Bedside manner? What bedside manner?

Thursday afternoon I still wasn't feeling all that well. Although my fever seemed to have abated for the moment, I still had a horrible headache, cough, sore throat, and my head hurt like crazy. Since I was supposed to fly to Vietnam the next day, I thought It prudent to get myself checked out in a country with significantly better medical care. I went to the outpatient clinic at St. Paul's hospital, just a few blocks from my hostel. Everything was very efficient with the nurses recording everyones' information and assigning them to a specific exam room where they would see that doctor. Anyone with respiratory signs, such as I had, had to wear a surgical mask. I figured I would have to wait to see the doctor. It turned out I had to wait 2 hours, which is not unreasonable for a walk-in clinic. My encounter with the doctor, however, was nothing short of ludicrous. He called me in, asked me what hurt. I told him and he did a cursory look of my throat with a tongue depressor and briefly listened to my lungs. I told him I had been coughing up some nasty green phlegm (sorry) and would like antibiotics for a secondary bacterial infection and pain medication for my sinuses. He said, no, you don't have a fever, it's just a viral infection, please wait at the pharmacy, thank you, and had the nurse usher me out of the room. The entire encounter could not have taken more than a minute. He never looked at my nose, my ears, felt my throat, or let me get a word in edgewise. I might have stayed there and argued with him, but I think I was too stunned that anyone would find this an acceptable interaction with their doctor. Absolutely unbelievable.