Hong Kong started out great! But took a most unfortunate turn.

After the first talk I went back to the hotel for an early night and slept almost immediately at 9.30. At 10.30 I woke with a severe fever and then started a very unpleasant rotation of activities that involved the sink, the toilet and lying on the floor of the bathroom.

My fever was terrible and I took paracetamol and neurofen in an attempt to bring it down, and when after 4 hours and more paracetamol my fever was no better I became more than a little distressed.

The hotel was no help at all and when I asked htem for any sort of help they replied somehting along the lines of “no” “no” “no” “sorry” “no” till eventually I begged them to call a doctor who quickly suggested that an ambulance was more appropriate. 10 mins later 4 men arrived at my door and whisked me on the wheelchair and off to the government hospital we were…

i won’t bore you with the tale as it continues in much the same vein as I waited in the triage ward for more than four hours and was eventually seen by a doctor at 6am.

In all the possible cultural experiences that I considered I might have in Hong Kong (great food, great shopping, interesting markets with live food that I wouldn’t feel comfortable eating, bamboo scaffolding) the hospital was a real eye opener.

The advent of SARS has meant many changes to the medical system, the most obvious being that all doctors and nurses wear masks and basically do what ever they can not to touch people.

One other very interesting thing to note was the difference in culture around treatment in China. Where in Australia when you feel sick they give you stemetil, when you have diarrhoea they give you imodium and for a fever paracetamol or others to bring it down. In Hong Kong they assured me that they would not have provided me with those things. Rather they give rehydration salts and antispasmodics to reduce digestive pains and then monitor your vitals. They feed you kongee when you have a fever although I have to say beef kongee is not my favourite and even the plain kongee was hard to get down!

Hopefully I will see another aspect of Hong Kong next time!

Back in Sydney now, convalescing.

Love to you all

Natasha

In the interest of getting this started. I have decided not to write to any of you seperately and to start blogging.

I have just arrived in Hong Kong from Hyderabad (India) and have at last got an internet connection and 5 mins before I go to sleep to connect with you all. India, as I guess we all know in our minds is a wonderous mixture of colour and smells. Warm and friendly people and great food (well you kow how I love Indian food!)

I can’t imagine though, that in 4 days I could have had a better experience. I was, day and night, with some of the most incredible people. People who have pioneered Fair Trading organisations and led the way in development in a country where people are still insisting that it is impossible. There is so much happenning and so much more to come.

On my last day, with my evening flight imminent, and after a meeting which ran too late, we were given the opportunity to go and visit a new cotton co-operative which has only 13 members at the moment. We were assured it would take about 2 hours to get there, no more than 2.5 hours so not to worry that I had to get back for my plane….

3.5 hours later we arrived at a tiny village and were welcomed into the home of the president of the co-operative (a woman!!!) I have attached some photos. Unfortunately due to the length of the drive we could not stay very long but we did manage to witness the most lucky thing.

As a new co-operative, they have only received one premium payment as yet. This payment was spent on a ‘weighing machine’ as up to now, they have been cheated left right and centre when they take their cotton to be weighed. We were there to witness the opening of the box. It ws very moving for who work selling fairtrade to see such an immediate benefit. I wish I could share all my photos but will put a few up on the site now.

More Later

I hope someone looks at this!

Love to you all

Natasha

Welcome to 11ty. This is your first post. Edit or delete it, then start blogging!