I can’t believe that I just finished my last day of internship at Tafelsig Clinic. This really means that the end of the trip is fast approaching and I’m having mixed feelings about it. While it wasn’t the easiest of situations to be in, I really did enjoy working with the staff there, and I learned so much from them. I truly feel that the amount of challenges that I faced are proportional to the amount of knowledge and experience that I gained while working at Tafelsig. One of the first challenges I faced was that of language barrier. Mostly everyone that works at Tafelsig, and the patients themselves are Coloured. Most of them, as a result, speak Afrikaans as their first language. It was definitely intimidating at first to be thrown into a place where I could barely understand people with their accents when they were speaking English, let alone when they were speaking a language that I knew nothing of.
Another challenge that I faced was finding a place that was suitable for me to be working, and doing something that I felt was useful. I came into this program with a certification in Phlebotomy, so I had hoped that I would be able to do something along those lines at the clinic. My expectations were more than met. While the challenges were many, I also had many opportunities to learn from Tafelsig Clinic. Because of the amount of people that come in daily, (over 500 per day fyi), I was able to be exposed to a lot of things that normally I would not see until graduate school in the U.S. With all the stuff that I was doing, mostly in the Emergency/Treatment room, I really felt that I was helping relieve the stress of the staff members,, just by doing the small monotonous things, so the nurses could focus on the more severe Emergency cases. It was so nice to hear the woman that I spend most of my time with say that she didn’t know what she was going to do without me now that I’m leaving. She had also said that she hated Thursdays and Fridays, because those were the two days that I was unable to come in and help her. Hearing this from her made me feel as though I actually made a difference during my time here, and even if it just in some small way that I was able to help, its good enough for me. Another part of the job that was rewarding was when I was able to do something for a patient and they truly appreciated what I did for them. Something as simple as grabbing a blanket for someone who had been waiting a long time for an ambulance to come, or grabbing a cup for someone to sip on some water while they were waiting to be seen by the doctor.
I have learned so much from the nurses that I worked with and in turn I hope that I was of some assistance to them. I learned a lot about myself, and what I am capable of doing, and I also learned a lot that is related to the health care field. Through endless discussions with the people that I worked with I was able to learn about their pasts and how they lived during the years of Apartheid, which is so interesting to learn about from someone who actually experienced it. During my last day I talked with one of the staff members, a lady named Iris who I had become closer with during my time at Tafelsig. She told me that she was truly going to miss me, and that she had really enjoyed our conversations and learning about my life and sharing her life story with me. It was so wonderful to hear such nice things from someone that I had come to respect so deeply. I remember when I first arrived at the clinic she would only speak Afrikaans, probably because she wasn’t as comfortable with her English. But our relationship grew to the point where even if I was sitting at the table during tea and lunch with a big group of people all speaking Afrikaans, she would make a point to speak English so that I could have some idea of what the conversation was about. Iris isn’t the only person at Tafelsig that I got to know on a more personal level, but there is just not enough time or space to write about all of them. Overall my experience was amazing, and I will forever remember my time at Tafelsig, the people I met, and the things I learned.
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