WORK EXPERIENCE/ O.J.T

Work experience is a way to get a feel for the type of job you want to do in the future and to find out if you really like it or not and if it suits you. Once you do work experience you don't think of the job you want to do the way you want to inside your head. It suddenly becomes real and it may or may not be the way you expect them to be. 

I know in the future I want to be in a job where I can help others and medicine will let me do just that. This may have stemmed from the fact that both my parents were nurses and it I'm thankful that they are because they were able to help when my family became ill or in any emergencies. 

Work experience for medicine is particularly hard to find because it deals with patients and there's no room for error. I wanted to get work experience for the summer so that it didn't clash with college time but we were also going to the Philippines for a short holiday and time was running out so I figured why not find some in the Philppines? Luckily I was able to find some but the process I had to go through was also time consuming. I went to the city mayor (Hon. Isidro L. Hemedes, Jr.) to explain and ask him for permission to get work experience which in the Philippines they call O.J.T. at the city hall.

I couldn't have done this though without the help of my grandad; because he was friends with the mayor, I got to meet the mayor. 

They mayor wrote this letter for me to bring to Dr. Diamante. If I didn't have this letter I don't think I would have had the chance to fo work experience at City Health Office I. 

I was only observing what the nurses and midwifes were doing and while I was there I got to see how they do blood tests on babies, how they organise admissions and consultations, fetal screening and immunisations. Everyday there were lots of people especially children because most of the mediciation was free and even more if you had Phil Health. To find out that medication was free was shocking to me because normally health check and medication wasn't free. I was glad to know that now the people that can't afford treatments now can but the downside is they only treat basic illnesses. If what the patient requires is beyond what they can offer then they will send them to another department who can help them or the hospital. All the midwifes I met were very friendly and they were happy to answer all my questions and I answered all of theirs. I got to know about their routines and schedules and how they felt about their job. One of the midwifes I talked to called Emily said that she preferred small organisations like this one and even more in the smaller branches where they help the poorer poeple rather than the hospital because of the tighter relationships held with the patients and because the stress levels were lower. She said jokingly that the hospitals were more toxic which I sort of understood because you have more of a responsibility to the many people you meet. She didn't put me off working in a hospital because everyone is different and have different likings and I haven't experienced it for myself. They on the other hand were very curious about the education here in the U.K. and also about the I.B because in the Philippines after you finish high school you then go on to college which is equivalent to university; after college they then find work. 

It was a great work experience although it was a short one and I'm glad to have had the chance to do it.

SWIMMING

Getting sun burnt for the first time!

PATUNGAN BEACH

One of my favourite sports has always been swimming although I'm not really a confident swimmer in very deep waters. Whilst I was in the Philippines I got to visit my uncles and aunties that I don't get to see very often, even when I am home in the Philippines. One of them is my Aunt Liezel and she lives in Batangas which is about a two or three hour drive from Laguna, which is where I am from. Whenever we left to visit her we would always go at around 4 or 5 am just to beat the traffic because the traffic in the Philippines is nothing like the traffic here.

Our first destination was Patungan Beach. I had never swam in the sea before and I was really surprised at how salty the water was. It felt like drinking a glass of water that was mixed with a whole bottle of salt. The waves were stronger on the edge rather than when you go in and the water was cloudy at the start but the deeper you went the bluer it became but I didn't go that far because I can't stay in deep waters. We got to the beach at around 7 and swam in it all morning. The reason we went so early was so that we wouldn't be swimming in the scorching heat but as you can see from the subheading I was silly and forgot to put sunblock on my shoulders. I've never been burnt before so I wasn't all that bothered about sunblock and so I payed the price. By the end of that day my shoulders became this red colour and for about a week onward my shoulder bag became my hand bag.  I had lots of fun and I think I became a little bit more confident in deeper water. It was nice to see all my family but the adventure didn't stop there. After the beach and after eating, my cousins wanted to go to Talon Falls, I don't go to the Philippines that often so I was definitely going. We took a tricycle (not the kids one if you're wondering) from the beach up to this bridge and from there we had to walk through the forest for about 20 minutes to get to Talon Falls. The excitement began once you heard the crashing of water and when we got there the first thing you'll notice is how clear the water is and also how cold it was even though the weather was around 35 degrees. It wasn't a heavy waterfall and people were sliding down it, I wanted to slide down it myself but the water was deep at the end of the water fall and the push of the water would push me down to much. We took lots of pictures, above and below the water and we were all shivering at the end. It was amazing to swim in the sea and at the waterfall and I hope to go back there whenever I go back to the Philippines. And for those out there wondering, no wellies were lost. ;)