That was quite a bright morning, everything was going as per schedule. I was a trainee at my office then. We were relishing the morning tea break, almost everybody had returned to the class except five of us. Four of five, including me, were busy playing Chinese checkers, the fifth guy was polishing his carom skills on the board. There was some kind of repair work going on over the terrace just besides the cafeteria. As we were fully involved in the game of checkers, the carom guy said." Bees are coming"!!
We all turned to witness bees increasing their count in the cafeteria. I was quite obviously baffled at the sight. I did not understand the seriousness of the issue instantly. I and another colleague of mine, jumped the walls of cafeteria assuming that bees will not follow us out. Initially I felt the situation hilarious. I ran hard. I under-estimated the speed of bees. They were following me and my colleague. At the begining I felt only few bees were behind me and I thought I could hit them out. I turned to get a sight of my colleague, I was dumbstruck seeing the number of bees around his face. The number was seriously more, I understood the seriousness of this attack.
My other two intelligent colleagues did not run as we did, instead they stayed back and took shelter. Also, we both had attracted the angry bunch of bees. The bees, racing with me, had started to sting me wherever they felt like stinging. I could smell the honey when those were around me. That was nasty smell and made me half sick:(
I was still running as hard as I can, making constant manoeuvers to dodge bees. I was looking for the shelter. My eyes fell on a tarpaulin, I waved over my head to get rid of the bees and quickly went inside the tarpaulin to get shelter. I covered my face with hanky and got rid of bees that were still stinging my body peacefully!! I shouted for my colleague to come under the tarpaulin. He was dangerously stung by them. More than 40 % of what they had stung me.He came inside the tarpaulin but could not elude the bees. After some time, he jumped out of tarpaulin and took shelter in washroom nearby. By that time the angry bees had calmed a bit and their number had abated. I was unaware of any of this. I started shouting for help, calling out my colleagues name.
No reply came back. I stayed back with my mind going blank.
After some time I shouted again for help. Luckily, I heard reply. They were telling me to enter back into cafeteria from one of the ends. I was so blank at that time, that I could not figure out, in which corner of the cafeteria I was sitting. Also I was dreaded by the bees and I was not ready to leave my safe haven. After some time, I gathered courage to jump back into the cafeteria. By that time the bees had completely gone. I was escorted down with thick blanket around me. The nightmare was finally over!!
The bees had stung me on head, arm, fingers, face. My finger had got numb! My colleagues took care that I and my another colleague got immediate medical attention. The poison took toll on both of us. We were feeling weak and numb for couple of days.
Its almost one year from that incident now, when I look back I realise series of mistakes I did on that day-
-I under-estimated the power of bees especially the speed.
-I made a terrible mistake of running, instead of ducking down.
-I realised the importance of unity in hard way!!
I learnt lesson of life time and I hope u too.
