28 September, 2024.

 

To the recipient of the marrow within my hip bones,

 

I don’t know your name.

I was told that your identity must be kept a secret from me. Apparently, there are good reasons for doing so. Keeping your identity a secret means that I can’t know your name, where you’re from, or even, your age. 

 

You could be reading this from anywhere in the world – Scotland, Sabah, Swaziland, Seoul, etc. 

Yet, in a few months time, one litre of bone marrow will be drawn out of my hip bones, and injected into your bloodstream.

 

I didn’t know that there could be so much bone marrow in a person’s bones. Nor did I know that bone marrow is a liquid. I always thought it was solid, hiding beneath the white of a bone. Well, it seemed that way when I saw the broken pieces of chicken bones in my mother’s soup. Maybe because it had been cooked, but I digress. 

 

I guess it hasn’t fully hit me that I will be going for the surgery. I can only imagine lying flat on my belly, with two sharp instruments drilling deep into my hip bones, like oil wells, extracting and pumping out the marrow from within. Hopefully, I’ll be fully knocked out then. But why should I feel scared? People go for surgery every day and for worse things. Besides, friends have told me that donating bone marrow to a stranger is one of the most meaningful and noble things someone could do.

 

Although I must confess, I don’t feel righteous, or any warm, fuzzy feelings when thinking about donating my marrow to you. I’m sorry. I don’t know what to feel. To give a piece of your body to another person, and to not know anything about them – that feels strange. To give a piece of your body to another, and not your story? That feels incomplete. Maybe that’s why bone marrow donation coordinators encourage donors to write letters to their recipients. I’ve never written a letter to someone I don’t know. I don’t even know what you look like. I only know of your medical condition.

 

Last week, I met the bone marrow donation coordinator for the first time. I could have met her online on Zoom, but I insisted on meeting her in person.

 

“Are you sure? Most potential donors prefer to meet us online. It saves them time,” she said over the phone, two days before our physical meeting. I explained that if you got a text message asking for your bone marrow, it would make more sense to meet the ones handling the matter – face to face. Anyway, I didn’t have to go to work that day. 

 

The office is located in a small town, my hometown. I hardly visit it now. Getting there takes 45 minutes by train, but the taxi ride only took 20. It also cost 30 dollars – the usual price of a Korean barbecue buffet meal where I’m residing now (which may or may not be Korea).

When I reached, I rang the bell and squinted through the glass front door. The coordinator appeared almost instantaneously. She looked more energetic than me.

 

“Thanks for coming in person,” she chirped.

 

“I’m so sorry for being late. I ended work at 11.30PM last night.”

 

“No kidding! You must be an accountant or something.”

 

“No, I work as a–”

 

“–Anyway, really glad you’re here, take a seat, we’ve got much to talk about. How’re you feeling?”

 

It was the first time someone asked me that question this week. It was already Friday. 

 

A weak chuckle escaped my mouth. “I actually feel really drained from work. I didn’t sleep well last night,” I replied. “Again, sorry for coming so late. I woke up late, and I tried to rush here in a taxi but I’m still 20 minutes late-”

 

“Right, I forgot to mention; we’ll reimburse you for the taxi fare at the end of the month. Just send me the receipt.”

 

“I beg your pardon?”

 

“As a potential donor, you can claim your taxi ride to today’s meeting and also a ride to your next location afterwards.” A free taxi ride? Maybe I could have Korean barbecue later on. I found myself grinning, about to thank the coordinator with expressions of gratitude that I usually reserve for unexpected gifts. However, I stopped myself. Nothing ever comes free. “Thank you”, I mumbled politely. 

 

Back to business.

 

I was led into a meeting room. From an open laptop, the coordinator pulled up a slideshow, angling it such that both of us could view it despite sitting two seats apart. For 10 minutes, the coordinator gave a usual corporate introduction. She sounded like one of those lecturers back in college who read off their slides. I wondered how many donors she had performed this presentation for, and if I was number 97, or something. My mind wandered to a TED Talk I had seen years back about the mistakes to avoid when giving a slideshow presentation. 

 

Yes, she was definitely reading from the slides.

 

My mind quickly snapped back to the meeting room when I heard her say, “Your bone marrow recipient is a male child below 21 years old, with a rare disease.” The name of the disease was long, multisyllabic, alien to the ear. I can’t recall the full name, but its acronym stuck – four letters of the alphabet that I never knew could be meaningfully placed together. Despite working in a hospital for 2 years, I’ve never heard of this disease.

 

Somehow, all my tiredness from this morning seemed to fade away. I could hear the coordinator clearly now. She sounded like she was talking about something that really mattered to her – to me.

 

To you.

 

I should probably give her a name - Lina. (Lina has probably read every line of this letter. She needs to ensure that I don’t reveal any information about myself, like where I live or what my name is.) Lina stopped referring to her slides. She now held in her hands a case note, stamped with the logo of the bone marrow donation office. I recognised the name of the disease printed in a bold font – its name, not its acronym. Of course, there was no information about you apart from you being a child below 21 years old”. I’m sure the note had a serial number to anonymise you but I don’t recall seeing it.