At 12:15am on Friday the 16th I was in an auto-rickshaw driving home from a hotel bar. The driver made a sudden turn on the wet road and I went flying out and hit the ground. The rickshaw overturned and rolled over me, with five people still inside it.
I remember spinning through the air, but I don’t remember hitting the ground. I remember the rickshaw rolling over me but I don’t remember it hurting- I just felt annoyed and wished it would hurry up and be over. Then I remember waking up, lying on the ground, not being able to move a single part of my body or hear anything. There were all these flashing lights from cameras and people grabbing at me. People’s mouths were moving but there wasn’t any sound. Everything was drowned out by this horrible high pitched screaming sound, like a possum, stuck in one of those guillotine traps, that isn’t quite dead yet. I realized later it was coming from me.
My left ankle is broken, my pelvis is fractured on the right, I have deep lacerations down my right leg, my right wrist is broken, my right clavicle has multiple fractures, my second vertebrae is cracked and my left arm is snapped clean off at the shoulder.
I spent five days in the ICU unit in Jaipur hospital in what they call on the news ‘serious but stable condition’. The first four days were spent wearing a $400 floor length evening dress because I wouldn’t let them cut it off me.
It was pretty freaky. The guy in the bed next to me died. And they gave me some weird drugs- like, throw-the-radio-in-the-tub-when-White-Rabbit-peaks type weird. I saw things.
My parents came on the second day to be with me and now I’m in the ward waiting to go home. So, trip over. No Varanasi, no Ganges, no Nepal, no Tibet, no Thailand. I didn’t even get to say goodbye to my women in the slum. But, I'm alive and I'm slowly regaining the use of my limbs. So yay for that.
Post script: I read this over and over again trying to figure what to cut and add to make it less depressing and more humorous. However, as my dad pointed out, it’s kind of hard to be upbeat about a car accident so I decided to just leave it.
You don't know me Frances, I am an old mate of Lynne's. I have read your blog and was aware of your accident. I was sickened to read of your accident and wish you the best for your long recovery. Varanasi, the Ganges, Nepal etc, will always be there, check them out next time!
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