Part 14: When Sickness Falls

August 25, 2022

Choyghoria, Batiaghata

District Khulna, Bangladesh

“Salaam alaikum”

“Alaikum salaam” I muttered the Arabic greeting back to the woman. I glanced at her. She was dressed in black from head to toe; only her dark eyes peeked out from behind her niqab. Not an uncommon sight, especially for the busy streets of Dhaka.

All around me was noise. The constant honking of horns had become so normal that I didn’t hear it anymore. The streets were so full of cars, CNGs, motorcycles, buses, rickshaws, and pedestrians that I barely noticed them anymore. There were so many beggars that I hardly cared anymore.

Twenty-four hours earlier, I had been standing in my village-y clothes, playing in the sand with the neighbor kids. We were keeping a safe distance from the last known location of the fat snake. We were hoping the snake would not show its face again and we would be able to play football in our normal spot.

Twenty-four hours earlier, Whitey and I had wallked down the road to find twelve-year-old Ishan fishing from a nearby pond. We had stood on the steep and muddy banks and I had offered my hand to help drag him up. Sitting on the broken bench in the sunset, we drank the concoction he had made for us at his cha dokan. We had no idea we would be in Dhaka before a new day arrived.

So, why were Whitney, Brandi, and I now standing in a busy intersection in the middle of the richest part of Dhaka?

When we had arrived home from Ishan’s cha dokan an evening earlier, Trevor announced that we would be leaving for Dhaka as soon as we were ready. Kylie’s condition had worsened, and they had decided it was time to go to the hospital. Kylie, the three-year-old, had been fighting off a nasty sickness for over a week: fever, awful stomach pains, and finally, blood. We had all quietly gone upstairs and packed our things. Trevor told us to pack for three days, but no one was sure how long we would stay.

Twenty minutes after sundown, we pulled away from our gate with well-wishes and worried goodbyes from our guard and closest neighbor. Night driving in Bangladesh isn’t the safest activity I can think of. We shared the road with out-of-control buses, big trucks with lights as bright as a thousand suns, motorcycles weaving in and out, and rickshaws and people of all sorts with no lights to make them noticeable.

Lisa tried to keep Kylie’s mind off of her pain. Trevor tried not to get involved in a vehicle accident. I tried to entertain the other kids. Thanks to the new bridge spanning the Padma River, we were in Dhaka in a mere three-and-a-half hours, as opposed to the 6-10 hours it took when the ferry was the only way across. One never knew how long you’d wait in line. Once, we waited for six hours to board the ferry.

Had it not been for the new bridge, Trevor and Lisa would have made a fifteen-minute flying trip into Khulna instead of the four-hour trip to Dhaka. Khulna is the third largest city in Bangladesh and is getting nicer every day, but they felt more comfortable with the hospitals in Dhaka. When we arrived at the flat at 11:45 pm, Trevor took Kylie straight to United Hospital.

The next morning, Lisa and Brock went into the hospital to stay until Kylie came home, leaving Whitney, Brandi, and I all alone. We went to the clinic for a delicious biryani lunch prepared by Josna and Sumita, our members who work at the CSI clinic. After lunch, I promised the girls we could go to North End Coffee Shop and do our Language lesson. We found an empty CNG to take us there, and sat packed in the tiny green cage, either zooming in and out and dodging trucks or buses, or stuck in unmoving traffic. (CNGs are little green three-wheeled thingies that cruise around, hauling people from place to place. You probably have the emoji of one on your phone. They can uncomfortably seat three people if you are a foreigner, and four or five if you are a Bangladeshi.)

The heat of being stuck in traffic in a CNG is like nothing else. Could it be compared to slowly suffocating in a cave hundreds of feet below ground? Could it be compared to being stuck in a tiny space capsule orbiting the earth when suddenly all power is lost, and you’re left to die alone and forgotten?

Forty minutes later, we arrived, alive and well. The coffee shop is BEAUTIFUL. It looks like a little piece of America amidst all the chaos. (And may I just say, their salted caramel latte has literally brought tears to my eyes. This may be a problem.) We drank our lattes and ate our brownies and learned about sentence structure and comma rules. After the lessons were done, we chatted and laughed and hung out as friends.

Now, we were standing in a hectic Gulshan intersection, searching for a CNG to take us back to the flat. Kylie was in the hospital hooked up to IVs, with a pair of doctors trying to understand what her problem was. One doctor said it was sepsis and that Kylie was not to eat anything but broth. The next doctor said she had parasites instead of sepsis, and that she absolutely could eat food; in fact, she needed to! The second doctor seemed to know more, so Trevor and Lisa decided to go with him.

