The school's clinic is large and spacious. It's a saturday, so the scanty activity clothing the clinic is understood. The setting of the building is rich(a little off noise).
I sat at the waiting room and let time pass as I wait for the card attendant to return. 20 minutes strolled by and I seem to wait for eternity. ‘Is not 20 minutes to long a wait for a card attendant considering my state of health?’ I asked myself. ‘How long then do I have to wait to see the doctor’?
In my quest for a solution, I stood up and walked through the balcony leading to different wards hoping to find someone I could ask questions. I found two nurses in an office just beside the wards.
“Hello, good afternoon” I greeted.
The uglier one looked at me and raised her eyes lids, obviously prompting me to say what I wanted.
“Please I want to see a doctor and the card attendant is not around”
“Go and wait, he will come. This is not where we give people their files, go and sit down at the waiting room” she replied me with annoying tune and gestures.
“I have been waiting for over 30 minutes” I exaggerated
“oga go and find a sit he went to eat I think” the other less ugly nurse said to me.
I just walked back to my sit. Not sure what to think or do. Obviously I have to wait for the attendant to return.
From where i was sitting I observed the clinic had three consultant rooms meant to be occupied by 3 doctors at a time. By my far left I noticed the clinics lab, pharmacy office and a host of other offices I did not mind to place. The clinic was big and spacious with almost just me inside the hall-like waiting room.
Silence filled the room as I waited and marked another 30 minutes all to myself. The steeliness of the sit had made me lost the feel my bottom. My temperature was telling high but I feeling real cold. A heavy aching head hung on my neck and pains tend to reign at every joint of my body. Definitely should malaria. Should I just avoid the test and a doctor’s scrutiny and get malaria drugs from a chemist? Rather than this long wait? With this a little more thoughts in mind slept off. My companion was off because keffi has vouched not to supply power with constancy.
I woke up just in time to notice a middle aged man walk into the building rather clumsily with strikingly un-kept beards. I adjust my sitting position and checked my time. I had slept for over 15 minutes. I watched him walk into his small contained office and take his seat. I was alone, so there was no need to rush, I gave him time to settle then dragged my ailing body to him.
“good afternoon” I muttered.
“uuhhnn” he happily muttered with a smile as he stretched his hand to receive my card.
He took my card, stood up and disappeared into a row of shelves filled with patient files of orange and blue colors. As he walked away I could hear him speak to himself clumsily; I couldn’t help but noticed his slight staggering state.
“giiiideeeeonnn james?” he stammered as he approached me from his large ‘chess’.
I nooded because I was in no good health-state to tell him its ‘Gordon’ not Gideon.
His cubicle was small and less spacious. He had an exit door and a window-like opening in front so he could attend to patients who came for file collections and other enquiries. I stood by the window-like opening for the few minutes he took to perform some official ritual on my file.
“ na now you come” he asked with his eyes on his table.
“ehn”
He kept mute as if to let my reply sink.
“you see doctor as you dey here since?”
I just stared blankly at his head that kept going up and down through his note taking process. ‘is he hinting that doctors are not on sit?’ I thought to myself.
“you no see one lekpa woman doctor for that room?” he raised his head to meet my face as he pointed to the third consulting room in a somewhat seriously rude look.
I looked down at his face. his face was a mess and he looked less young than I thought. His eyes were half red, hanging from two almost swollen sockets. His lips were almost pink and surrounded by un-kept beards and mustache. He just stared back.
“I no see” I replied firmly.
“why you no wan answer na” he faked a smile as he looked at me with half shot eyes like a baby pleading for meat from his older sibling. He said something like “you dey vex” in a less audible tone. I bent a little toward him.
“you say” I chipped
“I just dey ask you smaaaaaaallll” just then he belched a long stuttering belch before he concluded his sentence.
Almost immediately I perceived a thick stench of alcohol stroll through my nostril and sat straight in my belly. I felt my head spin and I could almost see my feet wobble. In my lil staggering state I grabbed his window to support myself. He just belched straight into my nostrils and mouth. I felt really sick and nausea. My headache tripled and I heard ‘pots and pans’ banging within my skull. Immediately I lost taste of my mouth and it watered. I could not think, speak or see clearly for a split second. I still cannot tell why I did not cry: that cry that forces itself out, out of anger.
I took a sit back at the waiting spot without a word.
“My person sorry” he shouted toward me.
At that point all I needed was rich and quality silence and a softer sit to lie on.
He came beside me with his alcohol laden body, placed his hand on my shoulder as he began a seemingly endless session of ‘sorry’.
I left the clinic two hours later after a long wait for a doctor who took two hours for lunch and a lab scientist who needed a lot of pleads to conduct urgent test.
Why is there a difference in customer experience in private institutions and government institutions? Why do we have tolerant and dedicated staff at the private schools, hospitals, offices and more while government owned offices are bedeviled with the direct opposite personages and characters?
What has happened to civil service?
Gordon James Enaypharo
©2016
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