Middle Earth

Well I am here in China and boy is it different. The people are different, the language is different the food is VERY different. Everywhere I look I see signs. Above shops, on doors, on menus and each time I look in anticipation of the signs delivering to me some much desired information and each time it fails. I look and the pictures give nothing away. The language I have so struggled to learn has not exactly stood me in good stead although it has provided amusement for the locals. I try my best to please! The hospital is a whole nother lesson. The way they do it here is very different to the way we do. Tongues and pulses they say what do you want those for. Privacy, patient practitioner interaction? not likely it is more patient, practitioner, students, observers, grandparents and cleaning lady interaction. The whole melee seems to work together in order to diagnose and treat. It truly is a community based hospital. I did go and visit the wind stroke ward where patients who have had strokes lie on western drips with their limbs in herbal poultices and acupuncture needles stuck in their heads. They even walk about in the hospital with the needles in their heads. No wonder the scalp acupuncture was not working for me I left them in for 20 minutes they leave it I for 10 hours. Slightly off on timescales. Never mentioned that in the books! I did actually have treatment today and was able to experience scalp acupuncture myself. Apparently my hair is thin but my scalp is tight. That from one of the doctors able to communicate a little in Chinese. I did also go and buy an English Chinese medical dictionary so I can at least point at the words and ask the question and they can look up the English reply for me. I think it may be a life saver, a sanity saver at least. My diet has been primarily rice and aubergine although tonight I did get to watch one of the others devour bull frog. Such sweet little leg bones. Offered to make one into a necklace for her if she sucked it clean. The shopping is ace, the weather muggy but hot and sunny. Basically having a ball.