Delirious Delhi

by Dave Prager

  The Delhi bombings, which killed thirty people, happened on a Saturday night. We were waiting for our friends Scott and Sally to pick us up for a party when we turned on the TV and learned that five bombs had gone off around the city, including at Connaught Place and GK-I’s M-Block market. The media reported that even more bombs had been found and defused, and that security was being bolstered citywide. We wondered if we’d be able to make it to the party at all, or if the security presence would be too tight even to reach our destination just a few miles north of Hauz Khas market.

  But we saw no sign of any additional security during the entire ride. If we hadn’t turned on the TV, we wouldn’t have known anything unusual had happened. It wasn’t until the next day, when an auto drove us past the GK-I market, that we saw the police presence: a few yellow barriers had been dragged across the road there, creating a checkpoint that slowed passing cars enough to create a traffic jam but not enough for the two nearby policemen to possibly determine whether the drivers were carrying dynamite on their laps or wearing Al Qaeda lapel pins or whatever other signs they would have been looking for, had they been looking at all, instead of reclining in the shade of a nearby tree.

  Before the Mumbai attacks had even ended, my boss Paul (the only other Westerner in my office) decided that if Western hotels could be attacked, Western companies could be as well. So he instituted a new security policy for our office, which was in a detached four-story building in an industrial neighborhood of Gurgaon: the iron gate in front of our office was to be kept closed and padlocked from then on. What’s more, our guard Jagdish would henceforth sit in the driveway to challenge visitors before they entered the building, instead of after they’d reached the air-conditioned receptionist’s desk.

  This new policy was diligently followed for a little more than a week, until the feelings of fear across the country subsided. The office slowly crept back to the old habits: first we stopped padlocking the gate, then we stopped closing it, and then Jagdish returned inside to the airconditioned reception room. The only tangible effect of our increased security was to deter a roving gang of hijras—eunuchs or transvestites—who, dressed in garish saris, had been bursting into nearby offices to sing and dance until they received payment to leave the premises, threatening to expose their genitals if their demands weren’t met. They couldn’t get past our padlock, though, so they just shouted at those of us who gathered on the balcony to watch and then continued on to harass the publishing company across the street.

  Paul’s vigilance for safety at work didn’t catch on. But he had also taken measures to protect his family, and he told me I was foolish not to do the same. After all, I was a Westerner. Which meant I was a target. Which meant I should indulge in some common-sense precautions: vary my route, plan for the worst, prepare for self-defense, and trust no one.

  Paul’s warnings came just as I’d finished reading the hottest book to come out of India at the time we lived there: The White Tiger, Aravind Adiga’s tale of a poor Delhi driver who kills his rich employer. Taken together with Paul’s doomsaying, I started thinking about just how much Birender and his taxi drivers knew about us, our routine, the flimsy deadbolt on our front door, and our total lack of Indian street-smarts. I found myself awake at night mentally mapping escape routes from my office, deciding which kitchen implements would make the best weapons, and realizing that if Al Qaeda had burst into our living room right then, neither Jenny nor I would know what to do beyond locking the bedroom door and hiding in the wardrobe. In New York, we would have called 911. In Delhi, I realized we had no idea how to reach the authorities.

  So I queried the online discussion group that Delhi expats normally used to request recommendations for Hindi tutors, ask which stores sold Camembert cheese, and critique the wine selection at the various five-star hotels. To that discourse, I added this question: how do you call the police?

  Many people responded to tell me that “100” is the Delhi equivalent of 911. And while there would probably be language challenges, I was told that if I babbled enough keywords (“Hauz Khas” “American” “terrorist with a chainsaw”), I could probably rouse a local cop to saunter over. One person suggested that Jenny and I should be proactive and make friends with the guys at the local police stand, but another advised against it: “We would rather call our embassy or someone known to us who knows someone in police. We don’t trust the police in Delhi.”

