 |
| Angelika/Mike Schilli |
|
Making an appointment was not easy at all, as the person who answered the phone spoke hardly any English, a very common phenomenon in Chinatown. However, I eventually managed to snag one. Now, you shouldn't imagine the whole thing as a doctor's office. Quite the opposite, the specialist sat at a desk in the back of the herbal shop. In front of her desk were a few chairs for those waiting, meaning everyone could hear everything, including customers standing at the counter buying something. When I entered the shop, it seemed like I traveled from San Francisco to China at light speed. The shop was filled with Chinese customers, and snippets of Chinese words were flying around me. Being in an environment where you suddenly find yourself in the minority is an extremely interesting experience. Although everyone was very friendly to me, I felt a bit out of place because I didn't understand anything.
Eventually, I reached the herbal specialist and described my symptoms to her. She asked me a few questions and quickly wrote Chinese characters down on a piece of paper. I turned pale with envy, as we were just struggling through our first Chinese characters in our third Japanese course. Then she measured my pulse, looked at my tongue, and handed the note to her colleague standing behind the counter. He then opened all sorts of drawers, weighed herbs on an old-fashioned scale, and distributed everything into five brown bags. I paid 32 dollars (5 dollars for each bag of herbs and 7 dollars for the consultation) and left. At home, I first took a good look at the herbal rarities in peace. There were things I had never seen in my life. I then made a tea from the whole thing by mixing the herbs with four cups of water and boiling it for about an hour. Of course, I also had to drink the tea. It didn't even taste that bad. Unfortunately, my throat is still bothering me, but the experience was definitely worth the visit to the herbal specialist.
){kind=link}