Sick in Korea

Good News!  Being sick in South Korea means you still have to go to work.  What are sick days?  Never heard of 'em.
 
Joseph and I have been going back and forth with being sick for about a week now.  Nothing serious, a cold/light flu.  Back home we might have taken a day off or two at the beginning to just rest and sleep it off and hopefully wake up the next day rested and feeling a bit revived.  Welcome to Korea...the land where this doesn't happen.


Korean's do not take days off for being sick.  If a Korean gets sick (or expat alike) they go to the hospital/doctor office (interchangable in most Korean cities).  What is a doctors office like in Korea?  It is the same as back home except much less crowded and there is not much of a wait time.  If you are waiting it is because the computer is running slow and they need to put in your ARC number.  While you are waiting it is customary to take your blood pressure and perhaps weigh in [in front of everyone].  All of this done in the waiting room.  Next you see the doctor in his or her office.  You sit in a chair and the doctor is at their desk in front of a computer.  You tell them your symptoms and they type them in and decide what you have.  Something I felt was really strange was how the doctor checked your mouth:  he had two stainless steel cylenders with stainless steel tongue depressers in them.  One holding used and one holding new ones.  Interesting.  Next, temperature and breathing are checked and then I was asked if I wanted a shot or pills (pills please as my director was in the room as well translating and I somehow didn't think he'd be asked to leave the room) and then a spray of stuff up each nostril that made me want to chuck him out of the window. 
After this a few steps out of his office to a UV machine that I was told to put on my nose to get rid of the germs.  Um...doesn't that defeat the purpose when I am holding that within an inch of my nose and it hasn't been cleaned?  Maybe that is just my OCD kicking in but I would think it would be sanatized after each use? 
I digress...left the doctors office and went downstairs to the pharmacy for my pills.  5 pills each day for 3 days, 3x a day for less than $2.50.  Name brands as well.  Not too shabby.  Days total expense? Approximately $10. 
We really, really miss our sick days from back home but this isn't too bad because as the doctors and our teachers at school continue to tell us: Korean's don't like to take off work so everything needs to be done faster and better as far as doctors and being sick is concerned.  We were also told that it is so rare for Korean's to take a day of for being sick that if they (or foreigners) take a day off the president/principal will come to your apartment and see if you are okay and acutally take you to the hospital/doctor's office.

Still miss those sick days though.