Going to the Dentist/Doctor?


One of the office aides took me to the doctor today. We rode in the bus and got off at Suyu Yuk to find the Nike Store. "Is on 5 floor of Nike Store," I heard a literal, broken English record say in my head.

"Ah, the Nike Store," I pointed with my hands. "We did it."

"Yes," Sujin agreed. "Nike Store."

"5 floor?"

"Yes, here," she pointed to the Korean on a column near the elevator. "It is here."

I tried to read the Korean. I was still hallucintating from the cold medication. I figured we might as well go up. Besides, Sujin, was already quick to tell me my Korean "reading" was awful by saying "Uh, PASS!" and shoved me on the elevator.

"Push," she told me.

"5 floor."

"Yes, 5."

"I like the doctor."

"You like?"

"Yes. Don't you?"

"No, I don't like."

When we got to the office, it was set-up like most American pediatric offices with a small playpen for kids, television for those who couldn't read, and an assortment of hobbling, snout dribbling, and coughing patients. Being none of the latter, and secretly feeling better, I was able to enjoy the very pink-pink suits of my nurses-in-waiting, and made them giggle continuously, by stating the obvious:

"I am sick," I told them. "I need medicine."

Sujin translated for me as we talked to the doctor. It was quite an experience. It felt very invasive, as I was strapped to a dentist's type chair, and then had various contraptions stuck in my nose, mouth, and ears. And I'm not just saying stuck as in "Ahhh" and wasn't that nice? No, I am talking strange protruding instruments that whirred and beeped as they were stuck in my nose, and then filtrated past where I may have wanted to dig, but could only imagine, like men who somehow feel like self-fellatio is possible if they were just more flexible.

I had no need for flexibility or worries. The doctor prescribed me some medication, and I was taken to the 9th floor drugstore for my fill. I waited around for a good five minutes eye shopping for some biore pore strips (got to look great), some multivitamins, and lemon cough drops. I didn't buy anything except the Biore pore strips. I don't know why. It might have had something to do with my amazement at the packaging of my medication - the sheer industrialized, wrapping of it all - wow.

"For me?" I asked the attendant.

"3 time after eat. 30 minutes."

I kept my activation of morse English long enough to get this final message, before I warped down for another long nap. It is 6 hours later, and I will take my next dose. I assume I will talk to you in some Rip Van Winkle time in the future.

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