Of Divisions and Unisons

In the dead of night with no traces of civilization for a few kilometers, caught on an inundated national highway of sorts, the three of us summoned all our might as we tried to push the two ton monster over the stones with could remind you of the Grand Canyon. Already soaked up to the knees in the icy waters of Indus, I could barely feel my toes. After ten minutes of intense struggle, the rear wheel slipped and hurled what looked like a football at my shin. The strike sent electric currents to my brain reminding of a pain that was reminiscent of a lumber puncture. I ambled towards the car, eager to get in but realized that I had underestimated the blow. The magnificence of red pouring down the leg, I immediately tried to blot the entire wound with all that I could find around me.

After what seemed like ages, we reached Drass and I was on a lookout for anything that had a red cross over its face. Knowing that we had not booked our accommodation for the night and that we were running couple of hours late than we ought to, finding a hotel was our top priority. The first illumination across the windshield of the car made us heave a sigh of relief. My friends went inside that hotel and inquired about the availability. Disappointed with the quality of what they saw I believe, we decided to look for something more inhabitable. I asked them to stay back and look for it while I felt the exigency of getting the blood staunched. Overhearing our conversation, Salim jumped into the scene.

While any total stranger will leave you at your own mercy to find a way to the hospital, Salim did not hesitate even once as he got into the car and instructed the driver authoritatively to follow the directions he told him. Within no time, we gatecrashed the government hospital and Salim rushed to find the doctor on duty. A thin white man with the typical look of a kashmiri, very similar to what you would have seen on your TV set, he barely resembled a doctor, let alone be one. It seemed that Salim knew him well. I could make it out from the way they were talking in their kashmiri dialect. Salim finally managed to convince the doctor to treat me and the doctor asked me to walk a few metres to the emergency cabin.

On the short 2 minute walk, the doctor bombarded me questions that one has faced several times in their lives...the pain was so excruciating that I couldn't process anything and he realized that. After summoning the nurse on duty, both the medics examined my wound, discussed something amongst them and decided to stitch it...As she put the needle through my already torn flesh, I could not help grimace in pain and shrieked. All along, Salim had been watching me and he came over. He put his palms over my eyes so that I didn't see what was going on. I don't know why I felt comforted by the fact that he was present there and that I was not all alone amongst a group of strangers. After the gory mess was taken care of, I was feeling unconscious and they decided to give me a drip full of glucose. Meant was intra-venal intake, I didn't even think once and started gulping on the bottle orally as I continued to lay on the emergency table.

After all things were taken care of, it was time for the formalities. The doctor and the nurse enquired me about my name. That I told them and quizzically they asked me for my full name. I replied to their question and they appeared perplexed. I could make it from their faces that they realized that I had a Hindu name. They asked me for my father's name. And yet their faces remained white. I noticed a nervous smile across Salim's face. Ignoring the tenseness of the situation, he helped me off the bed and I hopped my way to the car.

After we reached our original drop off place (where I had met Salim near the hotel), I found my friends waiting there for me. It was apparent that they had found a suitable accommodation for the night. Salim got off the car and headed into the hotel. It was there that we realized that he owned the hotel we had inquired about earlier and decided not to stay in.

Before he made his way into the hotel, he asked me whether I needed anything else - food, water, anything. Thanking him, I refused his help and told him that he had already done enough for me. Just before we bid our goodbyes, I asked him his name - for one I needed to relate a name to the face that had been my savior. "Salim" is what he told me. "Shukriya Salim" is all I could tell him before we got going.

I ate my medicine and could feel the sedative taking over.

A strange thought ignited in my head.
The befuddled faces of the hospital staff that were taken aback by my name and more so by my religion. And then the ever so caring smile of Salim, who a moment ago was just another stranger. I closed my eyes thinking that for some, while your name and religion is a division, for others still, there is only a unison called humanity.

Peace.