Part XIII
Oops!....I did it again
by Mad Dog

It hit me the first afternoon I was there. I spent the next two days in bed in a tiny hotel room. Luckily I was too sick to care. Or notice how small it was.

A. In Singapore it’s illegal to play any song with an ‘R’ in the title because it’s too difficult for the DJs to pronounce.

B. I’m supposed to be in a hawker’s centre eating some yummy food while preparing to go to Malacca, Malaysia with friends.

C. Singapore General Hospital is the name of a soap opera on Channel 5, not a real place.

D. I.V. shouldn’t have periods while PA should.

E. Everything.

    That was too easy. Easy enough to be a $100 question on Who Wants to Be a Millionaire, a show which is such a hit in Singapore that they’re starting their own version, and trust me, the host’s name won’t be Regis. The $200 question will be equally as easy: “Is it a requirement to get food poisoning on every extended trip?” The answer’s obvious. At least if you’re me.

    I have to say though, that I’ve done well this time. In France I came down with intoxication alimentaire after six weeks. Here it took six months. Obviously the feeling that time passes more slowly in the topics isn’t just an illusion, it’s a physical reality, something Einstein may have predicted in his General Theory of Relativity but I can’t be sure of since I lost my Cliff’s Notes edition and Classics Illustrated never put one out.

As you’d expect in Singapore, the hospital was clean, neat, efficient, and no one jaywalked. I saw a doctor within five minutes and he had them pouring fluid into my arm 20 minutes later. 

    It hit me the first afternoon I was there. I spent the next two days in bed in a tiny hotel room. Luckily I was too sick to care. Or notice how small it was. I was so sick that I spent a half hour watching a third-rate American syndicated TV show called Savoir Faire wondering the entire time how it is a host that incredibly lame can get a TV show, not for a second realizing that a glance at the clock would have answered the question. He was on a show that airs in Singapore at 4:30 AM on a weekday. Duh!

    The third morning I was feeling better—either the fever had broken or the air conditioner in the room had finally stopped fluctuating so much—but I figured I’d better go see a doctor anyway. I’d already looked through the medical section of the Lonely Planet Guide to Idiots Sick in Hotel Rooms in Singapore and ruled out at least three tropical diseases, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t still have leprosy, Ebola, smallpox, or the one that’s all the rage in Europe right now, foot-and-mouth disease.

       As you’d expect in Singapore, the hospital was clean, neat, efficient, and no one jaywalked. I saw a doctor within five minutes and he had them pouring fluid into my arm 20 minutes later. It had something to do with dehydration and me being dangerously close to being medically classified as a raisin. It was somewhere during the next seven hours and three pints of fluid that I heard La Vie En Rose. The only reason I noticed was that there was no TV, nothing to read, and they wouldn’t put my I.V. on a rolling stand so I could go to the movies.

Unfortunately this meant I didn’t get to eat any good food while I was in Singapore, like laksa, fried Hokkien mee, or Burger King’s Double Beef Rendang Burger. The closest I got was chicken noodle soup and cream crackers. 

    But as nice as the hospital was, I declined. I’d already called that morning and moved my flight up by three days—I figured if I’m going to feel bad I’d rather not pay a hotel for the privilege of doing it in their room.

    In true Singaporean tradition, I was fined before I left the hospital. Not for spitting, urinating in the elevator, smuggling a durian in my pocket, or littering. No, I was fined for using their facilities. But I can’t complain. After all, a visit to the emergency room costs S$80 (about $60 U.S.) and that includes everything. It’s the same whether you’re there for five minutes to get a splinter out, or really get your money’s worth like I did—taking up space for eight hours, watching three pints of fluid drip into my arm at a rate so slow the Chinese Water Torture would have felt like the Indy 500, and walking out with four prescriptions. I may not be able to bargain in the market, but when it comes to hospitals you can’t say I’m not a smart shopper.

    Unfortunately this meant I didn’t get to eat any good food while I was in Singapore, like laksa, fried Hokkien mee, or Burger King’s Double Beef Rendang Burger. The closest I got was chicken noodle soup and cream crackers. I also didn’t get to Malacca, though my friends did. I’m hoping they got me a T-shirt that says, “My friends went to Malaysia without me and all I got was this lousy T-shirt and food poisoning” but it hasn’t shown up in the mail yet.

    But at least I didn’t miss the Hamster Championship and Enclosure Competition at Tanglin Hall. That’s not until early April. Of course, first I have to think about whether I’m ready to venture back to Singapore so soon.

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