One last birth post

Things I didn't do (or won't be doing):

...eating seaweed soup for 30 days. I don't care how nutritional it is. It's slimy and gross. I eat occasional pieces of seaweed in other soups and dried seaweed on sushi rolls. Good enough.

...waiting several weeks after giving birth to bathe. According to one explanation from a Korean friend, after giving birth a woman's joints are disconnected and bathing could therefore be harmful. What???? Yes, her English is excellent, the communication issue is all cultural.

...waiting 21 days before anyone outside my immediate family can see the baby. My Korean mommy friend had a hard time understanding that I was inviting her over to see my 4-day-old baby. She did call to let me know she had her baby and was home from the hospital, but she didn't invite me over. (Oh, well.) She went to her parents' house in another city and won't be back until after the 21 days.

...waiting 100 days before leaving the house with baby. Seriously, I would have to be committed. Apparently, that's changed recently, but most women still don't leave the home for the first month. So I told Matthew to round up when people ask how old Rowan is. At three weeks, he was PRACTICALLY a month old.

...wearing shapeless tops that zip across the chest. That is the breast-feeding wear here. Most items also seem to be decorated with cutesy cartoon characters. Layering a tank top under my normal shirt works just fine, thanks.

Magical Mystery Card

My magical card, which was issued to "Cather," along with a somewhat explanatory note written by my doctor.

Sometimes, living in Korea is like a puzzle. I receive one piece after another, until I'm finally able to understand something.

At my 36 week appointment, my doctor gave me a "prescription." It was a form that he had signed, which he told me I should take to the bank. He explained that the bank would give me a card I could use to pay for prenatal appointments. The total value of the card is W200,000 and W40,000 can be used towards each appointment. He wrote down a few things in Korean and told me to ask a Korean friend about it.

I asked one of Matthew's co-workers, the same woman who graciously translated my birth plan. She hadn't heard of the program, but translated the form for me, then did an internet search and got back to me with what she'd found. Her understanding was that it was only good for prenatal care. As I'd assumed, it's another government-funded program to help raise the very low birth rate. Also, she told me that it would take a week after I turned in my form for the card to be issued.

I took the form to NongHyup bank where we have our accounts. The teller who always helps me placed a phone call, since no one there seemed to know anything about it. She told me I needed to go to Kookmin Bank (KB) downtown. The KB teller seemed familiar with the program and told me I needed to open an account there to have a card issued. After filling out multiple forms, she said my card would arrive in one week. Later that afternoon, she called to tell me that she forgot to have me sign a form and needed me to come back in. I took care of that two days later. My card arrived the very next day via courier.

In the meantime, I visited my pregnant Korean friend. She already had her card, even though her due date was two weeks after mine. This irritated me, because we have the same doctor AND he had given me the form at the same appointment when he'd run several (relatively) expensive, and in my opinion unnecessary, tests. I figured that he'd forgotten to give it to me when he was supposed to and cost me an extra W40,000. My friend did say that the card could be used for 15 days after giving birth. She planned to swipe her card each day at the hospital until it was used up.

I was able to use W20,000 for my 38 week appointment the week before Christmas, then had Matthew swipe the card the two days I was in the hospital, which took W80,000 off my bill (bringing the total bill to about $200). I also used it for my one-week postpartum appointment, but that was less than W3,000. It was at that last appointment that I noticed a poster on the wall. I recognized my lovely pink card and saw the date at the top: December 15, 2008. It's a brand new program, which explains why the doctor didn't give it to me earlier.

Bring on the national health care!

One of the things that South Korea does well is national health care -- at least in my experience. Matthew pays 2.2% of his paycheck, his employer matches that, and all three of us have coverage.

Here is my standard OB/GYN visit:
I walk in (no appointment necessary) and hand my little pregnancy booklet to a nurse at the front counter. She gives me a little strip on which to urinate (testing for excess protein in my urine). After I get back from the restroom, I check my own blood pressure on the automatic machine, then weigh myself. The nurse records both.
I take a seat. After about 10 minutes (20 on a busy day), the ultrasound technician calls me in to her room. She checks out the baby's vitals and measurements. About half the time she prints out a picture for me.
I return to the waiting area. After another 5-10 minutes, I'm called into the doctor's office. We discuss any test results, symptoms, etc.
Finally, I return to the front counter to pay. My usual bill is W20,000, which used to be about $20 before the exchange rate went to hell. Currently, it's closer to $14. My most expensive visits, with various blood and urine tests, have been W60,000.

