BOSTON—A foreign student at a local university was hit by a vehicle while crossing the street and says that she was beside herself—literally and figuratively—during the near-death experience but now has a much greater appreciation of the English language and especially its idioms.
Expected to make a full recovery, Cindy Mei Pin Chun, 23, says from her hospital bed that she was returning to her dorm after an English class on idioms when, lost in thought, she stepped off the curb right into the path of an SUV. She says she became separated from her physical self upon impact and saw her body thrown 20 feet, after which she walked over to it. She said that as she stood, distraught, beside it, she began to fret about her family back in China, about the leftovers in her fridge, and about the assignment on idioms that was due the following week. It was that last thought, she says, that triggered an overwhelming feeling of worry—which is also when the meaning of being “beside oneself” finally dawned on her. Overcome by fear that she would miss an assignment, something she had never done before, she claims she then re-entered her lifeless body.
Christopher Linfield, 53, a paramedic who arrived on scene, says that at first glance Chun appeared to be dead. And, despite being a 22-year veteran with the Boston Fire Department, he says he had to drag himself out of his ambulance. “To see such a beautiful young woman lying there motionless,” he says, his voice cracking, “was too much to bear.” But with the help of the crutch he uses for his bad knee, he says he eventually made it over to Chun and checked for a pulse. “At first, nothing. But then it was as if something passed by me. No, more like through me. So, I checked again. Just to be sure.” He says he was shocked to find a faint but undeniable pulse. He stabilized her, adding that he had to practically pry a textbook, the Oxford Dictionary of Idioms, from her cold, nearly dead hands.
