During my first few days in Bali, I fell ill with Dengue Fever. I was travelling solo and staying in an 18-bed dorm room in a hostel, sharing two toilets between 36 hostel guests. Here’s what happened.
The Incident That Started It All: The Mosquito Bite
My first ever visit to Bali started with a trip to a coworking space. I wanted to get some work done before planning any adventurous day trips, so I set off with my laptop and found my way there. I took a seat in the garden to enjoy the sun while I worked and within minutes I felt a sharp stinging on my arm. And sure enough, there was a big black and white striped mosquito on my arm, with its mouth still firmly attached to my skin. I knew the type of mosquito: the Aedes Aegypti.
I knew it only because I’d researched dengue fever the year before, while travelling through Thailand, and this was the type of mosquito that carried the illness.
Once I’d smacked the mosquito off my arm and the stinging had stopped, I sighed. I bet I get dengue fever or typhoid, I thought. That would be just my luck. Contracting dengue on my very first day in Bali.
My Descent Into Illness
I carried on the rest of the day, and the day after the bite as normal. But on my third day in Bali, I woke up feeling absolutely bloomin’ awful. I told myself I was just tired and hauled myself out of bed and into the shower. I had a new members meeting at the coworking space at 10:30 am, so I rushed to get ready and started the 20-minute walk.
A few steps down the road I felt even worse than I had when I first woke up. My head was pounding, my back was aching like crazy and I felt the same sort of nausea you get with a hangover. I didn’t really think anything of it — I just put it down to not having had any breakfast. I’m a bit of a diva when it comes to breakfast.
I arrived at the meeting late and sat at the bark on a bench. The pain in my back was getting worse and I shuffled and fidgeted throughout the entire meeting, drawing my knees to my chest, twisting, turning and arching my back just to try and alleviate the pain.
Once the meeting was over I ordered a chocolate muffin (because what better way to try and get better than with a large serving of something chocolatey). Each mouthful was a struggle. Halfway through the muffin, I realised I was unwell. Normally I devour anything chocolatey in seconds, but the muffin was a struggle, and each mouthful made me feel worse. And the pain in my lower back had spread down to my knees and to my upper back and shoulders.
I’d only completed a measly seven minutes of work, but I slammed my laptop shut and started to walk back to the hostel. I quickly came across a guy with a motorbike yelling ‘taxi taxi’ (they’re everywhere in Ubud), and decided there was no way I could walk back to the hostel. So I got on the back of the taxi driver’s motorbike and did my best to cling on as he drove me home. Looking back, I should have found a taxi driver with a car. I barely had the strength to hold on as he swerved through the Ubud roads and tiny streets to get me home.
A Shared Hostel Dorm: The Worst Place To Be Ill
I got back to the hostel at about midday and went straight to my dorm. A team of about 7 cleaning staff were in there changing sheets, sweeping and mopping the floor and carrying out their cleaning routines. My heart sank, I had to lay down, and I couldn’t get to my bed.
I made my way down to the pool, where there were beanbags and sun loungers. I collapsed onto a bean bag and fell asleep almost immediately. I woke up about an hour later, feeling hot, thirsty and downright terrible. I had to make it to my bed.
Luckily the cleaning staff had finished up while I slept by the pool, so I stumbled into the room, kicking off one shoe before falling into bed. I drew the horribly thin and transparent curtain around the bed to give myself at least the illusion of privacy and again fell asleep, with one shoe still on.
I woke up about 8 hours later, in the evening, when a drunken man who was in the bunk bed above me fell against my bed, knocking the curtain open. He started to apologise, but his ‘sorry’ faded into muttering — he was clearly shocked by my appearance. I looked rough. And I knew that was probably just the first encounter I’d have with a drunken gap-year traveller that night. I was in a party hostel, and I knew from the previous nights I’d spent there that the partying and drinking wouldn’t stop until 4-5 am.
Sure enough, throughout the night I had to deal with the sound of girls vomiting in the bathroom, people having sex in the beds around me, music thumping on the offbeat of my throbbing headache. The worst part though was the bathroom situation. There were only two toilets for over 30 people, and the illness meant I needed those babies pretty regularly.
