On Pins and Needles in Hectic Hanoi

By Josh Krist
See the original article here

I thought of going to the hospital, but a pharmacist—a traveler's best friend in Vietnam—had already put me on a regimen of antibiotics and aspirins. After a few days, though, I was only getting worse. To get my mojo flowing again, I followed a small beacon of hope: the National Institute of Acupuncture.

I'd never had acupuncture before, but figured that was all the more reason to give it a stab at last.

[. . . ]

To my surprise, the institute felt more like a regular hospital and less the incense–filled hippie–esque space I'd imagined. Sitting on plastic chairs in the antiseptic waiting room, the locals regarded me with some amusement until finally the doctor called me in and asked, in decent English, about my troubles.

The doctor wrote some things down on my medical evaluation and handed it to his assistant, a young acupuncturist from Switzerland, who then took me into another room and made me lie down on an examination table. He wheeled over what looked like a large battery with dials on it and started sticking needles in my face.

There was a slight pinch as a needle went in, but no pain. Then, by means of very thin wires, the assistant attached electrodes to the needles and turned up the juice.

My face muscles started jerking around—at the juncture where the needles met my temples and chin especially—and the assistant asked if I wanted it stronger or weaker. My face twitching like crazy, I told him it was just right.

After some time—10 minutes or 30; I lost track as the electrical pulses started lulling me like an odd face massage—the assistant turned off the electricity.

As he took the needles out, I thought I felt a little better, but it was hard to be sure. When I walked outside, though, the rainy street looked sharper, as if I'd just come out of the eye doctor with new glasses.

Then, on the back of a motorbike that the kindly assistant negotiated for us, I felt a wave of energy. The gray streets had regained their charm, and the light drizzle gave everything the look of an avant-garde French movie.

I thought the good vibes might be some sort of placebo effect, but when I woke up the next morning ready to shout "Good morning, Vietnam!" I was a believer.

Maybe the antibiotics had finally kicked in. Maybe it was the kindness of the doctor and his assistant, or the acupuncture, or the overall experience itself. Regardless, next time I'm in Hanoi and feeling weary, I know exactly where to go to recharge.