Currently listening to this song and reflecting on life while writing a paper for my "Jewish Settlements in Israel pre-1948" class.
Sunday, March 30, 2008
Thursday, March 27, 2008
Going Gray
But, honestly, I am not that surprised. This place, coupled with nursing, has been the most emotionally stressful experience I have ever had. I don't even know how to adequately explain it, examples will have to suffice.
Example 1 - this place. This past Sunday the Penn nurses were on an Arab bus on our way to Old City to experience a Purim celebration with our professor. We were pulled over by a group of Israel Police Officers. Everyone had to produce a passport or ID (which by the way, you don't need to ride a bus). He took one man off of the bus. We waited while 3 officers searched, interrogated, and just took their precious time with this man. Eventually the man came back to the bus to get his little son. The police interrogated and stood around some more. Eventually the man told the bus driver to leave, and him and his son piled into the Police Car. Such disturbing pointless intimidation tactics. Such racism. Such hate. And all we could do was watch.
Example 2 - nursing. I saw my first death. It affected me so much more than I thought it would. Especially considering that she was not even my patient. I knew nothing about this little 4 year old girl other than her medical condition, which I will not share. I watched almost an entire resuscitation attempt. It was fine as long as we were discussing technical skills applied and the physiology of the girl's condition. Somehow 45 minutes into watching the trauma put on this tiny body it hit me, and I had to leave. 15 minutes later they called it. I get shivers just writing about it. I cried. I keep thinking about it. I know it is better, that she was in no state to live, but I was there while she died. And all I could do was watch.
Thursday, March 20, 2008
Laughter is the Best Medicine
Saturday, March 8, 2008
The Work had to begin eventually
My clinical this past week was at
The lectures on the other hand, are much better than at Penn. With a class of 5 students it is much more relaxed, personalized, and gives leeway for more interesting stories and information applicable to Israel. You also get to know your professors very well. Oh, and best of all, class pauses when you need a bathroom break.
Saturday, March 1, 2008
The Best Laid Plans...
…are no plans at all. We decided to make the most of our last free weekend before intense nursing classes began. What better way than to go to a warm sunny beach on the
So, here we were, 8 girls, 1 boy, wandering Eilat at 11pm without a place to sleep. Pretty comical really, but it gets better. We decided to go back to the bus station, because we saw a couple hostels around. While walking through the station we ran into a group of boys from
While we split up to inquire about different hostels about open beds and pricing, the woman drove by and honked, then she stopped up by the other group and started bargaining again. She was going to give us 10 shekels less per person for two nights. We had to convince our friend that $2.50 was not worth risking our lives.
We ended up finding a beautiful hostel. The man who owned it has traveled all over the world, is an architect/designer, and designed his hostel. He even has the “nicest house in
The first day was very relaxed. We wondered around the beach shopping at different stands. It was gorgeous. A sea with the bluest water I have ever seen, surrounded by looming mountains. We meandered up the jetty to see if there were any boat rides on the