Hemorrhagic Stroke (5)

JP did not seem flustered at all when he walked in from his train ride.

I had been on the move for the last 24 hours.  

I was dead beat and not interested in hearing any explanations.

I could not hold back when he came to me after a conversation in German with admin, wondering if I would be happy to sign off on Mr K’s admission.

I was firm. I told him to go back to the room and do right by his friend.  

Respite

He came out after the paperwork and then said he would take me home.

He took my suitcase and I held on to my carry on. 

I thought he was going to get an uber… no… we were going to pass through a store and then get on a bus.

At the store, he bought supplies, actually asking me what I needed.  I did not understand then.

We got to the bus and we had not said much to each other.

At least I knew that he worked in a hardware factory, he was divorced and his children lived a four hour train trip away.  

By the time we got to our stop, there was almost no one on the bus.

It was obvious we were on the outskirts of town.

I could see skyscrapers, but there were ugly 20-plus floor buildings punching into the Koln night sky at even intervals. 

JP said we were going home and that the apartment was on the 14 floor of the same building he was on.

Its been three years since this happened, I look back and some things seem unbelievable.

This was not the tourist part of town.  

Here, working people were coming home after a long day at work and we two black men really stuck out.

No-one looked in our direction in the lift and their language was not German. 

Now I can’t remember what JP said about the room, as we went up the 14 floors.

I did end up in a furnished room, at midnight, but it was Mr K’s room.  

I am convinced that sometimes God has specific reasons for various experiences He allows us to have.

I still don’t know what the reason for that night in Mr K’s room was.

I do know that he used my first ten minutes in that room to teach me something about the transience of life.  

This room door had stayed shut months, since Mr K left.

He was obviously a tidy man who had not intended to stay away for long.

It was a small bedsitter, but everything was in its place.  

His clothes were ironed and queued in the small wardrobe. 

His shoes were shiny and lined up military style underneath.

He had a small TV near the window, with speakers by each side.  

Even the remote controls were lined up on the glass table, this was a well kept home.

Up here, one could forgot about the mouse I saw crossing the pavement on my way up.  

My wife could not believe her ears when I called.

I could feel her effort from 1000s of miles away as she tried  hard to swallow her ‘I told you sos’.

I was completely knackered out by the time I hung up.

JP had told me he was leaving for work at 5 a.m. 

Before I slept, I got on the hotel app on my phone and got a room for the next day.

Here I was in Koln, I had arrived without charging a physician per diem, laboured through economy seating with a non-ambulant patient and now I was having to pay for my own accommodation.  

JP came to visit at the hotel when he closed from work and insisted that I went for dinner with him.

By the time he had finished his story over dinner,  about coming to Germany from Northern Ghana by crossing the desert and getting on a refugee boat, I understood.

Now I had three days to kill and my dear friends the Danquahs and the Addae Mensahs, would host me each day.

I did not see JP again until two days later, when he took me to see Mr K, now all settled in, cosy in his bed.

He did recognise me as the doctor who had come with him. He even seemed to manage a smile.

 The German machine was working.

I said good bye and flew back home.

*Dr Teddy Totimeh is a Neurosurgeon