Gastritis

I remember having gastritis in America--an ulcer, actually--somewhere in the later 90s, but it was different than what I have now, and preferable in my opinion, though of course not pleasant. The former version was associated with an empty sort of pain, like a hole in my stomach. I remember leaning up against the car and sort of pressing my stomach into the hood to try to relieve the ache. The type that I have now comes with no pain, really, but with a sick feeling in the throat, a sort of swollen sensation that makes one want to swallow all the time, which itself makes one nauseous eventually. With the former version, coffee, for instance, didn't bother me; with this version, I can no longer drink coffee, as it instantly produces a sensation of sandiness in my through and mouth, and pretty much anything I eat makes me feel like there's something stuck in my throat, a persistent, annoying sensation, and one that is not easy to sleep with. Gak. As with so many ailments, gastritis appears to be associated with gastritis (along with many other causes).  MS seems to have a new surprise for me every day--payback, I guess, for having spent so many years with mild symptoms only. 

Freedom

An oppressive spirit has now been lifted from the villa. It is as if the air itself has been freshened, like a heavy, noxious mist has risen and vanished in the breeze. I could actually feel the freedom when I awoke this morning. There is, of course, still the cranky lady whom I have never met and who never comes out of her room, but she's not much of a problem really. Apparently, she and her husband rarely show up, and when they do, it is only for a stopover on their way to some other locale. In fact, if not for this lady's occasional complaints on the community message board, I would have no proof that she even exists. Takut the dog also feels much more at ease, as the only people remaining who are likely to chase him away are the caretakers, and since there are basically only two people now in the entire villa, the caretakers themselves rarely show up.

Bocah Nakal Lagi

The bocah nakal have returned and are causing trouble. It's not so much that they are using the wifi, but that last night they actually entered the premises sometime after I had gone to sleep and were hanging out in the back patio area. 

Previously, I had always locked the door at night, since my room is right next to the door, but then one of the tenants here got angry about that because he was still ordering food from GoJek after 8 o'clock. Eight o'clock, sadly enough, is my bedtime these days. So I stopped locking the door, thinking that perhaps he would take care of it when he was done ordering food. (Fat chance, right?)

So this morning the bocah nakal were once again in the parking garage when I went out to my bike and I told them not to play there anymore, that people in the villa were angry, and that someone would tell their parents if they entered again at night. They just sat there staring at me for a moment, so I spoke a bit more forcefully and told them quite simply "Go!" Lol. They seemed to understand that, and picked up their bicycles and pedaled away. So, we'll see. 

I'm always sorry to have to be severe with children, but then again they should know common limits.

Lizard Man

I am becoming a lizard person. Or maybe I've always been one, like those lizard people who disguise themselves as humans in the alien invasion movies, and my inner-lizard is just now emerging. I am shedding my human skin for a rough, scaly appearance, slithering around my room and hissing, though with displeasure rather than renewal. Perhaps, as in the Rick Yancey novel, The Fifth Wave, I have not even been particularly aware of my alien-ness, or lizard-ness, until I was reactivated by the alien ship that had placed me here in the distant past to be a part of the invasion when the time was ripe.

The sensation of intense inner heat I have had, and which I have mentioned before, has suddenly gotten much worse, such that it seems to be causing a red, dry, painful plague on my skin from shoulders to forehead. Looks and feels like I have a sunburn, but lizards don't get sunburns, and neither do people who spend most of their time in their room because they don't feel well enough to go outside.  The pills the neurologist had given for what he takes to be a neurologic problem associated with multiple sclerosis, are no longer effective. I now continue 24 hours a day to burn inwardly as if I were about to experience internal combustion.  What a way to go! I have left a message with said neurologist, but he has not answered, no doubt thinking Oh God no, not this lunatic again. 

