Getting a Colonoscopy in Korea...Viewer Discretion is Advised

You're looking at some lovely colour wallet-sized photos of my colon, which is normal and healthy with the exception of a few hemorrhoids (I said viewer discretion was advised!). I got to the doctors to have the usual pre-op stuff which included blood pressure and checking my heart. I've had this done at home before where the nurses put a small suction, bandaid-like thing on you for a couple minutes. The only thing I can use to accurately describe the "clamps" placed on my ankles and wrists are car jumper cables. This was the 1st sign that the quality of care I'm used to at home may not be the same here.

Next, I was given these short pants with a trap door in the back and told to lie on a bed where my feet dangled at the bottom (the beds were either very short or I have grown since being in Korea). The nurse placed an enema inside and instructed me to wait 5 minutes and then go up a flight of stairs and I'd find the bathrooms. The public bathrooms I was using weren't even connected to the doctor's office in any way. They were also really dirty and (obviously) smelled like sh**! It didn't help that I could hear a grown man grunting and farting in the room beside me or the woman in my room grunting every minute.

I was finally taken to the operating room and placed on a bed with a leather blanket and leather pillow. That's a first. The nurse then put a tight elastic around my head and stuffed this piece of plastic into my mouth. She said "to help breathe better." It actually has the opposite effect and I felt like I was in some 1950s psych ward.

Anyway who knows how coherent this will sound in an hour. I have already made several typos because I'm writing with one eye open -- think that means its' time for the night nightsl