where else...?

where else is there such a place as this??

• where else would you get to pray together before and after every shift, and all the times in between.
• where else would the important tasks of the day focus on drawing on balloons, suction canister holder basketball, colouring, elephant glove animals, knitting, crochetting, football now the world cup has started
• where else would you be surrounded so many languages; not only English, french, Ewe, Moba, Tchikossi, Twi, Adjo, Basser, Kokomba, Ashanti, Kabaye and the list goes on.  
• where else would the ultimate focus of the day be on sharing Jesus and building relationships, rather than the nursing task in hand?
• where else would you have a conversation when i am talking my language, she is talking their language and along with a few hand signals we totally understand each other?
• where else would you find a 15 second commute to work....?
• and arrive in work 7 minutes after your first alarm went off.
• where else would you have to dodge rats on your run.....?
• and cockroaches...
• where else could you play football and volleyball with your patients?
• where else is a port your back garden?
• and where do you ever share every meal with 400 other people?
• at home you certainly don't get to hold beautiful brown babies on your back African style, as you continue to get on with the task in hand!
• and at home would you ever gather as church in a ward in the hospital? 
• would there be another hospital where all supplies are not always available - if the paper towels didn't arrive on the last container, then you have to do without them.
• and when you've only been on board 6 weeks you are considered a senior nurse, as the other nurses working with you have only been here for 4 wks and 2 wks!
• and here we have special ship holidays as there are so many countries represented that there are far too many holidays to honour everyone's holidays.
• I like this one - where else do you have fresh mangoes and pineapples available for every meal or an African meal every Tuesday dinner?
• where else do you not only volunteer, but pay your way and have so much joy in doing so?
• and when does your home ever set sail, with home then being in a different port of a different country?
• during a normal shift you don't normally go about with stickers stuck to our face or feet.
• there are magnetic move able curtains attached to the ceiling, to give privacy around the beds.
• there are no pumps for normal intravenous fluids - its all old fashions drip drip drip rates.
• translating through 2 or 3 other translators and back again to determine if your patient is ok is normal practice. 
• Caregivers and families camp out on mattresses under the patients bed.
• there are about 1ft between each bed.
• All hospital trash is incinerated so it doesn't end up on the street, having had the locals search through our rubbish.
• no where else would there be instructions on how to use toilet-in an attempt to stop patient peeing in the shower.

and the list goes on and on. This place is certainly different and unique in so many different ways. Not only in the nursing practice, but in the daily living too and as my time draws to a close I just sit and reflect on what a special place it is, on all the love that surrounds me.
I've written down my thoughts in an attempt to try and convey some of this uniqueness to you all, so that you might catch a glimpse of what surrounds me and what its been like.