Out of the Hospital

They let me out of the hospital on Wednesday. I was very relieved to get out of there as it was very boring. I knew I was also running up a big bill that somebody was going to have to pay. The previous day, Tuesday, they did another X-ray of my hip. Apparently I was healing as expected, so there was no longer any reason to keep me there. They prescribed some pain meds, gave me a pair of crutches, and sent me on my way. Ralf, my boss at the hotel, came and picked me up to take me back to my room. Right now, I am hardly in any pain. My leg has been improving quite a bit. Now I can kind of limp around my room if I leave the crutches too far away. I can actually turn on my side when I sleep, a real luxury I will never again take for granted.

I was also relieved as I was leaving the hospital to find out the bill. I was worried my crappy traveler's insurance was going to be insufficient. I wasn't sure what to expect regarding the cost of 8 hospital days, with X-rays, CT scan, meds, physical therapy, crutches, etc. I figured somewhere between 10,000 and 50,000 euros! Turns out my bill was just under 1,500 euros!! Amazing! Which means my insurance should cover it and I won't have to pay a dime.

As for my plans, I will be leaving Austria next week on the 1st as originally scheduled. I think I will be able to carry my backpack. Ralf will give me a ride to the train station, then I will just have to carry it when I switch trains a few times on the way up north. Maybe I will find someone to help me if it's a problem. I think I will FedEx my skis, depending on how expensive it is, unless I am able to sell them in the next few days. I will most likely be pushing the date back for the start of my travels with Maren. Not by more than 2 weeks though. That would be 6 weeks from the date of the accident, and I doubt I will need crutches then. So that is not a huge setback, we will work out the plan next week.

The weather here is incredibly warm, I have been walking outside in just a T-shirt. Most of the snow has melted already, and it feels like summer. The whole town has cleared out quite a bit, only a handful of tourists and locals left. I am getting very anxious to finish my recovery and move on to the next adventure!

Scheisse....

On Wednesday, St. Patrick's Day, I went skiing after work as I often do. It was my 33rd, and last, trip to the slopes this season. On a good note, I would say I got my money's worth for my 510 euro season ski pass, about 15.50 euros per time. Though I had imagined I would have gone a lot more. The weather was perfect and there was a ton of powder, over 30 cm from the day before. I actually had to shovel snow around the entire hotel the day before. It took over 4 hours and I was exhausted. I also went running two days before that, for the first time in about 6 months. I ran for an hour on a hilly, snow-covered trail and felt really good, but my legs were very sore for three straight days. Which is why I waited until Wednesday to ski.

I was on the backside of one of the main mountains, in an off-piste area with some trees. It wasn't a dangerous place, and there are always lots of skiiers over there. My second time through, I hit a jump that I had found on my first run. It landed in a creek bed, but there was tons of snow, especially with that huge layer of powder on top. I took this jump a bit faster than the first time, and landed further away, but I never sensed any problem and fully expected to ski right on through when I landed. But for some reason, my skis sunk deep in the powder and just stuck there. I, of course, did not stick there. I was thrown forward and popped out of one ski. I somersaulted a few times and felt a horrible pain. When I stopped, I was stuck pretty deep in the powder. I slowly pulled my legs and arms out, but it was pretty painful. I spent about 15 minutes trying to stand up, but I quickly realized there was something wrong with my left leg. I couldn't lift it or put any weight on it whatsoever. I couldn't turn my body much either, as it caused excruciating pain.

I realized I wasn't going to be able to get off the mountain on my own. A couple skiiers came by and called the Ski Patrol for me. The Ski Patrol dude wanted to call in a helicopter, but I knew that would be insanely expensive (he said 2-3000 euros), so I told him no, let's get a ski-doo or something. An hour later, I was strapped in and on my way down the mountain, into an ambulance, and off to the ER in St. Johann, a town close to Kirchberg and Kitzbuehel. At this point, I was thinking I tore a muscle or something. Though the Ski Patrol guy and the EMT in the ambulance seemed to think it was a broken bone. I had an X-ray within 5 minutes of getting to the hospital. 5 minutes after that, a doctor came and told me I had broken my left hip. He said while it was a fracture, I didn't completely break it and would therefore not need surgery. They did a CT scan not long after that, then I spoke to another doctor. He told me that if I moved much, I could seriously damage my hip. Therefore I needed to stay in bed. No problem, I thought, just put me in a wheelchair and take me back to the hotel. I will stay in bed all day. Then he told me what he meant was that I would have to stay in the hospital for a week!

