Chinese Torture Medicine

Good grief! Last thursday, after I finish all my western medicine, my eyes were no sign of any recovery, so I decided to try chinese medicine. (Guess what I got myself into using chinese way!? )
I meet up the chinese doctor, well.... he was actually my girl friend's uncle; he touched my palm and squeeze my eyes' lids to examine my red eyes, he suspected heatiness within me. (I suffered nose-bleed for almost a week now!)
So he wrote out some mysterious character on a piece of blank paper, and handed it to the medicine "blender". (I don't know how they called the guy who combine all the medicine, he function like a blender.)
Then he laid out a piece of brownish oil paper on the table, pulling out all sorts of herbs from the tiny boxes on the cupboard. First, he sprinkle something red on the sheet, looks like powders; then he took out something black like fungus or mushroom, mixed it with the red stuff. Then I saw him pull out some creatures that looks like cockroach, plus some crushed shell, many more funny stuff that I never seen before. Finally, he wrapped up the mixture and handed it to me, he asked me to boiled the mixture with four bowls of water for one hour. I thanked him and leave the shop.
The night falls, and I unwrapped the packet, follow the instructions instructed by the "blender", four bowls of water, boiled for one hour, the water was crystal clear and I can see the cockroach thing-gie swimming in the pot. (Am I going to drink this?)
I waited for one hour, the chinese herbal smells circulating in my living room, I guess it's ready! So I took off the lid from the pot, and the crystal clear water turns into bitter blackish color, the smells it's horrible! The tastes of medicines was the worst I ever experience! (But to be honest, the stuff is good! My heatiness gone almost immediately!) Chinese people has a saying, bitter in the mouth, a good medicine!.....do you agree?