Ewww!

So, it looks as though I've had strep throat. But it's a lot more fun to say in Spanish: estreptococo. And it has nothing to do with coco. How sad.

I ended up going to a clinic on Tuesday, waiting around all morning to see the eye, ear, nose and throat doctor. In true Dominican style, you just show up first thing in the morning, the secretary puts down your name, and you wait your turn. Well, Marxengels didn't want to get up so early, and I didn't feel well anyway, so I was #11 in line by the time we arrived. I had plenty of time to master my vocab flash cards for the GRE, and we even took off for a while and had breakfast and watched part of an old Western at Margot's house down the road. Once my turn came up a bit past noon, the doctor surprised me. He looked in my throat, took my temperature (normal), and gave me some sort of antibiotic. No throat swab, lab tests or anything. He just told me what he thought I had, gave me some sample antibiotics, and told me to get some more plus an antibiotic/pain killing spray at the pharmacy.

Even though we tried to prevent it, Marxengels ended up getting whatever I have. He decided to bypass the doctor and called the pharmacy yesterday, asking for some amoxicilin, because it's stronger than whatever slow-acting antibiotic I was on. Perhaps you could say that things aren't so regulated here?

Because I was so tired, I took most of the week off from the public health office/community work. I decided that teaching English and piano - a little more distant from my students - would be manageable. I feel like I'm doing much better, and am glad that I had the ability to take it easy this week.