Chinese Medicine - Part 1

After an unsuccessful trip to the walk in centre in the Uk, I returned to China to find my ear trouble had become worse and my headaches had increased. After several days (of complaining) my friends persuaded me to seek the advice of a Chinese doctor.

In China, a visit to the doctor usually involves the a trip to the local hospital. Having never been one for liking hospitals I was a little nervous about going to one that (in my mind) would involve some big needles, suction  cups and some sort of fire treatment. But after waking one morning in severe pain, I had no choice but to take the plunge and so off we went to a hospital rumoured to be one of the better ones in my area.

The first thing that struck me when we arrived, was the sheer volume of people coming and going. I'm not sure why expected any less, after all, everywhere in Beijing is incredibly busy. But with so many long lines and a continuous stream of people coming through the doors, I had to wonder how on earth they managed to treat everyone? I thought that surely I would be in for a long day, especially having been used to long waits in the UK.

Registration however, was fairly easy (with the help of Meinan, my native friend) and incredibly cheap, costing only 5rnb (50p). We were given tickets with numbers (which reminded me of the meat and cheese section of a supermarket) and told where we should go to wait.

As we made our way upstairs, I couldn't help but notice how old and dirty everything was. I can't lie, even after living here for six months, I still expected a cleaner environment from a public hospital. It was an old, worn out building and even the toilets were some of the worst I have seen in China (and that's saying something!). We eventually found the room with the Doctors who would be able to help with issues of the head. For me this itself was something new, in the Uk a Doctor can see you for any part of the body, where as here it seemed that there are specific Doctors to go to for different parts of the body.

One thing you will notice when living in China is that due to the sheer volume of people, there is very little understanding of personal space or privacy. The hospital, it seemed, was no exception as I arrived to find an open door policy at the Doctors office. There were two doctors on duty and those waiting were waiting in the Doctors office itself. I watched for a good 45mins as those waiting walked from one bed to another, discussing each illness with both the doctors and the sick before being seen themselves.

Now, as a foreigner in China, you tend to get  a lot of attention. Just walking down the street can attract many stares and start many a whispered conversation. So when my number was called and it was my turn to see the Doctor, a small crowd seemed to form.

With the help of Meinan, I was able to explain the problem to the doctor and answer some questions about the pain. After discovering that I have been slightly stressed recently, the doctor put the pain down to stress headaches, gave me a prescription for what I thought would be pain killers and sent me on my merry way.

Having been through some stressful times in the past and not having had headaches as severe as these before, I left feeling a little confused and disappointed  with the outcome. Still I had some painkillers which for now at least, was all that mattered. So off we went to see Doctor number two, the ear doctor, to find out why I had pain and blood in my ear.

The next Doctors office was similar to the first only the doctors wore a uniform and tools similar to those I have only ever seen in horror films. Still, it wasn't long before it was my turn to be seen and this time the Doctor at least did an examination of the ear in question. He concluded that, yes, there is some damage to my inner ear and an infection had developed, which explained why there was the blood and pain.

I waited for some treatment suggestions or for a prescription of antibiotics (the normal procedure for ear infections in the UK) and was a little confused when I was being asked to stand up and leave. I had to ask Meinan to push for some answers and the only advice given was to keep water out of the ear and to leave it alone. So I left, confused and still in pain, desperately trying to understand what had just happened with the two doctors seen.

Having had confirmation from the ear doctor that my ear was damaged, we were at least able to go to the pharmacy and get some herbal treatments, to hopefully help kill the infection. So after a quick stop and chat to the pharmacist I had what I thought to be painkillers for the headaches and infection killers for the ear. Surely the pain would be over soon?

Meinan tried to explain the dosage to me and some reason, that she wasn't able to explain, the painkillers were suppose to be taken at night. She also explained that for my ear, I would have to take 8 bright green pills 3 times per day to kill the infection (it's quite common for Chinese medicine to involve an absurd number of pills per day). At this point, I didn't care too much and was simply after some relief from the pain, and so I gobbled down a couple of the painkillers.We decided to try and do some shopping and run some errands before heading home but for some reason the pain didn't seem to get any better.

