WORSTS AND FIRSTS

After a broken night’s sleep I still felt terrible. My fever was through the roof, the stomach cramps had gotten worst, I hadn't eaten anything since breakfast the day before and felt sick, I think this was the worst I'd ever felt.

I stayed in bed until about 4 or 5, there was WIFI in the room so I was chatting to some people of Facebook, Mona came on line and was saying that I should go to hospital, they'd given her a course of anti biotics and she'd felt much better in a few days. I got up, threw on some clothes and left the room. “I'm going to Hospital” I said to Matt.

Thankfully he came with me and we both arrived at the Angkor International Royal Hospital. It seemed very nice, and clean, and expensive. I explained to the guy on the front desk what I needed, he explained it would cost $150 to see the doctor in registration fees and doctor fees, whatever, I felt that bad I would have paid anything.

I saw the doctor, he ran various tests and took various samples. After about 30 mins of sitting on a table he told me that I had “animal in my stool”, which cause no end of laughter for Matt, less so for me. He diagnosed me with Acute Amoebic Dissentry. I said that I still felt sick although the pills he had given me for the fever seemed to be ding the job. He said that if i couldn't keep the antibiotics down then I would have to spend the night in hospital on a drip. He injected me with something he said would help with the nausea, which about 10 minutes later I threw up in the sink. So that was it, I was in for the night.

A few days ago over a meal we had all decided that Cambodia had become the land of “Worsts and Firsts”. It had the worst roads, the worst train, we'd had the worst boat ride, and the worst taxi journey. But equally it was the first time we'd ever ridden on the roof of a train, the first time I had driven a tuk tuk, and river boat, Kai had his first experience of Guinness and Mexican food, and now I was going to spend my first ever night in Hospital (as a grown up).

I wasn't looking forward to this at all. There didn't seem to be any other patients around, the nurse showed me to my room. I got my own room! It was nicer than any guest house I'd been in over the last few weeks, and I had 3 giggling cambodian nurses looking after me. I think I was going to be ok.

I ordered dinner, tried to sort out my insurance details, and settled in to watch the TV. As a sheer stroke of luck one channel was showing a dubbed documentary about Liverpool winning the 1977 european cup final, and another channel was showing the 100 greatest liverpool games. Finally my luck had turned.

But not for much longer, I was in agony all night, got no sleep, and when i did almost drop off the nurse would come in to change my drip.

To make matters worse, if I hadn't shown an improvement by the morning I would have to stay in for another day, and miss my flight to Laos. This was a concern.