4 years ago, Joseph Rojas' brother Mark suffered a fire and was in a coma for two weeks. No one knows how much information the human brain can process when in a coma. In this case, doctors can only advise family members to talk to the patient more.
"The doctor encouraged us to talk to him, but it felt a little strange to talk about everyday things." Joseph recalled, "I wanted to talk to him about what interested him most, which was video games."
Disaster scene
After that, Joseph started chatting with Mark in the hospital - of course it was just Joseph talking to himself. At that time, Joseph was playing "The Banner Saga", and he described to Mark the world view, gameplay, and the long journey that the characters had experienced. A doctor told Joseph that he could also let Mark listen to game music, which was one of Mark's favorite ways to pass the time.
"I still remember clearly when I was a child, when our parents told us to go to bed, we would often wait for them to fall asleep and sneak into the living room, block the light in the corridor with sheets, then turn on the TV and start playing games."
in Luo In Haas's family, his parents were very strict with him and his siblings. "Our parents don't allow us to date and fall in love." Joseph's sister Natalia said, "We can't watch adult movies, listen to secular music, or even celebrate Halloween. But I don't know why, our parents allow us to play games."
As a child Joseph and his siblings played games together
Not long after, Joseph came to the hospital with a Switch and started playing "The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild" in the ward. Joseph likened the experience to live streaming a game, where he didn't know if his "audience" would react to what he was doing, but he had to stay the course. "If other siblings came to the hospital to visit him, we would gather around the hospital bed and play 'Mario Kart.' We would always turn the volume up to the maximum so that Mark could hear the sounds in the game."
Mark said he didn't I don't remember anything that happened during my coma, except that the fire started in the kitchen. "It was an ordinary day in the summer of 2018. I was in the kitchen, putting my hands on the countertop, and had no idea what was going on until I heard the sound of a fire burning."
Mark looked around and discovered a terrifying Fact - The wall was on fire. The fire seems to be spreading from the apartment above. How to escape? At that time, his girlfriend and cat were not around. He briefly considered jumping out of the window, but quickly gave up the idea. In fact, his girlfriend woke Mark up when the fire first broke out and asked him to follow her out of the apartment. But at that time, he had just woken up, feeling dazed and surrounded by smoke. Mark did not run out of the house, but immediately got into the kitchen.
Mark decided to go downstairs and felt pain the moment he touched the hot doorknob. He grabbed a passing cat and continued downstairs, but realized he had made a huge mistake: the fire started not upstairs, but downstairs. In other words, he kept moving toward the center of the fire.
"I ran to the hottest place in the whole building, which is a flight of stairs that I climb every day after coming home from get off work."
Mark could hardly make a rational judgment and could only bite the bullet and keep walking forward. As he rushed out of the apartment building to put the cat down, emergency personnel quickly loaded him into an ambulance. Mark kept calling for his girlfriend, and then he realized she was sitting next to him. As the severe pain hit, Mark fell into a coma and did not wake up until a full two weeks later.
Mark is receiving treatment in the hospital
Joseph was working out in the gym when he learned of Mark's condition. Suddenly, he saw the TV station reporting that a fire broke out at a motel in Santa Ana, California the night before. "I felt quite cold at that time because my brother's apartment was right there."
He carefully watched the fire scene captured by the TV station and learned from the news that a man in his 30s was injured. “The TV showed a man being wheeled away on a stretcher, lying on his back with his arms in front of him."This position is called the 'boxer' because the surrounding skin shrinks and pulls, making the person look like a boxer," Joseph recalled. Also, I noticed that he has brown-black hair, and so does my brother! "
According to local media reports, three people were injured in the fire, of which Mark was the most seriously injured.
Joseph sent a text message asking if Mark was okay, but did not receive any reply. After some inquiries, Joseph decided to contact Mark directly for possible treatment. The hospital inquired about the situation, "I listened to a piece of waiting music before the call was connected. The music itself was not sad, but waiting was a very strange feeling... After waiting for about 30 seconds, the hospital told me on the other end of the phone, Mark was indeed sent to them. "
Joseph hung up the phone and cried uncontrollably. Then he took a deep breath and began to inform his family and friends that Mark was injured and hospitalized.