They determined she indeed did have parasites– a very, very bad case of parasites. On top of this, she had tested positive for COVID and Rotavirus. She was also extremely dehydrated. Kylie remained in the hospital hooked up to IVs for five nights and four days. Trevor, Lisa, and Brock stayed with her the whole time.

On the second day, we went to see her. We sat in the lobby on the ground floor waiting for Trevor. When I say lobby, I mean a grand atrium filled with rich-looking people and scores of armchairs that look to have been carelessly scattered in the center. We were motioned to sit down in the last of the empty chairs, and, while sitting here, I witnessed a heartbreaking scene.

Through the mass of people came two men– a father and his son, I presumed– with their arms around each other. Their faces were etched with heart-wrenching sadness. As they stumbled toward the door, the younger man stopped and let out a cry– a whimper– like a little boy who has just lost his mother. I wondered if this was what had just happened. His father took him in his arms as he let his own tears come. Soon, three more men came and wrapped their arms around the father and son. As they came near me, I could see the tears welling up in the younger man’s eyes: welling up and running over, each one a symbol of grief, but also of love. I could feel tears rushing to my own eyes, and I had to look away to avoid crying. It was a raw moment of humanity in a country where little genuine emotion like this is expressed: heartbreaking and refreshing at the same time.

The hospital was very nice. Kylie’s room was on the seventh floor, and the view was stunning. The hospital sits on the bank of a river, with palm, banana, and mango trees as far as

the eye can see. It is located in a quiet part of town away from all the hustle and bustle and sounds of the city. On campus is a little cafe with a coffee shop on the second floor. Connected is an express grocery store.

It became apparent that visitors were not overly welcomed in the COVID ward. Somehow, we got to be there for a few hours that day, and it was good to see Kylie’s smile again. She had been so sick, and it had been awhile. We left the hospital that day knowing we probably wouldn’t be allowed to return. At this point, we still had no idea if it would be a day or a week until Kylie would be well enough to leave.

In the meantime, the girls and I stayed at the CSI flat. We walked to the Farmgate market and did some shopping. We got street food for supper and ate cereal for breakfast. We stayed up late playing games and slept in in the mornings. We took a CNG to the coffee shop and did our Math and Language lessons that I had hastily thrown in. On Friday morning, we walked down the gray back streets and under the tangle of highline wires to the little CSI clinic for church. Daniel’s took us to a new Mexican restaurant for lunch, and we went to the hospital to see Trevor’s. We were not able to see Kylie, as security had become more strict about who could go back. Trevor and Lisa came out to talk with Daniel and Amber. They shared their frustrations with the care Kylie was getting, and asked questions and advice for how to deal with certain problems that arise in third-world-country-hospitals.

On the fourth day, Kylie came home. It was a miracle. The doctors said that with her levels, she could easily have gone septic. Then, one evening, her levels dropped dramatically and she made a turn for the better. We went to the dokan to get balloons to blow up and taped them to the ceiling. We made a sign that said “Welcome Home Kylie” in big, colorful letters. The girls and I met them all at the hospital. Kylie came bouncing out of the elevator, proudly announcing “I got better!” Then, we celebrated at Pizza Hut.

We stayed another day in Dhaka before returning to Khulna. Trevor’s wanted to be close to the hospital in case anything happened. Lisa had some shopping she wanted to get done, and they wanted to try out that Mexican restaurant that Daniel and Amber had discovered. Now, we are home again, back to our fourth week of school. “Is the little girl well nowl?” people ask. “We heard Kylie was sick. How is she?”

My need to learn the Bangla word for parasite has become quite apparent. When people ask me what illness she was stricken with, I don’t know how to say it. I have settled on telling people that “little bugs were in her stomach.” Most people understand, but some people squint their eyes and say “HUH?” And so I take the long way around, as we so often have to do when we don’t have the right words. “You know, like from the dirt. Maybe something dirty went into her mouth, or she was playing and didn’t wash her hands before she put them in her mouth. She is little, and little people don’t understand the need to wash their hands all the time. She is little, and she is weak. We are foreigners, and our stomachs are not strong like yours.”

When we arrived home again, our guard bent down and scooped her up in a bear hug. Our neighbor/friend stopped his motorcycle when he saw her playing. “Kylie, are you better? I was so worried for you!”

Bangladesh is always standing, waiting with a hug or a smile.

Night has come with all her cool breezes and stillness. Sitting on my balcony in the darkness, the sounds of the jungle are ever-present around me. The trees are alive with the constant humming of crickets and other unknown bugs. The frogs join in the symphony. Occasionally, I hear the whir of a passing rickshaw van or ez bike; the zoom of a motorcycle. I can hear laughter and voices as people periodically pass, and, in the distance, a song.

Come see me, -Kalli