After around an hour however, I did start to feel a little drunk. Having not had any alcohol for some time, it had to be put down to the painkillers. It didn't last too long though and another hour later I was very tired, still in lots of pain and feeling some what sorry for myself. So, feeling a little desperate by this point, I decided to try the infection pills and proceeded to gobble down 8 of the bright green herbal pills. After an hour of anticipation, the magical green pills seemed to have had little to no effect and so we headed home.

By the time we got back, I was crying with the pain. Desperate to understand a little more of what had happened at the doctors and wanting to know why I was still in so much pain, I decided to look up a translation of these 'painkillers' online.

I checked one website and couldn't believe what I was reading. So, I checked another and the another but, they all said the same thing. My 'painkillers' were in fact, sleeping pills...everything fell into place. My head Doctor diagnosed stress and after I had said that I wasn't a great sleeper (which is normal for me) he prescribed  sleeping pills. This explained why there was no real examination or advice given. This also explained why I had felt 'drunk' after taking them and then sleepy all afternoon.

I looked up the bright green pills, hoping they were what I thought they were, but as suspected, several websites gave the same conclusion. My infection killers were in fact pills used to treat skin bad complexion (quite a common problem for the Chinese people) and were not something that would be able to help an infection of the ear.

Giving up and feeling desperate, I had my friend contact our Manager at school to ask for help. Knowing a good doctor, he agreed to meet us the next day to help translate and get some more advice or medicine. Quite a nice thing for a boss to do!

Tired and crying from severe pain, I gobbled down some more sleeping pills whilst my Chinese friend gave me a head massage until I fell asleep.

It took a long time to drift off...



Continued in part 2

From Russia with love... A flight with Aeroflot

After a week back in the UK and after a very sad goodbye to my girlfriend, it was time to catch my flight back to Beijing. With a tight budget limiting my choice on flights, I found myself booking with Aeroflot, (I was saying Aeroflop by mistake for quite some time) a Russian airline I had hadn't heard of before. Having become good friends with a Russian back in Beijing and with plans to visit properly towards the end of the year, I was a little excited to be stopping in Moscow and being able to seeing a little of the Russian people and culture.

I have a irrational fear of missing flights and so as usual I arrived at Heathrow exceptionally early. I never mind so much as airports are an excellent place to people watch, and I spent the best part of an hour and a half watching the various nationalities pass the time before checking in and taking their flights.

After a long wait I was looking for my check in desk when I saw an air hostess that looked exactly like my friend in Beijing (tall slim and blonde), I guessed that this must be where I should check in and shortly after the Aeroflot signs appeared. After seeing this air hostess, the second Russian I have ever met in my life, I began to wonder if my stereotypical idea of big manly Russian women was all wrong. Maybe the Russian ladies are in fact all tall slim, blonde and elegant? After checking in I made my way through security (of course I set the alarm off and had to be X-rayed), found the gate and did my very best not to fall asleep. 

I have taken many flights in my life and when I could see that the gate was ready to open, I expected an announcement calling the different boarding numbers and was a little taken aback when a tired, grumpy Russian lady simply shouted 'Ready!' with an incredibly strong Russian accent. But this appeared to be all that needed to be said as everyone proceeded to board the plane. 

My heart sank a little when I boarded. Emirates it was not and I realised just how spoiled I had been in the past. The plane was far smaller than expected and had none of the usual gadgets I like when taking a long journey. The plane was something you would expect when taking a low budget flight such as Easyjet, and having paid far more than I ever would for an Easyjet flight, I was a little disappointed. The plane seemed rather rickety and I was slightly nervous when the long Russian safety talk was translated into short once sentence (heavily accented) English.

'В случае возникновения чрезвычайных ситуаций обратите внимание, что выходыслева от вас. Ремни безопасности должны носить при посадке и взлете и в том маловероятном случае возникновения чрезвычайной ситуации маски посадкивоздушных упадет с потолка над вами.'


'Please wear you seat belts.'

