“The Management of Grief”

The scene with roses and Dr. Ranganathan.
Dr. Ranganathan already knows that his relatives are dead and there is no hope for him. He might look a little bit of a tough guy in the scene, but he is just that kind of person that keep his problems bottled up. He is a man from another religion background, he is absolutely different from what Shaila is used to. He doesn’t really know what to say and how to make her feel better, he knows that it is worse to not know anything. The expression “No news is good news” doesn’t work when your close and beloved people are in the middle of nowhere and you have no idea what is going to happen with them. Dr. Ranganathan tries to comfort Shaila and offers her roses. In that situation, it actually means a lot. He is very careful with his answers and his questions: “Vinod is how old?”-he didn’t use the past tense, he thinks before he says something. He knows he can hurt Shaila a lot now and ruin her hope just by one little word. He can’t hold his feelings when they look at the pictures though. He can’t handle even more dead people around him, who he used to know. He apologized afterwards and ran out of the room. Situations like this are always terrible and difficult for everyone. People don’t know what to say and how to react, they try to help others too, but they are also being selfish and nobody blames them for that. Dr. Ranganathan is an amazing man, who was trying really hard to help someone else, knowing already that his relatives are dead.