Feeling So Sick I Couldn’t Walk Until a Fellow Passenger Practically Supported Me to the Toilets.
During my 19 years old, my regular journey to work meant taking an express bus. It remained full and would always be standing room only by the time I stepped aboard.
One particular morning, I was feeling incredibly sick while the vehicle rocked around the bends. I kept telling myself to endure just a little longer so the bus could reached where I needed to get off, so I could then rush hurriedly to the closest public toilet to be sick.
As we neared the avenue close to my stop and it dawned on me I wasn’t going to last. All of a sudden, it seemed a fog descended upon me. The world became hazy and muffled; like someone had turned off the audio. My mind raced, “I will lose consciousness”.
Fortunately, I stood toward the front of the bus, allowing me to take a couple of steps forward and requested that the driver to open the doors, telling him I was going to vomit. He promptly opened the doors and I weakly exited onto the sidewalk.
I was resolved not to vomit in view of six lanes of traffic, so I gathered myself and started trying to stumble toward the green space across the road, where I thought I could at least find some privacy behind a bush to vomit. However I likely blacked out. I was aware of my limbs, but I was unable to walk or see properly, leading me to start crawling towards the grassy area.
“You right, love?”
At that moment, I was lifted up. I felt someone holding me and a stranger inquired, “You right, love?” I explained to this unknown man that I required to vomit. Therefore, he almost carried me over to a nearby building and placed me inside the women’s restroom. He inquired whether I required him to wait for me but I declined.
A few minutes later, I felt better sufficiently to sit on the toilet and from outside the door came him inquire, “Are you OK, love? Is there anything you require?” I wasn’t able to get up just then but I did succeed to express my gratitude and shortly thereafter recovered the use of my limbs. I made my way home and spent the next few days healing from what turned out to be a horrible case of gastroenteritis.
I never glimpsed that man’s face – just his lower half and a large container for tools he was carrying – yet he rescued me, when I was completely helpless.
Frequently, society tends to make people self-protective, pushy, and rivalrous. His was the sort of gesture that undoes that protective shell. He demonstrated that our default setting leans toward compassion, something I love about humanity.
