Dusting Off Ye Old Computer

Literally. It’s amazing what a day or two away from the computer can do when one lives in India – even in rainy season!

Getting on here to write is proving harder than I ever expected. Between Sunday and today I estimate that we’ve had over 60 guests either visiting or staying over. It’s kept me on my toes.

Slowly life is getting back to a normal schedule tho. Whatever that may be. Yesterday I was out of the house at 7:30AM to get E. to school and pick up one of our Children’s Home kids to take to the eye doctor. When we got there we discovered the office didn’t open until 9AM but my driver, who recommended the Doctor in the first place, said it would be really crowded so we should get there early anyway.

Too early I guess, because we ended up having to find something to do for an hour, but Miriam, the little girl, needed a haircut in a bad way so we were able to accomplish that before 8:30.

Then back to the eye doctor’s office. Very Gujarati. So not Western, all I could read in the whole place was “Quiet Please” and “Diagram of the Eye” with a picture under it of… well, the eye.

At 8:55AM exactly, a man in a little office must have done something because everyone in the entire waiting room jumped up and shuffled into line, my driver included. You see, there are no appointments in any Indian Doctor’s office that I’ve ever been in. First come, first serve rules. We were about 4th. My driver called me over to give the pertinent info and pay the whopping 30 cents for the visit.

Then we wait some more by the Doctor’s teeny tiny examining room. A nurse calls 4 or 5 patients (and family members) in at a time and you squeeze around each other for a seat. When Miriam’s turn came an old, fat woman plopped herself in the seat before we could get there and the Doctor looked over and told us to wait just one more minute.

O-kay.

At last the woman left and Miriam moved up to the Doctor. He whipped her in and out of the hot seat in about 30 seconds which included the sight test to which he said, “Ok, no problem” when she was too shy to say any of the letters. He prescribed drops for her painful eyes and sent us on our way.

This is what I do, take kids to the doctor and practice hospitality. Back in the saddle again…