Ek-shem.

It broke his back.

A tree, that is.

“Big tree. Construction. Biiig biiiig branch!” he said animatedly, head cocking from side to side in his heavy Bangladeshi accent. “Biiig Biiig branch.”

It was a big, big branch. And he was a young, young man.

Of no more than 30 years of age, who had flown miles here 3 years ago to earn a simple living as a construction worker, living in 20-to-a-room dormitories, eating fare similar to but never quite the same or half as wholesome as that back home.

Then it broke his back, paralysing him from the tummy down. It happened 4 months ago on a sunny afternoon. A biiig biggg branch.

I couldn’t fully understand him. But from his limited English phrases and animated gestures, it seemed that they were doing some work at the construction site. A crane was activated to chop a branch from a tree, and it crashed down.

“Doktorrr, no need dis one. I ken do by myself.”

No need for the urine bag and catheter attached into his penis, because even though the tree left him incontinent, both urinally and faecally, he learnt to drain urine from his bladder by himself 6 times a day by intermittently sticking a tube into himself. The team at the Rehabilitation centre had intensively trained him to care for himself, to help reintegrate him back to daily living. This is supposed to cut down rates of urine infections, instead of leaving a bag hanging out from him all the time.

But there he was, admitted to hospital for his first urine infection anyway.

“I am ok Doktor. Pain many many but it is ok. I am ok Doktor.”

I looked at this young man with long eyelashes framing his large, beautiful eyes, with a smile so sweet it only broke your heart. I sat down to chat, stunned for a while.

After all, I had looked through his old medical notes before going to see him. I had read through his tragedy- the hole in his lung, his chest tube insertion, his delayed operation, his spinal fixation… I had expected to see a young man wrecked by the cruelty of fate, ravaged by depression and crushed with despair.

But there was none of that.

“Doktorrr, please, you see here. Sometink is here.”

Sitting up and lurching forward to steady himself, he struggled to grab hold of the front part of his lifeless right foot, after tucking away his other foot to show me what he meant. There was a tiny bump on his right ankle which was absent from his left one.

“You see, dis one. Yar, there. Plis chek for me.”

I was stunned. He was showing me his foot. Did he think he would be needing them again?

I looked at him, stunned for a moment. Then I steadied myself to take in what he was trying to tell me. He was telling me he believed in miracles, that he hung onto something called Hope because there is nothing else much left.

What was he expecting me to find? A fracture, dislocation or a deformity? And what would we have done? What difference would it have made to his debilitating disability?

It was after work and time to go home. But I wanted to speak with him to see if perhaps, a social worker could be roped in to help him with any emotional issues he might have. The tragedy was recent. Having to face intermittent drainage of urine 6 times a day for oneself can feel humiliating. Being away from family and having to go through unfair labour compensation from work-related injuries could leave one swimming in hopelessness.

“Are you… sad?”

He smiled. “No.”

“You sure?”

For some reason, I wasn’t ready to believe it.

“Yes. God… God He loves me.”

I sat there next to him, stunned.

“Yes,” I said, in full agreement, except I was stunned that he should believe it. “You’re not angry with God? Disappointed?”

“No. How can?” He said, looking up. “Dis life given by God. He give, He take. How can angry? Dis life I have, from God. Not I ask, but He give me dis life.”

“You don’t ask Him why this happened to you?” I asked cautiously, gently.

“No. Dis is ek-shem.”

“An exam?”

“Yar. Ek-shem. After this ek-shem, it will be ok,” he replied, looking upward onto the white, white ceiling above. “God give, God take. It is ok. He love me.”

I sat there by him, not knowing what to say except to nod in agreement.

“Ah-hong tell me. I must tink I can walk again. I cannot everyday tink I am like dis, like dis. If I tink like dat every day, I get headache many many. Pain many many. So I tink to myself, dis is ek-shem. One day, I will walk agen.”

Ah-hong. The coarse, rough-looking man who used to be the lorry-driver serving in the same construction company he was working in. He visits every day.

“I no sad. You see, dees people, dey help me many many. Ah-hong. Pearlyn physio. Many many help me.”

He fished out 3 namecards for me which he had obtained from the Rehab Centre located some miles away. Ey, wasn’t one of those names familiar? Then it struck me, that his physiotherapist, Pearlyn, was the same one who had helped my friend Fung, President of the Handcycling Association of Singapore, to rehabilitate from his spinal cord injury after being shot 7 times in a traumatic accident in America, which had left him unable to feel or move from his stomach down.

“Hi Wai Jia, it’s so good to hear from you!”

I called her directly. I was curious. I wanted to know if she knew his story, and if there was any way I could help.

Four months ago when the accident happened, he was a different man. Crushed, pressed down, beaten and overwhelmed with despair. Now, after a long-drawn battle for compensation and intensive rehabilitation and counseling from his healthcare team, he was a different man.

“You guys have done so much for him,” I told her. “He keeps singing your praises.”

“Thanks so much for the encouragement. When he first came to us, things were real awful.”

Awful. I would guess so.

Along the corridor today, I met my senior. He had played a part in attending to him when the accident happened. He fixed his lungs when one of them got punctured in the accident, he was in the operating theatre when the spine operation happened. He looked shocked to see his ex-patient admitted in the hospital, now having made progress from his initial state. We looked at each other, stunned, not knowing what to say.

We knew what was in store- a customized wheelchair made for him, more compensation money along the way, and then, a merciless shipping back of everything back to Bangladesh and possibly a lifetime imprisonment to a nursing home there and possible discrimintion from his family and community, the merciless shipping back of the wheelchair and medicine and memories of a biiiig biggg tree and hope for a future with legs that could walk.

“I just feel so sad for him, Wai Jia.”

“He tells me it’s an exam, M.”

Ek-shem.

When life hits you in the face, do you shake your fist at God? Or do you cling on tight to Him, remembering how much He loves you, how much He is hurting with you, and how someday, all this will end?

“How can angry at God? Dis life He give me, He can also take. No problem. It is ok. He loves me. Dis is ek-shem only.”

Someday, all this would end. Exams always end. And he was set to ace this ek-shem.

Someday, there would be no wheelchair, no lifeless legs, no yearning and waiting. There would be legs that can walk, and legs that can fly. Because in heaven, is where the poor and the faithful will find Home.

“Yes dear. God loves you. You will pass the ek-shem.”