But I'm, like, smart?

Don't read this if you're queasy. Or vegan.

I’m not quite sure what’s inspired me to recount this story, other than for an opportunity to take the complete piss out of myself. And I guess to normalise a very unglamorous side of travel. If you think for a second that some version of this story hasn’t happened to everyone who has travelled overseas at some point, then you’re probably in need of me diagnosing you with a severe case of denial.

I hope you find this as funny as I now do. My Mum is going to hate it.

Sian x

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So I’ve just got back from China. I was there with my husband and son and father-in-law to visit my husband’s family. To introduce them all to our son, to spend quality time with Andy’s 95-year-old grandma. Yes, 95 years old and she still lives independently on the third floor of an apartment building with no elevator and a concrete stairwell with no handrail. She uses a walking stick mostly as an extension of her pointer finger or Family Member Prodding Device, rather than a mobility aid.

The bridge to Grandma’s house. Suzhou, China

We are also there to eat. One of the greatest joys of our trips to China is the food. A common saying there is ‘eat to play’ but I’ve always interpreted it as ‘eating is play’. Because not only is there a nightly banquet consisting of a minimum of 15 dishes rotating enticingly on a motorised Lazy Susan, but there’s the hotel breakfast buffet and home cooked lunches at Grandma’s house (of which she prepares multiple dishes).

Almost immediately I seem to be able to find room for just one more dumpling or a third peking duck pancake or yet another freshly caught and cooked river crab to tear apart and patiently hunt for the sweet meat hidden in the legs and claws and shells.

A few days after arriving, the post-prandial comments about needing to wear looser clothing or undoing pant buttons begin. The last time I was in China, we stayed for nine days and I couldn’t do my jeans up when I left. So did I decide to pace myself more this time? Absolutely not. I packed stretchy pants and changed into those instead.

Peking duck pancakes

This went on for six days before something had to give. We returned to our hotel room after another full banquet dinner (no one does banquets like the Chinese). My stomach starts hurting, some cramping. I mentally run through the possibilities: A) Period? No, too soon. B) Pants too tight? No, unzipped them 2cm halfway through dinner. C) Pregnant? Absolutely fucking not.

It doesn’t take me long to formulate a diagnosis and apply a treatment for my discomfort: Bitch, stop eating.

We go to bed and by mutual agreement, my husband and I promise there is to be NO EATING at breakfast, no mater how tempting the buffet situation is. We will resume our consumption at lunch time instead.

I spend the entire night and next day in bed, dozing in between the stomach cramps and pain. My husband goes to another incredible banquet dinner while I stay in the hotel room feeding my son the plain noodles that were meant for me (jerk) (joking, I could barely eat or drink anything without it causing more pain). I start to rationalise that it was just the meal from the night before that was too much, too oily, I needed a break. And despite a sip of water sending my guts a-roiling, I was still jealous of the food I was missing out on. Very fucking inconvenient timing. I go to bed praying for a painless night and dreaming of dumplings in the morning, our second to last day in China.

How wrong I was.

I spend the entire next day oscillating between waves of stomach cramps and the wild-eyed panic of locating a toilet in the next 10 seconds before you completely shit yourself.

I attempt a light breakfast and have to speed walk to the restaurant bathroom clenching so tightly I resemble an Olympic speed walker with a carrot up my arse.

I do not attempt lunch and end up in a cold sweat sitting on the hotel room toilet several times that day.

I attempt dinner at the buffet and miraculously, manage to eat a few plain items and feel okayish. Half an hour later I’m rocking my son to sleep in his pram in a hallway outside the restaurant, when I feel it and send a panicked barrage of messages to my husband so I can tap out of parenting immediately:

Andy

Andy

ANDY

Urgent poo

I’m near the toilets

Andy

Andy

I return to the dinner table. A conversation is had; there is no awkwardness among the family, only concern. Andy’s Aunty obtains some tablets from the pharmacy down the road. They’re like a Chinese Imodium and bitter as all fuck, but I get those suckers down and pray to the baby Jesus that they do something quick because the next day is our last day and I’ve barely eaten food or drunk water for two days and I gotta get on an international long-haul flight with a toddler and a leaky bum hole.

Shockingly, they don’t work and despite taking three doses, I wake up the next morning and know that I need antibiotics. I’ve been in this situation before when I was living in Bali (a story for another time involving white lycra) but I had medication on hand. But I’m not in Bali and I don’t have the drugs I need and this is where the story gets even more unhinged.