Each time I staggered to the toilet, which was only a few steps away from my bed, the aching pain got worse. My ankles, knees and hips felt like they were breaking each time I put weight on them. The pain was so intense it felt like I could hear my joints crunching and creaking. And when those few steps to the toilet were finally over, I would have to wait for the gaggles of drunken girls to finish weeing, vomiting and using the toilets to have heart-to-heart conversations.
The Quest for a Private Room
There was no way I could stay in the hostel. But every step I took felt like setting fire to my joints and muscles. I didn’t know what to do, how could I summon the strength to pack my rucksack, and carry the massive 15-kilogram pack to a new place?
A couple of days after being ill in the hostel I knew I had no choice but to face the pain and move to a private room in another guest house. I booked a room online and prepared to make a move. Packing up my things took the best part of four hours. After shoving each item into my backpack I laid back, breathing deeply, giving myself a pep talk to keep going. Eventually, I had packed and had pulled my backpack onto my back. The pain was excruciating.
I made it to reception to check out and was met with ‘Oh my goodness, are you okay?’ from the receptionist. It was at that moment I realised I couldn’t talk. I knew I had a sore throat, but next to all the other symptoms I hadn’t really given it a second thought. But no, trying to talk sent me into a coughing fit that seemed to last forever.
After coughing over the receptionist, and trying to say thank you through tear-filled eyes and spluttered sounds, I made my way to the main road. A taxi driver found me instantly, thank God. He took my rucksack and put it in the car, ignoring my attempts to ask him how much he charged. My guest house was only a ten-minute walk away, a five-minute drive maximum. It hurt to talk, it hurt to stand so eventually I gave up trying to ask how much and got in. He was grinning, and I knew instantly he was going to rip me off.
After a few minutes in the car we arrived near the guest house, he said he couldn’t get closer despite many other cars driving down the same road, and jumped out, threw my rucksack to the pavement and charged me 150,000 IDR — about £9. The journey shouldn’t have cost more than 60,000, but I didn’t have the strength to argue and he knew it.
I tried to pick my rucksack up of the floor where he had dumped it and didn’t even have the strength to lift it onto my shoulders. Eventually, someone helped me lift it up, and I stumbled a few minutes down the road to the guest house.
My room wasn’t ready yet, but I couldn’t stand, or even sit any longer. I laid down on a bench in a lobby — I don’t think I’ve ever looked more homeless. I was shivering despite the hot Bali weather, my hair was unbrushed, and I smelt like I hadn’t showered in weeks. But I had made it, I had my own private room, and I didn’t have to carry my stupidly large rucksack anymore.
Recovering From Dengue Fever
I was ill for another week and a half, but gradually I started to get better. Having my own room made the illness so much more bearable, but still, I was unable to leave the hotel to get food. Luckily there was water just a few steps from my room, but it took me six days to be able to leave the room to get something to eat. And if there’s one thing I’ve learnt from this whole ordeal, it’s that going six days without food is horrendous.
After a week I made it to the hospital to receive the care I needed, and now, about two weeks on from that silly mosquito bite, I’m doing much better.
So if you’re suffering from Dengue fever in Bali, or any other illness really, here are my tips to you:
- If you’re in a hostel, leave immediately and find a private room, before the illness gets worse!
- Go to a hospital or Doctors as soon as possible. Bali healthcare is actually very good.
- Don’t go six days without food, you’ll just make yourself feel worse.
- Wear mosquito spray! I literally never did this before I got ill, now you won’t see me out and about in Asia without it
- Ask for help — I struggled through most of the illness on my own, but if I’d just asked for help there were so many people around me who would have given it gladly. The Balinese are such lovely people, and apart from the taxi driver, so many people did their best to help me.
I live in the UK, in the country’s most uneventful city, where the most interesting story in the local paper is about banning dressing gowns in supermarkets.
I travel and I write, because surely there are more interesting stories than that to write about and share.