The Hospital Waiting Room

by Ruth

I've been to the hospital three times in the past week, but mostly just in the waiting room.
At the beginning of the week, I went with a friend who was having outpatient surgery done. She saw me on facebook the night before and asked if I wanted to come. She said she wouldn't mind going by herself and I was like, "You're having surgery! Of course you don't want to go by yourself!" So I went and sat in various waiting rooms for about 5 hours.
While we were waiting together in the hospital lobby, a middle-aged western woman came in and talked to a nurse. "I need to see a doctor about a bite on my leg," the woman said. The nurse said something we couldn't hear and then the woman said, "Well, I don't think the gynecologist would know what to do about the bite." The nurse hesitated then said, "So you don't want a pap smear?" She led the woman away...in the direction of the gynecology unit, and my friend and I fell over each other laughing. Oh, the miscommunications!

The second time at the hospital was much shorter. Our teammate Christina was having her wisdom teeth out. When she told me about it, she was also planning on going alone. "I figured they could call a songtao for me" (the red taxi trucks). What is it with these people? I said, "You can't go by yourself!" Several other friends went at the beginning and Kevin and I came over later. I figured it might take hours but by the time we got there, they were already finished! Christina was sitting in the waiting room with swollen cheeks and a pained look. We made fun of her, caused her to laugh, and tried to get her to take pain medicine she couldn't swallow...because that's the kind of good friends we are. Kevin and I brought her flowers though, which we pointed out to her after apologizing for all the rest of the torture we were causing. I don't think she minded too much that we were making fun of her, I think it was more the problem that she couldn't talk back.

Today I went to the hospital for the third time. Kevin and I had dentist appointments. It was the fastest dentist appointment ever! Fifteen minutes and I was back in the waiting room. $50 later, we were both paid for and out the door. And no cavities. Which discourages me again from actually taking up flossing, since my teeth have always done okay without it. There's no dentists reading this blog, are there?

That should be all for the hospital visits this trip. It's not a bad hospital (they already do all their medical records on computer, kind of like America is hoping to do one of these days). Still, it smells all antiseptically weird and the colors are horrible. So hopefully no one else I know is planning a surgery in the next few weeks.