I message my friend back home (who is a doctor) and ask specifically which antibiotics to take, explain the leaking, the dehydration, flying concerns etc etc. I get the drugs with Aunty’s help and walk back to our hotel room in a frenzied state of delirium and relief.

Our goal is to finish packing and then go to Grandma’s for one last meal of homemade wontons before heading to the airpot to fly home. I Google translate the dosage instructions TWICE and proceed to swallow a bunch of tablets while simultaneously having a conversation with Andy and pulling a charging cable out of my kid’s mouth.

But soon I feel like I need to vomit and poo at the same time and I start panicking about where the fuck I’m going to find a receptacle big enough for my chunder should the simultaneous exodus of bodily fluids eventuate in the next 15 seconds (luckily it doesn’t). I dash for the toilet and exit grimacing, minutes later, for the umpteenth time that morning and wonder why I’m feeling even worse.

I curl up in the foetal position on the bed, the rogue toddler eating God-knows-what off the hotel room floor temporarily ignored, and translate the dosage on the packet again and realised I’ve accidentally fucking overdosed on the antibiotics. YES, ME. I HAVE THREE MEDICAL-ADJACENT DEGREES. This is firmly in my wheelhouse, this is not my first rodeo. I used to be a health professional for God’s sake and even after diagnosing myself, concerned about my prolonged dehydration, I didn’t even think to question the translation and fucking necked triple the dose I was meant to.

Now sitting here writing this, I am howling with laughter. I thought it was slightly amusing at the time, too. In a delirious and how the fuck have I managed this? kinda way.

My husband however, did not. There was panicked talk of my stupidity (valid), visiting a poison centre, cancelling our flights and my stupidity (fair). I told him to go to Grandma’s to eat while I lay in bed and try not to die. He didn’t find that funny. Tough crowd.

But in true wog martyrdom style, I fucking rallied. I ate my teaspoon of cement and I pulled myself together. I showered and changed without shitting myself and power walked in a cold sweat to Grandma’s house with wet hair (which is as sacrilegious in China as it is in Croatia, no matter the weather). I had to make it to say goodbye to Grandma and eat a wonton. Wontons hand made by a 95 YEAR OLD, you guys. I had to preserve my image as favourite granddaughter-in-law.

I made it. I ate the wontons (only five, I’m not an idiot). I didn’t shit myself.

Back at the hotel, Andy receives a message from his doctor friend in response to a frantic message enquiring about the likelihood of my demise, saying that the dose I took is not unheard of and I should be fine.

See? Not so stupid, after all.

Obliterating my gut microbiome got me on that flight and home in relative comfort, dehydration notwithstanding, and now the only thing I’m necking is a probiotic and a kombucha.

Seven Seasons of Good Shit (ha!)

Selling Sunset on Netflix

My cousin told me to watch this ages ago as a ‘feeding show’ to consume when I had a newborn stuck to my boob and breastfeeding took 40 mins a session (thank god that’s over). I tried the first episode initially but it must have been 3am and I was too catatonic to engage and switched to Drive To Survive instead, which I also highly recommend. Not a particularly difficult show to watch with all that smouldering and aggression and the vroom vroom, you know? Don’t ask me anything else about the sport(?) except which driver I objectively think is the hottest (Leclerc) and who I like best (Hamilton). But I digress. The point is, I went back and tried Selling Sunset again and now I am absolutely obsessed with it.

Look, I know what you’re thinking. A vapid and inane reality TV dramaaaaaaa with people so unrelatable, they become caricatures of themselves with each consecutive season, leaving you with an increasing feeling of murderous frustration at their inability to communicate effectively with one another despite being able to buy and sell multi-million dollar properties on the daily for their incredibly wealthy clients. You’re not wrong. But it’s also brilliant and fantastical and mesmerising.

If you don’t watch it for the catty drama, then watch it for the batshit fashion and outfits of the cast, the increasing litreage of botox IN and makeup ON faces with each season, the incredible properties (but tbh for a show about property, they’re just a very lush backdrop for the tea-spilling conversations), the raw and vulnerable moments shared by many in the cast and also the dramaaaaaaa. What an ESCAPE from my life! I adore it.

Also the reunion episodes, of which there are two (the most recent one is dropping TONIGHT and I am on tenterhooks), are hosted by Tan France. Like, say less.

If you liked this newsletter and it didn’t disgust you or make you feel ill, then please share it! Sharing helps people find my unhinged travel stories and other things that I write. The support is so very appreciated. Sian x