A member of my immediate family sits in a hospital bed tonight. They have just had emergency surgery, and I am thankful to say that they have come out the other end without too many problems (touch wood). I think. But the last 24 hours have been stressful, to say the least. Frustrating. I am a doctor. This was a speciality I am more familiar with than lots of others. Yet, I was hundreds of miles away at the end of the phone. Being given bits and pieces of information over international phone lines. Couldn’t move…… CT scan……. 2.5 cm…….

I dont do well in situations where I am not in control. And this was one of those situations. I wanted to be there. I NEEDED to be there. To look at the CT scan myself. And draw my own conclusions from facts I know. Come up with my own plan of action. Yet, I couldnt do any of that. All I could do was sit by the phone, and keep my fingers crossed. Do what family members of patients all over the world do. Hope and pray.

Being a doctor, and treating a patient with a particular disease is so different from being a family member of that same patient with the same disease. And I am just learning how much more difficult it is to be the latter. I just cant imagine how difficult and how scary it must be right now, for those that are actually there at the bedside. I am really hoping and praying that this whole ordeal gets over soon, and they can come back home safely.

Someone has left a large bunch of flowers in the doctor’s room. Expensive flowers. The kind that you can smell from the end of the corridor. Huge pink lillies, some yet to bloom, pink roses, purple sweet pea. All in an expensive pink ceramic vase. There is no name attached to these flowers.

Working on an oncology ward, you can never be sure what these gifts signify. Did someone bring the flowers in because a loved one was cured? Or because we had no cure for that loved one, but thank you for trying anyways?

So its all done and dusted. The MOTH, Jack and I have shifted to Melbourne. Its been almost two months infact. Thats how long it has taken to settle in. And apart from all the usual chaos that accompanies moving countries, it has been all the more chaotic than would be expected. First Jack got left behind in Auckland. Then, Jack arrived in Melbourne. Then, Jack was really pissed off at being left behind in Auckland, and not allowed to go out in Melbourne. Then Jack went out of the house, and decided not to return. Until hunger got the better of him, and he returned home after 10 days of being AWOL. All of this amidst days full of running around, buying things for the house, being at home when things were delivered to the house, trying to buy a car, not having the car delivered on time, being stuck in Melbourne with no mode of transport (almost!), extending the rental period on the rental car, then having the rental people call me up threatening to report me to the police for not returning the car on time…..WHEW! As I said, chaotic…

Anyhow, everything got done. And hopefully all the chaos is now behind us. But in amongst all this chaos and frantic running around, there was a moment about a week ago, when I paused to think. And I am a bit ashamed to admit this, but for the first time in my life, it struck me how lucky I was. It all started when I went to get my eyebrows threaded. The lady I went to was probably the same age as me, and from India, and as such, was someone that I could identify with. But the similiarities ended there. She was mother to a 3 year old gorgeous girl. However, she was here with her husband, while the kid was still back home, being cared for by the in-laws. Her husband was here in Melbourne, studying part-time, and working part-time. And she was here with him. And it was so obvious how much she missed her daughter. It made me wonder how someone could leave their child behind like that to come overseas. I would never do that, I thought, sitting on my high horse.

But then, as I sat there while she worked on my eyebrows, I realised I had no right to think that. In fact, I had no idea what it was like to be her. She and her husband were living in a room the size of my bedroom. It was their living room, their bedroom, his study, her work area. On one wall, right at my eye level, was posted his roster for the upcoming month. Majority of the days said “rostered day off”. And while she was working on my eyebrows, in the tradition of beauticians all over the world, she was chatting away, talking about how hard life is as an Indian in melbourne, how difficult it is to try and save money for her husband’s fees for the next semester, etc, etc. I couldnt get out of there fast enough.

Then I left. And came home to my 46 inch Sony Bravia and my leather recliner couch. And I realised why I was in such a hurry to leave. Because for the first time in my life, I realised how lucky I am. That I was born to parents who did all this hard work so their kids could have a better life. That I worked hard when I needed to, and I am reaping the benefits of it today. That I married a guy who did his share of hard work too. My life has been too smooth until now. It has gone according to plan. I havent hit any major glitches yet. I never appreciated how good I had it until now. And I am not sure I liked the feeling that I got when I realised it. I felt…..something similiar to…..shame, perhaps.

There is nothing quite like coming home after a 14 hour work-day to the sight and smell of your husband cooking steaming-hot, spicy bhurji (indian scrambled eggs). The aroma of freshly chopped green chillies, and onions sizzling in the frying pan, tingling in my nostrils. Ahhhhh….

I always knew I married the perfect man. This just re-affirms it.

…of Incredibly Strange TV.

For a few months now, ideas of romantic saturday nights with the MOTH have gone down the gurgler thanks to MGM channel. Ever since he discovered Incredibly Strange TV a few months ago, saturday nights have been dedicated to watching some of the most bizarre, strangest and most convoluted movies ever made. Apparently there is an art to making these movies. I dont get the art, but then hey, I have Harry Potter and The Da Vinci Code right up there on my list of favourite flicks, so no surprises there.

But given that being married means being supportive of each other’s …strange….hobbies, I decided to sit and watch these movies with the MOTH. And I have to admit, often I couldnt finish watching these movies to the end. But what really surprised me about these movies was how huge a fan base they have, given how unbearably BAD these movies are.

The first one I watched was Seeding Of A Ghost. Pretty young woman, has an affair, gets killed, husband gets pissed off, resurrects her ghost, who kills everybody. The usual Ramsay Bros formula. But SO much more twisted! Ramsay Bros never had the imagination to make a ghost have sex with a dead body and then give birth to the most horrible looking, mutated creature who becomes the harbringer of destruction!

Sadly, all the movies thereafter kept going downhill, each one worse than the last one (in my opinion. The MOTH thoroughly disagrees) Supervixens (The director was obviously obsessed with female torsos), Mighty Peking Man (King Kong on a budget), Monster From The Surf (Seaweed meets serial killer), Hercules Vs Mongols (no description necessary, thats actually what the movie was about!). You get the idea….

So today is the first saturday after this “film festival”, as the MOTH likes to call it, has ended. A saturday night with just me, and the MOTH, and no weird movies….:-)