I am working at Shyira hospital in the rural mountains of the north. When I arrived, I met the German OB doctor whose wife had been my contact through e-mail. The first thing he said was, "Good. I hear you are fluent in French." The national language is French, and all the hospital charts are in French. The people speak Kinyarwanda. The doctor I am working with is German. The culture is uniquely Rwandan. The pharmacy formulary is British. C'est facile, non?
Now I am working on a staff of two Rwandan doctors, two Congolese, one German, and two Americans on the way. My days include rounds in the maternity ward, pelvic exams, rounds in the internal medicine ward, visiting the lab to see stool samples infected with parasites, ect. And I've added French lessons at night to help with my "fluency" from high school classes.
More on Shyira's website: www.shyira.org
1 comment:
crack me up! of course you are fluent in French. . . high school languange courses in the states - top notch fluency preparation (ah yes, the ignorance of our educational system). fun that you are surrounded by so many languages!
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