China-Ni-Hao-Running a Marathon on the Great Wall

Ni-Hao

"Ni Hao"...means hello in Chinese.  "Ni Hao" deep-fried sea horse, I said to my dinner on a stick in the middle of Wangfujing Street in a city of 21 million people in Beijing.  I'd just run a marathon on the Great Wall of China that morning, and thought I'd try something a little exotic tonight for dinner.  Probably should have stuck to the KFC close to the Holiday Inn.  But I was always up for an adventure right?  Wangfujing Street holds the most interesting exotic food on wooden sticks in the world where at a night market you can try anything from starfish to grasshoppers to scorpions...and all on a stick.  I thought "Awesome, I LOVE stuff on sticks".  I'd been introduced to the idea in Africa while waiting on our Land Rover driver to get bailed out of jail for speeding.  But in Africa they stick to things a little bit more traditional...bananas, corn, chicken, beef, goat, fruit, etc.  Stuff on a stick in China?...let your curiosities wander. 

"Well it's a good thing they didn't have to bury you on the Wall" I sat in Scotland reading in a congratulations card my family had sent to me after completing the race, a card complete with my youngest, geographically challenged brother's artwork of me on  a barbed-wire Berlin Wall.  Oh well, it was another important Wall, at least he got the Wall part right I chuckled to myself.  And that's one of the many things I love about my family.  We always send ridiculous packages in the mail to each other whether we're half-way across the world or not and go WAY overboard on holidays.  But what's so wrong about that anyway?  Who doesn't love Labor Day and Cinco De Mayo?  And it's true; I had just run a Marathon on one of the world's biggest cemeteries and almost did get myself buried there.  The Great Wall of China was built over 2,000 years ago and stretches some 5,500 miles across the northern borders of the Chinese Empire, with the help of Chinese slave labor and a few graves.  It was as mind-boggling to me to see as the Great Pyramids of Egypt.  But I didn't choose to climb those Great Pyramids.  I just passively viewed them from Casanova's camel.  But for some idiotic reason I DID choose to run a marathon on this Great Wonder.  I wanted to run a challenging marathon as a celebration to myself for the completion of veterinary school.  And I wanted to do it to raise money for a charity at the same time.  At mile 21 climbing uphill AGAIN up the thousands of stairs on the Great Wall I thought to myself, "Right, probably should have just gone out to dinner with some friends to celebrate finishing vet school vs. running 26.2 miles on the Great Wall of China."  And there went another runner by me.  Where's the pall bearer I thought?  They say you "hit the wall" of a marathon at mile 21.  Hit the wall, you got it.  I was down on all fours hitting that Wall.  "There's no way I'm going to finish this thing."  To give you an idea of how "taxing" the thousands of stairs are on your body, you add 2 hours to your normal marathon time to calculate your Great Wall of China Marathon time.  "Well, let's just put one foot in front of the other"...and maybe throw a hand or two in there as at this point I was ABSOLUTELY on all fours dragging myself up the top.  And once I got to that top, fantastically enough, there was ANOTHER top to climb.  Maybe if my 50 year old roommate from the Czech Republic hadn't kept me up all night asking me again, "What time is it?” I might have had a little bit more energy at this point.  Georgie, the 50 year old who came to China without a watch, alarm clock, or cell phone...bless her heart.  I was her "Father Time" for the ENTIRE 8 days.  And maybe if we hadn't had to board the bus at 3:45 am from Beijing to drive to the Wall for the race, I'd be the Energizer Bunny right about now.  "Dear God, this is another stupid thing I've signed up to do...PLEASE just help me to catch my breath and finish these last few miles."  And I finished that stupid marathon, with a bit of help catching my breath from the powers above, and not too shabbily either placing 9th in my age group and the 39th overall female.  I did scavenge on the ground however for half-used water bottles during the last 6 uphill miles as the supplies weren’t stocked very adequately towards the end.  But maybe the bit of emrgency air-flight help I'd offered on the plane flight to Beijing 5 days earlier "helped me" to finish in return .