So here I am, still in the hospital. Today is day 4 and I am hoping they let me go ASAP. My first day here was pretty miserable. I could not move either of my legs even one inch without serious pain. The doctors wanted to shoot me up with pain killers right when I arrived, but as I have a deep-seated psychological aversion to needles, I declined. They have me on some pills, but the pain is not too bad anyway, as long as I don't move. It was really frustrating not being able to turn at all, so I didn't get a lot of sleep the first night. My condition has been steadily improving since that first day. I am now able to move my left leg on its own. I can slowly turn onto my right side. I can walk around a bit with crutches. I still can't put weight on my left leg, though the fact that I can now lift it up and down is promising. Yesterday was my first day of physical therapy, which went fine.

The latest news, which I heard this morning, is that next week I will get another X-ray, as early as Tuesday. If it looks OK, they will let me leave on crutches. I will have to come back a week later and get another X-ray to make sure I am healing properly. I should expect to be on crutches for about 6 weeks.

Ralf, my boss, came on Thursday morning to bring me some things from my room, including my netbook. So I have plenty of movies to watch and the internet as well. There are 3 other people in my room, all older Austrian guys with various ailments. None of whom speak much English, but I am getting to practice a bit of German. Though mainly with the nurses and doctors, as my roommates are not very social. With 4 people in my room, there is a pretty constant stream of nurses, doctors, friends, and family in my room. Which keeps me from getting too bored.

As far as work is concerned, I only had 2 more days left anyway. So I am not worried about not making that money. I can still stay in my room at the hotel until April 1st. Ralf will come pick me up whenever they let me leave the hospital, then hopefully take me back here for that last X-ray. As far as my trip goes, I am optimistic that this incident won't create any serious setbacks. I still intend to go to Germany and hang out with Maren and her family, then leave on the 17th for Istanbul. I might still be on crutches at that point, but should be healed well enough to move. My concern is carrying a big backpack around. So I am planning on just taking it day by day to see how I feel. I might need to find alternative transportation to Germany on April 1st as well. Perhaps I will put my skis and pack in the mail.

As far as costs/insurance, it's not looking good. I have very basic travel insurance, which I have contacted, but it is incredibly limited. Yes, Austria has universal healthcare like the rest of Europe. But it is unclear to me right now if that will benefit me in any way. I just read a story on the internet about some American without health insurance in Italy who had an accident, spent 2 weeks in the hospital, and walked away without so much as a bill. It sounds like I won't be so lucky, however, from what the hospital administrator has told me.

So, the good news is that hopefully my future travel plans won't be affected too much. I am recovering fairly quickly. I'm also fortunate this happened at the end of the season when I was just about done with work and skiing anyway. Though it's a bit depressing that there is still snow and the last 3 days have been sunny and very warm. I am going to make sure I heal properly before leaving the hospital, but I really hope that happens soon. I was not injured in any way besides my hip, so as soon as I am able to walk with crutches, navigate stairs, take a shower on my own, etc., I expect them to let me leave. (As of yesterday, I no longer have to pee in a plastic bottle or give myself a sponge bath in bed!)

I'll update this blog in a couple days, hopefully with news that I am about to leave the hospital!

Ski Season Winding Down

I am going to write a couple of blogs today, this one to cover the last month or so, then another to cover the events of the last few days.

