This week was quite exciting. Monday was P-Day, Tuesday was Zone Conference, but the fun really started on Wednesday.... You see, at the end of the week, our apartment was going to be clean checked by our stake relief society president. In order to prepare for her arrival, we had lots of cleaning and rearranging to do. Among the things that was in the way was the big old rusty bench and weight set a previous elder had purchased and left. Wednesday morning, we decided, was the morning we would move it.
Well, long story short, there were no clamps on the end of the bar to hold the weights in place and while I was moving it, 50 pounds ended up falling off the bar and right on my bare foot.
Ow.
The 3 other elders instantly came to my assistance after they heard the crash and my pain-filled (yet missionary clean) exclamations. We quickly got my foot elevated so I wouldn't swell and put a bag of frozen pork meat on it because we had no ice.
It hurt a lot, but I didn't think it was broken, so I didn't call Sister Shin (Mission President's wife) at first. After about two hours with the pain increasing, I decided a hospital visit might not be such a bad idea, so I called her up. A few phone calls that she made later, she called me back and told me about a hospital that a member from another ward owned so it would be free to go to. My companion and I then began our trek there.
We took a taxi, but getting out of the house and down to the street was hard enough. Heck, putting on my shoes was probably the worst experience of my mission. I didn't want to go outside barefoot as a missionary though, so I sucked up the pain and put them on. We got in the taxi and told the driver where to go. 8 bucks later, we were at the "hospital"
Oh. It was not a hospital. It was more like a doctor's office, but still not to American standards. The room where the doctor was in was in plain sight with the door wide open so everybody in the waiting room could see into it. As I waited my turn, I watched old lady after old lady take her pants off to get shots. It was not a desireable sight.
"Krapuh", the nurse called.
It was my turn. I went into the room and my companion informed the doctor that I had a hurt foot. The doctor commanded that I take off my shoe and sock. Oh the pain. I finally got them off. As he poked and prodded around my foot, I looked around the room. "This is not a doctor's office", I thought. I was sitting in a chair, just a plain chair. Where was the bed with butcher paper? Also, the doctor's desk was covered in a million needles and bloody used cotton balls. There were no gloves, there was no soap, and no care for organization. Plus, there was a mysterious door at the back of the room that I thought was just a closet but I wasnt sure......
My eyes drifted back to the needles again. "Luckily I won't be needing one of those", I thought to myself. That's when I saw that in his hand was a needle. What the!? I dropped a weight on my foot, I don't need a shot! Where'd you even get that needle anyway!?
Well he gave my foot a shot anyway and the needle and cotton ball he used joined the 30+ that were already on his desk.
"Great. Now I have AIDS."
He then proceeded to wrap my foot. No x-ray? No questions for me about how it happened, what hurts, etc? After he finished wrapping my foot, he told me to put my shoe back on.
Sigh. I began, but now that my foot was covered in wrap, it was too big and too painful to fit back in my shoe. I explained to him that I couldn't do it, hoping that he would say "oh no problem, you don't need a shoe. Here, have these crutches". But instead he just took off the bandages and said to put my shoe on without them. You've got to be kidding me.
As I was struggling to put on my shoe anyway, he left the room and came back with crutches. Now that's more like it! I stood up to claim my prize, but they were too small. He noticed that too, paused for a bit, told me to take a few steps, and after I limped to do so, he said I was okay and didn't need crutches.
Right as I was about to cut in and say that my foot hurt a lot more than he was giving it credit for, a timer went off on his table. He said to wait a minute and he grabbed an I.V. bag of fluid. He then walked to the mysterious door at the back of the room and opened it...
It turned out to be just a small, dark closet but inside was a half-naked man laying on a makeshift bed with an I.V. tower strapped to him.
WHAT IS THIS PLACE.
The doctor changed the man's empty bag with the full one, left him in the dark, shut the door like nothing happened, and returned to me. He told me to put the bandage back on once I get home and thanked me for coming. That's it? What about diagnosing my foot? You know, the one that is currently throbbing in pain infront of your face? But nope, he sent me back to the waiting room where the nurses took me back. Then, without any delay, I was lead behind a curtain.
"You have to get shot in the butt" said my Korean companion.
"I WHAT!?" I proclaimed outloud. No time to prepare, or delay, the second the curtain closed, the nurse pulled down my pants and started smacking my butt. While doing so, she stuck the needle in, gave it a few more pats, pulled up my pants, and shoved me back into the waiting room.
Confused, invaded, and incubating whatever chemicals they shot into me, I said thanks, goodbye, and left the hospital. I was speechless, haha, what had just happened? On our long elevator ride back down to the street, my dead serious companion broke the silence. "So is your foot better?"
Yup. And that was my Wednesday.
Since then, we've still gone to all of our appointments, I won't let a mangled foot bring me down. Plus, it's getting better anyway. But it sure provided my most memorable hospital trip to date haha. Hopefully I'll be more careful when we have our next cleaning check.
By the way, we passed it ;)
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