Fili’s world

“But why are you laughing?” the doctors asked. “Because I can’t cry” I tried saying, not being able to move my mouth.

Oh my, what have I done? How am I going to get through this? Laying back, a big napkin on my face, needles going in and out of my chin I was panicking. HOW IN THE WORLD?! Too many details to think of. I just found it funny that my first and most intense thought was how ugly I’m going to be after they finish up with me. Only after I was done with my western MTV line of thought was I ready to think about small details like clean-needles and anti-infection measures. This is Vietnam, and there are too many details I needed to remember but couldn’t and it was happening too fast for me to react. I was a player in a game I did not know and had no control over, things happening to me but feeling as though they are happening to somebody else.

“Will you be okay?”. “OK!? Oh my god, does this look ok? I need a doctor… now!”. I didn’t really see my face, but the looks on the children from the family running this lovely hotel were suggesting that this is the first time they were dealing with a chinless bleeding hotel guest. I was holding my chin up with a napkin and the kid, which I wasn’t sure was old enough to have a driving license, took me on the back of his motorbike. “I take you to a doctor…” he asked. Not knowing what “A doctor” is I said “No, doctor is not enough. I need a hospital”.

On the two minutes to the hospital I was trying to recall what exactly happened. It was the stupidest thing – a small tunnel in the road in almost zero speed that I somehow landed into. A flipflop through the air, instincts just grabbing tight to the bike instead of shielding my face, I landed on my chin. I don’t know why, buy the people that were walking by just turned and walked away in a hurry and I was confused. I knew my chin was hurting, but it wasn’t until I looked down at my blood covered only pair of jeans and sweatshirt did I fully realize the extend of how bad things are. Thank god I was still in walking distance from the hotel, so I tried putting my hand on my chin and stopping my bleeding as I walked back – horrified.

Hospital in Vietnam could mean anything from a small pharmacy to a voodoo priest, and all I could do is hope that Dalat has a good decent health facility. The doctors that greeted me in the ER were very friendly and extremely young looking, one of them – luckily – talking English. As they lay me back on the bed and started to ask me the usual stupid Vietnamese mantra questions of “What’s your name?” “Where are you from?” “How long in Vietnam?”, I felt like I’m about to lose it. It’s hard to admit but I was on the edge of sanity for a while now, going from one extreme feeling to another in this complex Vietnamese reality. My head spinning, maybe from the loss of blood, maybe from my famous psychological incapacity to deal with needles inside my body, I was completely lost. Hearing those questions, not being able to reply in a way that they would understand (“Isman? Iceland? England?”) has brought me down to an all-time-low. I don’t remember feeling this bad for a long time, yet all my body was able to produce was laughs – which was my weird way of releasing stress.

After talking to my family, cutting off the holy Saturday routine with a rare phone call, I felt a little better. Struggling with trying to figure out what drugs are to be taken when I was trying to make the whole thing a technicality. Only after a couple of hours of watching TV and regaining the very bad feeling in my chin was I left to confront the new reality. I’m alone here, I don’t know anyone, I can’t eat, it hurts to talk, I can’t sleep… Ironically, my only connection to man kind was a phone call to my new cellular from my best HoiAn friend  – Tam, which really cheered me up till my next down. It wasn’t only the physical pain, it is also a mental struggle. Not been able to endure any more Star Movies, I was left only to feel sorry for my self – which is something I have a PhD in.

My first time out of the room… the only comfort I have is that - together with my passport travelling all over Vietnam - this week can not possibly get any worse.