  I wasn’t sure if I had the answer. So I emailed Lynn, the US embassy employee who was the one who got the call when an American citizen was run over by the Blueline or arrested for stealing the Sankara stones from Mola Ram. Lynn had spent enough time visiting Americans in Indian jails—and, sadly, Indian morgues—that she could offer reliable advice for those who needed help from the authorities. “The best thing to do, if possible, is file a police complaint or First Information Report. Once you do that, call us and we will follow up with the police to make sure that they do whatever is needed in the situation. The police will not take our call as seriously if the involved party hasn’t complained. That being said, we want to hear about whatever is happening regardless of whether a complaint has been lodged. We always want to know if our citizens have emergencies; sometimes we can move things along or make suggestions.”

  In our eighteen months in Delhi, we never had any reason to contact Lynn in a professional capacity. Nevertheless, though Birender and his team never hatched a plot against us, I’m glad we did the research.

  I only wish we had done the same research when it came to medical emergencies. Because had we known whom to call ahead of time, I wouldn’t have found myself sprinting up Aurobindo Marg at two o’clock one cold January morning in a desperate search for an autorickshaw while Jenny lay on the sidewalk convulsing with fever.

  This story begins with a molar that became sensitive to the cold. Jenny’s dentist decided that there was some decay under one of her older fillings, and that a root canal was necessary in a few days’ time. To alleviate the pain until that procedure, he yanked out the offending filling, slathered the irritated root with medication, covered it with a temporary filling, and sent her home.

  Eight hours later, Jenny was suddenly shivering uncontrollably and burning to the touch. Summoning all my Boy Scout training, I ran around in panicked circles, held my head, and shouted, “Just let me think!”

  Finally, despite the fact that it was well after midnight, I decided to call the dentist on each of the six numbers printed on his prescription letterhead until I reached him at home. He told me to take Jenny to Indraprastha Apollo Hospital.

  But that was four miles to the east of us. And in my panicked state, that seemed much too far away.

  Jenny had found this dentist on a list of recommended medical practitioners published by the US embassy. The same list suggested a hospital much closer to us: Aashlok Hospital in Safdarjung, a private hospital only ten minutes down the road at this time of night. I bundled Jenny in a blanket and helped her down the stairs. With our block’s security guard staring at us from beneath his own blanket, we trudged towards Aurobindo Marg to find a ride. Jenny made it about halfway before she needed to rest; I helped her sit on the sidewalk next to the shuttered wooden box where, by day, a paan masala vendor sold shiny foil packets of breath freshener. And then I ran over Aurobindo Marg, deserted at this time of night, and waved like a maniac at passing autos until one stopped for me.

  He crossed the U-turn and followed me as I ran back to where Jenny was now lying flat on the dusty sidewalk.

  “Aashlok Hospital in Safdarjung!” I told the driver.

  “Kya?” he asked me.

  I repeated my destination. He repeated his query.

  I tried one more time as I glanced towards Aurobindo Marg to see if I could spot another auto. “Aashlok Hospital in Safdarjung! Aashlok! Hospital! Safdarjung!”

  Finally he clapped in recognition: he’d understood “hospital” and “Safdarjung.” Within minutes, we pulled up to a 1970s-style cement bui
lding. A few people holding brooms watched from the emergency room entrance as I helped Jenny out of the auto. I handed a hundred rupees to the driver as I gestured to the gawkers to get some help. Though the driver and I hadn’t discussed the price, I knew that change should have been forthcoming, even when including his late-night fee; but the driver just shouted, “Thank you, sir!” and drove off before I could argue, guessing correctly that I wouldn’t be chasing after him.

  I helped Jenny into the building, past a sign displaying the name of the hospital printed in Hindi script as clear as day to anyone who could read Hindi: Safdarjung Hospital.

  “Safdarjung Hospital” is not “Aashlok Hospital in Safdarjung.”

