One Day in the Hospital - Ocean College

Ship: Johnny
Date: 21.12.2025
Position: Martinique, Forte-de-France
Nautical position: 14’36.0986’N, 061’03.6699’W
Etmal: 0 nm
Total: 5272 nm

What is the best way to spend your time on Martinique? Right! With a trip to the hospital… At least that’s how I spent a day today. And let me tell you, understanding the health system in a foreign country is sometimes not that easy.

But let’s start from the beginning. It was planned to take the bus for the way there, but you should always bring a certain amount of spontaneity with you. After the bus connection let us down and just didn’t come, we decided to take a taxi.

Understanding the responsible employee on the phone was like listening comprehension in a French exam… you know what I mean. Luckily, a taxi came by spontaneously (or what we ordered? – we don’t know) and we were taken to the hospital! First task mastered!

Unfortunately, only patients over the age of fifteen are treated in the normal emergency room. However, there were four of us and two of us were fourteen years old. On the way to the children’s emergency room, we decided spontaneously that we are all fourteen. When we got there, we had to queue a little to register.

There was a waiting area outside the building with these typical airport benches. After registering, we were told we should wait there for the doctor, who was also very quickly with us. All four of us were examined and only two proved to be worthy of being allowed to enter the hospital afterwards.

At Liv, an X-ray image was taken of her finger (nothing broken, yayyyy), but she still has to spare it a little bit now. Tom was examined again by a doctor and then we had to wait a very long time for another doctor who was familiar with neurology.

While waiting, we looted the snack machine. The yield consisted of Oreos, Madeleines, Kinder Bueno, M&Ms and TUC biscuits. A very balanced variety of sweets. Luckily, the doctor was able to help Tom well and we were finally ready for the way back. Rip to Ylva and Helene, who spent seven hours sleeping and reading in the waiting area.

After our return trip to the port, we used our remaining two hours of free shore leave to eat pizza. We also met a few of the others spontaneously. In the evening, we went back to the Johnny and found our well-deserved sleep in our hammocks on deck.

Greetings:

Ylva: Viele liebe Grüße an alle meine Freunde und Familie! Ich hoffe, ihr hattet einen tollen 4. Advent. Heute habe ich btw zum ersten Mal in der Hängematte geschlafen – war voll gemütlich :))

Liv: Heeeey, LG aus Martinique ersteinmal und das Meiste wisst ihr über meinen Krankenhausbesuch ja auch schon… von daher jetzt heißt es tapen und hoffen, das es bald endlich vorbei ist. Es war auf jeden Fall ein sehr großes Erlebnis. Hoffen wir einfach mal, dass ich kein Krankenhaus auf der Reise mehr sehe. Hab‘ euch lieb und ganz LG aus der Hängematte. P.S.: Soll euch auch von Pear grüßen! Liv

Tom: Hi Leute, ich lieg grade in der Hängematte und versuche die ganzen Erlebnisse, an die ich mich erinnern kann (kleine Filmrisse vorhanden) zu verarbeiten. Heute nachdem ich eine Tablette genommen habe, war ich nicht mehr ganz zurechnungsfähig, aber ich hoffe, morgen geht’s mir besser wir hören uns bis bald. Euer halbanwesender Tom

Munguru: Ich habe die Toilette gesprengt🤯