrafts. These cafes serve more of continental food than Indian treats. Most of the places in Goa may not have many of these treats. The food is great in most places. A 20 min trek takes you to Kudle beach. There is no other way to get to the beach ! How lovely..

OM Beach

We had initially planned to take the 4pm train back to Mangalore the next day. Travelling ticket less was one of my greatest motivations to leave this place.  Also i had a flight to board the next morning back to Bombay. I convinced Bappi's friend to allow us to extend Gokarn departure time to later than 4pm. I was wanting to see the sunset. She agreed. We sat in our resident cafe , sipping on mint tea watch the sun leave us.


Our journey back to Mangalore was an experience in itself. I could write a new blog entry on it. However i have written enough... So i would cut the description short. We got to Kumta station at 11pm to board a train arriving at 12.15am. 

Midnight Dance

An hour at Kumta railway station was spooky. 
We decied to head to the waiting room.As we walk in there is no place, we walk in, some of them wake and offer us some seats.. Trying to me as quiet as we can, we think about our options as we have none left. The train is running late and we got no tickets. We call our 2 am friends to book our seats on the internet. When i look around in the room, now almost everybody is awake, seems like our "being quiet" wasn't quiet enough..  While in that thought, i see a lizard scrawling on the ceiling right above my head and i SCREAM..... and run out the room. Now everyone is awake.. I did not enter the waiting room, my friends got my bags and we walked to the platform.
There were not many people and the ones around were all sound asleep. People would occasionally wake up to attend to nature's call (not a pretty site). It was dark and quiet. We were exhausted to the bone, however this didn't stop us from being a pain in the ass to others present. We clicked a gazzilion pics with flash on.. and giggled when people woke up due to our banter. (thats right... we r going to rot in hell), when that was done, we didn't miss out on james bond impersonation, ram-leela and some yoga postures..ALL FOR THE CAMERA..   An hour later, we learn our train has been delayed by 2 hours.. Grr. BAd karma i guess. So we waited until 2.15 am to finally squeeze ourselves in to the train. There was no seat for us. Were we going to accept that and stand for 5 hours ? NO way.. We three hopped on to the wooden luggage rack above the seats. The rack under my bum was broken, Out of the four planks, it had just two. So if i lose my balance i would be landing into the annoying lady's lap. The family in our train booth were so annoying. I would slap them all. I spent my journey giggling at them and lost of eyes rolling. and spent our journey making more and more memorable moments..


This trip couldn't have got any better... I swear by every inch i gained on my waist due to excessive intake of aloo parathas..