  Once inside, men and women wearing white coats materialized in welcome sanitary contrast to the paansplattered walls. There was a rush of lights and moans as Jenny’s stretcher was wheeled through the halls, up an elevator, and into a room where a young English-speaking doctor queried us about her problems. From the next room over, I heard a whimper and then the sound of liquid splashing on the concrete floor. Some people stopped at the doorway and stared, but most were too wrapped up in their own misery to notice us. A man in a thin hospital gown walked by, pushing an IV stand on wheels.

  After a fleeting examination, the doctor decided that Jenny’s fever was “just a fever” and gave her a shot of something he said would “make it go away.” I have no idea what he injected her with. And while I’m pretty sure I have a memory of the syringe being removed from sanitary wrapping, I’m also pretty sure that my mind would have later invented that memory to save me the horror of imagining otherwise.

  “I don’t think it’s anything to worry about,” the doctor said as he pumped Jenny full of who-knows-what. “But there’s a chance it could be malaria. Just in case, I want you to take four of these pills tonight, along with half a glass of milk.”

  The mystery injection did the trick. Jenny’s fever went down, her shivering stopped, we returned home, and she slept through the night. We called the dentist first thing in the morning. “You went to Safdarjung Hospital?” he gasped, horrified. “That’s a government hospital!”

  And then he told us to call Dr. Bhatia. And though we later learned that Jenny’s fever had actually been a blood infection caused by a contaminated temporary filling, we are forever grateful to the dentist anyway—because time and again, Dr. Bhatia would be a lifesaver.

  We lost count of how many times we subsequently entered the inner sanctum of Dr. Bhatia’s Hauz Khas Enclave home office, passing through his immaculately landscaped grounds, feeling intense jealousy towards the German guy who’d been lucky enough to rent the flat in the doctor’s guest house, and listening as Dr. Bhatia effortlessly diagnosed our ills while still finding time to recommend tourist sites. He provided curative advice for all our ailments—including my Scotch-induced food poisoning, my laryngitis, my diarrhea, my carpal tunnel syndrome that ended up requiring a month of therapy, the spider bite that caused a quarter-sized patch on my neck to ooze and blister, my nerve hypersensitivity, more diarrhea, and my three-week-long ear infection. (“I strongly recommend that you do not fly!” he told me when I called him about the ear pain I was feeling while sitting at the gate in the airport. When I told him that I intended to fly anyway, he sighed and wished me “All the best” in a tone that could only be interpreted as, “Hey, buddy, it’s your funeral.”)

  So, eight hours after we left that government hospital, Dr. Bhatia appeared at Jenny’s bedside—a house call? Only in India!—to listen to her problems, reject the diagnosis of malaria in favor of the blood infection, prescribe antibiotics, and assure us that our problems were over.

  Which they were. Until we found out the hard way that chloroquine—malaria medicine—doesn’t go down too well on an empty stomach. We hadn’t been able to find any milk after leaving the hospital the night before, so Jenny had washed down the pills with a glass of powdered infant formula from an all-night pharmacy. And that hadn’t been enough to counterbalance the gastric effects of the chloroquine.

  It took the malaria medication about twenty-four hours to do its worst. So by midnight, everything that was inside of Jenny was coming out of her, including her antibiotics.

  “I’m afraid,” Dr. Bhatia told me, pleasantly unconcerned that I was calling so late, “that you must take her to the hospital.”

  This time, when he told me which hospital, I listened.

  And this time, instead of dashing out to the main road, I called the hospital—Max Hospital in Saket—to request an ambulance. They reached our flat surprisingly fast, and soon Jenny was being ushered across marble floors to a curtained area inside a reassuringly modern emergency room that, aside from three small drops of dried blood on the ceiling, was spotless. Jenny was admitted and examined and given an IV drip to replenish her fluids while I filled out the paperwork and chose between a four-person room, a private room with a couch, and a “luxury suite.” My choice became our home for the next two days.

