uncool sight seeing

Last night I did some uncool sight seeing and got the inside view of a Japanese ER. I was running a very high fever (39.6 Centigrade, I think maybe that is 103.42 Fahrenheit) and my glands were swollen. Ends up I have tonsillitis. In America, we usually just cut the litter buggers out, so I was terrified that I would have to go under the knife so far from home - or worse, that they would put me on a the first plane East and my trip would be over. But here in Japan they simply medicate the heck out of tonsillitis, so I'm currently popping more pills than Rush Limbaugh.

It's really funny to see the selectivity with which the Japanese apply their hyper-clean tendencies. One step into a household with an outdoor shoe on, and you may as well burn the whole contaminated building - but pulling an unpackaged needle out of a cluttered drawer, then fondling it with un-gloved fingers (I didn't see a single glove in all of the 8 and 1/2 hours I was hospitalized) and then allowing non-hospital staff (like my friend and dorm mother) to touch my open puncture wound when I was too "out of it" to help myself... It's that bad. Not to mention, the nurse whose bare hand was touching my needle-had some sort of raunchy nail-rot situation and I didn't see anyone wash their hands, even when bouncing between patients.

If it was the AIDS epidemic that made America as a country so aware of the importance of clean needles, then it just goes to show that AIDS is not yet considered a crisis in Japan (whether or not it is present is another issue, the fact that no one wants to address it is probably more likely).

Bless Megu's sweet heart. When I was rushed to the ER last night, she refused to leave my side. Just before I left, typed the word "afraid" into my thin, silver electronic translator and handed it to Megu. I knew that she had that word in her vocabulary, but I was afraid that if I said it aloud I would just break down crying. She completely understood. Later, inside the ER, stuck with needles like a pin cushion, sweating bullets, my skin too hot to touch, and occasionally slipping out of consciousness; Megu was there.

I could feel her worried eyes watching me, and I though about how she must feel. Megu is only 18 and this is her fist time away from home. For her, and many of Mukogawa's girls, this means the first time they ever need to take care of themselves. Even waking themselves up in the morning is often a responsibility they have never had. Taking care of someone else can be a terrifying idea if you haven't been prepared for it. So I extended my IV wired arm, and pounded my fist in the air three times. She caught on. I pounded two more times, then on the third time I flattened my hand in the air. We played rock-paper-scissors (or jenkin, as they call it here)for about 10 minutes, until I was too exhausted. I joked with her that, my head was a big bowl of steaming hot udon, and my brain was turning to noodles. I then pretended to reach up above my head, and eat my own noodle-brains with imaginary chopsticks. This made her laugh finally, and we both knew I would be OK.

I am completely exhausted, my throat is killing me, and all I can do is sleep. But I'll be OK.