The Tooth Fairy 2

I went to my first dentist in Hong Kong. I have been here for almost four years, so obviously I need to see the dentist more often. I heard too many bad stories about the way Chinese dentists do things. Some of them turned out to be true.

My appointment was for 2:50, so I showed up at 2:35. I filled out the form, in Chinese, and showed them my insurance card. I was a little proud of myself for filling out the form in Chinese. After I turned it in, they told me that there was also an English version. There is no reason there would not be. Hospitals in Hong Kong have English all over the place. I have never seen a Hong Kong doctor who could not speak English.

They checked my temperature and blood pressure, for some reason. I can understand the blood pressure if you are going in for some kind of dental surgery, but I was only there to let the dentist poke around and figure out what to do. It was essentially a check up when you know there is something wrong. Blood pressure is irrelevant.

After sitting in the waiting room for a good three minutes, I went in and they took a full series of x-rays. The problem is only one tooth, but they went ahead and scanned them all. If nothing else, now there are dental records in Hong Kong if my unidentifiable corpse ever shows up somewhere.

I was about to tell myself that Hong Kong dentist offices are more efficient. I had spent very little time waiting and everything was moving along quickly. Taking the x-rays took less than five minutes.

Then I sat in the waiting room for an hour. When I asked how much longer it would be, I was told about an hour. So I went home.