In two years in Holland I've been to a doctor twice. That's probably even a bit above average compared to the numbers over the last decade or so. As I'm now cracking the two year mark I went again today. Over the holidays I caught this nasty flu that's been pestering me for a week, with lots of coughing, not much sleep, and a general feeling of sluggishness.

I ended up going to this all night clinic after I went to the wrong location and got bounced around a little. I would have gone to the same place as the last two visits, but it's across town and with my bike being stolen yet again, it's just too far away. There is this place where they have a bunch of barracks (like at a construction site) and for some reason the all night clinic is located there. Odd place for a clinic. As I walk in I immediately get this strange sensation of having entered another dimension. There is a big plate of glass between me and the receptionist, with no holes and nothing that opens up. Only that little slot in the counter for passing stuff back and forth. It's like I'm in a recording booth, because she has to press in a button while she's talking to me for me to hear. In the back there are about 6 women sitting behind computers talking into headsets. Like people are calling in to order taxis and pizzas or something. This solid booth is the landing for anyone who enters the clinic. There is another solid door between it and the waiting room, with a lock on it. So if you don't have an appointment or you can't get along with the receptionist, she's gonna keep you from getting in there.

The receptionist I got (out of the 6 who were in the room) wasn't the most accommodating. She would ask questions in Dutch, I would answer in English, she would talk in Dutch again. When I didn't understand, she would bite the bullet and speak English, and then immediately go Dutch again. Most people when faced with this situation decide to have it in just one language. I don't have Dutch medical insurance, so I would "be paying". Okay, how much? 77 euro. That is... for one visit? Yes. (Not for a coupon of a dozen tickets or something.) And it absolutely had to be in cash. You would think for a place that isolates its staff behind bomb proof glass they would be more comfortable with electronic transfers and not having any hard money on site. Okay, but I don't have that kind of money on me. I haven't carried around sums like that since... well, ever. The nearest ATM is pretty far away too. Utrecht is very densely populated, but it is mostly suburbia-like, not city. So I get an appointment made and I step on it to get back in 30 minutes.

My appointment was.. short, but brief (like an English teacher of mine once quipped about a presentation I'd given). It was only as long as it needed to be: 6 minutes. 77 bucks for 6 minutes, so that means I paid 988 euro/hour to see my doctor. Am I crazy or is that rather high? Then again, if I had renewed my Dutch medical insurance, that goes for 300/year. I'd rather pay 77 once or even twice a year.

So I get out of there, past the waiting room, and into the tiny-but-freezing all night pharmacy. This room isn't even heated. There's only one guy working there and he's not especially fast, so just waiting for him to process one customer ahead of me took 10 minutes. Here too the sheet of glass. I was amazed by how small the place is. This is the pharmacy attached to the all night/weekends/holidays clinic, so whatever drugs you'd need at a regular pharmacy, you might need them here too, it's the one place in town that stays open. And he's only got one room with a bunch of shelves and filing cabinets.

It's funny the things you don't appreciate without having a special, personal viewpoint into that realm of things that aren't seen. It's like you have to tilt your head to see it. No no, not like that. Okay, stop tilting, it's not happening.

Remember the last time you had an orange? Nothing special about it, was there? Hah, told you you couldn't see it. Remember the last time you had an orange while down with a bout of flu and a sore throat? Ah-ha!

First comes that eerie phase of deliberation. When you notice someone is up to something. Got evil on his mind. It all gets buried beneath the standard fabricated lines that are supposed to lull the victim into a false sense of security. It's for your own good, I say to the poor bastard.

And then, with a glimmer of glee, I think to myself buddy, this is gonna hurt you more than it hurts me. Heck, this guy's been acting up all day, it's time he got a dose of his own medicine.

And then I realize that alas, you and I are both neurotically interconnected in the same organism. Should have thought of that, but it's too late now. The first bite comes in. A small seismic shock follows. The whole structure just sits there oscillating for a little bit. All of a sudden I hear myself screaming. I've been screaming the whole time, but it's only now that I realize. With eye closed in trepidation the last remains of orange juice make their way down. In cold sweat I look up. It's over. Somehow the little shack held up to the storm. Another one of those might...

I look at the orange. I've never seen an orange this big. What we just went through was taking a small bite of it, but the thing is still the same size it was at the beginning. This is gonna be a long 20 minutes. Like getting a succession of vaccination injections right in the same spot.