We're now pre-boarding China Southern Flight CZ346 to Beijing.  Preboarding.  Do I board, do I wait, do we practice boarding, do we just push each other in line?  I don't KNOW?  I'll just go now.  "Uhhhhh, this is your Captain speaking....I'd like to welcome you on board Flight 346 nonstop service to Beijing from Amsterdam.......no volcanic ash in sight today haha.....uuhhhhhh we're now cruising at an altitude of 30,000 feet....uuuuhhhhh we have clear skies and a temperature of minus 20......uuuhhhhhh the weather in Beijing is sunny with a temperature of 25 degrees Celsius.....uuuhhhhhhh the local time in Amsterdam is 16:55 and the local time in Beijing is 21:55....uuuuuhhhhh our flying time today is just over 9 hours.....uuuuhhhhh on behalf of the cabin crew we'd also like to apologize for the delay back at the terminal.......uuuhhhhhhh you may now unfasten your seatbelts but please refrain movement around the cabin to a minimum."  Thank God, unfasten seatbelts and maybe get some sleep as Mr. Captain has FINALLY finished his 5 minute welcome speech, and we all are CALMLY comfortable with locating the emergency exits if this thing goes down.  Or maybe I could just watch a movie in English subtitles on the scratchy screen in front of me as the toddler behind me has resorted to HIS in-flight entertainment of kicking the back of my seat.  Where's my Benadryl?  And usually I'm freezing on airplanes, how is it that this is the only flight I'm absolutely boiling on?  Oh good, free meal time.  At least China Southern hadn't resorted to making you pay for your 3 ounces of diet coke and peanuts no longer included in the cheap price of your international air ticket.  Delicious 5 star delicatessen prepackaged meal finished when...."Ummmmm, this is your captain speaking again (great), is there anyone on this flight that is a doctor or a nurse or is medically trained?  We have a passenger with a medical emergency."  As I peered over the tops of the heads in front of me I spotted a girl flat on her back, completely unconscious in the middle of the aisle 15 rows up.  Panic.  No one raised their hand.  Real Panic.  Oh my GOD, should I push the button, should I not push the button?  I’m not a doctor.  “But you’re a doctor of animals.  You know you could help.  Don’t be such a wimp.  Are you wearing your big girl panties or did you pack those in the cargo?”  Ahhhhh.  I pushed my "call flight attendant" button.  "Yes, ma'am oh thank God, are you a doctor?"  "Well, I'm a Doctor of animals not humans, a veterinarian, but physiology is physiology and maybe I can help?"  "Yes, PLEASE, come up to the front with me."  Seriously real panic now.  Are we anywhere close to landing?  No, we're 4 hours from sunny, 25 degrees Celsius Beijing.  The adrenaline pumping through my body at that point was pretty near record-breaking levels.  I followed the flight attendant to the unconscious lady.  SHIT, what on God’s green earth was I thinking?  (cursing is not lady-like and I hardly ever curse, but sometimes, and rarely, it's the ONLY appropriate word to express your emotions).  "She's completely unconscious, won't answer words, and seems to be travelling by herself.  What do we do Miss?"  It's big-girl-panty time.  "You can do this, she's just a small dog, just a small dog" I pep-talked myself.  Look at her vitals.  Breathing, good.  Pulse, yes.  I wanted a blood sample, blood gases, electrolytes, an IV catheter, fluids, a proper history... when I remembered I was NOT in a small animal clinic.  I was on a plane and this wasn't Fido.  Just apply basic common sense, assess the situation.  "She has stable vital signs but looks to be sweating a pool.  Can you help me get these 3 jackets off of her please?  And let's move her into 1st class where there's a bit more space and less of an audience, get some oxygen flow to her via mask, put some cold washcloths on her head and neck, and position the air-vents to blow cool air on her."  "Ok Doctor."  I thought maybe she was in a diabetic blood-sugar low or something.  "Can we get some sugar water too to try?"  She couldn't swallow the water, and we stopped that real quickly for fear of her aspirating the water.  An hour later the passenger started to come around, could hear what the flight attendant was saying to her in Chinese, had regained consciousness, and was almost sitting up in the seat unassisted.  I was sent back to my seat in the economy cabin.  And that’s where I definitely went wrong.  I should have insisted she still needed to be monitored by a doctor in “first class”.  I sauntered back to my economy cabin where the rest of the passengers were busy watching their in-flight entertainment.  I had just had about as much in-flight entertainment as I could handle.  Was I a hero?  No.  Did I get an extra bag of peanuts?  No.  Had I saved a life?  Highly unlikely.  Had I performed any technically advanced medical procedure.  No, I'd just used common sense.  But when someone asks for help, don't be afraid to lend a hand.  That hand might come back around and help you up the Great Wall of China someday.  "Ni Hao" marathon finish line.