A compilation of some of the more poignant moments from when I worked in a hospital - Part 2
So, not only did I ramble on for too long last Thursday that it has caused me to come up with a post today as well, you all seem to have really enjoyed it too! Since we are all familiar with the context, here’s the rest of the moments without too much preamble!
I once had the opportunity to interact with nurses WELL beyond their retirement age; nurses who were once midwives, something Singapore has done away with. Their dedication to the whole concept of babies and motherhood, their eagerness to teach new mothers things about their babies, and the fact that they still wanted to get up every day and go to work just like they had in their twenties was inspiring to say the least.
All the delicious Indian food I got to eat at fancy-schmancy dinner events simply because I request the vegetarian option.
One time I had to go around the hospital campus to advertise and recruit participants for a study. This was before I had been oriented with what was happening in each block, each floor, and each ward. I was tasked to go around the whole campus and that’s what I did. And that’s how I found myself in a very dark, very small, and very quiet room with gigantic machines that surprisingly emitted nothing beyond a gentle and steady hum, connected to … something I couldn’t figure out. Then it clicked in an instant. I was in the neonatal ICU. Where babies were fighting for their life. Hooked to machines that were thrice or quadruple times their size. I was so shocked by the number of babies and I was so thrown off by the incongruence of the scenario (underdeveloped babies that looked so fragile against clunky machines that looked like they had been invented in the 40s) that I forgot why I was there in the first place. I don’t know why but I always assumed neonatal ICUs had equipment in baby sizes. In reality, some of them looked bigger than what was used on adult patients. The innate human will to fight, even before you can understand the concept of survival was just astounding to me.
One of my biggest lessons from working there, although this isn’t specific to a hospital, it’s more important to have a supportive boss than supportive colleagues.
And the biggest moment of them all is the fact that to this day, I have absolutely no idea how I got the job. I was in university, and I was at home one day applying for the hundredth part-time vacancy when my phone rang. Someone from SGH’s HR introduced themselves and went on to describe the role and job description of Research Assistant. I had no recollection of applying for such a job, but I listened because I was a university student who desperately wanted some money to support her living conditions. They ask me if I’m interested, I say yes, and they arrange a time and date for an interview. But for some reason, someone else sends me an email confirming the date, time, and location of the interview. Not the person I spoke to. I’ve never been to SGH before and I have no idea how it works so I didn’t give the address a second look. Now for those of you unfamiliar with SGH, the hospital has individual blocks – 8 that belong to the hospital itself and run from numbers 1 through 8 (and a block 9 that we don’t really talk about), a number of specialty centres that run by name, and other peripheral areas that go with the needs of Singapore’s largest hospital. And while I’m reading my confirmation email, I check through my emails to see if I had applied for this vacancy. All I found was that I had applied to another hospital, for an entirely different role. Nothing about SGH. I assume the hospitals are sister organisations, conclude they must all share the same HR and think nothing more of it.
The day of my interview, I’m extremely nervous, and in that stress and panic, make myself too late to use the public transport system. I flag a cab and tell the driver I need to go to SGH. He says “Okay!” As we are nearing, he asks for the block I needed to go to since they all have different drop-off areas, I check my email and say, “Block 10”. He goes “Oh?” and drives around the campus twice as we can’t find any signs indicating the existence of a Block 10. All the numbers stopped at 8. As he prepares to drive around for the third time, I tell him it’s fine, and ask him to stop somewhere because a) the meter was still running and b) I assume for some godforsaken reason that walking the campus by foot would make it easier to locate block 10. I walk around the entire campus three times, part of which is on a hill, so it was more like I hiked around the campus three times, and surprise, surprise, see no signs for a block 10. The phone numbers for the person who called me and the person who emailed me are not getting answered. And since it’s a hospital, I mostly only see patients and people who have clearly visited someone, so I have no idea who to stop and ask (I also have a thing about asking people). So, I’m stranded square in the middle of the campus, my interview is to start in a few minutes, I’m exhausted from having walked so much, and the sheer idea of not knowing what or where this block 10 is driving me crazy to the point that I’m close to tears. I couldn’t believe I was so close to a fantastic opportunity with a decent pay that somehow found its way to me and yet it felt like I was about to lose it all just because I couldn’t find a mythical block 10. I’m not paying attention to my surroundings, I’m rapidly blinking my tears away and I’m just frustratedly looking around the same view I’ve seen for about five times now. Suddenly, like movie suddenly, this nurse appears in front of me and asks if she can help me. I gush “YesthankyouI’mlookingforblock10?’ She goes “What you’re looking for is not block 10. You’re looking for Bowyer Block. Block 10 is the old name for Bowyer Block – it’s the one with the clock on it” she gestures. I follow her hand and I can’t believe it. To my right was the building with a clock tower I had passed SO many times when I was running around the campus like a crazy person. It was about 10 steps from me, right in the middle of the campus. And it was ridiculously hard to miss. THIS was block 10?! I turn around to thank her again and she’s… gone. I look around, I can’t spot her and not wanting to be late for the interview, I run over to the block, find the person from HR, apologise about twenty times for being late (I wasn’t but I just have to be 15 minutes early for things like this) and show him the email where it said block 10. He goes “That’s weird. There’s no Block 10 in SGH. I don’t know why my colleague typed that.” I wanted to scream “YOU THINK?!” But I smiled politely.
At some point during my interview, he asks how I heard about this job. I said “Erm… because you called me?” He goes, “Yeah, I called because you applied” like I’m an idiot. And I go. “Noooo. I’ve only applied to (another hospital) so far for (post). I thought maybe you got my resume from there?” He gives me a weird look and says “Erm no we don’t – we don’t do that. We don’t pass around resumes. The only way you can get here is if you apply for this specific post.”
“…Oh?”
And we stare at each other in confusion before he pushes a form at me to fill up and fill the silence. I finish the rest of the interview and leave, thinking I’m never going to get the job. It’s not until I’m on my way home that I realise I have no idea how I figured the person who told me where I had to go was a nurse. She wasn’t wearing a uniform like all the other nurses I’ve seen. And for someone who has a pretty decent memory, I have no idea what she looks like to this day. The “uniform” I saw her in was nothing like the uniform the actual nurses in SGH wore. I can’t remember any features about her, nor can I even describe her height, size, or race. I can’t pick her out in a crowd. Which is fine I suppose, since the brain has a way of blocking things out when you’re stressed or hyper-focused on something. But what I find extremely odd is that she used the phrase “You’re looking for Bowyer Block”. And once I joined and became a regular employee who has learned about the history of the organisation, I learned that Bowyer Block was built in the 1920s and is the oldest structure in SGH. It has been called the Bowyer Block since the 1920s. The name has been slapped on the building. It has never once been referred to as “Block 10” in its history. Ever. So, of all the blocks, centres, and buildings there, this random person somehow knew exactly what I was looking for. Everyone I have told this story to finds it extremely bizarre and asks me if I’m missing out on a detail. I’m not. And no one has been able to understand how this lady knew that Block 10 was Bowyer Block because Block 10 is a concept that has never existed in SGH’s history.
But, like I believe I’ve said before, I wouldn’t have it any other way. I learned a lot, I got to interact with a lot of unique people, an opportunity I doubt I would have gotten otherwise and as cliché as it is, I couldn’t have learned this at a better place, but, life, uh, finds a way.
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