Working

Today I spent the whole day at the university working with my partner on my project. I think that it is going very well and I am excited to see the final outcome. My partner is very smart and really has great ideas on how to direct the project. She is very artistic and can draw really well. We had a hard time at first because of the language barrier but now it has become much easier because we both have figured out how to talk so the other can understand. Using an online translator helps also.

Tomorrow we will come back here bright and early and get to work on day two of the projects. I hope to accomplish very much and get to a point where I feel confident that we can finish it in time. My individual project is going very slowly as I am tired by the evenings and am unmotivated to work on it. However I really like my idea and want to have it ready in time for the gallery.

To jump back to Beijing, I got a spider bite on my ankle and it swelled up to the point where there was no definition between my calf and my ankle, it was very red and the spot around the bite turned almost black. It was very painful to walk and I spent the entire evening before the Great Wall trip in the hospital. The hospital was actually a very neat experience and gave me an insider look at how China deals with Health care. Upon arrival at the hospital by taxi I was immediately lead into a large room filled with able doctors who immediately looked at my injury. There was no waiting around for hours like in the States. It was amazing the care that the doctors gave me and the prompt way they dealt with prescribing medicine. After I was looked at I had time to talk with the doctor and three of the nurses who were students in medicine at the University, they spoke English very well and we had a good time talking about the differences in how our countries deal with medicine. They were astonished to hear about the long waits and the amount of paperwork that is needed in the States even before you are seen by a doctor. I did realize however that I was receiving a lot of special treatment as I was treated like a celebrity by the staff, especially when I was getting my I.Vs and the doctor came to personally check on me and give us his cell phone number.

The next day was the Great Wall and I was still coming down off the medicine. I boarded the large bus for the three hour bus ride to the countryside. I slept most of the way and didn't notice that my ankle had become more inflamed and when we reached the wall I was in a lot of pain. I decided to try and get through the hours of steep climbing but when I got to the top of the wall, my head started to spin and I ended up throwing up off the side. As I climbed down I knew that I needed to get some more medicine and make sure I did not have something serious. We hired a very helpful farmer to drive us into a local town were I was prescribed some medicine and given a shot in my butt. Very painful. The little hospital was very decrepit and the room that I was helped in had blood drips on the ground and a bucket of discarded needles behind the door. As I stood in the room I looked upon a row of laid out tools on the table and hoped that none of them would be needed today. Straight from a horror movie, all the tools blades were rusty with their handles wrapped in athletic tape that showed signs of much use. Luckily for me I only needed a shot and I was back in the van shortly after. The farmer drove us another hour to a bigger city where we paid to get a large bus to take us back to the hospital in Beijing for further treatment. I slept most of the way and upon arriving we took the subway to the hospital where I had been treated the first night. This time I was sent to the Infectious Diseases Ward and that was an experience all in its own. I had a high fever and had not eaten anything in over a day so I really was not feeling well. I had some blood drawn and urinated in a cup to make sure I did not have some sort of disease, everything came back negative and I was released to go back and get 4 more hours of I.Vs to help with my temperature. At that point I was so tired and sick that I just wanted to sleep, so we took the taxi back and got some dumplings on the way. I ended up sleeping for 15 hours straight and when I woke I felt much better. As the days passed my swelling went down and I was back to full health within a couple days.


I have many more posts to catch up on so I will try and get those up as soon as I have time. I am having such a great time in China and have loved every moment of it. I cannot believe how fast the time is going.