July 13th, 2009:
It was the best of times, it was the worst of times...
After drinking a LOT last night, I woke up this morning hung over as hell and late for class, sans my daily run. I got ready as quickly as I could and walked to class, but even still, by the time I arrived I was sweaty, tired, and hung over looking. I walked into class and as soon as I arrived, the professor stopped teaching and everyone just stared at me.
"Are you feeling ok, Koelen?" asked Professor Simpson. I just gave him an odd look back. No I'm not feeling well, I thought, I'm fucking hung over!.
"Koelen-", Andrew spoke up. "Rachel and Tessa have swine flu..."
Great way to start my Monday…
(As I denied feeling anything but 100% my normal self, I couldn't help but think that I could potentially also have swine flu after sharing food and drink the previous day with Tessa. Come to find out, Tessa was the first patient out of our group to contract the flu.
By the time we had gotten back to our hotel rooms after class, Tessa and Rachel had been quarantined to their room and Jay had also contracted Swine Flu. He was quarantined soon there after.
Cloe and I (No, not that Chloé...
Other Cloe)
left class and headed for the pharmacy where we bought lots of vitamin C as well as flu medicine and tea. I think, subconsciously, we both knew that we had been eating after Tessa and in such close proximity to Tessa and Rachel that either one of us could have been next to get sick. That was not going to happen to me! I was hell bent on staying healthy and was damned if I was going to end up quarantined to my room during my first trip to Europe. Throughout the remainder of the trip, both my teachers were constantly checking on me to make sure I was well.)
That was the summer where the deaths from swine flu across the UK and Europe were very high. On the day that Rachel and Tessa got sick, a little girl and an old woman died of the flu as well as Cherie Blair, former Prime Minister Tony Blair's wife, was also diagnosed with swine flu. It was a scary time and my teachers knew that I had hung out with Tessa as much as I had hours before she got sick. The chances of me getting it were very high.
Which is quite funny in retrospect: I was drinking half the time and pseudo hung over the other half all whilst traipsing all over London on about 3 1/2 hours of sleep per night. I coughed from smoking weed and cigarettes, and had several hang overs on the trip, but never did I ever contract the swine flu. I consider myself lucky, but I also glad that my positive outlook on the situation panned out.))