  The first day was physically miserable: Jenny’s stomach was knotted and cramping, she was weak, her hand was cartoonishly swollen from the IV feeding into her wrist, her bed was uncomfortable, and there was absolutely nothing good on TV. Sleep was impossible, with a constant parade of nurses and doctors and nutritionists and hospitality executives calling on us to explain how Max Hospital gives special attention to its foreign guests. I left the hospital around 2 p.m. to eat a quick gyro sandwich in the Saket PVR market before going home to shower and pick up our books and laptops in the hope of some distraction. I returned to discover the worst of it: the hospital didn’t have any Internet.

  By the end of the first day, Jenny had physically recovered from the gastroenteritis caused by the malaria medication. But the blood infection still concerned them, so they detained her for another evening of observation. Thus, while the first twenty-four hours had been one of pain and discomfort, the second day consisted of agonizing boredom that almost seemed worse. Still tethered to her IV, Jenny was so determined to be discharged on the second morning that she got herself out of bed and into the shower; she brushed her hair, straightened her clothes, and put on her make-up. Every time a doctor would come in, she’d hide her balloon hand and exuberantly proclaim how ready she was to go home. The doctors would frown, take her temperature, and suggest another night might still be necessary.

  In the end, we got out late on the second afternoon with two very valuable lessons learned: first, that the time to find a doctor and hospital is before a medical emergency.

  And second, that one should never eat gyros at the Saket PVR market. Jenny was the one with gastroenteritis, but I ended up spending just as much time on the toilet.

  When I returned to the office a few days later, my co-workers were livid that I’d not asked them for help. “You call to ask how to say ‘cauliflower’ in Hindi,” my colleague Pankaj barked at me, “but not when your wife goes to the hospital?!”

  As for Jenny, once she finally got her strength back, she still had to go and get that root canal.

  First, though, she found a different dentist.

  1. http://www.indianexpress.com/news/bluelines-claim-twolives-in-city-toll-reac/402617

  2. http://www.rediff.com/news/2007/oct/18spec.htm

  3. http://blog.taragana.com/n/delhi-government-to-phase-outblueline-buses-from-july-70451

  4. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7055625.stm

  5. http://www.dnaindia.com/mumbai/report_antibiotic-misusemaking-bacteria-resistant-to-drugs_1256400

  6. http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/2003/08/03/stories/2003080301260500.htm

  Photo Insert

  Celebrating Holi, the festival of colors, and applauding the foresight we had to wrap our camera in plastic.

  Hamilton Court rises twenty-six stories above Gurgaon. It was our home for exactly six nights.

  At the center of a Holi treat, this pebble of bhang makes the colors extra vibrant.

  Looking west across Old Delhi fro
m the minaret at Jama Masjid, India’s largest mosque.

  Back at ground level, two boys rush up for an unbidden photo op.

  Even if I had bought a motorcycle, I’m sure I would have lost it.

  Two of Delhi’s 50,000 autorickshaws queue for fuel, wasting not an inch of space.

  The Metro is shaping Delhi’s future.

  The well-being of livestock often remains the most pressing need of the present.

  Curries at Karim’s, making me hungry.

  Hauz Khas Market tailors humor me as I take yet another picture.

  I admired this circus poster almost every morning on my way to the office; with traffic, it generally took fifteen minutes to pass it.

  Looking down from a rooftop bar in Paharganj, Delhi’s backpacker hub.

  Were it not for the free meals, many of the families supported by the charity Pardada Pardadi could not afford to send their daughters to school.

  Perched above Delhi’s Sunday book market, a worker repairs cables the hard way.

  If asked which books I’d have expected to find in Delhi’s Sunday book market, I’d have named none of these.

  A letterer paints an ad on an autorickshaw.

  Lakshan the chaiwallah and his son Raju, always there to dispense four rupees worth of respite from the office.

  A sidewalk barber near Old Delhi.

  Riding with my mother among the bicycle rickshaw traffic in Old Delhi.