Can I please write about something other than a hospital???

Saturday afternoon…

I think it will be interesting to see just how this blog entry turns out. What makes this particular entry unique is that I’m not in an exceptionally good mood, and I’m sitting in a crowded waiting room in Hospital Telogorejo in Semarang. Maybe we’ll blame this medical visit on my having waded through flood waters infested with god knows what, or possibly, it could have been devouring food that had been sitting around all day at a popular eating stall, or maybe it was just using the notoriously soapless bathrooms at nearly every public establishment. No matter what, the fact of the matter is that my stomach is really bloated, I’m extremely drowsy and a little dizzy, and a doctor is about to analyze the results of a stool sample I just had to carry around with me for about 2 hours. Too much information? Too bad.

Sunday night…

Unfortunately, I feel worse than yesterday, and I’ve decided that it’s worth flying to Jakarta in order to get this checked out. I’m headed there tomorrow. Don’t be concerned yet though. It might seem like only something severe would merit a trip across the country, but it’s not as bad as it sounds (knock on wood). I’ve certainly never had to suffer through digestive problems quite like this before, but in order to get medical treatment resembling anything like that in the U.S., one simply has to go to the capital.

Having the privilege of dropping everything and heading to Jakarta for treatment is actually a pretty sobering experience. Sitting impatiently in Semarang, I had to reanalyze my situation because I started feeling conflicted about my feelings of irritation. I see people everyday who have problems like mine (or much worse) and who absolutely do not have the resources to treat their illness or injury. While hopelessly navigating that terribly disorganized hospital, moving from unclean room to unclean room, and being taken from person to person – over the course of 2 days – I began to get incredibly frustrated. My physical discomfort level was reaching a peak, and virtually no progress had been made toward solving my problem. I was bordering on becoming quite upset, but then I then I started to think about the fact that my even being present in that building was much more than the vast majority of people in this country could do for themselves or their families. So, I decided to be more patient.

Finally, a receptionist called me to one of the operating rooms, so that I could meet with the doctor I had been waiting for. It initially struck me as odd that I would be meeting with him in the OR. However, given the previous sequence of events that had led me to sitting around in the laboratory and chatting with people while they were getting their blood drawn, my state of surprise immediately subsided. I began to question how I could have thought that, in this country, any other location might have been more appropriate.

Now, this next occurrence might seem like something that would only happen in a silly movie, but keep in mind that I only post on this blog every once in a while, so it’s safe to assume that I’m saving the craziest stories for you! If movie-like incidents didn’t happen in people’s lives, then there wouldn’t be any movies.

Once I got to meet with a doctor, I felt much better, even though I was watching other surgeons strip out of their bloody scrubs about 10 feet away from me. Nevertheless, he was terribly pleasant and made me feel comfortable. Well, he made me feel comfortable until he started to look at my lab results with an expression of utter confusion. A series of outwardly irrelevant questions directed toward me suggested that something had to be wrong. Now, It’s hard for me to believe that in a Muslim country such as Indonesia, in a Muslim hospital such as Telogorejo, and in a file index organized by Muslims – such as the one in which my test results had been stored – a mistake concerning the name of an American male could be made. But low and behold, among the names Mohammad Markason, Muhammed Ansori, Mohamed Ahkyar, Imam Sujono, and Kenneth Moore, I managed to leave the waiting room with a sealed envelope, inside which the medical files of, yes, someone else were enclosed.

The doctor didn’t tell me anything about whose results these were or what this person’s condition was. But judging by his questions, I imagine that it was either a pregnant woman or an amputee.

Tuesday evening…

I honestly couldn’t even be angry about the mix-up. I just laughed, went back up stairs, and had them give me a copy of my actual results. It’s unfortunate that, once the doctor got to look at my true printout, a conclusion still could not be made. But at least I’m in Jakarta now, getting the opinion of AMINEF’s official doctor. I’ll probably know next week exactly what’s going on, when all the lab tests come back. In the mean time, I guess I’ll just lounge around this hotel some more and enjoy the free wireless… that is, if the power comes back on.