McCormick Mission Hospital in ChiangMai

Dear Health Care Associates,

This post will contain no pictures I am afraid, because it would be a little impolite to take pictures in the hospital. Although one of the kids we are staying with and I drew pictures of people sitting around us on a newspaper to entertain ourselves. We have arrived in ChiangMai, but over doing it has effected Dad, me and the people we are staying with. And, we have been to McCormick Hospital twice.

Maybe this would be a bad thing on vacation, but it is what you do when you have kids and right now we are just part of the daily life of the family friends that we are staying with. It feels reminiscent of my childhood and after lots of travel everyone can just let their guard down, stop doing and just be. Even if who they are is a little sick.

The hospital is very different from a US hospital. For one thing there are lots of open air courtyards in the center for patients, for another all the nurses wear white hats (the kind that only fit on the front and then are attached with hairpins), and the three people we took were seen in less then 2 hours. The patient rooms are big and the patients' family can sleep in the room with the patient (we just looked at a patient room, no one had to spend the night). There are lots of food sellers outside to sell food and magazines and toys to the family, too. The doctors and the nurses spoke some of the best English we have heard in Thailand. And they have an acupuncture clinic which I had an appointment to tour but then everyone else got sick so we had to take care of them instead.

Everyone is on the mend now, has had acupuncture from me and antibiotics from the hospital, and is being low key. And I felt fine until an hour after the last visit and now I am taking Yin Qiao San and going to sleep.

Good Night All,
Elaine