The First Days are the Hardest Days

These words from the Grateful Dead Song "Uncle John's Band" couldn't ring more true at the moment. On Friday night, I was beginning to feel a little bit woozy and develop a bit of a cough. I went to bed quite early, thinking that it was probably owing to my lack of sleep and an adjustment to the tropical heat and humidity. Woke up the next morning, and it was a bit worse. I was sure I had a fever. So I decided that I wanted to be sure I didn't have some sort of nasty tropical fever, such as Dengue or something like that and made a trip to the Rong Phayaban Ramkhamhaeng (Ramkhamhaeng Hospital.) Upon arrival, they took my temperature, blood pressure, and so on. Then they brought me to a doctor, who spoke limited but sufficient English, which was good, because my Thai wasn't quite sufficient enough for this. She asked a few questions, looked in my throat, and decided that I have tonsilitis. After that, I went into another room where a tiny nurse who spoke less English than I spoke Thai put a needle that was almost bigger than she was into my but cheek, and they gave me six (!) prescriptions. Total cost? Around $33 (1300 Baht), including the cab fare. Not too shabby.
And I'm already feeling better.
Other than that, we have our first meeting tomorrow for faculty, which should be interesting, as we will be able to learn more about what we're doing. Hail progress!