Broken Noses

While we all hope we never see the insides of an ambulance, we do secretly wonder what it looks like. Unfortunately, I was in one not too long ago, but it went much better than I expected. No dramatic beeping, no family members or friends riding along worried, and in fact the one guy in it was a greek guy I had never met before.

It's not that I really needed it or anything. I had broken my nose but as I was on the university campus, they immediately called the uni health center which arrived at the crime scene with an ambulance within 3 minutes! Hah, crime scene! They seated me inside and took me to the health center where they inspected me and came to the conclusion that I needed to go to the hospital. Wow, what a surprise, right? No matter what you have they always tell you they can't help and you need to go to the hospital. But they were really kind and made me feel much better while I was there. They also drove me to the hospital so that's nice.

"How did you break your nose??" you may ask. Well, a very close friend of mine, Hassan, wanted to try out ice skating. You can see where this is going... The problem was that I only had 15 minutes before my conversation circle class. Ah, what the heck, let's go. The ice skating rink is right next to the cc class so I figured we could go there and have other friends come by as I leave. We get in, dress up, put on our skates, and enter what in hindsight was a battlefield of an ice rink. It was Hak's first time so he wanted me to explain a bit how to skate but little did I know I probably needed some showing myself. The moment I lay foot on the ice I slip and fall forward. Luckily, I had my safeguards on my palms so I stretch my arms out in an attempt to stop dipping. Now I get why they call it a "nose dive". My arms slid outwards with the floor being slippery and my nose high-fived the ice. Boom. The first thought I had was oh crap this is bad... I get up on all fours and realize the ice is red. Everything is happening in slow motion. My fountain of a nose is bursting blood all over the place and I hurry back off the rink and to the reception. Meanwhile, my friends are coming in through the entrance and they see me running holding my nose. Hak hadn't even gotten on the ice yet.  The reception tells me to sit down and they get tissues to stop the bleeding. I had already regained my senses but I couldn't feel any pain. Perhaps that was the shock element...

Now we're back in the ambulance headed for the hospital. My stuff were at the ice rink and the last thing I said as I left was "tell the Sarah I won't make it to cc!" I'm the one who is supposed to lead the conversations and I didn't want the students wondering where I was. She sent me an email afterward checking on me, how nice.

Two doctors saw me in the Acibadem hospital and for that, I had to pay 1500 TL (which was about 250 euros for my European chaps)... They even made me pay 15TL for the ice pack! They took an X-Ray and saw my nose was broken so they fixed it by sticking rods up my nostrils and moving my nose about. For the stitches, however, I would have to pay another 4000TL. I told them they can keep the stitches and left Jason-Bourne-style with my nose still bleeding. Okay no... The doctor himself suggested I visit a public hospital where I would pay only a fraction of that. Acibadem hospital was the fanciest I had ever seen, I will give them that. It might have been a 5-star hotel and I wouldn't have been surprised. Merve and Yusuf (my mentor and her boyfriend) had arrived and they paid for the 1500TL. I didn't have any money with me so I don't know what I would have done without them.

We leave the hospital and get on the metro towards Sariyer hospital. We arrive, find our way through the maze that it is just to be told that they cannot do stitches. What kind of hospital can't stitch back a nose? Also, how the hell did my nose get a cut? Eee I don't want to imagine my nose ripping as it hit the floor in slow motion. We're told we can go all the way to Mecidiyeköy Hospital but it's too far. See the problem is we were told my nose needed stitching within a specific time frame after the incident and already lost a lot of time. So we take a taxi back to university where Yusuf and Merve had a car and we drove to the hospital. I've got to say, Yusuf drove like we were making a new Fast and Furious movie and for that I thank him. He's a medical student so he knew the risk of losing time better than me. 

Now it's already been like 4 hours. We get there and after, again, finding our way through the maze of a hospital (who came up with those designs?) they finally stitch me up and let me go. The nurse was really funny but I felt like maybe she didn't know what she was doing. Yusuf said she did a very good job, so I took his word for it. Now it's 10pm and we're all hungry so we get into the McDonalds next to the hospital (I think it's ironic having a McDonalds there) and fill our tummies. I feel so ashamed because not only did Merve and Yusuf take care of me, pay for everything, and stay with me until now, it was valentine's day and they had planned a nice day. On top of all that, I drop the cola all over the table and their food. In my defense, I felt drugged and tired.

We get back to University around 11:30 where I go grab my stuff from the health center and go back to my room to rest after this long day.

Over the next few days, I feel like crap. It's strange how when one part of you is not functioning properly your whole system goes on stand-by mode. I spend most of my time in my dorm getting some rest because I can't even see properly with the bandaid on my nose. Every friend I meet asks me what the hell happened to my nose and I come up with a different story to test out like "oh you should've seen the other guy, though" or "oh I just got in a fight with a squirrel". Very funny, I know... The best part though is that the moment this happened during winter and I was running between hospitals with no coat so I got sick. I can't touch my nose, I have a huge bandaid on it, and my nose is running like Usain Bolt in a 100m sprint. 

It's already been 3 months and I still have a tiny scar on my nose. It just looks like a pink piece of flesh wants to say hi. My nose now always feels weird when I touch it and I still haven't gotten used to it. One thing I've noticed is that I now subconsciously look at other people's noses more... I guess that's what you call insecurity. To this day I blame the ice rink for my dip, not my fabulous ice skating skills. It was just too wet and slippery so don't listen to my friends if they bring up this story!