( A piece of copyrighted material from my upcoming book called: Understanding Life)

 I had an experience with a similar-themed experience in Mecca when I made my hajj(pilgrimage) in 1984. Fortunately that one turned out well,but not because of me.Let us continue and you will see why.As I was preparing to do my tawaf(circumambulation of the Kaaba)I noticed a man in the second balcony a few hundetred meters away struggling to breathe.Fresh out of my latest residency medical training,I rushed up,Dr. Wellby-style, to see what I could do.Not having even a stethoscope with me I began by examining the man for dehydration which sure enough was complicating his problem.There was a wiry Bedouin man standing 50 meters away with a full container of Zemzem water(holy water from the well of Zemzem).It should be noted here that, at the time, the well was open to all visitors so it would have been no problem for him to refill his jug if we emptied it.

Instead, he refused to give us any.I tried through several translators to convince him-to no avail .Finally a Saudi soldier who I had not even noticed but had surely noticed us, was watching the event unfold.At one point, out of the blue,he entered the scene,took the back side of his bayonet and gave the Bedouin man a shove that sent him flying for a short distance.He then took the jug, gave it to me and said”Dr. Give your patient what he needs”(I feel moved recounting this story more than 30 years later).

The story ended well! An ambulance arrived,we went to the local emergency room,and he was seen by some well-trained(I believe in America,actually) Saudi doctors.They diagnosed asthma(his first episode I believe) ,gave him the necessary meds and he left the emergrency room feeling fine! This was truly the best-case scenario as I had been suspecting a heart-attack or pulmonary embolus which would have been much more problematic.

For a long time I reflected on this incident doing some serious self-reflection and serious self-reproaching”You’re the fool,Ibrahim,I told myself.You always believe you can talk people into the truth.(Still do lol)The Saudi soldier was the clever one” A dose of humility and Reality once again. Alhumdulillah.