Tales of the Bionic Woman

So as of today I am officially immune from Typhoid, Yellow Fever, Meningitis, Polio, and Hepatitis A. I am bionic woman, free from all disease and harm. Immortality is clearly within my reach.

It is funny because I ended up having to go to two different clinics to get all my shots and my experiences could not have been more different. The first was in a poorer part of town, in a kind of shady, almost unmarked and tiny, tiny office. There was only one examination room that also apparently was home to the staff fridge, because the nurse's daughter wandered in and tried to pull her lunch out, prematurely, I might add. There I had a short conversation with the nurse, paid, got my shots, and was out.

Today I was in a large, crowded clinic, which nonetheless I think was fairly upscale by comparison. I spent about an hour talking with the nurse about various aspects of travel precautions. Actually, it was more like she was lecturing me about the six other vaccines and tests and physicals she recommended I get before leaving. I think she was doing her level best to scare the shit out of me before I could go anywhere, considering she spent the bulk of our enchanting time together detailing the many, many ways that getting a mosquito bite would cause me to contract a disease which would turn my insides into green goo before you could point to the international symbol for "Oh, God, my liver!" Seriously, this woman was like safety on hyperdrive. No sandals, no sitting on the ground, gloves when you're touching other people, and a face mask for dealing with the kids, soaking your body in soapy water if you get licked by your family dog, no swimming or wading, mosquito repellent at all times. Maybe it would be wise for me to go and just sit inside a plastic bubble the entire time and just wave to the Nigerians! I don't know quite what to think of all this. Obviously I'm not opposed to taking common sense precautions like not eating raw oysters from a street vendor or frequenting the red light district. But seriously, socks and shoes all the time? Pants tucked into your socks? Does anyone really do this? Those who have been to Africa already, feel free to weigh in.

So, after telling me all this in excruciating detail, she asked me, rather pointedly in my opinion, "So, why do you want to go?" Translation: "In the light of this information and the odds that some form of excruciating and cureless illness will surely be yours, why on earth do you want to do this?" I'm not sure what I said, something about the need being so great, to which she conceded. Oh to see what exactly was going on in her mind.

Truth be told, a lot of people have asked me that question, without the sinister subetext, and I honestly never know exactly what to say. Actually, I feel like at this moment, this little segment of time in my life, I kind of don't want to go. I think I wanted to have another adventure, to see a place in this glorious world that I have not yet explored, but mostly because there is so much bad in the world. I watch it on the news, I see it in the faces of the homeless people on my street corners, I feel like it presses in around us all the time. I wanted to do something to push back against all that pressure, to feel like I'm doing something significant and worthwhile and not wasting my life moaning about the problems or feeling helpless. I don't feel that at all times, I don't feel like I want to go. I feel rather indifferent, and sometimes I feel like it's going to be a diaster. But I have learned, as a rule, to not overrule while I'm dreaming a decision I made while I was awake. I'll stick with it. At least through a few more meltdowns.

Until the waking,
S.