I'm back!!
Got back yesterday. It's good to be "home". Yeah, looks like NZ is now more "home" to me than Malaysia even when I remove the family factor out of the equation.
Am off today to rest and recover and take care of a pile of personal matters that need my attention. Then tomorrow it is back to the office - lots to do, especially writing out my sermon. Good thing I have done most of the preliminary work.
Will post more over the next few weeks on my trip to Cambodia and Malaysia. For now two major health related incidents. First was in Cambodia - I had a first hand experience of being electrocuted. Not the most pleasant experience. Felt as if I was shaking for about10 seconds but from what I was told, I was thrown from across the room. What happened was that the pet rabbit living at the centre where we were staying sneaked into the office and chewed up a number of wires. I was helping reset the office PC and accidentally touched an exposed wire.
What was funny was that when I was electrocuted, a friend instinctively switched off the power switch - except that in Cambodia, the power point switches next to the power outlets are actually light switches. So the room light was switched off and the room was almost pitch black. When I had recovered from the shock and the pain due to a headache and twitching due to the knocks and muscles cramps etc, I opened my eyes (or at least in my mind I tried to). And my first thought as concerned people surrounded me and asked me "Are you okay?" was "oh - oh, this is bad, I can't see!" - I thought to myself - I didn't know electrocution caused blindness. Hehehehe - I was very thankful when I said "I can't see" only to have a friend turn the light on! From then on, I knew that it could only get better! Two days of aches on the left side of my body was cheerfully accepted as a small price to pay for not being blind. LOL. My only disappointment was that unlike the comic books I did not get super electricity based powers ... :-(
Second health related incident was in Malaysia. Warning - some details not too pleasant :-)
I had a wonderful time eating in Cambodia - both outside food as well as inside food (had a great cook on our team) - so good that despite the heat and the tiring pace we out ourselves through, I gained 2 kg! But when I was in Malaysia (arrived on a Friday evening) I had a serious diarrhoea problem on Monday morning.Not sure how I got it but I suspect it was a combination of things - being very tired and slowly unwinding from Cambodia but still busy ... (I even dozed off during the Sunday sermon! :-( )Sunday afternoon's char kueh teow with sea hum? And then a very long (2.5 hours) hospital visit in the afternoon - probably picked up some bugs there. Anyway on Monday morning straight after breakfast (2 mins!) the runs began. The kind that you get when you take laxatives to clear your system for a colonoscopy. Any liquid intake no matter how small - even half a glass of water would cause me to bloat up and go. For 2.5 days I did not even urinate. ... Saw a doctor but no medication helped until my "quack doctor" neighbour (PhD is in Chemistry, though his son is a qualified surgeon) gave me pepto bismol (unavailable in Malaysia) - only then did my runs start getting better. I had the runs for 5 days!! Going out was a nightmare - had to time myself and not take any liquids etc. Normally could last just over an hour and had to come back exhausted. Thank God that while I had the runs (first few days - more than 20 times a day - no exaggeration - I was bored so I counted!) I was able to do limited things on Thursday and Friday.
Then of course due to the constant runs - I now have an inflamed hemorrhoid that is bleeding. Miserable going out and while the runs thankfully stopped by Saturday, sitting and even walking was a pain (literally and metaphorically). Got so ridiculous that I ended up using "panty liners" due to the bleeding esp when I went out and had to walk and sit in not so comfortable places. Long flight back did not help much either .... lots of fresh blood this morning with my stool too, *sigh* Makes me feel so old.
But at least I am now back to the comforts of home!
Am off today to rest and recover and take care of a pile of personal matters that need my attention. Then tomorrow it is back to the office - lots to do, especially writing out my sermon. Good thing I have done most of the preliminary work.
Will post more over the next few weeks on my trip to Cambodia and Malaysia. For now two major health related incidents. First was in Cambodia - I had a first hand experience of being electrocuted. Not the most pleasant experience. Felt as if I was shaking for about10 seconds but from what I was told, I was thrown from across the room. What happened was that the pet rabbit living at the centre where we were staying sneaked into the office and chewed up a number of wires. I was helping reset the office PC and accidentally touched an exposed wire.
What was funny was that when I was electrocuted, a friend instinctively switched off the power switch - except that in Cambodia, the power point switches next to the power outlets are actually light switches. So the room light was switched off and the room was almost pitch black. When I had recovered from the shock and the pain due to a headache and twitching due to the knocks and muscles cramps etc, I opened my eyes (or at least in my mind I tried to). And my first thought as concerned people surrounded me and asked me "Are you okay?" was "oh - oh, this is bad, I can't see!" - I thought to myself - I didn't know electrocution caused blindness. Hehehehe - I was very thankful when I said "I can't see" only to have a friend turn the light on! From then on, I knew that it could only get better! Two days of aches on the left side of my body was cheerfully accepted as a small price to pay for not being blind. LOL. My only disappointment was that unlike the comic books I did not get super electricity based powers ... :-(
Second health related incident was in Malaysia. Warning - some details not too pleasant :-)
I had a wonderful time eating in Cambodia - both outside food as well as inside food (had a great cook on our team) - so good that despite the heat and the tiring pace we out ourselves through, I gained 2 kg! But when I was in Malaysia (arrived on a Friday evening) I had a serious diarrhoea problem on Monday morning.Not sure how I got it but I suspect it was a combination of things - being very tired and slowly unwinding from Cambodia but still busy ... (I even dozed off during the Sunday sermon! :-( )Sunday afternoon's char kueh teow with sea hum? And then a very long (2.5 hours) hospital visit in the afternoon - probably picked up some bugs there. Anyway on Monday morning straight after breakfast (2 mins!) the runs began. The kind that you get when you take laxatives to clear your system for a colonoscopy. Any liquid intake no matter how small - even half a glass of water would cause me to bloat up and go. For 2.5 days I did not even urinate. ... Saw a doctor but no medication helped until my "quack doctor" neighbour (PhD is in Chemistry, though his son is a qualified surgeon) gave me pepto bismol (unavailable in Malaysia) - only then did my runs start getting better. I had the runs for 5 days!! Going out was a nightmare - had to time myself and not take any liquids etc. Normally could last just over an hour and had to come back exhausted. Thank God that while I had the runs (first few days - more than 20 times a day - no exaggeration - I was bored so I counted!) I was able to do limited things on Thursday and Friday.
Then of course due to the constant runs - I now have an inflamed hemorrhoid that is bleeding. Miserable going out and while the runs thankfully stopped by Saturday, sitting and even walking was a pain (literally and metaphorically). Got so ridiculous that I ended up using "panty liners" due to the bleeding esp when I went out and had to walk and sit in not so comfortable places. Long flight back did not help much either .... lots of fresh blood this morning with my stool too, *sigh* Makes me feel so old.
But at least I am now back to the comforts of home!
can't believe you were electrocuted!!!!!!!! so scary!!! glad you're not blind. ;)
ReplyDeleteWelcome back. That was an interesting trip. How's your family in Malaysia?
ReplyDeleteZ, Doc,
ReplyDeleteThanks!
Family in Malaysia very well. More later - got to work on my Sunday sermon :-)