Are you a doctor?

Do you ever wonder whether the security people actually watch the monitor as your carry-on luggage goes through the scanner?  Well, in Johannesburg they apparently do....and they don't care about what size your shampoo is or how full your water bottle is.....instead, they key-in on the stethoscope. 

That's right, medical vignette number one of this trip resulted because the security lady saw the stethoscope show up when her backpack was scanned.  Then, after confirming to whom the bag belonged, she asked if we were doctors.  I believe "yes" was the simplest answer at the time though I don't really recall exactly how it was explained.  Instead of asking what we were doing here, where we were going, etc, she wanted to know what caused dizziness.

It's a good thing Carter wasn't feeling super-talkative because asking a budding neurologist about dizziness could open up a book of causes.....in fact, I'm sure there are (several) books on that topic alone.  Unphased when Carter gave her standard answer of dehydration (which very often is the case of folks' dizziness), the security lady asked if that would even cause dizziness at night in bed.  Really, it quite possibly could - and she probably doesn't drink enough water, but in order to calm her a little further we explained very quickly about the crystals of the inner ear & how they float in fluid in the ear.  If they get moved out of their normal place, dizziness can result.  So then we explained a brief maneuver she could try at home to reposition the crystals - and Carter imitated said maneuver on one of the security tables (without actually lying down - which is probably good because who knows what security would have thought about that!).

In any case, that's medical vignette number one....I imagine that a good number will follow.  In the meantime, we're in the airport in Johannesburg waiting for our flight to Swaziland in an hour or so.  We will update again once we're settled (hopefully tonight but perhaps tomorrow).

Hope everyone back home is enjoying a nice weekend!