I rarely get homesick. Sure, there are moments in my travels when I think, "yes, I'm ready to go back now," but these thoughts are always more epiphanous than sad. But for the past three weeks, I've had a stubborn cough and flu that just won't go away, and I've never missed Canada more.  

Here in Korea, where I work as an ESL teacher, illness is seen as a private matter that has no influence on one's professional life. When I first fell ill, I went to my director for help. After all, I'd need a Korean translator in the exam. He whisked me to a doctor (actually, an ear, nose and throat guy, it was the closest clinic around), whisked me to the pharmacy to fill my prescription (fistfuls of pills, three times a day), and whisked me back to work, right on time to teach my next class. 

The Korean approach to treatment, it seems, is to medicate, medicate, medicate, and get on with one's day. Though I try to keep an open mind, I can't wrap my western head around it. But surely, I'll infect the students? Surely, the work will suffer if I can barely keep my eyes open? Surely, I'll recover much faster with a day or two of bedrest? As I spend the better part of January coughing through my work days, the leap from I want to be in bed to I want to be in my bed in Canada was a short one. 

Of course, everyone gets irritable when they're ill. But when I'm ill abroad, I become a nightmare expat. The patient, wide-eyed traveler in me takes off, and instead I become petty, demanding, and utterly impatient with anything unfamiliar. I turn up my nose at healthy Korean food. All I want is tea and toast. When old Korean men spit on the street (a very normal practice here), I cringe in unconcealed disgust. When people cough or sneeze in a crowded sardine-like subway car, I think it's no wonder germs flourish here. When the doctor examined me a second, then third time, a hyper-critical monologue ran through my head. He didn't even take my temperature! Are those instruments sterile? That nurse should be wearing gloves. 

But I worry the sickness blues (and the homesickness blues) walk a fine line between tolerable crankiness and outright ignorance. Living in Asia, I'm a big believer in keeping an open mind to eastern practices, no matter how unusual they might seem through western eyes. I've met my fair share of expats who have no interest in understanding eastern customs. I've overheard those cringeworthy lines like "Do. You. Speak. ENGLISH?" or "rice for breakfast? but they don't seem poor." And I have little patience for that kind of closed-mindedness. But I worry, as I walk grudgingly to work, coughing and resenting everything, perhaps I'm no better?

I asked a fellow expat teacher, on week two of her stubborn flu, whether she was feeling homesick too. "God, yes!" was her reply, "I've been so moody, I've been snapping at everyone, then going home and eating overpriced Campbell's soup from the import shop." So perhaps I'm in good company after all. Perhaps once the illness passes, the hostile thoughts will too. In the meantime, I've struck a satisfactory balance of work by day and tea and Arrested Development by night. It's not home, but I think it might be working.