When a successful doctor stared at cancer death, here’s what he chose to do

NEW YORK, Dec 17: US-based Indian-American Paul Kalanithi was 15 months away from completing his training as a neurosurgeon at age 36 when he was diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer. The cancer was inoperable, he was going to die.

When Breath Becomes Air is a memoir that begins with him examining his own CT scan with his wife Lucy, also a doctor.

“I had earned the respect of my seniors, won prestigious national awards, and was fielding job offers from several major universities... I had reached the mountaintop; I could see the Promised Land,” he writes in his memoir, which he began writing after his diagnosis.

Within seconds, the vision dissipated and from a doctor saving lives, he becomes a patient facing death.

“As a doctor, I knew not to declare ‘Cancer is a battle I’m going to win!’ or ask, ‘Why me?’ (Answer: why NOT me?),” he writes.

He died in March 2015 before he could finish his book. Ten months later, When Breath Becomes Air hit the stands and has stayed on the New York Times bestseller list all year.

Kalanithi’s memoir chronicles what he went through when confronted with death and how it taught him to be fully alive, including the decision to have a child knowing he would not be there to watch her grow up.

His degrees in human biology, English Literature, and history and philosophy of science and medicine from Cambridge and Stanford Universities before he graduated from Yale School of Medicine, helped him articulate his thoughts on living, dying and accepting death.

“I began to realize that coming in such close contact with my own mortality had changed both nothing and everything. Before my cancer was diagnosed, I knew that someday I would die, but I didn’t know when. After the diagnosis, I knew that someday I would die, but I didn’t know when. But now I knew it acutely. The problem wasn’t really a scientific one. The fact of death is unsettling. Yet there is no other way to live.”

When his father tells him he would beat cancer, he reflects; “How often had I heard a patient’s family member make similar declarations? I never knew what to say to them then, and I didn’t know what to say to my father now.”

The book courses through his life as a student excited about where a career as a neurosurgeon would take him, to becoming a patient with a terminal illness, from being a husband in a rocky marriage struggling to balance work and a relationship, to being a new father knowing that saying goodbye to his little daughter would be the hardest thing he would ever do.

He does it eloquently. “That message is simple: When you come to one of the many moments in life when you must give an account of yourself, provide a ledger of what you have been, and done, and meant to the world, do not, I pray, discount that you filled a dying man’s days with a sated joy, a joy unknown to me in all my prior years, a joy that does not hunger for more and more, but rests, satisfied. In this time, right now, that is an enormous thing.”

Republic of Kazakhstan celebrates Silver Jubilee of Independence

By Deepak Arora

NEW DELHI, Dec 4:

Kazakhstan celebrated 25th anniversary of Independence and the Day of the First President of the Republic of Kazakhstan here on Friday.

India's Youth and Sports Minister Vijay Goel was the chief guest at the reception held at the Imperial hotel here.

The visiting Kazakhstan Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Akylbek Kamaldinov, who was in India on a working visit, also attened the reception.

In his opening speech, Kazakhstan Ambassador Bulat Sarsenbayev thanked the guests for attending the evening and mentioned the current high level of mutual understanding and the achievements in various fields of cooperation between Kazakhstan and India.

The Ambassador underlined India and Kazakhstan friendly relations and that the two countries have always supported each other.

“I am sure that our mutual efforts will be directed at boosting bilateral ties for the sake of prosperity of our peoples and countries, as well as peace, security and stability in the region,” said Ambassador Sarsenbayev. 

The event was illuminated by the performance of the Symphony Orchestra of Almaty.

It was led by the outstanding Kazakh violinist Marat Bisengaliyev and well-known opera singer Oxana Davydenko,

They were especially invited by the Embassy in order to introduce Delhi audience to the classical music performed by the world level professionals.

On the following day, under the patronage of the Embassy of Kazakhstan in India, a concert of soloists of the Symphony Orchestra of Almaty was held.

It was dedicated to the 25th anniversary of Independence of Kazakhstan.

It was held at the hall of "The Umrao" hotel which seats 1,500 people.

The large gathering of audience, appreciated and lauded with loud applause the concerts.

The Ambassador said the visit of the delegation of the Almaty Symphony Orchestra, the excellent performance of its soloists and the world-famous stars allowed to show the level of cultural development of Kazakhstan.

He said it opened the new horizons for cooperation between the two countries the sphere of culture.

Apart from the Almaty Symphony Orchestra, internationally-renowned violinist Marat Bisengaliev is also the founding Music Director of the Symphony Orchestra of India - the first and only symphony orchestra in India. Its backbone of which consists of Kazakh musicians.

Among the guests, who attended the events, were well-known politicians and public figures like Lok Sabha MPs Virender Kashyap of BJP and Jayant Panda of BJD, former Foreign Minister Salman Khurshid, heads of the diplomatic missions, representatives of business circles, mass media, as well as many classical music lovers of Delhi.