Taking Care of Business

So I’ve been a bit lax in my updating! Things have picked up here, and it’s been hard finding time to blog. In the last few weeks I’ve been taking care of logistic type things, figuring out more stuff about my project(s) here and generally exploring Beijing.

First big item I had to take care of was the residence permit business. When we last left off I was told by my local police station to go register at the big public security bureau. In order to register you need about 7 pieces of paperwork, most of which I had, but I was missing the physical exam form! So I had to way to the outskirts of town (where they send all the foreigners) to a designated building to get examined. The physical exam is a process. Lots of waiting in line: to register, to pay, for each of the 6 exam rooms. The exam consists of: taking your BP, your height and weight, a quick look in your mouth, a quick eye exam, a chest x-ray, an EKG (more on that later), and bloodwork. I was pretty amazed by the efficiency of the whole process and how docile the entire foreigner population was (myself included) with being poked and prodded.

Ok, the EKG was maybe the one place where I felt a little violated (just slightly). You go into a room with a curtain drawn for some privacy and a middle aged Chinese women talks to you in rapid Chinese. She told me to take off my shoes and lie down on the table. Then she said something about my shirt which I didn’t understand. She clarified this by grabbing my shirt and lifting it up to my neck. She then said something else I didn’t understand, which she also clarified by pulling my bra all the way up off my chest. I was recovering from this shock when she started squirting my now naked chest with cold water. Then she started attaching the EKG leads, which are kind of like suction cups (hence the water). She then kept shaking my ankle and telling to me to relax while laughingly saying I must never have done this before. She was quite right.

As for the bloodwork, the phlebotomist was excellent, though I think I kind of insulted her when I asked to make sure the needles were new (yes, I’m paranoid). Oh and though they don’t say what they’re testing you for, when I got my results back it turns out they test for syphilis and HIV (informed consent, take that!). I spent some time discussing with my friend the purpose of this whole exam. Some stuff was obviously to stop sick people from staying in country, but other stuff (vision check?) I wasn’t sure of.

After I picked up my physical exam results, I came with what I thought was everything I needed to the public security bureau, ready to get my permit. But alas! It turns out one of the forms I had was wrong, and I was missing some stamp on the other one. I spend the better part of a day tracking down this stuff, only to be told when I came back that something else was wrong. I wasn’t quite clear on what happened, but after an hour or so of waiting as this poor man made about 10 phone calls to someone or another they accepted my paperwork. Hopefully I’ll be able to pick up the finalized document sometime next week.

Other than that and work, I’ve been having fun with friends, checking out cool
bookstores and food places and parks near me. Parks in Beijing are beautiful, the whole water, tree, rock aesthetic is awesome. Tomorrow I’m off to a meeting in Linxian which has a super high rate of esophageal cancer and then Shanxi where they’re currently doing some cervical cancer screening/treatment programs.

Oh and I want to say a quick congrats to all my classmates who have now decided what kind of doctor they’re gonna be, that is so cool!!!