KFC= Excellent Hospital Care!

Dear Family and others of interest:

A lot has happened since I last sent a family letter out. A couple of weeks ago, We traveled to Hong Kong for teacher training. We were in Hong Kong for 4 days. Hong Kong is very beautiful, very expensive and a lot a very tall buildings. It is a very clean city. Most of the items sold in Hong Kong are imported from P R China. After leaving Hong Kong, we traveled to a town just across the border from Hong Kong. Mother got very sick from food poisioning. We were not able to travel with the rest of our group on that day. We stayed at the hotel. Mother didn't seem to be getting any better, so we took a taxi to the hospital. A fellow from the hotel went with us to speak Chinese for us. The Doctor checked mother out, and then said she would need some I. V.'s with medication in them. The doctor gave me a prescription. I went to an area in the hospital and got the prescription. I also had to pay to check mother in. It cost me 72 cents to check her in. Well, that was rather expensive in as much as there was no heat in any part of the hospital. I had to pay about $18.00 for the four prescriptions. They consisted of four I. V.'s and 4 bottles of something to put in the I.V.'s. Along with that, the pharmicist gave me some needles to put into mothers hand and some needles to go in the I. V. She told me to go start the I. V. I said O. K. I don't know how to start an I. V. though. I go into a room. there are about 18 or 20 people sitting on a chair, all with an I. V. stand in front of them, and all of them are receiving an I. V. This is what you call a shared room. Well. they take mother into another room across the hall. It is a room with a bed in it. No heat, and two doors wide open leading to the outside. The nurse tells mother to take off her shoes and hop into this icy cold bed. I tell the nurse the mother is cold. She brings in 4 bottles of hot water. Puts two near her feet, and one under each arm.. Well that keeps her somewhat warm. The doctor sees that I can't start the I. V. so someone else comes in and starts it. I go outside to get mother a glass of water. Outside of her room in the hall, is a dead lady laying on the bed in the hall. No one seems to be to concerned, and the dead lady didn't seem to mind. I bring mother in her glass of water. I then tell mother that I am going to go back to the hotel to get some warmer clothes for me and her. I walk outside the room and pass the dead lady. As I am passing her, she raises up and yells something to the nurse. Scares the be jeebies out of me. I realize she is not yet dead. But now I am almost. I go to the hotel and get some warmer clothes. I also go to the post office to mail the stuff that I have purchased so far on the trip. I mail it to the USA. I go back to the hospital. The almost dead lady is still in the hallway. This time I keep my distance. I go into mothers room. The first I. V. is about 1/4 gone. Going to slow. I go get the Doctor, and show her it is going slow. She speeds it up a little, and leaves the room. Mother says that if I go to KFC and buy the doctor and the nurse some chicken, they might pay more attention to us. I go to KFC. I take the chicken into the doctor and nurse and give it to them. The Doctor comes back into mothers room, and puts the I.V. into high gear. It worked. I go back to KFC and get the doctor and the nurse something to drink. I return and give it to them. Now mother has her own private nurse. Not a bad deal for 96 cents. Well, by now 4 hours has past and we are only down two I. V.'s We have two I. V.'s to go. We also need to catch a plane to meet up with our group. The plane leaves at 8:00 P. M. I tell the doctor. In my best Chinglish I know. She understands and says , "no problem." She speeds up the I. V. By now, mother starts to feel a whole lot better. Finially 6:15 comes and we need to go to the airport. The doctor says mother doesn't need all of the last I. V. I ask the doctor how much the bill is. She says that I paid the bill at the pharmacy with the prescriptions. Well, I figure the price was right. Total cost for an 8 hour stay with medication was $18.72. Well, I'm OK with their charges. Mother gets up to leave her hospital bed. The doctor takes out the needle out of the back of her hand. I tell the doctor that I am going to hail a cab. She says, "mayo, mayo, mayo. means no, no, no" She tells us that her husband is taking us to the airport. We get into her husbands car and away we go. We get to the airport on time and make our flight.

We sure can't complain. The hospital wasn't much, but what they had, they gave us their best. The doctors husband wouldn't take any payment for taking us to the aiarpot. Oh, by the way, the dead lady was gone when we left the hospital.

The rest of the trip was quite uneventful. It was a great trip and we saw a lot of China that we had not experienced before. I purchased a bunch of items that I had not seen here in Tianjin or Beijing.

Yesterday, I was riding my three wheeler. It quit. I knew the problem, the battery had become disconnected. I opened up the battery compartment, took the connection off and used my needle nosed pliers to pry the brackets apart a little so they would make a better connection. In the process of prying the positive and nevative wires apart, I touched the positive and negative connections together with the plyers. The battery really started sparking. I tried to pull my plyers off the battery, but to no avail. The plyers were welded to the top of the battery connection. Now my bike won't go at all. I proceed to take the battery out of my bike, (plyers and all) and hail a cab. I get to the bike shop. I show the owner my battery and the connected plyers. He laughs. He knows what has happened. All this time the taxi driver and the bike shop owner are deciding how is the best way to make the necessary repairs. It only takes a few minutes to repair the battery connection, but my 26 cent plyers still have a part of the old battery connection welded to it. The bike shop owner starts to qrind down my plyers. The taxi driver watches the bike shop owner grind down my plyers. The taxi driver doesn't like the way he is grinding down my 26 cent plyers, so the taxi driver takes the grinder from the bike shop owner and the taxi driver shows the bike shop owner how to properly grind the battery connection off of my plyers. They argue back and forth how the best way to proceed would be. Finally they finish and hand me my new Chinese plyers. They now look like they came from the 12th century, but they work. Ok well, this is china. I ask the bike shop owner how much I owe him, he motions nothing. I try to pay him ,but he won't take anything. We load my battery back into the taxi cab and away we go back to find my bike. It's still there, right where I left it. (only because there was no battery in it, and no one wanted to steal it when it wouldn't run.) I hop on the bike and away I head for home. Well, another day in China.

We are very excited that the four girls are coming out tomorrow. (Ashley, Amber, Emily and Trisha) We can hardly wait.

Well, that's all for now. I love you all. Dad