The text message Joseph sent to Mark that night
A difficult beginning
in On the night of the fire, as usual, Mark and his girlfriend turned on the PS4 and TV after dinner and sat side by side playing "Final Fantasy 14". Mark loves games and has collected a large number of antique game consoles in the past five years, including 10 Game Boys of different models and two Game Watches. However, Mark was the last person in the family to buy a Switch. It was a gift from several brothers and sisters when he was in a coma.
In the next two weeks, Mark. After about 11 skin graft surgeries, he had no memory of his family visiting him in the hospital, and had no idea Joseph had ever talked to him about "The Banner Saga" or that anyone else had gotten together to play "Mario Kart" when Mark woke up. When he came, the first thing he thought about was not his own physical condition, but the cat he rescued.
"I thought it was my wife's cat (the two were not married at the time), and I saved it. It wasn't until I woke up and talked to her that I figured out what was going on. "
Mark's experience was traumatic for everyone in the family, both physically and psychologically. "When you're with a family member in the hospital, you reflect on how you've gotten along with that person over the years and whether you can Let the relationship between each other become more harmonious and beautiful. Joseph said, "There was a period of time when we were not sure whether he would survive. This thought was particularly strong." "
In the hospital, Joseph demonstrated the game to Mark.
Fortunately, two weeks later, Mark woke up. Since Mark woke up, Joseph often played games by his side to help him pass the time. At first, Mark could not use language. To communicate, he could only stare at the "Y" or "N" written on a whiteboard. Joseph played games like "The Banner Saga" in front of him and asked him every 10 minutes if he wanted to continue. Watch, while Mark's eyes are usually fixed on "Y".
Since burn patients are easily infected, Mark lives in a separate ward without roommates, and Joseph has been accompanying him in the ward, and his girlfriend also visits him every day. But Mark still feels lonely when his parents, siblings and girlfriend are not around.
Mark's family bought him a Switch, but due to muscle atrophy caused by burns, the handheld console was too heavy for him. ...In the first few days after Mark woke up, even if he was only allowed to hold his iPhone, he could not hold on for more than a few minutes.
Mark was discharged from the hospital two months later. However, for him, leaving the hospital was just the beginning of a long journey of recovery. At home, Mark had to deal with constant pain, which he described as a "combination of fire bugs and pins and needles." Fortunately, the Switch helped him get through that difficult period.
At that time, I had to relearn many daily skills to adapt to my new life. Although I couldn't cook in the kitchen, unscrew the cap of a soda bottle, take my wife to a nightclub, drive a car or sleep on my back, I could play games like before. I like to sit on the couch and start running around in The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim. Playing games makes me forget about my physical discomfort. ”
Brothers and sisters spend time playing games together at Mark’s house
At the same time, games have also brought several brothers and sisters closer together.
Mark's sister Natalia admitted that before the fire accident, her relationship with her brothers was not close and they rarely expressed love to each other. Today, these young people value family ties more than before. "I often think that as long as Mark can survive, we must make changes and integrate into each other's lives in the future, but what should we do? The answer may be games. Playing games is a simple way for us to get closer to each other. "she says.
Every Monday, Joseph, Natalia, Mark and his other brother Vincent get together to play games. “I look forward to Monday nights because we all take a break from what we’re doing and spend an hour playing Mario Kart, Mario Tennis, or Minecraft,” Vincent said. “As a family, we maybe We have different lifestyles and don’t meet often, but games allow us to communicate as easily as children again. "For me, games have become more important," Mark said, "It’s not just about playing anymore." Playing games to release emotions or pass the time can help me adjust my mood, even on those bad days."
This article is compiled from: vice.com
Original title: "How Video Games Brought Together the Victims of a Tragic Fire Accident".
Original author: Patrick Klepek