I feel like I've been cursed with the plagues of Job, and, like Job, I can't help but ask why, because I ain't done nothing wrong! Well, not so wrong, anyway, as to deserve seven plagues. And anyway most of my wrongdoing was accomplished years ago, when I was still young, more or  less, and had the requisite energy. I mean really, God, are you going to choose this time to punish me when I've basically been minding my P's and Q's for so  long? 

In his book Disappointment With God, which I just happen to be reading at this time, Phillip Yancey devotes many pages to the book of Job, and many more to the contemporary trials that people go through--good people who have done nothing wrong. He addresses all the age-old questions (as old as the Bible, as old as the Book of Job): Why is this happening? Did I do something wrong? Will you be distant and silent forever?  Is prayer empty and ineffectual? Why do evil people thrive while good people suffer? God, are you even there? 

I say that Yancey addresses these questions. He does not answer them, any more than the Book of Job answers them. The only palatable answer, I suppose, is to appreciate, or at least acknowledge, that the difference between our perspective and God's perspective is akin to the difference between the perspective of a microscopic creature on a lab slide and the man looking through the microscope. God lives in all dimensions of creation, and then beyond even those dimensions. God is creation itself, and more. Infinitely more. Why does God neglect to answer Job's questions? Perhaps it is because, as Yancey suggests, we could not possibly even begin to comprehend the answer. It's not a very satisfying conclusion, or even a very helpful one. But maybe it's the only one possible until we see not through a glass darkly, but face-to-face. 

*Note: The drug prescribed for this intense inner heat, as well as other weird neuropathic amusements, is Pregabalin (or Trileptal).

Cewek Kasar

So I'm sitting on my porch this afternoon, and this girl, Chris' girlfriend (Chris the neighbor in this villa), to whom I have never even spoken except to say hi, passes by and says "Is there some reason you gave out the wifi code?"

I am taken by surprise by this sudden eloquence of more than two words, and for me it is a huh, what, who? moment given my speed of comprehension, which is always slow at best. 

"Excuse me?"

She repeats the question. 

"Is there some reason you gave out the wifi code?" 

"I didn't," I say. "I mean, I don't remember doing so." 

At this point, as I attempt mentally to determine just what she's talking about, the girl huffs and walks away. 

And so, taken aback by the rudeness of this stranger, I'm turning the thing over in my mind. She must, of course, be talking about the wifi code for the villa, and I do remember, come to think of it, Chris obsessing about this in the past. I know that I gave the code to my wife, who has only visited perhaps three times in the past four months, and I know that my little buddy Viana tried to copy it once over my shoulder, but got it wrong. But I haven't seen Viana in weeks now. So she must be talking about the little boys, the bocah nakal, who play out in the parking bay. They must be using the wifi. But I don't even know these boys or where they come from and they've certainly never asked me for the code, so I have no idea where they got it (if they have it). As a matter of fact, I don't know the code myself anymore, and I'm sunk if I should ever need to input it again.

But there's something really irritating, isn't there, about a person who accuses you of something and then walks away before the matter can be discussed. And there is something very unsettling about coming upon a rude Indonesian, as these folks are, 99 percent of the time, uncommonly pleasant and gracious.  

Bocah Nakal!

I was surprised this morning by the appearance of the maid at my place--not that she jumped out of closet and shrieked "Surprise" or anything, but because I was 100 percent certain that this was Friday rather than Saturday.  She, of course, assured me, somewhat apologetically, that I was 100 percent wrong and that this was in fact Saturday, her usual day to come for the weekly cleaning. So I had to pack up and get out of the way quickly, although I had not anticipated dragging myself out today, given the oppressive headache, nausea, and fatigue I've been suffering. But Oh well. Maybe it's good that I got forced out, rather than spend another day of contemplating how rotten I feel. I could have gone back to the communal patio in the rear of the villa, but that's kind of boring, so I've gone out for coffee instead (which, technically, I'm not supposed to have because of its irritating effects on the gastritis situation). But hell, I've never been one to deny myself of simple comforts for very long, gastritis be damned. 

