My Chinese Health Screening

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I was told last night, after arriving, that I would be picked up this morning and taken to downtown Chengdu for a blood test. No problem I thought. Sure enough, 8am on the dot Ricky, my Chinese translator, called and I met him at the door. From there we got in the reserved car (cars are mostly hired here) and we zip downtown. By "zip" I mean it took and hour and a half to make it there because of traffic. And the Chinese drivers are ridiculous! I cannot even begin to explain how many traffic rules we broke in our outing, but it was impressive. Along with the ridiculousness of the drivers there are thousands of people on bicycles, scooters, and pedestrians. My favorite is watching the scooters and bicycles on the sidewalks! When the lights turn red a car has about 5 additional seconds in which it may pass through the intersection (at least that’s what I observed), but then they get stuck in the intersection--but that doesn't stop the cars with the green lights to stay put, they proceed! This means the green light cars are weaving thought he red lighted cars--its enough to make a passenger in the car grip their seat with their life...

We finally arrive at the hospital, Ricky moves through lines quickly, obtaining the correct paperwork for me. I fill out what I can then hand it over and he fills out the rest. Again more lines--picture taking! And payment, all before tests are done. We shuffle upstairs to do the blood test where after talking to a tech he looks at me and points and stammers, "You, ahhhh, ummm...there," as he points I turn around and see a pile of plastic tea cups, I ask what those are and he points again to a sign above the cups. It reads, "Urine Test." I laugh because nobody told me about this, but more importantly, I don't have to go?! I tell him that and then he points to the water cooler. Ricky then talks to the tech for a few moments who then agrees to let me do the blood test first (apparently they prefer sticking to a strict order). While I'm waiting in line for this Ricky runs up and down floors in attempts to find me a cup for the water--he's quite the go-getter. While I'm left on my own, I start taking in everything around me. Normally, when one is having blood drawn they would be alone in an office, here however, you get in line, put your arm through a window, and they take your blood. Then you sit in the room for a few minutes, pressing two q-tips against the hole to stop the bleeding (no band aids?!), and wait to make sure there are no problems. The thing that alarmed me? There are drops of blood all over the floor and bloody q-tips lying everywhere...not very sanitary.

So after that, I'm gulping cups of water trying to make this process go as fast as I can when Ricky tells me we can do the other tests while we wait for my bladder. I didn't realize there were other tests-but we head downstairs and turn into a hallway with many rooms off the sides. First I did an eye test, easy. Then we enter another room and Ricky tells me he'll wait outside. Perplexed, I enter the room and there's an ultrasound machine?! Did that one, then we wait a minute or two for another room where again, Ricky waits at the door. Confused I walk around the curtain and there's a bed and a bunch of clamps and suction cups!! In Chinese the doctor tells me to lie on the table (and then does a lot of pointing) so I lay down and then he/she (I really couldn't tell) starts pulling at my pant legs? I roll up my pants and he/she clamps two things to my legs--then my arms, then he/she starts tugging on my shirt?! After quite a bit of resistance and confusion I lift my shirt up and have several suction cups applied to my chest. Then I wait...then the doctor pulls all the suction cups off and I'm free to go, that was my EKG. Thinking this can't get any stranger, we enter the x-ray room. By now Ricky is holding my papers, my cup of water, my sweatshirt, jacket, and purse--we must have made quite the couple. The x-ray tech talks to Ricky, and then turns to me and starts snapping my bra?! Confused and a bit pissed off I turn to Ricky and say, 'What the hell?' Ricky stammers for a while but finally manages to tell me I have to take off my bra. They show me to a curtain and I do as they say. I come out and stand inside this large machine while the tech pushes me up against a wall--rather forcefully. At this point I'm just laughing because he keeps barking orders in Chinese and I have no idea what's going on?! After all, I just showed up to give blood. Finally, with my face and chest smashed into the wall he leaves and clicks a button to complete my chest x-ray. With all the correct signatures in place on my papers we return upstairs for the damn urine test.

I'm not afraid to say that in the past I have had a lot of trouble with pee tests, they stress me out. But thinking I was ready to go, I grab my tea cup (with no lid I may add) and march into the bathroom determined to get this over with so we can leave. In the bathroom I notice we are missing one key detail. A god damn toilet!! This has just become my first experience with an authentic Chinese toilet. Wish I had my camera. I awkwardly position myself over the hole and shuffle my feet a little for better positioning, but without realizing I stepped on the flushing button (on the floor) and am sprayed with water...not very refreshing. Long story short, I conquer the pee test and am out of there (with the new found knowledge that public restrooms do not provide toilet paper). Victorious I proudly walk down the hall with my specimen in hand, careful not to spill. Beaming with pride I yell to Ricky that the task is complete and we can leave.

It is now 11:30am and I haven't eaten (wasn't allowed to eat before giving blood), so Ricky takes me to "Grandma's Restaurant" which served nothing my Grandma would have ever made?! But had a tasty veggie pita sandwich and finally was returned home. I spent the rest of my day unpacking, rearranging, and getting to know my apartment. That evening I was introduced to Hua, another English teacher. She is from California and taught last semester, so knows her way around. Also is fluent in Mandarin which is very helpful for me. She took me to the cafeteria and then the market. She does all the talking for me and then I get all the smiles and 'thank-yous' from the clerks--they love me 😊

I begin teaching Monday morning and from there should be pretty busy, which will be very nice.

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