Eid ul Adha has come and gone

As I near the end of three years in Saudi Arabia, I think back to my arrival in the Kingdom on the night of 16th November 2011. At that time, Hajj had just got over, and in the post Hajj scenario, I never got the chance to see how the Eid ul Adha is celebrated. This year, however, is my third year in the Kingdom, and what I saw is that the evening before sees a lot of activity and visiting shops etc. Almost all the villagers in the village are out on the roads in their cars. They visit shops, supermarkets and so on, while their male members are busy getting hair-cuts, buying new clothes and accessories and so on.

The same was the milieu in the village on the evening before the Eid! The next day, the shops stayed closed through most of the day as the locals dispersed to their own homes after the Eid prayers. It was only after sunset that a few service-oriented offices had opened, and that too, very sparingly.

Over the course of the day, and for a day more after that, we continued to attend to our duties in the hospital; we received quite a few packets of goat's meat from doctors who had performed the sacrifice. My colleague Dr. Afzal - a Kashmiri doctor - prepared fried mutton pieces - a dry, tasteless offering that I could not reject, yet, did not enjoy much. Our mutual Kashmiri resident doctor friend Dr. Tahir prepared a traditional Kashmiri dish called Yakhni and sent a large amount for both of us (Dr. Afzal and me). We had this the next day, and by jove, it was fantastic.

In the last three days, I completed three CME courses offered by the Ministry of Health of the Kingdom. These courses were all offered ONLINE and concerned preparedness of the Ministry in case of an epidemic of either the new Corona virus or the Ebola Virus and what we must do to save the patients as well as protect our own selves. Each course took about an hour and a half to complete successfully.

In Zalm ... day 2

Yesterday I reached Zalm for my 2-day stint at about 10 a.m. The doctor who was waiting for my arrival is Dr. Hany Moharram, an Egyptian Pediatrician who is quite senior but usually very amiable and friendly. Today, my meeting with him was a bit soured by his impatient temperament bordering on poor manners. I learned from others that he had been pressurising the Medical Director for some days to be allowed to go for 3 days to his family in Taif, but when I received the missive from them, which was in the afternoon the day before yesterday, I only agreed to go there on the next day. Which I did. 

Anyways, Dr. Hany left as soon as I had met him, and the rest of the day passed off without any major event or calls. I had brought a plate of paya with a roti from the Pakistani restaurant in Al Muwayh before leaving that place, and I invited the Zalm ENT surgeon Dr. Baksh to share this with me at lunch. He did come, and we also finished the hospital-provided lunch between us.

I slept in the evening for quite a few hours, and as a result did not get any work done on the net or in relation to my courses. In any case, the rest of the evening passed without incident. I sat with a few other doctors who are also serving at Zalm but have come from other places just as I have; at mid-night, I took leave of them and went to sleep.

Early the next morning, I received a Cesarean section call, and so, I left my room at six a.m. After the job was done, I returned to my room and freshened up for the rest of the day's duty. The duty hours passed uneventfully again. I had just 4-5 patients in the OPD. In the evening, I returned to my room and watched a very endearing unusual film on rollerblade skating for children. The movie is called "Hawaa Hawaai" and featured child artistes in the main roles. I guess it was released sometime in 2013. I would recommend that my readers do try and see this movie if they can. 

That's it for now.

My short trip to Ta'if and what lies ahead

As I stated in my last post, I went to Ta'if for a half-day. I left my home after the Dhuhr prayer, reaching Ta'if just after Asr'. I had a simple agenda. The first task was to visit my bank and send money back to India; after this, I had an open agenda to spend the evening. I had hoped to fix my car, but realised that time would be wanting; hence, I just visited a grocery store to buy several items to take back home; a bufiya (a fast-food joint) to have tea and some snacks; the mosque to perform the Asr' prayers; and, finally, Ta'if's Heart Mall to purchase some food from McDonald's to carry back to my place as well as to do some window shopping.

I completed all these tasks by half past seven, and so, left Ta'if to return to Al Muwayh. Both, while going to, and returning from, Ta'if, I used my car's media system to watch two old Hindi movies - Aar Paar and C.I.D. Naturally, I had to watch them in bits, as I had to keep my eyes (and my mind) on the road, but I daresay many of my readers will think I did something unacceptable! Hence, before you say "WTF", let me submit that yes, it was wrong for me to have done so, and I was putting myself at peril.

But it was really enjoyable to listen to the fantastic bouquet of songs from both these movies ... and while Waheeda Rehman was scintillating in C.I.D., Guru Dutt was thoroughly enjoyable in Aar Paar.

Coming now to what happened on the next few days. Sunday was uneventful, but today, i.e. on Monday, I gave an educational talk on "Effective Communication" in our hospital's conference room. Interspersing my talk with anecdotes, and embellishing my presentation with some cartoons helped my listeners to stay awake through the necessarily brief talk of just over 22 minutes. 

I caught up with my online studies today evening, and, after writing this, I plan to prepare a small bag for my 2-days' duty at Zalm starting tomorrow. Yes, Zalm beckons again. So, as my colleague has completed over six weeks there last month, it is my turn to go.