So, taking myself and my laptop case out to our little parking bay, I found the usual gang of boys at play. I had yelled at them last night because they were bucking up and down on my motorbike as if it were a broncing bucko. I don't mind if they sit on the bike, which seems a fairly common thing here with any parked bike, but of course I don't want them wearing out the shocks on the thing. 

"Hey!" I  shouted, "Jangan! Jangan main kuda dengan motor saya!" (Don't play horsey on my bike). 

"Oh, sorry, sorry, Mister."

This morning, they're back on the bike, but at least they're not playing rodeo horse. So far. And I tell them again not to do so. 

"Okay, okay, Mister, we  not."

Just then another friend of theirs showed up on his own motorbike. Or someone's. The boy is about the size of a 7-year-old, comically dwarfed by the vehicle. I asked how old he is and he tells me he's 12. 

Hard to believe. Poor boy must be undernourished. 

Well, I myself am undernourished, because all I've been eating, twice a day, is a boiled egg on toast. According to my research, anything and everything else makes the gastritis worse. Then again, it doesn't seem to be getting any better with this starvation diet, despite the medicines. What's a fella to do? 

Second Visit With Wibawa

Follow-up visit with the man of few words, Dr. Wibawa, was not as momentous as I thought it might be. This is good, I suppose, in the sense that nothing as portentious as I had expected might be present was found. On blood exams and endoscopy and biopsy, there was nothing earth-shaking. I myself was pretty sure that a Helicobacter pylori infection would be discovered, but not so. On the other hand, I am still sick after a week or the medications he prescribed on the previous visit, with no end in sight. One hopes that something critical, a causation that had heretofore escaped notice, would be identified--an Ah ha! moment when the critical element behind the illness is at last unmasked, exposed, such that it may be specifically targeted. There was no such moment. The doctor merely prescribed more of the medicine he had prescribed last week. 

Again, as on the last visit, Dr. Wibawa seemed quietly aloof, almost disinterested, except when it came to the mysterious whereabouts of the endoscopy report. 

"Can I see the endoscopy?" he said, holding out his hand without looking up from his papers. 

"What? Endoscopy? I don't have it."

He looks up, brow furrowed, as if he had misunderstood me. 

"Who has it?" 

"Why, you have it!" 

He holds out both hands, palms up, glances about the desktop illustratively. 

A long discussion ensues about where the endoscopy could possibly be, my own sense of clarity mitigated by a westerner's automatic faith that the doctor is in control, that he has the records, the paperwork, the computer files, all the pertinent documents that have been collected. 

In Indonesia, this is not so, and after eight years here I should know that. I do know it. Still, fifty-five years in America has acclimated me to a system and practice that actually works. I'm thinking, My God, doesn't he have all this documentation on the computer right in front of him? Or doesn't he at least have a paper copy in the office or in some clerical filing system up front? But wait, this is not his office per se. It is an office, to be sure, but likely serves as such for any number of people during various hours of the day and night. And what sort of clerical filing room can I be imagining when the entire building is about the size of a studio apartment, and the only thing behind the front desk is a wall? 

I have no recollection of having been given the endoscopy report, and therefore I am certain that I do not have it. It is only later, on the way home, that I remember that there are many things about which I have no recollection. I begin to wonder whether I have the report after all? Could it be? 

Well, yes, it could, and is. At home, I find the endoscopy report and images in a closet I don't remember putting it in. Kind of embarrassing, actually--but, sadly, par for the course. 

Following the kerfuffle regarding the endoscopy report, Dr. Wibawa performes the perfunctory exam--listening to bowel sounds with a stethoscope, tapping out a little drumbeat on my stomach with two fingers--and we're back to the desk, where he scribbles several prescriptions, and then I'm out of there. Anti-climax. 

Well, I'll take the medicines, try to watch my diet, continue to avoid coffee as much as possible, continue at failing to stop smoking, and likely see the doctor again whenever the medicines run out.

Next time, I'll remember to bring my endoscopy. Maybe.