I've become quite ill in the last week. I try to stay healthy by staying active and exercising so I don't become just another overweight, lazy foreigner who's out of shape and unhealthy. No matter what physical shape I'm in I have found my self no match for the tiny Asian Tiger mosquito. I first noticed my lungs felt like they were filling up with fluid. I began coughing a bit. I tried to brush it off as just a cold or maybe a mild flu. I developed a fever and noticed a strange pressure that felt as if something was pushing from behind my eyes. As I sat here on my computer sweating feeling as if my brain was becoming so hot I actually worried it might even cause brain damage. As I sat here contemplating my symptoms a strange word just popped in my head out of nowhere as if it were just shoved into my thoughts by some unseen force. That word was "Dengue". So I searched it and as I saw the diagram in the picture which also displayed a rash that was to accompany the symptoms of Dengue. I noticed the rash was actually developing on my chest as I was reading about it. I just knew I had Dengue fever but before I mentioned it to anyone I first decided to check online and see if there were any outbreaks of Dengue reported in my area. To my surprise outbreaks in my area were reported and described as "terrible" according to the Bohol Times. So I went to the hospital where they told me I also had an upper respiratory infection. They gave me some meds that I was to take. One thing I first noticed about the reported cases of Dengue is that even though the number of cases was described as "terrible" the actual number of deaths from the virus seemed relatively low to me. Out of 623 cases only 8 people had actually died from Dengue. There are actually 4 different types of Dengue and if I were to catch a different strain of Dengue after already being infected then that could easily lead to Dengue hemorrhagic fever which would be much more serious and possibly kill me. Dengue is also known as break-bone fever because it causes great back pain and joint pain but as painful as it is it's easily survivable as long as you don't later contract one of the other three Dengue virus's which you haven't already been infected with. The first couple of days is really the most difficult part. Once the fever breaks then you get this crazy rash. For me the rash started on my shoulders and rapidly spread down my stomach to my upper thighs. I still have it by the way. I would say I'm about 8 days through it and on the road to recovery. You can learn more about Degue here.