Good news from the hospital

Finally some good news from ICU C of Ain Shams hospital. It’s not my good news, my news is the same, my father is stable but not better, nor worse. The good news however is that the 15 year old boy is out of his coma and has been transferred to a regular room. I arrived to find the same group of 70 people, all with big smiles on their faces. The men directed me to the neurology floor, which was a rather grim walk. I followed a gurney for corridor after corridor. On the gurney there was a young girl entirely covered by a blanket and I was struck by a little white hand and finger nails dyed red with henna.

Finally I reached my friend’s room, it was bursting with at least 20 people. The young boy was asleep on the bed and there were around 5 children on the bed with him, pulling at his toes and playing with the hospital bed remote. Thankfully he was unaware and resting. A child even tried to tickle him but received a smack on the head from a cousin or an aunt.

The grandmother, a formidable woman who looked anywhere between 70 and 100, pushed me with surprising physical strength to the front so that I could see her grandson and gave me a hug that made my bones rattle. I was astounded at her strength given that she is tiny, no taller than 1m50, and extremely thin. She told me that her strength comes from “سمنة بلدي" (traditional Egyptian clarified butter) and spending time in the sun at 6 am each morning. The young boy’s mother had tears of joy in her eyes. I left them feeling hopeful.