A Crazy Last Day In Paris

What more could a girl ask for on her last day in Paris than a thrilling ambulance ride (well, it wasn’t actually an ambulance, but it was just like the ambulances we have in Canada, sirens blaring and all) with firemen to the hospital?  While some of my girlfriends would love to be carried away by French firemen, I could have done without the ambulance ride, but it was definitely a unique experience!

Before you panick, don’t worry, there’s nothing wrong with me!  (And if you didn’t panick, what kind of friend are you? Just kidding J)  A combination of not enough sleep, eating something bad at lunch (I’m blaming the raw mushrooms in my salad), and getting overly warm on the metro when we got stuck in a tunnel for a while caused me to momentarily black out when we got off the metro.  I don’t know what it was – I just started to feel overwhelmed with nausea, then I felt all hot and sweaty and started seeing white spots and next thing I know it all went black! Thankfully Paul and Armel were right beside me and helped me over to a bench.  Once I sat down, I started to feel better, but as a precaution, Armel thought we should press the S.O.S. button in the metro station and get someone to come check me out.

When the station attendant showed up, she said she couldn’t let me go without getting the firemen (who apparently do everything here) to come check me out and maybe take me to a hospital.  I really didn’t want to go to the hospital because I felt fine, but Paul and Armel said I should go get checked out since we’re off to Germany tomorrow and it won’t be as easy to go to a hospital there (we don’t speak the language) if something is wrong.  So, after a bit of persuasion, I agreed to go with the firemen, who brought me to the ambulance-type vehicle and checked my blood pressure and pulse.  They said everything seemed normal, but because I had almost fainted, they wanted me to go the hospital to do some tests, so off we went.

The hospital ended up being a total waste of time because we waited around for almost 3 hours for someone to come collect blood from me to run some tests, and we ended up leaving without the test since it was taking so long (luckily they didn’t ask me to pay for anything!).  When we first got there, they checked all my vitals and everything seemed fine, and then they stuck me in a room to wait for someone to come run the other tests.  After a while, Armel asked a nurse how long it would be and how long it would take to get the results back, and we realized we’d be there all night if I was going to get these tests done!  I felt totally fine, apart from being tired with a bit of a tummy ache, so we decided to leave and headed to Armel’s parent’s house to rest for a while. 

After a long nap on the couch, I felt completely normal and we went back to chinatown to eat at Armel’s favourite restaurant, Chez Alex Africain Malaysien.  They specialize in a roasted chicken, served with deep fried bananas, white rice, and two types of sauce – one white and one red.  We don’t know what the sauces are made of, but the white one tasted like asparagus and the red one was a bit sweet – it didn’t matter though, both were delicious and we loaded our rice with sauce!  The entire meal was really really good, but I held back from eating too much in case it made my stomach hurt again.

Apart from being a really good tour guide, Armel was a lifesaver today because there was no way I could have gotten by without him as my translator!  Thank God the only time I’ve gotten sick so far this trip is with a friend who can help out with the language barrier – it’s really different to go to the hospital when you can’t explain how your feeling or what’s wrong!  Now let’s just hope this is a one time thing and I don’t get sick again