The south end of the beach at Hua Hin, Thailand.
Where are Kevin and Ruth now? Hua Hin, Thailand.

Where are Kevin and Ruth going next? Maldives on March 23rd.

Saturday, December 19, 2020

A new twist in our eye surgery story!

If you haven't read yesterday's post, you really need to do that before reading this one.

And so, given the events of Thursday, we had pretty much given up on getting the corrective eye surgery done while here in Turkey. But you never know when fate is going to change your direction in life. And so it was yesterday. What a strange story!

We had made a plan to go down to the Antalya waterfront. We had read there is a pretty waterfall and a nice waterfront park to go for a stroll. A great way to take advantage of yet another beautiful day. Temperature was 19C (66F) with clear blue sky and sunshine and no wind.

On the main highway that cuts through the city.

We easily found a parking spot and walked the short distance to the waterfall.


This water has no idea what it's in for!

What a beautiful waterfront park.

This was at about 11:15am. Not many people around, but there were a few joggers, walkers, and cyclists. But we have learned that Turkish people tend to come out after lunch. It was much busier after 1:00pm with many people out enjoying the park.

Duden Waterfall.

This is Lower Duden Waterfall. There is also an Upper Duden Waterfall, about 10 kms (6 miles) upriver. We will have to go check that one out as well!


We can definitely understand the attraction to the city of Antalya. It's a clean, modern city with a population of around a million people. It's scenic, with both a rocky coastline that you see in these photos, and a beautiful beach area to the west of the city. And a view of the snow covered mountains in the distance. 

The Saklikent ski area is only 50 kms (30 miles) away. Antalya is one of those cities where you can go skiing in the morning, and swimming in the afternoon!

Antalya coastline.








We strolled for about an hour. Ruth had brought a couple of snacks, but we had finished them she was starting to get hungry. Restaurants that choose to open are doing takeout only. I was doing okay, and would have been quite happy to go home and get something to eat there.

Ruth spotted a place across the road, so we went over to check it out.

A woman came out to help us, and she was really friendly. She spoke a little English, and asked where we were from, and we had a short conversation. She brought us some menus, and we placed the order. We almost didn't stay because it was quite a bit more expensive than what we normally have paid for this type of meal in Turkey. But we were there, and the place wasn't busy. In fact, we were the only ones there.

The woman, Yasemin, came back and sat down opposite us while the meal was being prepared. We were just talking about the other tourists who come to visit Antalya. She mentioned that a lot of people come for plastic surgery and dental work, and Ruth mentioned that we had just been to have our eyes looked at.

Yasemin says "I just had cataract surgery last week".

So of course, we started questioning her. She is younger than us, and only needed to have one eye done due to a problem with only that eye. We got to talking about money, and she had paid 7,000 lira ($1,175 CAD, $$920 USD) to have it done. This is less than half of what we had been quoted at the eye hospital we had been at the day before!

Now, maybe she needed a different type of surgery, who knows... of course you want to be comparing apples with apples.

So I asked her for the information of the doctor who she was dealing with. She went and got his card from her purse, and then she says "do you want me to call him?".

And so she did. The next thing you know, I'm talking on her phone to the doctor, and he speaks perfect English.

I explained what we wanted done, and what the price was at the last place. We joked a little bit about "tourist prices", but he said the place we went is well known in the industry to be expensive for both tourists and locals alike.

He said "I will give you the Turkish price, not the tourist price, and it is 18,000 lira ($3,000 CAD, $2,350 USD) total for both eyes per person."

The other place had wanted 30,000 lira. A huge difference in cost.

We have appointments with him at 3:00pm Monday afternoon!

When we got home, I did some research on the doctor. Suffice to say, he knows what he's doing and has completed over 12,000 eye surgeries. He studied in both California and Europe, and worked at quite a few clinics and hospitals before taking the big step to open his own clinic here in Antalya in July of this year!

The whole way home, all I could think of was how odd it is that these little interactions you have with people along the way can change your life. I mean, what if I had insisted we go home for something to eat? What if we had decided the restaurant was too expensive? What if this really nice lady Yasemin had not brought up the dental and plastic surgery comment? What are the odds that we randomly met someone who just had lens surgery done last week??

I guess it was meant to be.


The main street by the waterfront park has a walking path, and a cycling path.
Why are people walking on the cycling path? We have no idea.

Fishing!
He better hope he doesn't hook a big one!

And here we are into another weekend already. Five days of freedom, and two days of lockdown. 

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Record low deal on this Kodak Film and Slide Scanner to digitize all of your old slides.

And in Canada...



28 comments:

  1. Do you think the weekend lock downs is helping with covid? That is a beautiful area you are in.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Turkey is now in 6 th place in the world . Their COVID numbers are increasing in leaps and bounds . I suppose the lock downs can’t hurt but I think things are out of control.

      Delete
    2. There really is no way to tell if it is helping or not but I guess it also isn't hurting anything by doing it.

      It seems to us that most places are now out of control. We try not to pay too much attention to the numbers because it is so hard to know how true those numbers really are! We will just continue to do what we are doing which is basically staying away from the public as much as possible, wearing our masks, washing our hands, using antiseptic wipes and sprays whenever entering or leaving stores and keeping ourselves healthy but eating right, getting our exercise and getting enough sleep.

      Delete
    3. Ruth, good answer. Numbers here in FL are up too but I personally know 2 people who recently tested positive...one has very mild symptoms yet his wife has no symptoms. I have friends back in CA whose whole family (6) tested positive and only 2 of them were sick so there's a lot of head scratching on some cases.

