Today my eldest daughter, Emma, had her tonsils removed. She was a brave ten-year-old and came through with flying colours, being the only family member to have survived surgery in a foreign country (she's quite proud of that!).
South African hospitals are so different than American ones! I guess I should have expected that, but somehow I missed that one on my list of "Things to Wonder About". There are six patients to a room (as opposed to two), the beds are really narrow (not much wider than a stretcher), there are no electronic buttons to move the bed up and down or call the nurse, no TV's in the room, and no vending machine in the waiting room. On the plus side, though simple (or maybe American hospitals are too posh?), it was clean, well-run, the staff was friendly and helpful, and South African hospital gowns actually cover all of your body parts!
When I filled out forms I had to indicate whether I was English-speaking or Afrikaans-speaking, but it didn't matter as everyone addressed me in Afrikaans, from the nurse to the anaesthetist to the cleaning lady. In a room with six beds and five different Afrikaans conversations going on around us, it was a very lonely and foreign feeling. When they wheeled Emma away to theatre (that's South African English for "operating room"), I almost cried. I felt like the only English-speaking person in the whole country.
Emma was released three hours after surgery. She was nauseated from the anaesthesia, and my favourite moment of the day was when she said, "Mom? I think I hate throwing up almost as much as I hate satan." I have to agree...
(By the way, if you want to know how to say "tonsillectomy" in Afrikaans, it's "mangeluitsnyding")
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