Days 56, Tuesday 10th January and 57, Wednesday, 11th January, 2012

The last two days of the working week were as routine as the previous three, but there are a few things to note, and hence, I am entering those things here.


First off, Dr. Asadullah is a pleasure to chat with as he is very soft-spoken intellegent and kind hearted. It is sheer coincidence that he comes from the same geographical region of Pakistan as Dr. Niaz. When they meet, they speak in the seraki tongue, a type of language that takes from the Punjabi and the Multani languages. Dr. Asad loves his tongue, for he is a member of the Causes group on FB that wants the Seraki dialect to be an official language of Facebook. He has, within four days of his arrival in Al Muweh, already performed two appendicectomies. The case he did on Wednesday was a case of gangrenous appendix, and he told us that had he not performed the surgery, the patient would have perforated even before reaching Ta'if. Hats off to his courage and judgement.


The second thing is that I have prepared papers for demand of the House rent allowance and Furniture allowance to submit, via Mr. Md. Nawaf, to the Muderiya Sahat. Md. Nawaf is probably the most approachable person working in the administrative department of the Al Muweh General Hospital, and he helped me with the forms to be filled. The person who actually prepared the applications in Arabic and helped fill over 7 forms was, however, Dr. Aala, the E.N.T. specialist from Egypt. He is a portly, 55-year old doctor hailing from a small town north of Cairo. He is one of the most humble Egyptian doctors working in the hospital. Not only that, he is eager to help other doctors - especially non-Arabic speaking ones like me - guiding us, helping us to draft applications, write letters, and so on, and I have never seen or heard him procrastinate or avoid such requests for help. Hats off to him for being such a dear person. I pray that he lives long and that all his wishes and prayers are answered by the Almighty. 


The third thing is that in the last working week, there has been a decline in pediatric OPD patients as well as admissions. On Tuesday, I had about six to eight patients in the OPD and no admissions or calls from the ER. On Wednesday, there were just three OPD patients and one admission, which, too, did not require me to visit the ER, as the admitting resident, Dr. Measser, had already assessed the child correctly. He simply called me and admitted the child and endorsed the treatment recommended by me. 


Fourthly, 10th January was my wedding anniversary (the court marriage one ... I will be celebrating the actual Nikaah anniversary on the 20th January). Nishrin and I completed 22 years of marriage. I spoke to her on Skype, and as a token of the anniversary, I also had a chicken burger that I had bought in Ta'if on my last visit there. I also had a large chocolate to observe the anniversary. I miss being with her on this important day. The family plans to celebrate it with a dinner at some nice place on the 20th, and I extracted a promise that they would send me photos of that day's celebration. ;'-)


Finally, a word about the weather. Over the last ten days or so, the weather has changed - gradually, but perceptibly. The cold wave has passed, and the nights have become warmer than they were back then. I had to wear two or three layers of clothing to go out for the evening walks, now these are not needed. In the night, I simply wear my Tee shirt and my half pants and cover myself with the blanket. The fan is on throughout the night. 


Thus, it seems that winter is already over before mid-January. And they told me that the cold season would last till February end. What a pleasant (?) surprise.

Comparing a Saudi town to an Indian town

In the past one month of my stay in Al Muweh, which I have classified as a small town, I have come to realise the similarities between a typical North Indian village and Al Muweh, which, after thinking about it, gets re-classified into a village rather than a town. Let me explain how this change came about.


As my in-laws are from Punjab, I have been to the villages there; you will see similar pucca houses, wide roads, lots of cars and SUVs, dusty side roads, young boys huddled on the road sides with gossip, cigarettes and even traditional string toys, adolescents driving cars, a single main road with typical shops selling provisions, dhabas, tea stalls, welding shops, small supermarkets, vehicular service stations and petrol pumps.


As there are similarities, there are differences too, of course: the roads in India are not as well maintained, the children are not as well clad, the shops are more grungy and dirty, the houses are often just on the ground floor or with one additional floor (instead of the two or three floors seen here), the cars are old and often noisy (here the cars are often new and of different brands), the atmosphere is free and not punctuated by silences when everyone rushes to the mosques for namaaz, the street-lights are not as flashy, water is not scarce (which is the case here), the schools are not well maintained (here, they are clean, big and well-maintained), and the trees and birds are more plentiful (here, you see just acacia bushes and a few hardy plants, along with sparrows).


A few of the features resemble that of the villages of a deserty place like Rajasthan. As my friend Dr. Narendra tells me, the villages there are similarly barren, dusty, hot in the day-time and cold in the night-time, and people are prone to remain dirty and not take daily baths!


This realisation has refreshed me somewhat, and I look forward to discovering more similarities/differences in the place I live in, vis-a-vis Indian places. If you, dear reader, have some comments on this issue, do share them here. I intend to discuss the local people's attitudes too, but I have to tread softly on that one, right?