Getting sick overseas

As I mentioned I got a tooth ache a few days ago.  I waited patiently hoping it would go away but it's only been getting worse.  So I googled and asked around and found a good bilingual dentist close to my hostel.  (Actually there are at least 2 good bilingual dentists nearby.  I guess there's a market for foreigners with tooth problems.)  So I walked over this morning for their 9AM opening, hoping they could squeeze in a drop-in.

It was a very modern clinic (with the exception that they have both "private" and "non-private" chairs - "non-private" are basically a row of chairs with people getting cleanings and checkups etc) and apparently the 2 dentists are trained in either North America or Europe.  The dentist poked my teeth and gums ("Ouch!  Yep that's the one.") and then took an x-ray, and determined that everything looked ok.  I had either bumped my tooth or bitten down too hard on something.  The x-ray looked normal.  good news - no problem.  Bad news - nothing they can do about it!  I just have to put up with the pain until it goes away.  They even let me keep the x-ray for a souvenir:

The whole visit took about 15 minutes and they charged me 15 RMB.  That's about $2.50 but no problem, I've got travel insurance so I can make a claim when I get home.

Getting sick overseas is no fun!  It puts a damper on the whole holiday experience, and it's much more difficult to deal with.  I *might* have been able to deal with the dentist in Chinese, but how to translate technical terms like "crown" and "root canal"?  Also I brought a small supply of advil and tylenol but I'm rapidly running through it, and it's very difficult to come by this kind of medicine over here.  I'm going to have to save my supplies for night time and put up with the pain during the day, unfortunately :-(

A note for anyone thinking of coming to China:

- Bring lots of advil and tylenol (if you don't need it I'll take it off your hands!)
- Bring lots of dental floss - this is something else I haven't been able to find here, fortunately I brought enough for my whole trip.