January 12, 2007, 11:18 a.m.
The United States has great saran wrap. I mean, it’s just a pleasure to do leftovers in the U.S. You might not recognize it now, but spent 10 months in a country with saran wrap with no serrated edge, nothing to keep it from clumping and bunching and clustering around itself and amassing into a useless bundle of clear plastic annoyingness, and you will fully appreciate the lovely American saran wrap with its clean edges and happy sheen. Yessss.
Other great thing about the States: Everybody speaks English. You know why that’s great? Cause I can eavesdrop. The same thing happened when I came back from Spain – I was amazed to understand … everybody. It’s crazy – I can understand people on the bus, in the grocery store, at bars, on the street, in line at the bank, in bookstores, on TV, and everywhere else. It’s so entertaining! I love it.
That’s not the only great thing about the States, either. Want to know what else is great? Americans never ask you for change. This includes American waitresses, American sales clerks, American taxi drivers, and American Starbucks barristas. You can hand them a $20 for something that costs a mere $3.26, and they won’t even flinch. They don’t ask you if you have a quarter, or a $10, or even a $5. They don’t even blink; they just make you wonderful change. Plus, you can use your credit card almost elsewhere. Plus, there’s cash back. Whoever thought of cash back, by the way, is a genius. Here’s your milk and eggs and hey, there you go, have twenty bucks.
Want to know something not great about the States? The healthcare. American healthcare sucks. It should be noted before I commence with this story that my travel insurance has recently expired. I am currently one of millions of uninsured Americans. Check this out:
So about two years ago, I got my first Urinary Tract Infection (UTI) in Spain, which is excruciating, and solved it with antibiotics sold over the counter. It was easy – on a Saturday night at 11pm I went to a 24-hour pharmacy, told them my symptoms, and for €13 they handed me the antibiotics and a liter of water. Then a year and a half later, I had other similar medical issues in Argentina and went to the hospital. After waiting in line for maybe half an hour, I saw a specialist for a whopping $8, who did a full check-up and then gave me what I needed for another whopping $4 or some other ridiculously miniscule amount. Now, fast-forward to a week ago, when I realized that I had a UTI again (by the way ladies, you can get a UTI just from holding it for too long, so if you are ever on a roadtrip or out and about and you think, “I’ll just wait until I get home,” I strongly recommend that you don’t), only this time I was in the good old U.S. of A., also known as United States of Annoying medical care. This time it was a Saturday and I was familiar with the symptoms. I knew what antibiotics I needed, so I called the nearest pharmacy. Turns out that for this incredibly common illness that affects millions of women, in the U.S. you need a prescription. Except that I don’t have a doctor. Which means that I would either have to go to an ER, or … wait, what’s this? I see an ‘Immediate SF doctor referral’ website – so I call it. Within 10 minutes a doctor calls me back and we chat; he says it’s almost definitely a UTI and he can write me a prescription right now – just come to his office. I am thrilled until he mentions that oh by the way, the cost of the consult will be $200. $200!?!? “I absolutely cannot pay that,” I informed him, and hung up the phone. Now, due to the heathcare situation in the States, here were my choices: Pay $200 or the equivalent to see a private doctor; go to the ER and wait for hours, probably to pay something else excessive, or go to a low-cost or free medical clinics, of which there are several in SF. The problem is that they are only open Tuesday and Thursday from 2-4pm, or Wednesdays by appointment … which means that on a Saturday afternoon with an illness that you know will be agonizing by nightfall, you’re … what, exactly? Just screwed? What else could I do? What do people do? In this case, I did my homework and found a homeopathic remedy (thanks in part to advice from Nicole), which consisted of consuming probiotics (anti-antibiotics – they put the good kind of bacteria back in your system. You can also get them naturally by consuming yogurt, but when you have an infection of this sort, you need the pills, because they give you millions of the good guys per unit, rather than hundreds, like yogurt), taking superdoses of special cranberry pills with echinacea and goldenseal – which happens to be a natural antibiotic, and drinking exorbitant amounts of water and cranberry juice. This was actually a much better solution for a number of reasons, not the least of which is that I didn’t have to put my body through another round of antibiotics, which I really don’t like doing, plus it was cheaper and faster. Moral of the story, though: Americans think they have it better than they actually do, in terms of healthcare. They think they have the best hospitals, the best doctors, and the best service in the world, but they don’t. The U.S. might have the highest number of cardiothoracic surgeons in the world (and I stress the might in that sentence), but when it comes to plain old regular medical care, in my humble opinion, the States sucks. Healthcare in the States is confusing, complicated, and above all, astoundingly expensive. End of diatribe for today.
Leaving Argentina was easy. By that I mean I got almost all of my errands done in the last few weeks I was there, and I wasn’t sorry to say goodbye. As was probably already abundantly clear from past blog entries, I was ready to come home.
So home I came on December 21st, back to crisp, cold San Francisco with its clear, brisk afternoons and thick gray morning fog. I had a number of bright, happy days with family, and some stressful dark periods due to some family problems. I was reunited with those I love (one in particular) and came into difficulty with others that I love. As I wrote to one of my friends, life is everything and all at once. I’m just trying to keep up.
