20/10/2025
What is a Diwali evening like, at a hospice, where there isn't a riot of noise and festivity, but a gentle celebration with lights, sweets and togetherness.
At Ganga Prem Hospice tonight, there were mustard oil lamps lit all over. Those patients who were well enough came down to the Sukhdayini Ma Ganga temple courtyard to celebrate and sit around, surrounded by their caregivers and staff. A little boy who speaks little and does not smile too often because of his sickness, was happy lighting sparklers. Draped in a shawl, he looks like a little adult. His older sister is in her late teens and enjoys firecrackers that light up. From the courtyard, you can hear somebody chanting Ram, Ram. It is the wife of a patient who is in precarious health and unconscious. She stops to attend to a phone call from home. Her family can't be there but they are worried for her and her husband.
Elsewhere on the patients floor, GPH nurses keep their vigil, going from room to room, checking especially on the patients who either do not have a caregiver, or their family member has joined the Diwali celebration downstairs. An elderly patient who is nearly eighty, is alone tonight, as her family has gone home for Diwali and are expected back in a few hours. When the GPH nurse tenderly asks her if she is okay, the ever-humble mataji even in her drowsiness, joins her palms to say thank you. The nurse stops her and holds her hands in hers. Two rooms down, there is another patient, nearly thirty years younger, but critically ill and on oxygen support. The nurse checks on her syringe driver meds and covers her with a blanket. She promptly uncovers herself, maybe feeling a little warm.
There is going to be a shift change half an hour later, with the evening staff being replaced by the night duty nurses and nursing assistants. The patients who were downstairs are being wheeled back upstairs. The kitchen team is preparing an early dinner as they have to go home to their children celebrating Diwali. The security guard is vigilant as always. The GPH doctor has retired to his room after checking on his patients and joining everybody in the Diwali celebration.
And so as the festival night carries on in the rest of the world, there is one place that remains an oasis for those who are between life and death. Ever serving, ever caring.
It is a hospice.
