A Visit to the Hospital

This morning, I did what I could - unfortunately for me, the folder with all of my files was unavailable due to a network error! I was so relieved to find that once the network was back up that I would have all of my files. Phew.

I had to deal with some upset people who could now not receive their Naldo Bescheinigungen (student confirmation) until Monday, but after six years in the restaurant industry, that was no problem.

Because of the computer problems, I decided to take my afternoon off from the office. During this time, I relaxed and waited for some Kettering students to arrive. Two guys knocked on my door a little later than expected, but they had made it.

I got them settled in their new room and helped them figure out where a few key places were. I also gave them some advice about living in Reutlingen. I ended up slightly chatting their ears off, but I hope they got something useful from all that I had spouted off at them. :)

Once that task was done, I went with Joe, Alejandro, and Julia to visit poor Chris in the hospital. He had surgery on his arm that morning to put some screws in, and he was going to have to stay at least one night in the hospital. We arrived kind of late, about 9 p.m., and we were slightly worried that we wouldn't be allowed in because it was past visiting hours. What are German visiting hours, you may ask? We may never know.

When we arrived at the hospital, about a 15 minute walk from the Stadtmitte bus stop, we were unsure where exactly to enter. We ended up following a woman who pressed a button and was admitted through a side door into the hospital. My plan was to just walk in like we knew what we were doing and head straight to Stock 6, Zimmer 6 (floor 6, room 6), but Joe and Julia held back, and Alejandro crept in like he was robbing a bank. After receiving a weird look from a receptionist behind a glass wall, I simply stated that we were here to visit our friend on floor 6, room 6 (in Deutsch, of course) and she pointed us in the right direction. We were in!

We wandered, and had we been following Alejandro, we would have been lost for forever. I, luckily, had just enough information from Chris to figure out the wing he was in, as well as figure out where the sixth floor was. It seems easy, but when half of the hospital does not have a sixth or seventh floor, you have to do some searching.

The strange thing about this hospital was the lack of people. On our walk around the hospital, we did not see one other person on our journey - no nurses, no janitors, no family members of patients. There was nothing and no one! The silence was unnatural and strange.

Alas, despite our troubles finding the floor and the room, we found Chris! I peeked my head in and he headed out to meet us so we wouldn't disturb his roommate, Robbie. Robbie, apparently, fell off of a roof and shattered his foot. Yikes.

We went into this nice lounge area and hung out with Chris for a while. He looked exhausted, but it looked like he was glad for some English-speaking company. Joe brought Chris some chocolate, his phone charger, and Chris' newly-arrived Harry Potter book in German.

We left after about an hour and headed back downtown. We stopped at a Chinese noodle shop, which sold inexpensive and delicious noodles with fried pieces of chicken. Julia, Joe, and I ended up relaxing in a lounge once we got home. It was decided that, after we had gotten a good night's rest, we would make some pancakes in the morning. Not crepes, but real, thick American pancakes. I am excited. :)