The flight to Moscow was 4 hours long and I managed to sleep most of the way. Having left a sunny England, I was a little unprepared for a snowy Moscow airport when we arrived and proceeded to put on all layers of clothing I had in my hand luggage. It was 2am Moscow time when I arrived and it was a 10 hour wait before my connecting flight to Bejing . Exhausted, I needed to find a safe corner to sleep in and so started to wonder round the somewhat peaceful Moscow airport. 

After half an hour of wondering I found what appeared to be the 'sleeping area' (named so simply because of the number of people there sleeping) and so took off my shoes and curled up with my bag, quickly falling into a blissful sleep.

Considering I was sleeping on an airport floor, I slept well and woke up around fours hours later. My sleeping companions long gone, I was alone and children were the only ones paying any attention to me, somewhat amused at my sleepiness. I took a wonder around the, now lively airport, admiring the different shops and becoming rather intrigued by the Russian people.

Something I did notice about Moscow airport was that it full of Russians. An obvious statement I know but having just spent a considerable amount of time watching people from all over the world in Heathrow, the lack of foreigners was quite prominent. My hopes of finding tall, slim, blonde women everywhere were also short lived, as many Russian ladies around me lived up to the stereotype (I found myself hoping I wasn't sat between some of the larger ladies!) I found my gate and curled up again for a little more sleep before boarding the long flight to Beijing.

My second flight was in a slightly larger plane and being long haul, even had a TV! However this being a Russian flight from Moscow to China, all instructions and announcements (and TV channels) were in either Russian or Mandarin and so my understanding of any important information was very limited! I was also sure that the  Russians had a their own idea of evacuation as the Russian emergency exit sign was pointing to the left and the English emergency exit was pointing to the right. These things (on now 2 of Aeroflot's flights) on top of a rickety plane (with a healthy dose of turbulence) had me question just how safe this flying malark really is. But surely, I was just being a nervous passenger, right?

I spent the long flight either sleeping or watching some Russian comedy and after 8 hours it was time to land in Beijing. Now, I wouldn't exactly call the landing 'smooth' and although nervous I at least had exceptions to land safely. However the Russian passengers didn't seem to have hopes as high mine and once safely landed a rounds of applause and cheers could be heard throughout the plane, as though this was the first time the pilot had flown (maybe it was?!). Either way I was just happy to be home at last after such a long journey.

Back in Beijing, I explained my experiences to my Russian friend and she simply laughed. As it turns out, the Russian airlines don't have the best safety record and the round of applause at landing really is because they aren't sure if they will land safely! A few days after talking with my friend, a Russian airline crashed, killing 34 passengers.

Needless to say, if I do pay a visit to Russia in the October holidays... I will be taking the train!

Happy Birthday to me! (The English Birthday) (17.03.2012)

As I'm getting older and am living in a different country, I thought I deserved at least two birthdays this year and so I decided to use my return flight to head back to England for a flying visit after 6 months of living in the Eastern Hemisphere.

My journey back was long but comfortable and I spent the best part of it bringing myself out of the China 'bubble', preparing for a week in the normality of English life. After taking so long to get used to the various differences in cultures, it was hard to imagine how I would feel being back in the western world, understanding the spoken language, eating English food and sitting down to pee... (I guess some things would be easy to get used to again!)

Of course, I was very much looking forward to seeing the girl again after being apart for so long and I was filled with excitement and anticipation when I arrived in London. Long distance relationships are very hard at times and with us both having been through such different, although equally challenging times without each other,  we were both looking forward to reconnecting once again.

After collecting my baggage and freshening up, I went on to tackle the London trains to make my way home. After jumping onto the wrong train and taking a detour into central London, I finally arrived after 27 hours of travelling. There, I found my girl, waiting for me with a smile.

Of course all you blogger readers don't want to here the details of what was a very romantic first evening together, so I will get straight onto the interesting stuff... Birthday presents!

Those of you that know me will know that it's the simple things in life that make me smile, and in this instance it was a set of Rubik's puzzles  that had me as excited as a three year at Disney Land. I had wanted these puzzles since I was very young and so for me this was a very thoughtful gift. I really am a big kid at times.

But this wasn't to be my only present (yes I really was spoiled), I was to be pampered with a spa weekend at a local spa resort, massages, facials, dinners... I couldn't think of a nicer way to celebrate my birthday with my girl.

