super legit piercing place

I have two anchors on the back of my neck that I naturally cannot see. Sometimes they catch on things like shirts, scarves, etc. and get a little red and irritated, but it's not big deal. If I am getting sick, one of them will usually get red and irritated. It's been cold since I've been here, so I've been wearing a lot of scarves and they haven't been especially happy with me, but all I need to do to make them better put warm salt water compresses on them for a while. Different piercers in the States will tell you different things (like maybe to use alcohol or something instead), but the ones I trust the most subscribe to this so I do too.

Anywho, the one on my right side of my neck has been especially sore feeling recently. I could feel something funky if I touched it, but I thought it was just crusted puss or something, so I had a friend clean it out. The friend did, but failed to mention that the thing was half ripped out of my neck. I don't know if he thought it was normal or what, but it didn't look like the other one at all, so if it were me, logically I would think something was up with one of them... but maybe that's just me.

Yesterday one of my students tried to explain to me that something was wrong, so she took a picture and showed me. I asked her how long it had been like that and she said maybe a week; she thought I knew. No bueno.

When an anchor is half out, you still have to go see a piercer to pull it all the way out; it's not an easy thing to do (or maybe I'm just a wuss). I've accidentally pulled one half out before. My piercer pulled it the rest of the way out, I let it heal for a month and then she redid it for me. That was my plan here as well.

There are a couple problems with this though. Chinese people don't really get tattoos and piercings. China is also very dirty. On top of that, Songyuan is pretty darn small, so I was a little concerned with A.) finding a clean piercing shop B.) finding a clean shop that had some experience with anchors C.) finding a piercing shop period.

I asked a Chinese friend of mine for help and he did some research. He called a cosmetic surgery place (not sure why) and they recommended he take me to a hospital. He's a big worrier too, so that was his plan, but I wasn't down with that. He did also find one tattoo/piercing shop that he checked out, but he was concerned with the cleanliness, the fact that the shop owner was smoking in the shop, etc. It still sounded like a better option to me, so we took another Chinese friend of mine and went there first.

The shop was unfortunately closed when we got there, so my friend called the guy, who had apparently spaced the fact that we were coming. We had to go pick him up so he could check me out. He looked at my neck in the car and told me that my piercing was infected from the water. That didn't exactly instill confidence in me, seeing as how it was clearly ripped halfway out, but I still didn't have any other options. I showed him my others to prove that it wasn't the water. He said if we took him back to his shop he'd pull it out for me.

The shop was pretty standard, if only not quite as clean as the States. He cleaned both of my anchors and took the jacked up one out. He seemed pretty worried that I was going to be in pain because I'm a girl, which made me laugh. Both of my friends were Chinese and pretty freaked out by the whole thing too. After the piercer took the one out he said maybe he could try to put it back in right away. It sounded like he had never put an anchor in someone before, soooooo I declined.

He seemed pretty adamant about me not putting water on it to heal though (what is WITH the Chinese and water?!) and made my friend go buy me iodine to clean it with. He told me not to wash it for like three days. About that though... not listening to him. Warm salt water has always worked for me in the past, so I'm sticking with that. I go to Hong Kong in about a month, so I figure they probably have more experience with piercings there so I can give it a month to heal get it redone then.