A few days after my last post in the middle of February, I was out skiing in one of the parks. There was one particular jump that seemed pretty popular, and I went off it several times in the day. I was feeling pretty confident, so I decided to attempt a helicopter (360 spin) on my last jump of the day. I've done that trick before, but it has been years... Well, for no apparent reason one of my boots popped out of my binding right as I left the snow. I spun all the way around in the air, but the landing with only one ski on resulted in epic failure. I limped my way home with pain in my lower back. Every tiny bump in the snow hurt like hell. So I ended up having to take about a week off from skiing until my back felt better. I didn't need to miss any work, but was very fortunate that it didn't snow much that week so I didn't have to snow shovel! My back fully healed and I was back on the slopes near the end of the month.

My friend Lisa came to visit on the last weekend in February. I had to work the first couple of mornings, so she got to sleep in. We went to Kitzbuehel one evening and I showed her around the town. We met up with some of my Aussie friends and went to a couple of bars. We took the train to Zell am See another day, where they had a really large street market going on. We waited for Saturday to hit the slopes. Lisa had told me before that she was a beginner skiier. I told her no problem, but I hadn't realized until we were on our way up the hill that it was her 2nd time ever skiing! Looking back, we probably should have taken a different lift to one of the beginner hills. Those lifts are free, by the way. Fortunately for Lisa, we found someone selling a lift pass in front of the ticket office for only 8 euros! What a steal! The problem is that the main gondolas in the Kitzbuehel ski area don't lead to any easy runs. We went on the easiest run that I knew of and quickly discovered one critical element of skiing that Lisa lacked: the ability to stop! All in all, I think it made for a pretty humorous day, and she didn't get hurt at all. Hopefully she learned a little bit, though I think her next trip skiing should be on a much flatter hill!

Lisa and I took the same train on Sunday. I left her in Munich, where she headed to the airport to fly home to Dublin. I continued on towards Nuremburg to meet up with Maren. Her sister lives with her boyfriend, Arne, in a suburb of Nuremburg called Schwabach. Unfortunately her sister was out of town, but Arne was happy to have us stay with him. We checked out Nuremburg one day, which turned out to be a cool city. There is a huge walking area in the center with lots and lots of shopping. The architecture and old buildings were pretty nice as well. I couldn't tell you a whole lot more about the city than that, as we only had one afternoon to walk around. Maren and I got groceries, then got lost on the incredibly long walk back to the flat in Schwabach. We finally made it and cooked a big dinner for Arne with he got home from work as a thank you for letting us stay there. The following day, Maren and I took care of some things and talked about our trip some more. We took the S-Bahn to the main train station in Nuremburg where we said our good-byes. She headed to Frankfurt for her flight to South Africa, where she is right now. I took the last train back to Kirchberg.

The month of March has been mostly uneventful for me. I have been working quite a bit and skiing every time I don't work and the weather is decent. There has been a surprising amount of snow this month. The weather seems to stay very cold for about 3-4 days and we get 20-30 cm of snow, then turns very warm for a few days without a cloud in the sky. At work, another dishwasher named Misa was hired a few weeks ago for a couple of nights a week. He is very nice and speaks to me in German, very clearly and slowly and without an incomprehensible Tirolean accent. I was told that my last day of work would be March 21st. After that, there won't be enough guests in the hotel. That will also be Tommy's last day. And Andrea left last week, so life in my basement room has been a bit lonely and dull. I feel pretty good about work ending. My boss told me that I can stay in my room until April 1st, as that is the day I will head up to Germany and meet Maren when she flies back from South Africa.

Maren and I are both very excited for our trip together. We have booked the first flight to Istanbul, we leave on April 17th. The rest of the trip is still coming together. We are cutting Greece out. We both feel it is a 'normal' place (i.e. not exotic) that we can visit some other time. We would prefer to save more time for Southeast Asia. It looks like we will split 4-5 weeks between Turkey, Israel, and Egypt (max one week in Egypt). That will give us 8 weeks for India, China, and Southeast Asia (possibly Thailand and Cambodia). I can't wait to leave!

After much work, I have completed Rosetta Stone German Levels 1, 2, and 3! I am feeling much more comfortable with the language. It is still very, very difficult to understand Austrians when they speak, but I can now read German quite a bit better, and my speaking ability is improving as well.

As I alluded to earlier, important events occurred on Saint Patrick's Day, which I will write about later today or tomorrow.