Last Tuesday, I noticed that I had a bit of a soar throat but didn't really think much of it. Wednesday I had a little bit of a stuffy nose and noticed that cigarette smoke was agitating me a lot in a café, but still went about my business. Well, Thursday came around and I woke up with sinus pressure and was stuffed up. At this point I started taking notice of what seemed to be coming over me, but it was too late. Thursday night and Friday night were miserable as what seemed to be a refrio (a cold) turned into what seemed to be a sinus infection. At this point, I started mentioning to people that I was sick, and holy cow, I was inundated by things I needed to do in order to get better. As said by my grandma, "When people get the sniffles in Chile, they stay in bed!" and I am pretty sure she is right on this one. Everyone told me that I needed to stay in bed, drink lots of liquids, and sleep. To me this seemed ridiculous because the only reason you stay in bed in the states is when you are on the verge of death! On top of thinking bed rest for a cold was over the top, a sample of some of the other things I was told to do includes, "make fresh orange juice and drink it within 10 minutes before the vitamin C disappears," "drink a beer with lemon and salt and then stay in bed (I heard this one several times, and I want to know what the purpose is of wasting a beer on sleeping!), and, "Do not be around humidity and steam because it will stuff you up," (which is just flat out wrong!).
Well, today I went to the student health clinic at the university to get what I expected would be an antibiotic for a sinus infection because that is always what I get sick with during the winter (which means that I can expect it again when I come back to the states when it is winter!). Rather than seeing a nurse first to collect all of the pointless information about me like my weight and blood pressure, I was immediately seen my the doctor (that is to say I surpassed seeing a nurse before seeing a doctor, because I definitely waited for ever, I do not think chileans are familiar with a term to express immediacy [actually they express that by saying altiro, but it is used to mean right now most of the time], but they are definitely into the concept of tipin, meaning around a general time!). After a quick visit with the doctor, she prescribed me an antibiotic for sinusiti, a sinus infection, but she did not even check to see if I was taking any other medication that might interact!
Off I went, an hour and a half after arriving at the doctor, to a farmacia to fill my recete. Here in Chile, there is basically a farmacia on every corner, but of course, the day I needed one I had to walk forever. Once I finally found one, I went in, pulled a number like I was buying luncheon meats, and waited for just a few minutes before I was seen. I told the pharmacist what I needed, showed my prescriptions to him, and in under a minute he was back with what I requested. In the states you always have to wait for insurance to go through, the time to fill the prescription, blah, blah, blah. Here is was as easy as buy chocolate at a candy shop! After finalizing my purchase, he said to have a good day and gave my my prescriptions back. I'm thinking, "What?! Why did he give me my prescriptions back?" That makes absolutely no sense to me, now I can just go and fill the prescription again at my own leisure!
Definitely interesting to see the Chilean way of dealing with sickness, although I would have been okay with never knowing in the first place! As for the bed rest, I suspect this is a sociocultural thing, meaning that the Chileans that do this are the ones that can afford to, and they likely have a maid that will take care of their every beck and call (which I definitely did not have!). Careful though, do not tell any chileans that I am out of bed writing this blog or I will get yelled at!
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