Wednesday, December 31, 2003
Agitato
I went down to Specialists’ Shopping Centre for the walk-in-interview for the job at John Little’s Warehouse Sale. The sale is to be on from 15-18 January at the Singapore Expo, and John Little is contracting people for the job.
According to the newspaper article, the interview starts at 10am. However, given the kiasu mentality of people, it’s better to be there early. Anyway queuing is a national sport; what better than to spend a fine Tuesday morning engaged in a healthy activity?
So I arrived there 9:30am with my mother who had to accompany me because of the dental appointment in the afternoon. There was already a queue that snaked an L-shape around the corner leading to the John Little office. I only tolerated riding an SBS Transit bus only because I got a new CD/MP3/VCD player, which shut out the irritating TV Mobile that always irritates commuters but the top people at SBS don’t seem to realise because they have their own cars and don’t have to suffer like us poor souls, who also need to pay more money every time to ride public transport. I had Sibelius’ Symphony No. 2 (managed to listen to the first two movements on the bus) to accompany me on my trip.
At 10am they divided us into two groups: the adults went into another line: my contemporaries and I were brought into a seminar room, where we were quickly briefed and asked to choose the positions that we wanted to take up. Then we went to sign up. I was called back for an orientation session on Friday, 2pm, same place.
Half an hour and it was finished. But there was a horrifically long queue outside after that: the line ran all the way to the lifts and the car park. I think people were still joining the queue at the ground floor.
Since I was finished early, we decided to rush down to the National Dental Centre for my appointment. I got my appointment time with Dr Tang wrong and we rushed there like mad, running up the hill to the building with my mother panting away. There was a delay again at the lobby where we had to sign the SARS form and wait for the counter staff to verify… then it’s another mad rush to the lift and to the fourth floor clinic. The only goal was to arrive there before the appointment time and ask Dr Tang if it were okay to see her then. I took out the card, flipped it open… 11:30am.
So we were 25 minutes early.
Better early than never
Today Dr Tang took out the rubber separators; one of them had broken, possibly because I gnawed on it too much yesterday. In replacement metal rings were slipped in on the lower teeth. It was much more painful, because the rubber separators had been more flexible. Now the metal compressed onto the tooth and squeezed the life out of it. I asked, “Is wearing braces like that?” “Every tooth will feel like that.” Terrible!
I was to go for lunch before the tooth extraction, otherwise my whole mouth would be so bloody that I couldn’t possible eat anything. We went to Chinatown for pork porridge. The porridge was easy to eat; first time I ever ate it without chewing, but it slid down my throat like the flume ride at the theme park. The pork was harder to chew: my teeth were sore from the pressure exerted by the metal rings against the tooth. Mince pork was easier to handle, but provided a metallic taste… it just didn’t look like mince pork.
Lunch over, I hurried back to the NDC to brush my teeth before the extraction. My mother was fussing about me like a kid… asking me if I was ready for it… terribly disgusting… thanks very much, the doctor reiterated, “Oh, don’t worry, he’s a brave boy.” I’m eighteen going on nineteen, not seven going on eight.
“Okay, there’s four jabs. I’m going to inject into the gums…” In the needle went… “I need you to concentrate on your breathing…” I breathed in, breathed out… very quickly… “Good! Good! Keep it up…” I threw the feeling of pain out of my mind.
“Now, the second jab is going to more painful, but very, very quickly.” In the needle went. A flame shot into my brain. Then it was finished.
The doctor massaged my gum area to let the anaesthesia flow through. There was a bitter sensation. “Doc… it feels bitter…” “Yes it does; you can wash it later.” He let me wash.
“Now, I’m going to pull your teeth now. You’ll feel pressure, not pain.” I nodded, too excited and nervous to speak.
Then there was this hard, yanking sensation. My tooth was being tugged at with a lot of force. My head was tossed left, right, left, right… then the doctor held up a bloodied fang… “There, it’s out.”
I was shocked to see my tooth.
He finished off with the lower tooth. Finally it was over.
“You want to keep your tooth?” a nurse asked me. I nodded my approval.
The part of the mouth where the drug had bee injected felt puffy and light, as if someone inflated it with a pump. The doctor asked me to wash; the water was infused with blood. He stuffed a piece of gauze over the wound to absorb the blood was trickling like a fountain. “Change the gauze every thirty minutes” was the instruction as he handed me two packets of gauze. The nurse gave me my two extracted tooth, in a plastic bag.
I was regretfully gung-ho enough to still go shopping; we were going to Sim Lim Square, and I needed a new pair of earphones for my player. It was terribly difficult walking around with a piece of gauze in the mouth. I couldn’t talk properly: I handed a few incomprehensible murmurs that only I could understand because I was the one who thought up the words anyway.
At Sim Lim I changed the first gauze. It was so saturated that when I squeezed it blood actually dripped. Twice the blood accumulated in my mouth and threatened to spill over the lips and onto the floor. The problem was I couldn’t tell when the blood spilt because the affected part of my mouth was neutralised by the anaesthesia. Anyway I was happy acquiring a pair of Koss earphones, which I listened to Shostakovich’s Fifth Symphony with great glee while my parents shopped at OG and the great praise of communism effectively wiped out the Chinese New Year muzak. So much for Sino-Soviet splits.
When I got home I went straight to bed. It was too antagonising having to compose with blood dripping onto the computer. Woke up for a quick dinner of white rice porridge with marmite; the only thing I could handle then with my teeth effectively out of action. I slept quite fitfully that night.
Next morning I found a pool of blood on my pillow and that part of the mattress where my head lay upon.
