Jakarta

I just got back from an overseas assignment in Jakarta.

It was a really rushed trip - flew in on Monday evening, the next day was packed with conferences and media launches, and back to Singapore on Tuesday evening.

The assignment was on Paediatric Pallative Care - or caring for a terminally ill child.

I met with many medical professionals on the trip, some of whom are extremely established in their career. Others had incredible experiences providing medical expertise in war-torn countries like Bosnia and Sri Lanka.

But the one person that left the deepest impact on me was a nurse who works in a hospice in Singapore.

She was anxious, yet brimming with excitement at her first overseas trip without her husband and four children.

I talked to her about the work she does at the hospice.

When a person is dying, it's not merely about giving lots of medication to ease the pain, she said.

Rather, it's about providing the dying person with the best quality of life he or she could hope for in their remaining days.

While other practitioners talked about infrastructures and medical training that was required, this nurse told me of:

• a patient whose only request was to have a taste of this traditional malay dish that one could hardly find in Singapore anymore; the nurse went back home, got the recipe from her mother, went out, bought the ingrediants and cooked the dish. The patient took a few spoons of it and thanked her. A few hours later she passed on peacefully.
  
  
• a patient who would die in a few hours, but was longing to see her son who was working overseas; the nurse rushed to set up a video call for them so that she could see and talk to her son for the last time.
  
  
• a patient whose only wish was to be at her daughter's 21st birthday celebration, despite the fact that she barely had a few weeks to live, and that her daughter was now just nine years old. The nurse bought 12 birthday cards, one for each year the daughter had to go before she turned 21. She gave them to the mother and told that to write a letter for the daughter in every card, and the nurse promised to give one card to the daughter every year on her birthday, till she turned 21.

It's people like this nurse who really make me feel in awe at one human's capacity to give to another.

It's not about the advances in technology, nor the complexity of medicine.

But it's about the human touch that a person can bring to another's life.

If all our nurses were like her, I'd say that our health sector is truly world class.

I noticed something at the local hospital.

It was pouring heavily when we were about to leave.

There was a bunch of about 6 or 7 kids at the entrance of the hospital, carrying umbrellas, bare feet, and drenched from head to toe.

They looked about 11 or 12 years old, max.

They were sheltering people from the hospital to their cars, and they held the umbrellas for these people while they themselves got completely soaked in the rain.

All they asked in return was 1,000 Rupiah.

1,000 Rupiah = S$0.14

Makes me feel sad just thinking about it

So even though the trip was short, it was a good experience.

I'm thankful for the people I got to know and for the great company of the host organisation and the other journalist I met.

Here we are! =)