Joseph Lewis D’Silva
I tell my experience with the accident, for I feel that it may help many to learn from mistakes and give some suggestion to the government to take precautionary steps.
I considered myself expert in negotiating many blind curves with much care during those working days. This inflated me with pride, like many others, that I was an expert rider of two wheelers. But I was unaware that besides my limited experience of blind curls there were many other various possibilities at blind arcs.
I must say, a blind curve is a dangerous turn on a roadway in which drivers cannot see approaching traffic. Therefore, one should reduce one’s speed when entering such a bend.
Recently, I had just crossed a perfect blind curvature and stopped. I looked towards right and left, as precautionary measure and seeing none, I was about to take a right turn.
Just then, young lass on her scooter, who had few miles to run at her place of work, with full speed, suddenly, crashed on my two wheelers. She kissed the road injuring my right leg finger toe and fracturing right fibula. I, however, controlled the steering-handle and managed to maintain my ‘perpendicularity.’
The young voice shouted fiercely that I had not used the buzzer to signal, the right turn. I was shocked. It was so sudden. I could only gape at her. Very soon good Samaritans gathered with hospitable haste to help.
I said to the good people with concern: “Please help the girl who has fallen.”
A female voice from the group leaned forward and said: “I am the girl who had tumbled.” Her two eyes viewed my injuries benevolently and went away to cover the remaining distance to her place of work. She suffered only bruises.
A few moments later, I was carried by a siren-blaring ambulance which screeched to a halt in front of the local hospital where I experienced most inhuman treatment from the staff. I struggled on the bed writhing with pain and half the bed sheet where I lay was soaked with blood as these wisest, brightest, meanest of mankind could not stop the oozing of the blood from my injured leg, not because they were ignorant about how to do it, but because they were too busy with the onslaught of countless outpatients at their medical wing. I felt my bones floating under my skin. I wondered whether I had landed in a savage hospital. I silently screamed in agony. My wife took me to a private infirmary where I received polite attention.
In sick room, on sick bed, I pondered over the girl’s screams accusing me that I had not used the direction buzzer; but I wondered why she had not slowed at the blind curve instead of dashing at the young, supersonic speed. She thought that I was guilty for not using the direction signal and I thought she was at fault for her high speed without slowing down at blind curve.
Life is a long road with sharp bends and bumps. We have to pass through this cruel cycle with mental strength to lessen the difficulty of distress and thus enjoy a happy life. “It is not about waiting for the storm to pass; it is about learning to dance in the rain.”
This is just one of the many such incidents in our state. I hope the government installs corner signals at unsafe places, as: “Slow down! Blind curve ahead. Proceed with caution.”
