Let's hangout at the Jeonju General!

This morning was, in short, hilarious! In order to get our "resident alien cards" (finally I will be a card carrying "alien"...I'm sure that some of you have been just waiting for this with baited breath for literal YEARS! Korea is onto me people, Korea is onto me!) we had to go on a super fun trip to the hospital to get a thorough check up. You know, just a general once over to make sure we didn't have the Tuberculosis, or the HIV or to ensure that we weren't addicted to a ton of contraband substances. The whole thing was altogether hilarious because we felt like, and somewhat had to behave like a kindergarten class of four on a class trip to the hospital as we followed the "foreign teacher coordinator" around the hospital to the various stations we had to visit, practically holding hands in a straight line behind him.

If we looked like puppies or toddlers, there was a good reason, considering that our only other source of guidance was a series of lines painted on the floor which our "handler" explained led to the three areas we'd have to go. The white line led to the clinic where we'd see the doctor, the red line led to the area where we had to give them our blood and the yellow line...led to the x-ray area! I know right? I totally thought it'd be something else too!

Our number one stop on this grand tour of physical check-ups was in the x-ray room. Luckily for us we ladies had already been warned by another of the teachers that they'd want us to take off our bras for this magical operation, so we didn't have to spend the ten minutes she did trying to figure out what the waving of palms in front of chest was supposed to mean! It was a pretty basic operation, y'know, just put on this hospital top and press your chest really really hard against this thing and then get out...yah. I mean, it was no mammogram or what have you (boob crushing...but for a GOOD reason!), but seriously, I'm pretty sure we all had to have Tuberculosis screenings before we got here! Anyway...whatever, so long as I get my "alien card".

Next off, at the same table where we had to give them our blood (muahahahahahahahahahaha! Bloooooooood!) we had to give them a small bit of other bodily fluid. Now, I'm sure we can all agree that this is a pretty normal part of a physical, but let me tell you right now it was the weirdest freaking urine sample I have EVER given in my life! Instead of just peeing in a little plastic cup with it's own little orange lid we were given a lovely little paper cup of the type one would usually use to get a bit of water from a water cooler (not the pointy bottomed type, but made of pretty much the same stuff) and two separate tubes. Once given these vessels, we were sent into the public washroom where we were to pee in the water-cooler cup and then dump the contents into the two test tubes. Maybe it was performance anxiety, or maybe it was the fact that we weren't allowed to drink or eat anything since last night before twelve, but a couple of us were having SERIOUS trouble with this! We both ended up half filling the tubes, even though they were supposed to be filled to the top (even though one of them lacked a cap) so we'll have to see if they call us back in there later to finish off the test. Really though, how much pee do you really need to determine whether or not I'm all up on the drugs?! So stressful! I can't just pee at the drop of a hat people, I can't! BAH.... It did lead to some hilarity, since once we met back up with our "handler", I felt that it was necessary to inform him that the two of us had had some issues with providing the specified amount of pee and that if they called him it might not mean we were on drugs so much as that they hadn't gotten enough pee to prove we aren't! And don't even get me started on the fact that they drew our blood directly beside our uncapped urine samples...whatever hospital, whatever!

Our last stop on this wonder-tour was at the clinic where individually we had our eyes, ears, weight, height and blood pressure checked. Hilarity also, of course, ensued here as one of the other chicas started reading off letters while looking at numbers, thus proving her eyesight was HORRIBLE, and Bryan, instead of leaning back while reading off the letters leaned far far forward! It was also pretty funny when the nurse took our weight, height and chest circumference (yes, chest circumference...are they keeping records of this? Like, the average chest size of everyone in the country at any given time...?) I'm pretty sure the nurse was like "what the hell?!" since all three of us gals are pretty big lovely ladies in a variety of different ways. One of us is tall, one of us has beautiful voluptuous hips and I'm just generally a large lovely lady...all in all, body types that are just not super common up in here! Whoo hooo, messing up your potential record keeping with our gorgeous selves!

Aside from that, this whole aspect was pretty basic and otherwise unexciting. The trip into the doctor's office, however, was fairly laughable. In addition to some pretty basic questions about our medical histories, including an inquiry about diabetes, smoking, heavy drinking etc., he also asked each and every one of us if we had any "symptoms". Not of anything in particular, but just general "symptoms". Now, this seems pretty broad considering just normal "being" could be considered symptomatic of lots of different things, depending on one's "normal" state of being in regards to everyone else's idea of "normal". Again I state, whatever it takes to get my "alien card" so that I can finally be identified as as out of this world as I think we can all agree I behave most of the time!

Who doesn't love a fun trip to the hospital I ask you?