China Hospital

Fuzhou, China Hospital: May 6, 2013

Imagine a 1000 people. Varying ages from infancy to senior citizens bowed over with age and ailments. Hoards of people, pushing, coughing, crying, ...and even some holding dripping wounds of blood. These thousands of people are crammed together like discarded leftovers. Sweltering heat to the extent that you have rivers of sweat raining down your chest and down your back and buttocks. Imagine the absence of any ventilation; no breeze, no air conditioning; and 95 % humidity. The kind you already can't breath in. It's feeling a lot like Hell already. ...minute ten.

Now throw in the "most deadly bird flu ever." Unknown faces being wheeled on hospital beds between hoarders of people, IV bags flapping. People running for the one working elevator. Escalator broke. The crowds do not break for the man on the hospital bed, in hospital/surgical clothing. The only face covered by mask is the orderly trying to shove his charge into a jammed full elevator. The crowd does not give. He shoves the bed into the over crowded elevator. People shift to sit on the side rails of the man's bed. I pray the elevator doesn't stall and that the man, fresh from surgery, doesn't die from "crowded elevator infection."

The hoards of people in complete disarray. No rules, no lines, no doctors. Just people limping or people carrying or supporting others in makeshift stretchers. People coughing on you because there is no escape. You are hemmed in by the throngs that keep growing and pushing.

I have my two babies. My three-year-old toddlers. "Carlton do NOT let Mia touch a thing." Hold her. Do not let her be touched, be pushed or be crowded in. I'm clutching Ollie to my chest, holding too tight. I am afraid for my babies in this "hospital." What will we catch in this God Forsaken place? How can they call this a hospital? Why would a government allow such a place to exist?

Where the hell is our Fuzhou government guide? The 20 year old something, fresh from college with her Tourism degree? No where to be found.

Penny is in yet another "line" trying to pay ...bribe? so Ollie can receive updated blood tests that Dr. Katie would like to see before the adoption is finalized. My poor boy....Ollie is fast asleep in my arms. Mia is drenched in sweat, her hair plastered to her head, also thankfully asleep. ...hour one has long passed.

Carlton and I exchange looks of sheer terror. Upstairs is no better than below. No exit upstairs, only a shaft of a window crack. We greedily stake our place there as hour two descends upon us. Carlton turns away, seeking some inner calm that I don't possess. An old Chinese man, dressed in rags, appears in front of Ollie and I. He has a meanness in his eyes as they connect with mine. He hurls his spittle on Ollie.

Damn this place and everyone of its occupants! Penny is completely clueless. I will never ever come back to this wretched country!

My son and I are finally called in the room to draw his blood. There is another Chinese boy already there. He is about six years old. He has four adults laying on top of him, restraining him. The boy screams and screams. Ollie starts to whimper in the chair. I am instructed to hold his arm still. I am face to face with the blood stained pad my son's arm rests upon.

They did not perform all three of the blood tests Dr. Katie wanted.

We were not going back. ...My son would no longer live in this country.