Sick and Smothered

Let me first preface this by saying that I love my host family and they are sweet people with good intentions.

So I’ve been sick for almost a week. I started feeling crummy last weekend when our group visited the trainees staying in the nearby community of Sveti Nickole (Saint Nickolas). That morning I had woken up to a sore throat. By that evening it turned into a headache as well. I ended up spending the entire day on Sunday in bed.

Superstitions are common in some cultures. In Macedonia, there is a common opinion that sitting in a draft, called “promaya”, will cause you to get sick. My family has a couple of ideas about what caused my illness. Mostly they blame the fact that I’ve been washing my hair in the AM and going out without drying it (an advantage to having short hair). They also blame Sveti Nickole and the fact that I drank cold soda when I was there. (I, of course, believe I got a virus because my immune system was down due to stress and not enough sleep).

By Monday I knew that I had a bad cold. I stayed in bed all day. My family became very concerned and tried to persuade me to call the doctor. I tried to explain (in my broken Macedonian) that I didn’t think it was necessary. I knew that the doctor would tell me to do all the things that I was doing already; resting, drinking liquids, taking aspirin, cough suppressants, etc (which fortunately are supplied in my medical kit). By Monday evening I gave into their insistence and called the Peace Corps medical doctor. I explained my symptoms and what I was doing to get better. She agreed with me and then spoke to my family to calm their nerves. Monday after lunch my family wanted me to stay downstairs with my baba (grandma) because it is warmer down in her room (thanks to a wood-burning stove) and it’s next to the outdoor bathroom. Of course, it’s also where everyone eats their meals, watches TV is and where all the guests “negosti” (visit). I ended up in the bed of my baba’s living room for the next two days. Although I could lie down and rest and I was being pampered like a small child, my family also kept waking me up every couple of hours to see how I was doing. They were frequently offering me coffee, tea, bread, vegetables, meat, and chocolates. I soon developed a runny noise and a bad cough.

Monday night I vomited so on Tuesday I stopped eating all foods and only drank water and tea. At this point my family acted as though I had something life-threatening. I tried to rest while my host dad watched football on TV. I declined all offers of food from them. I told them I just wanted to sleep. But I couldn’t sleep very well with my nose all stopped up and coughing all night. My baba was sick as well, and my host mom had three teeth pulled! (I suspect that once you have a bad tooth in this country, they just yank it out, which would explain why most of the old people don’t have many teeth left!). So here we were all feeling ill.

It was very interesting to me how there seemed to be no concept of what foods are best to feed a person who is sick. I was offered all kinds of foods that I know are not easy to digest. I did request eggs a couple of times, but that was about the only kind of “easily digestable” food I got. My sore throat longed for something cold to help the swelling; a cold drink, an ice cube or ice cream. But I knew I would get none of it. After three days one of my fellow trainees smuggled me a soda when she came to visit me, from my request, it was awesome.

At one point this week I vaguely remember six women entering the room, all sitting down to “negosti” and have tea. I could hear them clucking their tongues as they talked about me, how I was sick and not eating. They again offered me food and tea. I mumbled in Macedonian that I was tired and wanted to sleep. Then I remember one of the women standing over me, saying my name, practically wagging her finger at me, lecturing me in jumbled bunch of words about my being sick, that I should eat. I barely opened my eyes to look at her, I was so tired. Next thing you know my language teacher was above me calling my name. The women were gone. I learned later that she had driven them out. She stayed for a short while, talking with family and with me and I was so happy when she suggested I move back upstairs to my room. On Wednesday I had a house call from a Peace Corps doctor and nurse, which was nice. They were able to confirm that I didn’t have anything more serious than a viral infection, so no antibiotics were necessary. It was then that I learned that there were single-use strip thermometers in the medical kit, as well as some nasal decongestants. I was given some more cough drops and ibuprofen. They also gave my host family some peace of mind as well. I started to feel better mid-week, but it’s been a slow recovery.