{"id":219,"date":"2010-06-16T16:05:31","date_gmt":"2010-06-16T08:05:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.kerry.net.au\/?p=219"},"modified":"2010-06-18T01:21:50","modified_gmt":"2010-06-17T17:21:50","slug":"a-cup-or","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.kerry.net.au\/?p=219","title":{"rendered":"A Cup or"},"content":{"rendered":"

A Cup or \u2026<\/p>\n

I receive a expat newsletter once a week. The author usually writes about interesting subjects and enhances it with a sense of humour.\u00a0 \u00a0He had a topic about health in Friday\u2019s edition which led to a link about his experience with ba guan or as known in western circles, cupping. http:\/\/www.chinaexpat.com\/blog\/ernie\/2008\/04\/08\/ba-guan-beginners.html<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0He tried it because his body suffered from too much computer use and as I suffer similarly thought it was worthy of some research.\u00a0\u00a0 Seems like is used as a treatment for numerous conditions.\u00a0 \u00a0The idea is that poisons are drawn from inside the body by the effect of the vaccuum created by the glass cup.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0After researching the topic and being briefly distracted by an interesting blog which I stumbled upon, I texted a student asking her to take me where I could receive it.\u00a0 \u00a0It\u2019s always a pain calling or more commonly texting people because it\u2019s usually rest time when I think of it and I have to wait for a window between after the rest and before\u00a0 class.\u00a0\u00a0 She didn\u2019t contact me and I knew she had a class so I wasn\u2019t expecting a call for a couple of hours.\u00a0 \u00a0However, she called saying she had permission to leave class and she and a friend would visit me within minutes.\u00a0\u00a0 Goodness knows what ailment the teacher thought I was suffering from to\u00a0allow such speedy attention.<\/p>\n

\u00a0The teacher had told her to take me to the shiny new hospital associated with the college down the road which we visited about a week before.\u00a0 \u00a0She thought we should try the \u201chospital\u201d she had patronised for a minor ailment and to which I had visited with her.\u00a0 \u00a0It was unable to do the deed so we headed towards the hospital.\u00a0 \u00a0However, in the same block as the college is a Community Health Service Station which she decided to check out.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Someone had taken me there late last year when I was looking for vitamin C tablets so I was familiar with the shop part.\u00a0 \u00a0When we arrived on Saturday staff were cleaning and rearranging the shelves of manufactured medicines.\u00a0 \u00a0As building and interior\u00a0\u00a0cleanliness is not an outstanding feature of China I was encouraged.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>\u00a0<\/p>\n

This photo was taken during my quest for Vitamin C tablets.\u00a0 The draws contain ingredients for prescriptions.\u00a0 The picture shows 3 sets of scales.\u00a0 The doctor was busy collecting ingredients for a prescription and placing them in the plastic bags.\u00a0 The shelves containing manufactured medicines are to te left and in front of this picture.\u00a0 The shiny cannister on the desk is a container for tea.\u00a0 The better ones are insulated and have a section for storing and straining teas leaves.<\/p>\n

The centre provided cupping so we waited for someone to prepare and hand her a pair of forceps and tell us to go upstairs.<\/p>\n