That's impressive, but the truly impressive part is yet to come.

Liam is sick. He has a bad cough and now a slight ear infection. There's a pediatrician's office in the same building as my OB/GYN. We've now taken him in three times, as the doctor wants to check his recovery frequently.

Here's Liam's visit:
Parent gives child's insurance booklet to counter nurse. Another nurse is simultaneously checking his temperature via an instant ear thermometer while he plays on the slide or rocking horse in the waiting area. Within 5 minutes, parent and child are ushered into the doctor's office. While Liam screams and (at least when accompanied by me) pulls parent's hair, the doctor and nurse work together to listen to his lungs and heart, check his throat and ears. The doctor then gives directions to the parent (or the other parent if both are there and Liam is still screaming in first parent's ear). The bill and prescription are all on the same paper. Today we were in and out in about 10 minutes total.

Total cost per visit: W1,800 to 2,800 per visit. Yup, that's about $2.00.

We take the prescription to the pharmacy across the street from our apartment building. (There is an on-site pharmacy, but we like our local pharmacist and prefer to give her our business.) She gives us the medicine in small bottles (just the right amount for the two or three days until the next doctor's visit) labeled with the amounts and times per day to be administered. She also throws in free vitamin C tablets.

Total cost for 2-3 days worth of medicine: about W3,000. That's the same price I paid for a little toy train at the discount shop down the street after Liam's second doctor visit.

I will point out that something like 92% of medical facilities in South Korea are privately owned. It's a very different system than many countries with universal health care. But it certainly seems to work, at least from my vantage point.

Note to self: stop falling down

Some women get clutzier when they're pregnant. I guess I'm naturally clutzy enough that I can't get any worse. I never tripped or fell when I was pregnant with Liam. I blame Liam completely for the fact that I've now fallen twice, in public, in the past month.

The first time, I was walking with Liam on a rainy, dismal day. I remember that it was the day of my friend Aubrey's birthday party and we were returning from the stationary shop where I'd gotten a card and ribbon for her gift. We'd also picked up Liam's favorite little fish-shaped, custard-filled (shuga-cream in Konglish) breads. Liam was tired, which he proved after we got home by throwing a stupid fit (over the fish bread) and then falling asleep on my lap. So, on the way home, he wanted me to carry him, something I've been doing less and less lately. Because of the toddler perched on my protruding belly, I couldn't see the curb very well, came down on my ankle wrong, and fell, dropping my child and the bag with the fish bread.

Why is this worth blogging about? Because there was an older woman walking by who saw the whole thing, saw that I was obviously pregnant, saw that I dropped my child who was then crying, and did NOTHING. She was not feeble-old or helpless-old, just grandmotherly. She didn't even ask if I was okay. She just stared at me for a moment and then kept walking, before I was even collected and off the ground.

Yes, I added this to my "list of slights," an imaginary list that I invented once in conversation with my friend Jen. I'm taking back what I previously said about old people in Korea being extremely courteous. Apparently that only applies when others are around to see them being nice to the foreigners.

This past week, I was walking down the sloped sidewalk in front of my apartment with Liam. He was holding my hand and started running, then fell down. He somehow took me down with him. So there we were, sprawled on the sidewalk, checking out our scrapes, and I looked up. A girl was standing at the end of the sidewalk just staring at us. In Korean, I said to her, "What? What are you looking at? Go!" Then in English, "What are you looking at? Foreigners fall down, too." She looked surprised and walked away. (She might have been surprised because I yelled at her. She might have been surprised because I spoke Korean. Or she might have been surprised because I said, "Mul ba?" which is the way gangsters in Korean movies ask "What are you looking at?")

I know that I'm a cranky pregnant woman. I understand that's just the way Koreans are in general, and specifically around foreigners who don't really fit into the social strata. That doesn't stop me from getting very, very, very irritated. So obviously, I just need to stop falling down. That will solve the problem. (And I still say it's all Liam's fault.)