CAUTION: nothing for sensitive natures!

There are some dangers on a boat you might not be aware of enough. Like a fishing rod carelessly stored in the guest cabin (among a lot of other stuff, again...you might remember our post "cleaning the attic"?!).

Marco unfortunately managed yesterday to push a hook with a barb into his finger so deep that we haven't been able to pull it out again. Dinner was just about ready on the table and he wanted to grab the foldable chair... With the conclusion that instead of eating we had to make a trip to the local emergency unit. What turned out to be an adventure by itself! First we called Ralph the cab driver of our trust. As he wanted to prevent us of paying too much he first directed us to the General Hospital, a governmental clinic. Puh, I didn't dare to take a picture but to put it this way - it didn't look very reliable or hygienic... A bunch of people was already waiting outside! and the queue didn't seem to move at all. Ralph went inside to inquire for us. When he came back he just shook his head and made us go back to the car. It looked like we had to wait till midnight for our turn!
So he drove us to the second choice, the private hospital St. Augustine's. What a difference in any respect! First: It looked and smelled like a real hospital. Secondly: There were no people waiting and the nurse had to call the doctor to come to the clinic. Thirdly: We realized that it was going to be much more expensive (guess that's why there were no other patients).

Anyhow we were happy when the doctor, an Indian by the way, appeared shortly after the call and seemed to know what he was doing. He had to anesthetize the finger, cut it open to finally remove the hook and suture it (Sorry, no pictures of that!). Marco almost fainted during the procedure as he'd drank some rum before to numb the pain... Alcohol and anesthetic don't go together well obviously! The doctor recommended to take some antibiotics and it turned out that we had in our medical kit what he was going to prescribe. At least one point where we were able to save some money!

Lessons learned:
- never store a fishing rod with the hook attached OR wrap it so it won't cause any injuries.
- keep some order on a boat so you'll find what you're looking for at one glance (at least TRY it)
- keep the list of your medical kit on your phone in case you need to know its content
- the same applies for the list of vaccinations
- next time don't cut the hook that short - we could've managed to press it through and remove it as the barb was in the right direction - yes, it would need much more rum!

And before you say anything about poor fish or so...Marco is planning already for the next "hunt" -  I guess that's a kind of a boy revenge thing...

With love from paradise
Rahel