Grandpop, Day 7 - Hospital

What a day.

I went into Seoul this morning for my weekly Korean class. Just after it ended, my grandfather called me on his cell phone saying he needed to go to the hospital.

I rushed home, took a taxi from the station to my house, and then we took the same taxi to go to Osan Air Base in Pyeongtaek (평택). There, they admitted him to the infirmary, and diagnosed him with pneumonia. They also detected a heart murmur (common in folks his age, but potentially dangerous given his angina surgery in 2000), and didn't have the equipment (or confidence) to risk treating him, so they transferred him to the Samsung hospital in Irwon (일원).

We stayed in the ER for the rest of the day. Just like in Osan, they poked him full of needles to do tests -- he must have lost about a Big Gulp's worth of blood from all of it. They took some X-rays, gave him some antibiotics through an IV, got us ready to set up camp for the night.

A few of my friends, the ones he met on Wednesday, came to visit. Most notably, my friend Bobby, in spite of a midterm on Monday, even stayed until 6:00 am, just chatting away with him. That's an amazing thing -- I owe Bobby an incredible debt of gratitude.

For my part, and I'll probably get branded the Worst Grandson in the World for this, I was about ready to konk him over the head. He simply would not get any rest -- he stayed up the entire night talking. How this 77 year old man, with pneumonia, who hasn't slept or eaten well in the past three days, could possibly manage to stay up the entire night talking I'll never know. He tried, but couldn't, sleep laying down, so he decided to stay in the wheelchair. I eventually fell asleep on his hospital bed at about 2:00 am.