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    4. It is so difficult to know who it is going to affect and how hard it will affect them. All I can say it to stay away from situations that put in you contact with more people and hand wash a lot as well as using antiseptic wipes as much as possible.

      Hopefully 2021 will be a better year for everyone.!

      Delete
  2. Hi Kevin and Ruth,
    You made me laugh on the comment on your las picture...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Lol, there is just no way you would catch us out on that cliff fishing!

      Delete
  3. I had multi-focal lenses put in B.C. about 17 years ago.Love them. I had to pay the difference only between them & the single vision lenses our medical plan covers so not as costly.
    One thing to ask is about the halos caused by the multi focal lenses. At that time 25% of individuals get them with the multifocals & I am one of them.
    So at night all lights including headlights have them - not fun driving.
    I bought non glare glasses in Mexico (no prescription) to help but still want to look away from headlights.
    The opthamalogist I saw then stated it was the main side effect that discouraged him from getting them.
    Worth investigating.
    Hope it works out.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yes, that sounds like it would make the price a little more affordable. We are glad to hear that you love your multi-focal lenses and that was 17 years ago, just imagine the improvements that have been made since then.

      The first doctor had already told us that those "halos" do often occur in low light such as driving at night or watching TV in low light conditions and this is one of the few negatives when it comes to the multi-focal lens replacement. Seeing that we rarely ever drive at night, we think it is something that we could live with but thank you for mentioning it.

      Delete
  4. Street 2 lanes 1 way, separate bike and walking path. That’s the way it should be done!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Absolutely and we see a lot of bike/walking paths like this here in Turkey. There are also lots of bike lanes on the regular roads too, some are even separated from the road by a curb or small pylons.

      Delete
  5. If you are starting with Cataracts it would be better to simply have the Lens replacement done without the Laser Surgery. That is what Kathy had in 2018. Because I had Laser Twenty Years earlier I now have one eye weaker then the other.
    Would it not be to your benefit to be Ontarians for Six Months in order to get the procedures done for free back home?
    Be Safe and Enjoy your upcoming appointment.

    It's about time.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. We had pretty much just said no to laser, if we still have to wear glasses then we just don't see the point on getting the laser done, maybe if we had been a lot younger we might have thought about it.

      No, it would not benefit us to be Ontarians for six months! One we don't want to "live" in Ontario again. Two, we don't want to live in Ontario or any other province for six months! And three, my cataract is only just beginning in one eye and they wouldn't do the surgery until it got really bad which could be a few years down the road yet so it would not be paid for until it gets to that point.

      Delete
    2. Wow! Do you still want to be Canadian citizens? Just asking.

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    3. I have no doubt that we will always be Canadian citizens but at the moment we don't want to be tied down anywhere for that length of time unless we absolutely have too. There are still so many interesting places to visit. Will we ever settle back down in Canada permanently probably not, that is one of the reasons we love to travel. We are always looking to see if we can find that perfect spot, even then we probably wouldn't permanently live it that spot either, lol! We honestly keep coming back to Mexico, we really love it there.

      Delete
  6. Bernd had both lenses done in 2019 and did not want to spend the money for the all round lenses ($3000.-) each. Now he is buying reading glasses.
    Driving in the night was very difficult until I bought from the internet yellow glasses to reduce the oncoming lights. Now he is quite happy.
    Good luck for your operations!!!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you for the input Angi, we do appreciate it. If we do go ahead with the procedure we will get the multi-focal lenses so that we won't have to wear our glasses anymore. The price would be about the same $3,000 but that would also include the surgery and lenses for both eyes, not just one and it would include all the pre-op exams and care after the surgery.

      We rarely ever drive at night so it really shouldn't cause an issue for us but it might still be a good idea to get a pair of those yellow glasses just in case.

      Delete
  7. After yesterday's post, I was almost sure the first doctor had come back to offer you a better price. I'd love to do without glasses.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Nope, he hadn't! I think that hospital has set prices for "tourists" and separate prices for the "Turkish" and they don't negotiate.

      It will be interesting to see what this new doctor will have to say. They always say to get more than one opinion so that is what we are doing. We also have a few more questions to ask that we hadn't thought of before.

      Delete
  8. A complete off-topic subject a while back you went for Merrell walking shoes to another brand could you tell me how well they were holding up and what brand did you get
    Merrell Makes a great Hiking shoe but I think their quality is suffering With all the walking that you do I was curious what brand you got

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The new shoes that we got are Oboz and we are loving them! We have always loved our Merrell's but the last few pairs that we have both had, have just not lasted like they used to do years ago and maybe that is because we do more hiking now than back then. Our Oboz have been lasting really well. We have done a ton of hiking in them and they are only just showing a few signs of wear and tear but not much and we have had them for over a year now. It will be interesting to see what they will look like once we are finished all our hiking in Tanzania.

      The tread is still looking pretty good on both of our pairs but the one complaint that we have is that when the surface is wet or damp, we find the soles are very slippery. Apparently this has been a problem and the company and since changed the sole and maybe our shoes are from old inventory.

      Delete
    2. I remember when you got the Oboz, and I was really hoping you'd love them as much as my husband loves his. Glad that is the case! He has super wide feet (4E) so had a terrible time finding wide-enough boots.

      Delete
  9. Funny how things have a,way of working out

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It sure is! We will see how this appointment goes later today. :-)

      Delete
  10. So beautiful! And see, sometimes it pays to "splurge" every once in a while 'cause you never know how it will benefit you! Glad you found an option for your eye surgery!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. We can't believe how that chance encounter changed things for us! :-)

      Delete

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