The nice side of Aqaba ...Much as I like Aqaba as a town, I don't really want to think too hard about the hospital there and would recommend avoiding it if at all possible ... When I woke up in the middle of the night there after finally having been given enough drugs to send me to sleep, I found that I had been moved off the A&E ward into a room with no lights, no water, no food and no way of calling a nurse. I also seemed to have lost all of my possessions and was again in an excrutiating amount of pain. To my relief, there was another sick person in the room and her elderly auntie who was sleeping on the floor next to the bed, and after a few minutes I decided that I really was in too much pain and woke up the old lady to ask for her help. She was adorable and went off to find some help for me, which is when the three witches of Aqaba AKA the night duty nursing staff turned up next to my bed - when I explained that I was in agony and asked for some pain killers to help me sleep, they looked scornfully at me and said that I'd already had Valium and something else earlier that night, and what did I want more pain killers for? I was almost too stunned to answer, before somehow locating my best calm voice and saying that well, because I was still in pain, and that I really wasn't going to get any sleep without some help. I could feel the disdain waving across the room, and they huffed out and were gone for what seemed like an age ... and then on their return, rolled me on my side (small scream of agony) and jabbed a needle in my arm - I swear they didn't even look at what they were doing, and I still have the bruises from it nearly 3 weeks on.
My friendly nursing staff ...And as if that wasn't scary enough, I then drifted off to sleep, only to be woken about an hour later with the three witches hovering over me again, in the middle of taking what looked like a REALLY large amount of blood out of my arm - they hadn't even woken me first before putting the needle in! And looked like they were enjoying it too. Creepily, I never found out why they took the blood, and there are no blood test results in my notes from the hospital, so maybe they were vampires after all rather than witches, who knows ...
I woke again early in the morning, slightly more rested but still in pain and still without water, food or any idea where Mike and Vanessa had gone. Then thankfully the nice doctor turned up, and gave me my mobile phone that my friends had given him to pass on to me, and I was able to call for help which arrived about an hour later. The rest of the morning was spent trying to get discharged so that I could get back to Amman - the nice doctor said I was stabilised now and just had to make sure that I got operated on in the next 2 weeks, and gave me some pain killers to see me through and a prescription for what turned out to be the world's most uncomfortable crutches that dug into my armpits because they were just a bit too high for me (but the only other option was too short, which we reckoned was worse than useless). They were good enough to get me into a car and back to Amman though, and when it became clear that I wasn't going to be able to fly home anytime soon thanks to the ash cloud, I settled into waiting in my flat for things to blow over (literally).
Now, I called my doctor in Aqaba 'the nice doctor', and he was very nice, but not the most effective doctor in the world it turns out ... aside from the crutches, he prescribed me the most measly painkillers - paracetamol and one ibuprofen 3 times a day, I've been known to take more for a headache! - and I was in way more pain than the drugs could cope with. On the first night back at my flat in Amman, I ended up nicking some of Mike's back pain drugs just to get to sleep. So the following morning I did some research into the state of medical facilities in Amman (not being massively keen to return to a Jordanian hospital at that point), and eventually got some help to go and see Dr Amr Y Amr, who it turns out is pretty much the best orthopeadic surgeon in Amman - hoorah, competence at last! He took one look at my x-rays and informed that he was going to have to take me into A&E straight away, as my leg was disclocated as well as broken and the dislocation was causing swelling, which was going to prevent anyone from operating on the leg as well as causing lots of extra pain. He then very efficiently got me into theatre and gave me another Valium shot, which he said wouldn't send me to sleep but would mean I wouldn't feel anything while he manipulated the leg back into place ... Well, I'm lucky that I'm one of those people who gets amnesia from Valium, because apparently I was wide awake and very much did feel it when he did his thing, during which (according to my escort) I called him something along the lines of a "f***ing c***" and then fainted. He apparently didn't bat an eyelid, but it explains why some of the nurses and my escort both looked a little shocked and amused when I came round again!
And for those who like that kind of thing, here are the before and after photos - can you see where the dislocation was? Amusingly, when I showed my neice Alice my xrays and asked her if she could see the break, the first thing she pointed to was the dislocation and asked if the bone was in the wrong place, funny how she could see it but the nice doctor missed it ...
Before ... 
... and after. All neatly back in place again, and with some decent painkillers in my pocket, now all I had to do was wait for the swelling to subside and continue to chill out at home until I could get on a plane home - and I was surrounded by help and love at home, especially with Mike and four stranded French friends as well as my flatmate Ruth to look after me. In fact, the next 3 days are full of many warm and happy memories in my mind, including some strong love and great food - and no, I wasn't just high as a kite from the opiates (although it did help!) ...
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