So, please excuse my super belated entry!

On Feb 11th, while in Shanghai China, Rafael was hit by a car and had his ankle severely broken. He was due to fly to Bangkok the next day and stay for 8 days. The hospital in Shanghai wanted to perform immediate emergency surgery, but as the cost was estimated at $10,000 USD he decided to return to India for the operation. The doctor in Shanghai put a temporary cast on him and he returned to his Hotel around 11pm.

He somehow made it to the airport early the next morning and Thai airways immediately rescheduled his second leg of the flight so that he would fly from Bangkok to Delhi the same day. He arrived in Delhi on the 12th night, and on the 13th we checked into a very good hospital, Max Hospital in Noida, a suburb of Delhi. Actually the Indian Surgeon, Dr. Sanjay Sarup, said that the cast put on by the Chinese doctor was done so poorly that it made Rafael's foot swell up like a blown up rubber glove! It was at this point that we realized that it was a damn good thing that he didn't have the surgery done there! As the foot was too swollen at that point for surgery, we returned to Vrindavan on the 15th to wait for the swelling to go down. We returned on the 19th evening, and on the 20th morning his surgery was performed. The procedure took around 3 hours, and in order to "piece" his ankle back together the surgeon placed 8 screws, a metal plate, and a piece of bone from his hip into the ankle fractures.

When I was called into see him in the recovery room, even though he was totally out of it he showed his true form. He opened his eyes and looked at me and said "Excuse me Ma'am do I know you?" and then he proceeded to tell me that he was hungry and was lamenting that they wanted to keep him on a liquid diet for the rest of the day. When the anesthesia wore off, he was in serious pain even though he had a painkiller drip administered. He told me later that it was the worst day of his life. The day after the surgery the pain was greatly reduced, and I began to see the effects of the semi-narcotic painkiller manifesting in amusing anecdotes. Because the hospital allows an "attendant" (family member) to stay with the patient in the room I was with him the entire time and would sleep on the provided couch at night. After 4 days we returned home to Vrindaban.

The Hospital was very small and modern. We were very pleased with the facilities and service there...and of course the price. There were only 6 rooms on his floor, and three nurses on shift. We took a double room to cut down on costs (the surgery is charged on a sliding scale according to the type of room you get...so to stay in a single room would've made the surgery much more expensive) but the other bed was empty 3 out of the four days we were there!

Now Rafael is doing quite well...his spirits are always up, and he is recovering nicely. He will have the staples from the surgery removed this upcoming week, and then we will get a report from the Doctor on how he is progressing. He is getting quite sick of laying in his bed however, and makes a daily journey to the Gosalla that we do service at "care for cows" which is five minutes down the street from our place. The workers bring him there and back on a flat bed riksaw, and he really looks forward to his time outside everyday, and the chance to be licked by small calves!

Actually this gosalla takes care of injured and abandoned street cows from Vrindavan, so there are many cow patients who are in a similar situation as Rafael, so he feels right at home. We have several cows who have also been hit by cars and sustained broken bones. Our Vetrinarian for the cows also had a look at Rafael when he arrived with the cast!