Goodbye Dear Delhi, Hello Home!

My friend Amanda congratulates me right before I leave India, on surviving Delhi alone. I can’t help but correct her statement about my incomplete mission. “You haven’t survived Delhi alone, until you have survived Delhi airport alone,” I said. We both laugh finding the humor in it, but knowing it’s really not that funny at all, because it’s oh so true.

I started packing two days before my departure -- but it was the kind of packing where you are just shifting things around so it feels like you are doing work, even though nothing is really getting done. I soon realize while cramming my belongings into my suitcases, there is not enough room. I have no idea how I acquired so much extra stuff, or even what it is for sure. Part of the problem (although I can’t blame it fully), is the amount of medication I decided to take home. It’s so cheap in India that I can take months worth of all of them for half the price I pay for just one at home which my insurance won’t cover.

One of my suitcases is too small. I venture down to the main drag, determined to come back with a new suitcase. A B-I-G one. I’ll ditch my small one and leave it for one of the work boys at the hospital. Then, I’ll have my new one, and a borrowed duffle that I’ve become all too attached to. The street is crowded; bubbling with people. They are tearing up the road for the Metro underground project. One of the doctors told me that once the Metro is done, Delhi will be less crowded because they are hoping a lot of people will be hanging out under the streets. I’m not sure about the strategy behind this plan, but each time I get stuck in a sea of people, I like the idea more and more. On the way to the shop, I am called by three men coming out of a store. “Maaaam. Xxxxcuse me maaaam. American maaaam,” they say, alternating turns. I whip my head around and excitedly say, “Nooooo thank you.” You see, this is what happens after awhile in Delhi. You find that you can be unpredictably snappy without being aware of it. You become so used to being called, begged, persuaded and charmed, that you morph into a hypersensitive defensive human. It’s not necessarily that people are always even harassing you; you are just always “bothered,” sometimes only for a person to innocently ask which country you are from. Still, you are an anomaly and you feel like it ALL the time. The men are following me even after I rudely brush them off. They don’t give up. Finally one taps me on the shoulder and as I turn to consider yelling at him, he hesitantly points to my shoe. I look down and I have stepped in what looks like the biggest pile of cotton candy in the world. I immediately shrink inside. All he wanted was to let me know my foot was covered in goo. It makes me worry when I get home, I will have a hardened shell, unable to socialize or respond properly to strangers. I am disgusted with myself, and this mission. I find the suitcase, buy it and begin to navigate the broken up dirt paths that used to resemble sidewalks.

Huge ditches run along the shops and I have an enormous suitcase to balance with. It must be lunch hour because it seems everyone is on the same street as me. I suddenly realize why Indians carry things on their heads (bowls, food, goods, bags full of sticks, etc.). There is no room to carry it by your side. If you do, risk getting knocked down, sideswiped, tipped over, and pushed into a car. “When in Rome.....” I say out loud. I flip the suitcase up onto my head, one arm strapped around each side, and quickly make my way back to the hospital. I hear some of the deepest belly laughs ever as I walk through the streets. I can only imagine what I look like: stark white me, Maui Jim sunglasses, Nike shoes, long curly hair, pink lip gloss -- and a suitcase bearing an unidentifiable Indian brand’s symbol, on my head.

It becomes a worthy journey when I finally get everything to fit, although still not by much. The taxi comes to pick me up at 8 p.m. and by the time I reach the airport, I have a headache. My driver has decided to bring his friend and they are smoking in the van. I try to ask them not to by using my best charade skills, but they act like they don’t understand. The thing I remember most from the Delhi airport is an endless supply of men aggressively trying to help you with your bags for tips. I figure that this is how I’ll navigate getting two huge bags, plus my carry on and backpack to the check-in desk where I can hand some of them over. When I arrived with my parents in December, they were literally fighting for our bags. There were enough of these men to accommodate a steady stream of Asian tourist buses. Tonight, the taxi drops me off, tosses my bags on the curb and I look around. No one. Not a single luggage guy is in my future to help. I am alone with bags that easily triple my body weight. I spot a luggage cart and drag my stuff over. I load it up and push it into line by a handle that is hanging on by a prayer. Inside the double doors, there is an x-ray machine where the bags are to be placed, then put back on your cart to proceed to Continental’s check-in counter. I drag my stuff up on the platform while the people x-raying look annoyed that I’m struggling too slowly, but don’t offer to help. I remove them after they go through, put them back on my cart and go to the desk. As I walk away, the x-ray guy is mumbling “tips, tips, tips,” as if he’s done all the heavy lifting.

