Hospital

We had a “team building” event on Thursday which involved a few outdoor games and I got dragged into the tug of war.

Going home Friday I felt a bit tired – assumed I may have been affected by de-hydration or after effects of the team building – but later in the evening my stomach started to feel a bit "over full".

I could still feel a bit bloated on Saturday and spent the day mostly asleep. As it hadn't cleared by Sunday I went to the Bangkok Pattaya Hospital.

First a “muscle doctor” checked me but concluded it wasn’t muscle related so was sent to another section. They prodded around, gave me an X-Ray and scan and determined I had a colon infection – the technical term is Diverticulitis.

I was told that they thought this could be cleared by anti-biotics but that they wanted to keep me in hospital for observation. As the consequences of the anti-biotics not working would be a trip to the slicing and dicing department I figured I’d best go along with this.

A drip feed was connected to the needle/injection point that they’d put in my left hand and I was admitted to a room on the tenth floor which had a helpful sticker on the door saying” nil by mouth”.

About every two hours a nurse would take my blood pressure, temperature and pulse – and sometimes pipe in another bottle of antibiotics on the drip feed line.

Monday I was allowed three solid meals of soup.

Showering with one hand gloved up attached to the drip isn’t a barrel of laughs but I managed.

Tuesday I was taken off the drip and allowed soft food – mashed potatoes being a prominent feature – along with fish and things that had been minced. The stomach pain at least seemed to have gone.

Wednesday was more of the same – and finally at about 4.00 pm today they let me out with a load of oral antibiotics and an appointment to see them again Tuesday.

Christmas in Thailand

On the last Friday before Christmas my boss got a call from one of the girls – Tonpeeb – to say there were monks in reception and could he join in to give them food. Off he goes – back 5 minutes later – no monks yet. Gets another call – they are here – so off he trots.

Back ten minutes later – “there’s only so much chanting a man can stand” he says.

Another call – Tonpeeb turns up with a little basket of stuff – will he go down and give it to them? Having been down 6 flights of stairs 3 times already he says he will give it a miss.

So she wanders in my direction. “Why are they here?” I asked.

“Because it’s Christmas”

“But I thought they were Buddhists? Are they singing their song?

“What song?”

“Way hay we’re the Monkees”

Clearly I’m not taking this seriously enough so off she trots to find someone else!


On Christmas Day I was up around 9.15 and down for a swim. The pool is a bit cool at present – there is a breeze that cools it down – so I got it to myself. I do 20 lengths – about 400 metres – every day.

Christmas Dinner was at Greg’s Kitchen. I had home-made vegetable soup followed by a decent helping of turkey, chipolatas, veg, roast spuds and chestnut stuffing. After that Greg’s home-made vanilla ice cream and tart – very good. Cost 850 Baht – about £17.50.

Afternoon on beach reading and listening to “The Spaghetti Western Orchestra” on the MP3.Bit breezy so kept my shirt on.

Back at condo ate the pork pie I’d made a special trip to the other end of Pattaya to get from the “Best Supermarket”. They have Scotch Eggs, Steak pies and other such delicacies there!

In the evening chicken fried rice at BJ’s then off to see the Sherlock Holmes movie – which I quite enjoyed even though it’s supposed to be set in 1891 yet the technology (guns, cars etc.) is more akin to 1911.

Rest of week has been spent in similar vein – must be first Christmas where other than a Jameson’s with BJ it’s been alcohol free! I normally only go to the bar with live music Friday & Saturday – so I’ve stuck to that. Otherwise if you go every night it gets boring and the first beer tastes like the last beer from the night before.