And if that’s not grotesque enough, tune in to the Addams family. ¶ 12/31/2003 03:07:00 pm
I went down to Specialists’ Shopping Centre for the walk-in-interview for the job at John Little’s Warehouse Sale. The sale is to be on from 15-18 January at the Singapore Expo, and John Little is contracting people for the job.
According to the newspaper article, the interview starts at 10am. However, given the kiasu mentality of people, it’s better to be there early. Anyway queuing is a national sport; what better than to spend a fine Tuesday morning engaged in a healthy activity?
So I arrived there 9:30am with my mother who had to accompany me because of the dental appointment in the afternoon. There was already a queue that snaked an L-shape around the corner leading to the John Little office. I only tolerated riding an SBS Transit bus only because I got a new CD/MP3/VCD player, which shut out the irritating TV Mobile that always irritates commuters but the top people at SBS don’t seem to realise because they have their own cars and don’t have to suffer like us poor souls, who also need to pay more money every time to ride public transport. I had Sibelius’ Symphony No. 2 (managed to listen to the first two movements on the bus) to accompany me on my trip.
At 10am they divided us into two groups: the adults went into another line: my contemporaries and I were brought into a seminar room, where we were quickly briefed and asked to choose the positions that we wanted to take up. Then we went to sign up. I was called back for an orientation session on Friday, 2pm, same place.
Half an hour and it was finished. But there was a horrifically long queue outside after that: the line ran all the way to the lifts and the car park. I think people were still joining the queue at the ground floor.
Since I was finished early, we decided to rush down to the National Dental Centre for my appointment. I got my appointment time with Dr Tang wrong and we rushed there like mad, running up the hill to the building with my mother panting away. There was a delay again at the lobby where we had to sign the SARS form and wait for the counter staff to verify… then it’s another mad rush to the lift and to the fourth floor clinic. The only goal was to arrive there before the appointment time and ask Dr Tang if it were okay to see her then. I took out the card, flipped it open… 11:30am.
So we were 25 minutes early.
Better early than never
Today Dr Tang took out the rubber separators; one of them had broken, possibly because I gnawed on it too much yesterday. In replacement metal rings were slipped in on the lower teeth. It was much more painful, because the rubber separators had been more flexible. Now the metal compressed onto the tooth and squeezed the life out of it. I asked, “Is wearing braces like that?” “Every tooth will feel like that.” Terrible!
I was to go for lunch before the tooth extraction, otherwise my whole mouth would be so bloody that I couldn’t possible eat anything. We went to Chinatown for pork porridge. The porridge was easy to eat; first time I ever ate it without chewing, but it slid down my throat like the flume ride at the theme park. The pork was harder to chew: my teeth were sore from the pressure exerted by the metal rings against the tooth. Mince pork was easier to handle, but provided a metallic taste… it just didn’t look like mince pork.
Lunch over, I hurried back to the NDC to brush my teeth before the extraction. My mother was fussing about me like a kid… asking me if I was ready for it… terribly disgusting… thanks very much, the doctor reiterated, “Oh, don’t worry, he’s a brave boy.” I’m eighteen going on nineteen, not seven going on eight.
“Okay, there’s four jabs. I’m going to inject into the gums…” In the needle went… “I need you to concentrate on your breathing…” I breathed in, breathed out… very quickly… “Good! Good! Keep it up…” I threw the feeling of pain out of my mind.
“Now, the second jab is going to more painful, but very, very quickly.” In the needle went. A flame shot into my brain. Then it was finished.
The doctor massaged my gum area to let the anaesthesia flow through. There was a bitter sensation. “Doc… it feels bitter…” “Yes it does; you can wash it later.” He let me wash.
“Now, I’m going to pull your teeth now. You’ll feel pressure, not pain.” I nodded, too excited and nervous to speak.
Then there was this hard, yanking sensation. My tooth was being tugged at with a lot of force. My head was tossed left, right, left, right… then the doctor held up a bloodied fang… “There, it’s out.”
I was shocked to see my tooth.
He finished off with the lower tooth. Finally it was over.
“You want to keep your tooth?” a nurse asked me. I nodded my approval.
The part of the mouth where the drug had bee injected felt puffy and light, as if someone inflated it with a pump. The doctor asked me to wash; the water was infused with blood. He stuffed a piece of gauze over the wound to absorb the blood was trickling like a fountain. “Change the gauze every thirty minutes” was the instruction as he handed me two packets of gauze. The nurse gave me my two extracted tooth, in a plastic bag.
I was regretfully gung-ho enough to still go shopping; we were going to Sim Lim Square, and I needed a new pair of earphones for my player. It was terribly difficult walking around with a piece of gauze in the mouth. I couldn’t talk properly: I handed a few incomprehensible murmurs that only I could understand because I was the one who thought up the words anyway.
At Sim Lim I changed the first gauze. It was so saturated that when I squeezed it blood actually dripped. Twice the blood accumulated in my mouth and threatened to spill over the lips and onto the floor. The problem was I couldn’t tell when the blood spilt because the affected part of my mouth was neutralised by the anaesthesia. Anyway I was happy acquiring a pair of Koss earphones, which I listened to Shostakovich’s Fifth Symphony with great glee while my parents shopped at OG and the great praise of communism effectively wiped out the Chinese New Year muzak. So much for Sino-Soviet splits.
When I got home I went straight to bed. It was too antagonising having to compose with blood dripping onto the computer. Woke up for a quick dinner of white rice porridge with marmite; the only thing I could handle then with my teeth effectively out of action. I slept quite fitfully that night.
Next morning I found a pool of blood on my pillow and that part of the mattress where my head lay upon.
And if that’s not grotesque enough, tune in to the Addams family. ¶ 12/31/2003 03:07:00 pm
