Here's to good health.

I took parts of this post from an email I sent to some friends not too long ago. I think it's pretty funny:

In terms of health, I've really been blessed since I've been here. The only big problems I've had were 1) a monster spider (I think) bite on my left cheek which left a thumb-sized bulge on my face (this was around the second week I was here), 2) a tingly feeling in my left arm that lasted a few weeks (I think it was from some bug bite as well), and 3) a killer headache 3 weeks ago which really shut me down, but, luckily, it was a one-day thing. Overall, I've been good though, and I those are just issues that you have to deal with in a tropical country; the locals definitely get it a lot worse than I do, so I'm not complaining.

I'm actually happy that I'm not in the U.S. during this whole swine flu fever time. It's crazy over here, but the issue often seems like a light-hearted affair at times, although I don't know if it should be. A few weeks ago in one of my classes, I had 6 kids out: 2 were just MIA, 2 had high fevers, 1 had H1N1 (swine flu), and the other had bird flu...AND, the kid who told me about the student who had swine flu had JUST recovered from it himself. I rolled up to that class one day to a sight of 40 students ALL wearing disposable masks, looking like some straight-up ninjas!! It was so weird, and yet silly; every time a student wanted to talk, s/he would slip the mask off his/her face, which pretty much cancels out any deterrent effect the mask would have, right? Plus, I really don't know how effective masks are in stopping the spread. With a few exceptions, it doesn't seem like people take many precautions against swine flu: I don't see cats whipping out their hand sanitizers at lunch (although in Bangkok they handed you some before going onto the Skytrain/Metro), don't see students rushing to the bathroom to wash their hands, or people restraining themselves from picking their noses in public. But, some students are making the best of the situation and putting their own style on their masks.

To deal with the swine flu scare, the university brought students and teachers from the many sections of the course into a huge room, turned off the AC, handed out a bunch of masks, and the health officials told everyone to avoid being in the same room with many people. Haha!!! I missed this meeting, but that's just how ridiculous the whole thing is. The second the health experts left, the students asked if we could turn the AC back on...and life went on. It's a serious issue, but not really that serious. I feel like in the States people are freaking out more than they are here, but I might be wrong. I assume that I'll be good when it comes to H1N1, because with all this direct contact with it here, I should have been in trouble by now. I'll have to keep my fingers crossed...and avoid hanging out with this kid.