Zhang Fan and the other doctors had all been woken up a bit past 4:00 a.m. to come to the hospital and perform surgery. The surgery on the teenaged girl hadn't finished until past 9:00 p.m. on the same day. The doctors hadn't seen the light of day for all this time. Was this normal? It could be said that it was common for most Chinese surgeons to see no sun at all for at least 20 days of each month. For resident doctor slaves at a large hospital, they usually wouldn't be able to see the sun for 10 months out of the year. This was no exaggeration. Chinese doctors would know this!
The surgery was now over. The older doctors, especially Director Zhao and Vice Director Song who had gotten no rest at all, lost all of their energy. Since this was quite common after a major surgery, the head nurse had long since already prepared two cots for them to sleep on right in the operating room.
