Kasi-Blog

On Friday afternoon, I had the opportunity to get to know the British Health Service a little better. I was always told that the British Health Service is really bad, but I was very surprised. The ambulance was fast, the doctors in the hospitals nice and the surgery did not take long. Maybe it’s because the stitches are on the back of my head so I can not judge the quality of the surgery, but the scar does not even hurt anymore.

This sounds all worse than it was. Here’s the story: On Friday night I was riding on my bike towards the Ice-Skating-Range in Cambridge to go skating with friends from Trinity Hall. I wasn’t going particular fast, there was no alcohol or any other car involved and there were no people to be swerved around. I simply hit a bumb in St. Andrews Street, went over the steering bar of my bike and made a touch-down on the pavement.

I got up and was a little bit dizzy, but I thought nothing really happened. My bike was alright and I had no pain whatsoever. Some bystanders took me to the side. They made me kneel down and bend my head forward. When I touched the back of my head, I knew why: blood! The bystanders were really helpful, called the police and tried to calm me down, but I did not feel very excited anyway. I thought, damn, now I am gonna miss the fun on the ice.

So I chatted with my rescuers and found out that they were students from Sri Lanka studying in Cambridge. The students also helped me to chain up my bike. Thanks, unknown people, for your help!

Within minutes the ambulance was there and I was taken to the hospital. In the hospital I got a bandage for my head. Before that my scarf served as a bandage (and today I am trying to get the blood stains out of the scarf). In the ambulance, I chatted with the two medicals, learned that they had twelve-hour-shifts and got less pay than firemen or policemen.

Within ten minutes we arrived at the Hospital in Cambridge. I had to register and then wait for a while in the waiting room. Meanwhile I was interviewed by a police-officer whether there was a car involved in my accident. And I was interviewed by a nurse who told me to wait a little bit more.

The waiting was the worst bit, simply because it was so boring and I was so hungry as well. I broke hospital rules by slouching over to the snack machine and getting a nice Twix. I don’t know how long it took them, maybe 45 minutes or so. But I kept myself busy by playing Bubble Breaker on my mobile phone.

Then I was called in from a doctor with a heavy spanish accent. The doctor told me he’s from Cuba and then we talked about Cuba and I told him that my mother went there a couple of years ago and that I would like to go and then he said he wasn’t there for many years and then we started talking about politics and he said how he disliked politicians. The doctor was a really nice chap, he made me lie down on the bed and started stitching up the back of my head.

He also washed the wound which caused the blood and the water to run down my neck and unto my shirt, which was effectively ruined by that. Damn, but it had a hole anyway from some year’s ago when somebody at a party by accident connected his cigarette to my shirt. Then the doctor gave me some pain-relief pills and I left.

I took a cab home, worrying a little bit that I would spill the nice driver’s car. We chatted about being a Taxi driver and he convinved me that it is a really good job where you don’t have to answer to a Boss and where you could work whenever you want.

At home, I sat down and watched the very funny movie Shaun of the Dead with a mate from my college and fell asleep for about 14 hours. I had no headache, no speech impediments, no blurred eye sights and did not vomit – all things that are normally associated with a head injury. But it seems I was really lucky. Today I went into town, retrieved my bike and went to King’s Bike Shop where I got me a new helmet for 20 pounds. So from now on you will see me riding around town with a bright red helmet – a colour to match my new shoes.

What lessons did I learn? British Hospitals are not bad and certainly not worse than German Hospitals. And a helmet can prevent cobblestones from spoiling your evening.

This entry was posted on Sonntag, Dezember 16th, 2007 at 04:52 and is filed under kasi-blog. Tags: bicycle, cambridge, health. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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