Upstairs among other nooks and crannies were 3 small rooms on each side of a central corridor.\u00a0\u00a0 They were separated by walls about 6 foot tall with the doorway covered by a cloth from about 6 to 4 foot from the ground.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\"\"<\/a> Each room contained 2 wooden beds.\u00a0\u00a0 We were the only ones there apart from staff so we chose a room with a view, not that I got to see it as I was stretched out on the bed with my back uppermost.\u00a0\u00a0 A doctor appeared with a plastic bag clanking with glass bottles.\u00a0\u00a0 She applied some oil to my back & rubbed a \u201ccup\u201d along it a bit.\u00a0 \u00a0After a short time she lit the gauze on the forceps and used it to draw air from the glass cup & applied it to my back.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 This continued till she\u2019d decided she\u2019d done enough.\u00a0\u00a0 I asked for my legs to be done too as I have many knots in them.\u00a0\u00a0 I was told it was incredibly painful but I insisted so I ended up with 3 on my lower legs.\u00a0\u00a0 This photo shows those about to be applied to my back on my third visit.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\"\"<\/a><\/a>It didn\u2019t hurt a bit.\u00a0\u00a0 I had about a dozen bottles applied and hopefully sucking\u00a0 poisons from the inner recesses\u00a0of my body.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I then got to lie covered up for 10 minutes.\u00a0\u00a0 Afterwards\u00a0the\u00a0doctor\u00a0 returned, removed the cups, cleaned off the oil and we were ready to go again.\u00a0\u00a0 All quick and simple and I did feel a bit more flexible afterwards.\u00a0\u00a0 I did have some marks but nothing as substantial as those shown in the article.\u00a0\u00a0 It cost me 10 yuan so it was very inexpensive.\u00a0 \u00a0I was told it would be beneficial if I returned the next day for another treatment although the normal period between treatments is 5 days.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0As we were about to leave 2 people appeared in the room across the corridor and one of the doctors prepared to insert an intravenous infusion.\u00a0 \u00a0It seems to be panacea for just about every ailment, including colds.\u00a0 \u00a0It don\u2019t understand the connection between Traditional Chinese Medicine and such an invasive technique.\u00a0 \u00a0I read somewhere it is a nice money spinner too.\u00a0\u00a0 Never found anyone I can discuss it with or more correctly thought of it when I\u2019m talking with anyone whose English is adequate.\u00a0\u00a0 There was a box of used tubing sitting on the floor in the corridor.\u00a0\u00a0 It was even fuller when I returned the next day.<\/p>\n

\u00a0I returned the following day without my entourage. More beds were full so I missed out on the room with a view.\u00a0 \u00a0I also missed out on the oil.\u00a0 \u00a0The cups were applied with another doctor checking vacuum. Somehow one cup went flying and ended up in shards on the floor.\u00a0\u00a0 It was swept up quickly, but from my bird\u2019s eye view with my head hanging over the end of the bed I got to tell the staff 3 times of bits they missed.\u00a0\u00a0 There\u2019s no knowing what a cut foot would acquire from that floor.<\/p>\n

\u00a0I got left for 15 minutes. One of the doctors tried to be friendly and talk with me while I waited, as had one downstairs who told me he spoke English.\u00a0 \u00a0However, had world peace negotiations depended upon our mutual linguistic abilities we would all be doomed.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

The friendly doctor told me the price was 4 yuan.\u00a0 \u00a0Downstairs the man at the cash register said 10.\u00a0\u00a0 After some discussion I received 5 yuan change from my 10 yuan note.\u00a0 \u00a0A cheap treatment and I felt better and more flexible.\u00a0\u00a0 I\u2019m due again on Thursday.\u00a0\u00a0 It will be interesting to see what the charge is then.\u00a0\u00a0 Anyway it\u2019s a cheap cultural experience even if I am imagining the benefits.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A Cup or \u2026 I receive a expat newsletter once a week. The author usually writes about interesting subjects and enhances it with a sense of humour.\u00a0 \u00a0He had a topic about health in Friday\u2019s edition which led to a link about his experience with ba guan or as known in western circles, cupping. http:\/\/www.chinaexpat.com\/blog\/ernie\/2008\/04\/08\/ba-guan-beginners.html\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_s2mail":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[93,6,94],"tags":[15,29,30],"class_list":["post-219","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-china","category-work","category-xingtai","tag-culture","tag-health","tag-medicine"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kerry.net.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/219","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kerry.net.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kerry.net.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kerry.net.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kerry.net.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=219"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.kerry.net.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/219\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":226,"href":"https:\/\/www.kerry.net.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/219\/revisions\/226"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kerry.net.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=219"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kerry.net.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=219"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kerry.net.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=219"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}