Left exhausted by hospital's super efficiency

Beijing veers from smooth efficiency one minute to sheer chaos the next. Each time I do something new, there's an added element of unpredictability, as I don't know whether things will be organized with military precision or whether no one will have a clue what's going on.

Take getting around the city. Look at a map of Beijing and you see an organized grid-style road network. But then when you undertake an excursion, chaos ensues. Crossing a road is like running a gauntlet. Bikes, cars, minivans, and even the odd horse and cart compete for space. People yell at each other and cars constantly beep their horns.

Another battleground is the supermarket. Queues are an alien concept. I stand politely waiting to pay for my goods and a withered old man is suddenly in front of me paying for his. I have to stop daydreaming and focus on the competition on hand, even if that means fending off the elderly.

But it seems the city is as good at clinical efficiency as it is at disorganization. I noticed this when I recently went for my medical examination that all foreigners have to undergo when they come to China.

The HR lady at our company took me to the hospital. The test took place in a big hall with numbered rooms at the sides. It was busy with foreigners, standing in long queues at each room and gathered at the front desk. There were a few rows of tables where I sat to fill in the form, which I picked up from a clearly labeled desk.

Once the form was signed I had to visit each room to have various checks done. I was impressed at how thorough the test was. I had my eyes checked, my lungs x-rayed, my blood pressure taken, and was weighed and measured. I even had my blood extracted and an ultrasound scan.

Every test was carried out with such rapidity that I barely had time to register what was happening.

In the height/weight room I walked into, I was ushered onto a raised platform, and ushered off and out of the room within seconds.

For my eye check, I only had time to figure out that I was supposed to tell the direction of the symbols on a lit box about 4 m away before I was whisked on to the second part of the test.

For the ultrasound test, the nurse ordered me to lie on the bed and lift up my shirt. She then proceeded to smear cold jelly on my tummy and sides with a cold metal applicator, which made me wince. She peered at a screen in front of her, assessing my insides. I wondered how many other people had spent their morning looking at the internal organs of hundreds of people.

"Ok?" I asked. "Normal," she declared, before patting me on the shoulder in a signal to wipe myself off, and leave.

The only hiccup occurred when I had my blood taken. Luckily the pace of events slowed somewhat as the nurse tried digging a needle into my arm. However, even though she took a little more time than the other doctors and nurses, she couldn't quite get it right. Eventually enough vials were filled but I left the room with plasters on both arms and bruises.

When I was done, most of the rooms had cleared too, and the nurses and doctors began to emerge from their rooms for a well-earned break. I felt I needed a rest too as I was so taken aback by the sheer efficiency of the whole operation.