My friends and family back home keep
asking me what my favorite part about Cape Town is. How do I sum up everything
I love about Cape Town in one response? To me, what stands out more than the
amazing food, beautiful scenery, and great music, is the passion behind the
people involved in changing their communities. The people I’ve met working for
some of the NGOs and projects that either I or my co-educators have been a part
of have been so brilliant and wonderful that they now occupy a special place in
my heart, I call it my fifth chamber—the Cape Town chamber. After spending this
past weekend with the Khayelitsha Fire Fighters soccer team at their Kensington
Tournament, I’ve grown especially fond of their coach, Abongile Qasana. Bongi
calls himself a transformational coach—he doesn’t just teach soccer, he
instills important life values and offers a unique support system to his
players that transforms their entire growth. You can tell the kids really
admire him and that the program means so much more to them than anyone on the
outside could ever understand. What Bongi is doing for his community is
absolutely incredible. His efforts combined with Power’s help have definitely
convinced me that sport does in fact have the power to change the world.
Even though the Fire Fighters don’t
all have their own cleats, a goal to practice on, or grass to play on, they
still played their little hearts out and competed with the ‘big teams’ of the
area—the ones that are well funded and more structured. It was so fun to cheer
for them and they were incredibly happy to have us on their sidelines,
especially Bongi. They won their first two games on Saturday but
lost their third on Sunday. One of the younger kids on Saturday said,
“losing isn’t bad, it’s a part of life” which was really cute but also really
cool to see someone understand this important lesson from such a young age. I
was so happy to be there to support them, especially since none of them had
family members who came to watch. This was something new to me since I don’t
think my dad missed more than 5 games my entire high school career. It really
put into perspective how privileged I am that my family could access and afford
transportation, and have the time to come cheer me on.
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| Eric, Abby, Mariko, Paige and Dereck with the Khayelitsha Fire Fighters Soccer Club |
I spent the morning at Tafelsig in
the maternity unit, screening pregnant mothers and listening to their baby’s
heartbeats. Everything was going well and it was actually pretty uplifting
until another code blue was called—this time it was called for a four year old
boy who was being resuscitated. I came to the scene at the end, and was the
last one to give chest compressions. It was a very weird feeling to be the one
to stop the compressions when the time of death was called and I felt very numb
afterwards. I wasn’t truly affected by it until after the debriefing when I had
time for it to sink in and for my mind to resonate with what just happened.
That’s all I want to say about the topic because it was, and still is,
emotionally taxing and difficult for me to think about. I came home and wasn’t
really in the mood to talk to anyone or do anything. I know losses come with
the territory of entering the medical field, but they are not easy. I hope
tomorrow is better.
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