Easter medicine in South America?

I am a cynic I know.




I feel bad writing this story because I don't want to offend one of my closest friends here, but it is too funny to keep to myself and I am sure and I hope he will never read this.



Since coming here to the middle of the earth the climate and the long days of standing have really taken a toll on my legs. They throb at night and veins have started to burst in my legs (ugly) but what is worst is I have taken to wearing support stockings everyday. I feel like I am 103 years old!



So my friend suggested I go with him to visit his doctor. I knew he went weekly to his doctor for his knee. I had thought he was going for acupuncture. And so when he suggested I come along to see if the doctor could help with my pain, I thought sure I had heard good things about acupuncture and my legs had so much pain I would try anything!



So Wedensday it was. A bus ride and a short walk later we were there in a neighborhood buzzing the bell. We read Colombia's magazine "Semana" together in the waiting room and I tried to scope the place out but there really wasn't much to see. No incense burning, no zen fountain flowing and no mood lighting....just some fluorescent lights and a Novella playing on the TV.



When the Dr called me in we went in together. Since the doctor advertised himself as a holistic, naturalist doctor I was expecting a little more with the esthetics, but the office reminded me of the office of my mechanic. Plain white walls in need of painting, a radio on the shelf a desk with a notebook on it and a bed against the wall.



The doctor was as odd as the room he wore pin striped pants and a dress shirt and he wore surgical gloves that were tucked beneath the sleeve of his dress shirt. I think he wore the same gloves all day. He started off by writing my name in his notebook where he had a list of previous patients. Then he asked me about 1000 questions ranging from, If I had loose bowels to if I have itchy head....random. A few minutes later he checks my blood pressure, weighs me and asks me to lay on the bed, where he rolls up my pants.



Next with out any explanations he gets a needle from a draw, washes it with windex and proceeds to draw blood from my arm.

Then he takes a glass bottle of what he tells me is a vitamin complex out of his draw and adds it to my syringe of blood.

Now, with the needle full of this mysterious vitamin and my blood he goes to my legs and starts poking my legs and says he is adding my now vitamized blood back into my legs to help with the circulation but the problem is I barely feel a prick and he is doing it very quickly all over my legs....and as he squeezes the blood he uses the cotton swab to wipe up the mess. I have a feeling I am in one of those places that they pretend to take out a cancerous tumor from your body but it is really just a slight of hand and a cow heart on the table. And I am a cynic.



He tells me I am all set and then my friend climbs up to the table and the story plays out much the same but his blood is put back in around his spine.

The doctor informs us there is no charge but that I need to buy and take these medications to help my leg. He hands me two bottles with labels that look they were made on his computer....

As we walk home my friend says his knee felt better already and he followed this up with some stories of miracles performed by this doctor. I felt guilt for feeling so cynical, I felt shitty knowing I would not go next Wednesday despite the fact that I made an appointment but most of all, I still felt pain in my legs. I guess all I really got was this funny story.