I was on a flight yesterday from London and the gentleman next to me was sweating a lot and telling his friend that he thought he was going to be sick.
While I was listening to this conversation I was reminded of a time when I used to travel on packed trains in the summer in Tokyo, and how cold they were. It was easy to get an acute cold, much like the symptoms the fellow next to me had. I realised I was limited in recourses to actually treat him but decided to ask him how he was.
He said he thought he was having a stroke. I looked at his pupils and decided this wasn’t the case, and told him not to worry. I figured the best thing was to warm him up a bit so I asked the steward to bring a cup of hot water. It was funny as she intervened immediatly and said that she thought he would need something cold, and suggested putting ice on the back of his neck! I explained that would be the worst thing for him and would actually exacerbate his symptoms and probably ruin his holiday in Barcelona.
After a few sips of the warm water, the colour started to return to his face and the sweating stopped. He still had an acute pain in his stomach so I pressed a point on his wrist that was closest to me and the pain went. He told me he thought he saw two large white gates. I said, well yes, we are actually ” up here” and probably he would go to heaven as he seemed a nice chap to me but as we were about to go “down there” then it’s good to have a chat with Lucifer, as he was a fallen angel and knows what the score is “up here’ … I said he’s the kind of bloke we should talk to and that there are plenty of opportunities to sin in Barcelona! Anyway, I told him that, at the very least, he should avoid cold foods for a day and stop eating the strong mints I saw he was carrying with him.