Meeting Himesh

He has been motherless for over five years, was abandoned by his father, and now lives in the hospital.

One week ago, while walking through the ward, one of our outreach workers introduced me to Himesh, an 11-year-old HIV-positive child. Himesh came to Sion Hospital two and a half months ago so debilitated by drug-resistant tuberculosis, malnutrition, and other illnesses that his mobility was limited to dragging himself along on the floor. Even now, he looks no older than my 5-year-old cousins, his growth severely stunted over the years. Himesh’s father abandoned him after admitting him into the hospital and was not to be heard from again.

Himesh was quite shy initially and not in the mood to talk. The nurses told us that now that his condition is stable, he spends his days parading through the pediatric ward singing songs for the other patients, playing with the little children, and roaming around the hospital campus by himself. Having been working with such children up until now, I had a number of questions for him. But he was not ready to talk just yet. Not before he took another spin around the ward on his tricycle.

Himesh became a bit irritated when I started asking questions, presumably because I was not the first one to do so. When telling me that his mother passed away when he was a child, that he got a call three days before telling him that his father died, that his grandmother is a drunkard who is mentally unstable (voe beyvadee hai, daru peeti reheti hai), and that now no one is there to look after him, his words were icily placid, laden with little emotion. It was difficult for me to tell whether this was because he had been asked these questions so many times that his answers seemed rehearsed or because he had built a wall around his emotions. Either way, it was clear that he had no idea where he would go from here.

He has no home either, even when he lived with his father. On his chart is written, “Kalyan Station, Platform 4” under "Address." The hospital had become home for him, but it was not a safe place. There was no constant supervision and no promise of food outside of the generosity of the nurses and other patients. Just over a month ago, a child was kidnapped from the hospital. I told myself that I’d help him find a home for him the following week and promised him that I would bring him a chocolate next time. Little did I know what I was getting into...