It was Tuesday when I arrived and so had some time to recover from the jet-lag and catch up with as many people as I could before my weekend of relaxation. Unfortunately the evils of jet-lag had other plans and I lost around two days to a severe lack of energy. I was also suffering from some nasty headaches and having had some trouble with my ear for some time, I thought I would take the opportunity whilst home to see an English Doctor for a check up.

In England, health care is free and in order to see a doctor, you simply need to have an address and register with your local GP. With my address currently in China, I had no choice but to visit one of the local walk in centres and wait for what could be an eternity before I could be seen.

Luckily, there was a walk in centre not to far from home and I set off, Rubik's puzzle in hand, hoping the wait wouldn't be too long. After explaining my situation to the reception staff I was met with much scepticism. 'Your living in China? 'Ok then, can you speak Chinese?!' (that makes a difference?) 'We need your Chinese address... what do you mean you only know the Chinese charactors?!' and so a long registration process began.

Once finally registered, I sat down and began the long wait. With my head and ear throbbing by this point I was quite thankful for what was quite a peaceful waiting area and so I sat and started to try and solve my new puzzle. Unfortunately this peace and quite didn't last long as the local drunk walked in shortly after for treatment to her hand. At first this drunken lady was loud but friendly and proceeded to try and cheer everyone up with some tuneless songs. Despite my throbbing head, I was amused greatly, it had been a while since I was around such behaviour, the Chinese certainly don't find themselves in these drunken messes.

But the friendly songs and conversation didn't last long, after discovering I wasn't from around here (I didn't mention I was living in another country) it was assumed that I was foreign and here wasting her tax money with 'just a headache'. After trying to explain that I was English and also a tax payer, I was informed that I 'Don't sound English' and should 'Fuck off back to my own country'. At this point I was moved to another waiting area (I'm not quite sure why I was the one to be moved?) where I continued to wait, angry and somewhat upset by the narrow mindedness of some of the people in my own country. This part of England I really didn't miss.

Shortly after I saw the doctor (who amusingly enough was foreign) and proceeded to spend just a few minutes looking at my ear before explaining that the pain was most likely just wax, the solution to which was simply painkillers. I asked about ways to remove and prevent wax and therefore this pain in the future, but he could offer no advice and I left still in pain, with no solution to the problem and feeling somewhat dismissed. The has potential to be great once again, but after several similar experiences I have to say that there a certainly flaws in the system.

With such little time, jet-lag and the headaches, there wasn't much opportunity to see too many people whilst home. However, one person I was very much looking forward to seeing was my older brother Luke.

I'm very close with my older brother and he is always there to give me advice or to tell me I'm being a fool. After six months of skyping my experiences and feelings it was lovely to be able to have a proper chat over lunch and coffee.

We met in St Albens and it was a beautiful sunny day. After leaving China in the snow it felt great to be outside in the warmth. We wondered around the Cathedral park, checking out the grounds and a Roman Mural, talking and catching up properly. It was so nice to be able to spend some time together after so long. But of course, the time came when we had to leave and I was sad to have to say goodbye again, not really knowing when I would see him again. I miss our fortnightly get together lots.

The weekend was spent with the girl in a beautiful spa hotel. We enjoyed a relaxing swim (thoroughly enjoyed by myself ), saunas, steams, massages, facials, dinners, sunshine and beautiful surroundings. Much needed by us both after such a long time apart. It was a lovely second birthday and for the first time in six months I felt completely relaxed.

But, time flew by and before I knew it it was time to say good bye once again. Feeling just as heartbroken to be leaving as I did the first time, I realised that my feelings for the girl haven't faded even a little over the time and distance. I know that for me right now, China is where I am meant to be, but when that same feeling is also telling me that the girl is just as right, it's very hard to say goodbye and be apart once again. Needless to say there was tears and sadness from us both when we finally did part again.

I spent my flight back thinking everything over. I'm really not sure where my life is heading or what lies ahead for me. But despite any sadness, there are so many opportunities ahead of me... I just need to be strong enough to reach out and take them.