Surgery? Oh crap!

After thirty minutes of stop and go, honk and swerve, and toot and brake, we arrive at the hospital and I’m swiftly wheeled to the Emergency department. The only way I know that we’ve arrived at the ER is by the small sign, affixed to the wall next to an open door, proudly proclaiming—in English—the department’s identity. Beyond the doorway, the room is the size of a small bedroom, emphasis on small. There’s one stretcher next to a wall, a desk, another stretcher behind a curtain, and a little counter. On one wall is a shelf with all kinds of old glass bottles filled with liquids and potions labelled in Arabic. Oh boy! 

I glance up and check the ceiling, anticipating the look of canvas draped over a bamboo frame. Instead, I see the ubiquitous fiberboard tiles, a select few in one corner decorated with tiny water stains. Okay, not a tent, but the ambience is definitely reminiscent of times long gone. With no time to loiter and further admire this quasi-medieval torture chamber—and it will attempt to become one soon—I’m whisked next door for X-rays. 

The expression “next door” is a not entirely accurate since we don’t actually go through a proper door to get there. One wall of the ER is really a huge sliding panel made of what appears to be lead-reinforced plywood. With just a little push, this moveable wall glides smoothly on rubber casters to reveal the Radiology department, which is essentially a room with an X-ray machine. After being kindly invited to do so, I climb onto the slightly antiquated appliance while everyone else bolts out of the room like scared rabbits. Radiation is spewed at my leg—only my leg, I hope—and radiographs are taken. 

Moments later, I’m back in the wheelchair and after a few minutes, the chair starts rolling. I’ve no idea who is pushing it; it could be Daniel or it could be Shrek. At this point of the game, I’m just a stunned passenger in a possessed wheelchair. 

Passing through the plywood portal and the ER department, we continue on to the main hospital entrance where the chair slows down and then stops squarely on the threshold of the front door. I’m literally half in and half out of the hospital. At any moment, I expect the back end of the chair to lift as a subtle hint to get out, but before I can move, the chair starts moving backward, returning me to the ER. With no obvious reason for this latest exercise, I imagine that this was done for the sole purpose of airing me out like dirty laundry.

Refreshed and back in the ER, Nice Hotel Doctor has my X-rays. A few minutes later, another doctor, looking somewhat like a young Hercules Poirot, joins Nice Hotel Doctor and a discussion takes place. Although all in Arabic, some English words make their way into the conversation, words like dislocation and internal fixation. Crap, crap, crap. This is not sounding good. The animated conversation comes to an end and I’m invited to lie down on the stretcher, the one behind the curtain. 

Hercules examines my ankle and foot. Looking as if he’s about to solve the case of the Mysterious Elephant Foot, he firmly grabs the ankle with one hand and the foot with the other, while Nice Hotel Doctor holds on to my leg. Two nurses materialize out of thin air at the head of the stretcher, ready to pounce on me and hold me down. Super crap! I realize what they’re about to do. I also now understand the significance of the curtain. It’s intended as a sound barrier to shield unsuspecting ears from the hideous sounds about to be discharged from my lungs. 

Without preamble, Hercules yanks the foot left and right, tugs on it, pushes on it, swivels it nearly 360 degrees. I expect my foot to detonate at any moment, but oddly enough, there’s not much pain. Nice Hotel Doctor is amazed that I’m not screaming like a banshee. I’m amazed that I’m not wetting my pants. 

Having failed to either completely detach my foot from its hinges, or skewer it back onto my lower limb like an olive on a toothpick (I’m not sure which was the intended outcome), Hercules now tells me I need surgery, and that the surgeon will do it tonight, at midnight. Great, the witching hour.