Drip Drip Drip ( hospital day three)

I woke up to another day...my goals were normalising....looks like I was going to live!  But there was a always a drip.  When ever I needed the  loo, someone needed to be there holding it high.  I never find it easy to pee with someone standing besides me!  This was even more difficult because I had t make sure that I did not knock the drip needle out of my hand.  Thank goodness numbers twos were not yet happening!  I don't think I could bear squatting with a friend alongside holding my drip!
First to arrive was this woman.  I don't even know her name!  I just call her Jiejie which means big sister.  She is a real matriarch in the local community and has taken a sisterly liking to the strange foreigner.  She is quite an unuual lady, and very colourful for Jiangkou!

Jiejie

Jiejie was concerned that I had not been eating.  She is very down to earth, and quite knowledgeable too...perhaps she was once a nurse.  She asked through Charles if I had yet had a bowel movement.  I had.  Shortly afterwards Charles, who had made me some porridge for breakfast, left.  He had lessons.  I spoke with Jiejie for a while and she asked me to come with her to the nurses desk.  I put some warm clothes on and went with her.  She organised for dinner to be sent to my room and ordered evening meal for me too.  We went back to my room.  Food arrived, chicken soup and rice.  She said she had to go as she was cooking dinner for her niece/granddaughter.  Family relationships are astoundingly complicated here!  I offered to pay for lunch, but it was her treat.  I ate it.  Lovely, it was so nice to eat real food again.  Shortly after finishing and clearing up, Red arrived beaming a huge smile!  She had made me some fried rice!  What could I do?  Second lunch I had to eat it!  Could this be the origin of my bloated feeling?  Surely not!  After that the doctor arrived to re-dress my wounds.  No privacy in China!  Red took some photos for me.

After all this, Red made a few weird dancing videos with me.  She then said she had to go.  I offered her some of my fruit mountain and to my surprise, she gave me a hug....and took half of it!  Hahaha!
Then there was a bit of peace and quite and a few more private uses of the toilet as my drip had been removed!
At around lunchtime, I was about to order food, when I got text from a friend.  She works in the Police station canteen.  She too had heard that I was in hospital and was asking if I had eaten.  I had not.  She offered to bring me in some food.  We negotiated and decided upon noodles and goose meat.  True to her word she turned up with a bowlful of noodles adn goose meat and a small side of vegetables in a plastic cup.

She was a little worried about meeting me alone as she is very traditional and that sort of thing is not allowed, and she did not want her photograph taken. However I persuaded her to take one of me and the noodles.  She left shortly afterwards and I enjoyed those noodles!   Blood pressure and temperature taken, then time for a quick nap.

In the late afternoon I got a text message from a student.  As foreigners we are not supposed to have WeChat accounts of students, but I gave this girl my account a long time before that rule came into place.  She had helped me in the park with some singing and we had shared photographs.  she had also take me out previously to swim in the river with her friends and to visit the lotus fields.  I had not heard much of her since.  She had heard I was in hospital and wanted to know if it was okay for her to visit.  I told her it was.  She turned up her friend, a few gifts and some food.  We chatted a while.  It was nice to catch up with things.

poppy (right) and friend

Poppy (left) and friend. Pikachu is a hand warmer.  None of the classrooms have heating and at this time of the year, many of the students use hand warmers!

In the evening, Sherrie and Star visited me again and made sure everything was alright.  Eventually they left, and I had a good night's sleep.  Another interesting day!