I hand the Continental counter my passport and other travel documents and they say there is a wheelchair order in the computer. It’s probably in there because I used one on the way to India. “Will you like this service maaam?” the ticket guy says. I think to myself, knowing this means I would bypass much of the bureaucratic crap of getting through an international terminal. “No thank you,” I say. I leave my way too heavy bags with him and say a silent thanks to the Universe when he doesn’t weigh them. I know they have exceeded the 50-pound limit and the overweight fee is hefty.

I pass through line after line and after having Subway sandwich for a snack (my baby stem cells are always hungry), I enter security. I am patted down, searched and electronically tested for explosives. In India, when you are searched, you are SEARCHED. No quick pats. Be ready to be shaken up, felt almost everywhere (thoroughly, but by a same gender security agent) and then searched again. I get to the gate early and eventually, the 15.5 hour plane ride to Newark is under way. When I get to Newark, I have a connecting flight in two hours. By the time I get off the plane, reclaim my baggage (which is coming out at two different carousels for some absurd reason) and re-check them after customs, I almost miss my flight. I get to the gate two minutes before it closes and that is only because I had to run a good part of the way. Yes, I was running. I felt like Forest Gump on a mission. I was the only sprinting smiling person in Newark that day -- maybe ever.

I arrive in San Francisco finally......30 plus hours after I left Nu Tech Mediworld hospital. My sister and nephew are waiting and I practically melt when I see their familiar faces. I feel beat up, washed over and dragged down. My sister tells me I look great. God bless family.

It is strange to be sitting in a totally different world and seemingly different body now. I am being unusually responsible about my rest. I don’t want to lag behind and let my hard working system become bogged down. I promised Chavi when I left, I’d come back in July with the same strength or better than I am now. So now that it's been a few days since I've been back, it's time to start a physio routine again. It will be a challenge without her help, and our perfect blend of determination and giggling sessions to keep me motivated.

Despite my confused internal time clock, I feel amazing. I am grasping onto the feeling with everything I have. Last week, someone asked me bluntly, “Are you afraid it will go away?” In my immediate honesty, I jumped to a “Yes.” I suppose it’s natural to feel that way. I do not consciously worry, but admittedly, it enters my mind far more often than I want to welcome it.

I have an appointment with my doctor the first week in March. I am excited to see what he has to say about my progress. It’s hard for the people who see you every day to gauge a change objectively. It’s even hard for me. How easily we forget the “what used to be.” The other day after an IV stem cell infusion, I had body aches that came on like a flu I had one miserable Christmas. I was shivering cold, bones throbbing with pain, chills running up and down my limbs in perfectly timed waves. I pouted. It occurred to me that my body has already forgotten so much of the pain I have been wading through the last years. I have been in a horrific nightmare of every type of discomfort, hypersensitive skin, violent muscle spasms.....and here I was, void of all that on a daily basis, and almost excessively intolerant to pain.

I realize more and more that this is not the same life I left nine weeks ago. I ironically feel like I’m in somewhat of a foreign world, thankfully empty of so much that filled me up before: hopelessness, helplessness, confusion.

But I recognize a wave of new emotions that well inside of me.

Like a dream you are trying too hard to remember, I am worried that if I focus too much, this new life will all slip out of my reach and I’ll sit here wondering, “Did that really ever even exist?” I wasn’t prepared for the looming presence of this fear. It’s subliminal almost.

But, such is this beautiful, wondrous, ever-changing life that is full of surprises -- ones that are undoubtedly here to teach lessons. Ha! Just when I thought I’d surely learned enough to last awhile......

It all comes back to balance. How metaphorical the tandem walk with the suitcase on my head was as my trip in Delhi folded into its finality. Chin up, watch where you are going, always feel your way and still, never lose sight of the little things around you while you make your journey. Oh yes, and if you fall, pick up your stuff, throw it back together, regain your balance, and keep on keepin’ on.

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About Amy B. Scher

A passionate author, pioneering patient, and sassy spirit with just enough sweetness to get me by, I live by my self-created motto: when life kicks your ass, kick back.Amy B. Scher's profile Amy B. Scher's blog