June 19th: During our long drive down the mountain from Ooty, we were all laughing and telling stories of crazy ex-boyfriends and past experiences, enjoying each others company and getting to know one another a lot better. It was a really fun drive back and much different from our groggy half-asleep drive up the mountain. Suddenly, we passed a man who was lying motionless in the road with two large rocks beside him. Our driver zoomed around the him without a second glance. Being nursing students and just general people with a passion for helping others we all were immediately yelling for the bus driver, "Stop! Stop! There's a boy in the road! He's hurt! Stop!" The driver just turned around and waved his hand at us as if to say, stop it it's fine, don't worry about it. Assuming it was the language barrier stopping him from pulling over we all looked to our professors, the principal of PSG college and our program coordinator from PSG but neither seemed phased at all. We continued yelling for the bus to stop and turn around to help him but all four Indians traveling with us just looked at us with confused faces. Finally the principal said, "no, we cannot stop, we'll be at the police station for weeks explaining ourselves if we try to help him." And before we knew it we were too far away to help him if we wanted to. That man could have very easily been hit by a car since the roads were full of blind curves and passing traffic. We began to ask them if we could at least call 801 (the Indian equivalent of 911) but the instructors just ignored us entirely. At this point we were beginning to get angry with them. We have to stop! We kept shouting. But nothing. A little while later as we all sat in shock at what had just happened the principal went on to say that the man probably would have told people that we hit him with our bus and the college could get in a lot of trouble. The gossip and storytelling had ceased. We could hardy react to how the situation had played out we were so surprised. About five minutes later a police motorcycle drove by and the principal said, "see, look, someone else will help him."
They treated this human being as if he were just road kill. We came to India to learn about health care practices and how health care "professionals" act? Well we have certainly learned first hand haven't we. Students were whispering much of the way back that we could have at least checked his pulse and pulled him out of the way of traffic if nothing else. I began to try to understand what had happened. These women with us were highly religious, good women, there had to be a reason we didn't stop. I tried to keep telling myself, this is not my country, this is not my culture, it is not my place to judge as there are things I may never know or understand about it. I suppose when your country has over a billion people, just one might not matter that much to you?...I just can't imagine ever feeling that way...especially as a nurse! A nurse who teaches other nurses no less. Perhaps it is just the way the government is in India, maybe there's no such thing as the good samaritan law. Maybe it's simply the way hierarchy works here. I may never know, but I do know that I can be thankful for the blessed life that I live and the country that allows me to never have a fear to help others.
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