A Tryst with a Fever

A Tryst with a Fever… and further revelations!!!

Long long time ago, there used to be a doctor, one of the greatest ones of his kind. A doctor who could sense the disease his patient was suffering from just by entering the patient’s room. No diagnosis, no Pathology reports, no X-Rays and Bingo! He always cracked it. His name was Dr. Bidhan Chandra Roy. But that is history… Today the name B. C. Roy is remembered for one of the highest awards of honor that the Indian government presents to noted Doctors.

Welcome to the Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur and just like the rest of India, the name B. C. Roy is famous here as well. The only hospital available in IIT Kgp for the best brains of India is called the B. C. Roy Technology Hospital. Technology Hospital???
Never mind the name, for everything in IIT has the word Technology attached to it.

From here begins my story, not as queer as the Comedy of Errors, but regarding the fact the fact that we are comparing a work of fiction to a real-life incident, one could rate it quite close to the plot that has been the evergreen magnate of comedies.

10th of January, 2006 – I mange to catch up a mild fever. Against all my wishes, my friends force me to visit BCRoy (Hereafter, BCRoy shall refer to the hospital only and not to the great physician). So I make my first visit to BCRoy as a patient. The doctor seemed to be a genius. I gave him the list of symptoms.
Shock 1: The doctor, in no time, sensed it to be typhoid. Oops, all those who have suffered from the disease before must know that detecting typhoid within 24 hours must be the dare of a maestro.
My reaction: I was not conviced at all. I went to the nearest pathology and got myself checked. Gosh… no malaria, no typhoid, thankfully. I consulted another physician (another maestro from BCRoy). A dosage of a few antibiotics couple with ad-hoc paracetamols worked and I was Ok in the due course of time.

27th of January, 2006 – The fever relapses, this time more rampant than before with a sense of vengeance as it had been mercilessly pushed out of my body two weeks back. This time it came with a lot of shivers and shot up to 104.3 degrees on the Fahrenheit scale. For the second time, against all my wishes, on being forced by friends (Since friends in need as friends indeed), I was taken to BCRoy and this time, was admitted there.
Shock 2: The next day was a Sunday and the BCRoy pathology centre was on a weekly off. So no tests on Sundays…
My Reaction: Doctor, can I consult another pathologist?

Shock 3: Yes, you can; but we would not accept it. You will anyhow have to go for another test tomorrow… (Please remember this shock, for it is a prelude to another one to come)
My Reaction: My blood is not free, man. Better delay the test by one day…

Next day…
Shock 4: Doctor says that the report shows that I am perfectly fine and that I will be fine in a couple of days.
My Reaction: Do I have a choice? Maybe, the thermometer is a liar… Stupid thermometer!!!

When lunch is served, I ask the nurse if I can get chapattis instead of rice since I am feeling nauseate.
Shock 5: You may, but not now. Lunch has been served today and you will have to eat it. The change in your lunch schedule will be made from tomorrow.
My Reaction: Firstly, what do I eat for today? Secondly, what if I don’t feel nauseate tomorrow? God knows… let the time come.

Two days go by, and I continue getting rice. I use my right to speech and ask why am I not getting chapattis?
Shock 6: The nurse complains – “You might have told to other nurses. You will have to report it to the nurse who is on duty for the day.”
My Reaction: Shame to Oracle, Microsoft and creators of the database management systems. Long live the traditional file systems where the old data is lost as soon as the system restarts (I mean, change of duty).

Finally, I get Bread instead of rice… I dare to ask again, “But I asked for chapattis…”
Shock 7: This is what we know as chapattis here!!!
My Reaction: Grrrr!!!

Meanwhile, fever is still as rampant as ever… still crossing the 104 mark on the Fahrenheit scale…
Shock 8: (An extension of Shock 3) Son, we are not able to detect anything here; you better get yourself checked by another pathologist…
My Reaction: As you say doc. Maybe my blood IS free after all…

Next day,
Shock 9 (The Biggest One): Doc himself comes to me and says that nothing has been detected as yet. All reports say that I am fine… We all here believe that your fever is due to an unknown disease!!!
My Reaction: I call up home, and the next thing I knew that I was leaving on the jet plane (Jet Airways, to be precise) and was homeward bound…

Back in Agra (my hometown), my family doc asked me to go for another blood test (Poor me…) After going through them, gave me a couple of antibiotic doses and believe me, I was alive and kicking in a couple of days!!! Am now returning back to heaven, a place that gives me an identity in all spheres of life, a place so perfect in placements, infrastructure, faculty and everything one could think of, but void of any medical facilities – IIT Kharagpur.

A Land where Death is So Cheap…

Gone are the days of Shakespeare when he ‘wasted’ one of his longest plays ‘Hamlet’ where the Prince of Denmark spent half his time soliloquizing ‘To Be or Not To Be’. Today is the era of J. K. Rowling, where the Hero called Harry Potter lives in a world where death comes now and then, in full consciousness or in a pure absence of the brain.

Another edition of The Daily Prophet and one won’t be much surprised on Ron asking Hermione “Is anybody we know dead?” As if it were asking “Is he asleep” or “Is he on a holiday”. Hats off to JKR for that…

It all started with James and Lily Potter. Cedric Diggory and Sirius Black followed suit, and now; of all the people in the Magical world, Dumbledore??? It’s agreed that James and Lily died much before the real adventures began and therefore their death is justified.
Say even Diggory was not as close to the reader’s brain so as his death would affect him to a great extent. But what did the authoress have for Sirius Black? A moment back, he was there, smiling and dueling with his own cousin, Bellatrix Lestrange. And just in the very next moment – Harry’s Godfather was no more. And did anybody seem to mind it? Of course, nobody did. It might have made just another one in The Daily Prophet – An item of much interest to Rita Skeeter and Luna Lovegood than Hermione Granger or Ron Weasley. Unfortunately, even JKR took this issue as lightly as that of Amelia Bones. But dear JKR, what of your readers? What of those who had been, by now, been so much attached to Sirius… of those who were anxiously waiting for a movie called ‘The Prisoner of Azkaban’ just to see how their dear Sirius Black looked like? All, in vain!

And now here we have the man who stood by Harry all through the last six long years, Albus Dumbledore – the man who is no more. And what a paradox!!! Life for everybody still remains the same. Harry could still feel the trace of a flowery scent in the air, and recognize Ginny. Fleur still loves Bill even after he is bitten by a werewolf called Greyback under extraordinary conditions. Tonks declares her love for Lupin. Molly Weasley is much more concerned of her injured werewolf-bitten son rather than the dead Dumbledore… and Deputy Headmistress Prof. Minerva McGonagall taking Dumbledore’s seat as the new Headmistress. Everything remains the same, as if this murder was intended to be another one in The Daily Prophet.

What can be JKR’s aim in doing it? Clear enough, she wants her old Harry to be the one and only Supreme Hero. Any effort by any other character in defeating Lord Voldemort would only dilute Harry’s image as the Hero. What philosophy!!!

So who’s going to be the next? Oh my, JKR has a world of options. I won’t be much surprised if any of Lupin, Hermione, Ron Tonks, McGonagall, etc etc etc is the next. Of course any one of the Weasleys won’t mind to die. They are SO many, one less in number and it won’t matter would it? Arthur, Molly, Charlie, Bill, Percy, Fred, George, Ron, Ginny… Ay, there’s the rub. Not Ginny! Don’t we see she is our Hero’s latest girlfriends, what if Harry has already denied her for any more ‘snogging’…