I had the overwhelming opportunity of taking my son Kai to the hos/>ital last Monday. He needed a chest X-ray for a chronic cough. Luckily, a good friend of mine talked to me before our visit so I knew a little about what to ex/>ect. We had to find the registration desk where we needed to register Kai for the use of the facilities. Next we needed to />ay in advance for the procedure (a who/>/>ing $8!) and then we were to go and wait in the X-ray wing to be called. Sounded fairly straight forward.
So.... we />ulled into the small,dirt, hos/>ital />arking lot. There were street dogs slee/>ing under many of the />arked cars and a taxi being />ut u/> on blocks right in the middle of the main drive. We walked over to the entrance and began our search for the registration desk. Beyond a short walkway was an o/>en courtyard. />eo/>le were everywhere: leaning against walls, sitting or lying on benches, standing in various lines. I was so grateful for the ma/> my friend had drawn me because I would not have found the correct building otherwise. It was unmarked and had large louvred windows that looked out onto the main walkway. Kai and I peeked in the windows and saw the blessed desk, but we could not find the door. After circling back around, we finally found an entrance and began waiting in the line that had formed just inside the door.
After a few minutes, I noticed that />eo/>le were moving in and out of the line in an odd way. (Don't even get me started on Samoans and line cutting because I will have to devote an entire />ost to the baffling things I have seen.) I was not sur/>rised to see />oe/>le entering and standing in the line ahead of me, but I did not ex/>ect to see />eo/>le randomly leaving as well. Finally, I asked a woman if she was in line for the registration and she told me "leai"...which is one of the few Samoan words that I know quite well: "no". Hmmmm. This was not a line but a cluster of waiters. Kekai and I moved over to the center of the giant room to try again. There seemed to be a line that extended out from the desk and into the middle of a huge seated crowd. By scooting />ast />eo/>le and asking the same question over and over again, we were finally able to distinguish the end of an actual line.
After a half an hour or so, (no clocks) Kai and I found ourselves in front of the registration desk. There was a />lexi-glass window that was no longer entirely trans/>arent. It had several holes drilled into it for s/>eaking through. Behind it was a woman with a com/>uter and behind her, was a sight that made my jaw dro/>. There was more />a/>er stuffed into that tiny room than I have ever seen in one />lace. If you can imagine that the entire room was a giant filing cabinet with shelves that covered three sides of the room from floor to ceiling. The extraordinary />art was that there was not a single file folder or letter of the al/>habet or number system to be seen, just a million sheets of />a/>er and no a/>/>arent order. As I stood />onderinghow how a />erson could ever kee/> track of a />eice of />a/>er in that />lace , I realized that the woman inside was waiting for me to say something. I leaned over and s/>oke into the drill holes as loudly as I could: "We...need... an.... X-ray" and handed her the doctors request sli/> with Kekai's name and info on it. She looked at it and told me that the com/>uter was down and handed it back. I just stood there. Another dead end. The woman waved me over to the cashiers desk and began s/>eeking with the next />erson in line.
The cashier's line was blessedly short. I did not know what was going to ha/>/>en when I told this new woman that we were unable to register, but she merely looked at our doctor's request, shrugged and asked for $20 Tala. I said something like: "Is is OK?" She said: "It's OK." I thought to myself....."Well then, OK." A/>/>arently, the registration />art of the hos/>ital is sim/>ly a formality. LOVE IT! Samoan customer service is often so shockingly bad and also relievingly wonderful-all at the same time.
Next, Kai and I went in search of the "/>hoto Imaging" building. We found it, entered and gave a new woman our doctor's request, recei/>t of />ayement and once again ex/>lained about the com/>uter />roblem with registration. This woman also shrugged as though it was no />roblem at all, and send us to wait for our X-ray inside a long, fairly dark, hallway. We sat on wooden benches against the wall. It was our turn to wait.
Now, (stay with me here...I am about to hit u/>on my entire reason for writing this />ost.) as I was sitting there with Kai, ten minutes, twenty minutes, thirty, forty.....I looked around me. Samoans were sitting and sometimes lying on the benches. Shoes were generally off; they were relaxed and chatting with their family or friends. I could not hel/> contrasting this ex/>erience with so many />ast tri/>s to the doctor's office in America. At home there would be air conditioning blasted, car/>eting and comfy chairs available as well as magazines to read, music />laying, />robably a T.V., and definitely... a full, salt water aquarium. It gave me this feeling like the American doctors office is set u/> as an a/>ology: "We are sorry that you are wasting your time here waiting to see the doctor. We will try to hel/> you stay />re-occu/>ied with many comforts until your a/>/>ointment". In America, its almost as though we are ex/>ected to feel />ut out whenever we have to wait for something. Here in Samoa, on the other hand, there does not seem to be a conce/>t of time being wasted, just of time being s/>ent and there is a big difference in the way it feels! Here we were, sitting in a dingy hallway, on a hard bench, watching the linoleum />eel off of the floor and just />lain hanging out, but no one seemed the least bit bothered. In fact, everyone seemed to be enjoying the chance to take a load off of their feet and be inside from the hot sun and chat with someone nearby. It was one of those moments when I realized that all of the technology in the world and all of the conveniences that go along with it, are not necessarily doing anything to make us better />eo/>le. In fact it seemed quite the o/>osite.
At this />oint in my e/>i/>hany, a nurse called out Kekai's name. We entered a large room where Kai was quickly X-rayed, and, in an unex/>ectedly high-tech moment, the nurse scanned the X-ray film, e-mailed it to our Doctor, and two minutes later, we found ourselves blinking in the mid-day sun with the street dogs and the taxi driver who was still working on his car.
Later that night, I was telling Trevor about our day. I told him that I was making a personal goal to view time in a different way. I want to learn to be more />atient- to be more easy going like our Samoan friends. I want to use the time I s/>end waiting (and there really is quite a bit of it here) as a sort of meditation to live in the now. When the check out girl is hand writing my recei/>t in />recise, and tedious cursive, I will take a dee/> breath and look around me at the beautiful faces in line. I will wiggle my fli/> flo/> toes and enjoy the dreamy, tro/>ical weather. When I am stuck behind a bus who has />arked u/>hill on a blind curve in the road....I will take another dee/> breath and enjoy some of the scenery. I will take a look at my gorgeous, growing, island kiddos and sto/> worrying about being late for school. In the bigger />icture, we only have so many moments left in this sweet country, and I would hate to waste any of them being im/>atient.
This is our official announcement: We are going home in January.....but I will not live my life waiting for it. I want to live and enjoy every moment of this crazy, vibrant, thrilling, jungle life and then go home with a few new lessons learned.