New year’s eve was a highlight; it was a lot like last year, but with better music. Nicole, Angie, Jake, Kenda, Amari and I brought sexy back and attended a rockin’ Stanford party, after taking a number jello shots and rocking out to the rad new Bay Area radio station that plays songs like Groove is in the Heart, and This Is How We Do It. The party was fun but even better was walking home afterwards, when Ryan mooned a car full of boys that were gawking at Kenda, trying to take pictures of her on their cell phones … ahhhh, good times.
Other highlights were doing sudoku with Ryan while Kenda and I did a sewing project … and by ‘do a sewing project’ I mean ‘Kenda making me a sexy new tango skirt.’ I also loved going for a breathtaking seaspray hike at the Headlands, and having three different types of yummy latkes at our family Chanukkah celebration.
Then in typical whirlwind fashion, on January 3rd I flew to Hawai’i, where I had a splendid tropical time going beach with Dana and going North Shore with Ali (who also generously put me up). It was strange being home but not really being home (for those who haven’t heard, my Mom sold my car, my bed, and my piano, and leased the house for a year while she rents in SF), but still completely fantastic to eat ono local grindz and get some color at Kaimana, Magic Island, Shark’s Cove, and Lanikai. **sigh** Hawai’i is so beautiful …
Language Spot:
So I have been doing pretty well with transitioning to English all the time. Last night, ironically, I had my first dream where I remember speaking Spanish … actually the only reason I remember it is that I recall being proud that I used the subjunctive properly. What’s funny is that now that I think about it, I actually used it wrong. Anyway. My one slip-up was on the phone, when I asked the hardware store man if they could copy my keys in the act. I knew as I said that it was wrong, that I was translating directly from Spanish en el acto, but I couldn’t think of the correct phrase. “In the act?” he inquired, which gave me the time I needed to stammer and finally snap my fingers, “On the spot!” I proclaimed excitedly, “Do you do it on the spot?”
From work:
As always, I never make any of this up. I’m simply not this innovative:
“The values that they have imbibed in me over the years and still do have without a doubt pulled me through times of hard decisions.”
“Additionally, I have realized that to explore my academic concern, I should study the two interlocking issues: the family and the phallus. The exploration of both of these themes relates to my ultimate goal of establishing a career in university education.”
“As an undergraduate, I focused on human resource management, and discovered that the problem of “human” is the most important issue for enterprises. However, this cannot be solved with quantification. Thus, this is very amusing.”
Yes, it is very amusing. What is even more amusing is trying to turn your essay into something coherant…. not.
“Additional Instructions: It is one of my application. I would like service to who has good envriomental studies backgrouds.”
“I do not boud that Berkeley will best prepare me for my investigation and as a future scholar.”
Um. Boud? Are we just making up words now? Speaking of making up words:
“Additionally, my dialogical ability is well good. While I was on a trip to Morocco, Africa last year, I participated in a Sahara desert tour with many foreigners. With people from various countries, I had no problem in a conversation.”
I’m sure you had no problem in conversation, especially when you used advanced words like dialogical. I looked it up, btw, and here’s the official definition:
Dialogical: (adj) From Latin roots diabolical and illogical: Nonsensical deviltalk. i.e.: His essay was pure dialogical genius.
And I swear to God, this is the introduction for someone applying to a Creative Writing masters program:
“I don’t consider myself a great writer, but I would like to become one someday. When faced with the challenge of creating a piece of writing, I feel excited about it. I didn’t study literature or majored in English in College. I’ve written marketing materials and web content with conviction in previous jobs, but I haven’t written on a personal level.”
… and you never should.
I call this one, “Face the big danger.”
“I am Lee Young-uk, the Republic of Korea's naval officer lieu·ten·ant
I apply for your school, in the navy, passing the test of going to study abroad.
Appling for the master's course and the major field of study is environmental engineering, usually, I am interested in global environment a lot, and I store up professional knowledge by way of the media of newspapers, internet web-sites, etc.
If I study and research together with capable students and teaching staffs, those studies and research will be good to solve the global-village-environment issues, they will be good to navy I am in, as well.
Without spacious seas, blue mountains, extensive fields, all the scientific technologies will lose the grounds, I think.
I would like to study and solve the problems together with capable professors and students, get the growing clues about environmental issues.
Submarine where I work, eat, sleep and live underwater is the one of navy forces.
it responds to the change of hydro water and underwater sensitively, if we judge underwater environment by mistake, we will face the big danger.
I would like to see you at your school before long.”
> Dear my editor,
>
> I am applying for graduate schools, and today p.m.5 is the deadline.
>
> For technical problem, my essay was delivered to you a bit late.
>
> But I wonder if I can have it as soon as possible today.
>
> Sincerely, Sejung
Now you decide what is worse; essays of the previous sort, or this:
“In this way, I elucidated the convergence of social processes through which the policy options and the regulatory responses by the state were overdetermined by structural and cultural limits and how the unity of political hegemony is maintained through cultural identity discourse interpellation and legitimating force of this exceptionalist identity in the form of imperialist U.S. foreign policy.”
I told my friend Rachel about this one and she goes, “Well, it is hard to edit bullshit.”
