Reflections 4 - Joseph

RE Reflections 4: 14/4

This was almost the last time that we went down to the hospice. We had decided to take the mrt this week, mostly because of last week’s bad experience. Jue Fei and I actually did not really support going on the mrt due to time constraints, but it didn’t turn out as bad as I thought, surprisingly. Sure, we were later by a bit, but it didn’t seem to affect much. But then, I still am not in the favour of taking the mrt in the future, because even if it didn’t seem to affect much in fact it took up practically one fifth of the time there. Now on to our activities there. It turned out that a school had decided to go over to the hospice to help. They ended up doing something like charades, and singing some malay songs. I felt that this was quite a good plan, as it managed to cater towards the malay and indian patients instead of just the chinese ones. Some of them conducted the activities, while others mingled amoung the patients, talking to them, while some others were taking pictures. The staff there, Jo, asked us to go on the van with the patients, but I told her that I couldn’t make it because it was rather far away, at Jurong, while my house was in Pasir Ris, and this week was rather near to the exams already. She really wanted us to go on the van that day. Leon’s patient didn’t come today, and so he talked to my patient along with me. We ended up talking about his operation, which would actually affect his ability to walk. The tragedy was that his heart problems made him too weak to be able to go through radio or chemo therapy, and thus he was not able to fully recover from his cancer. He had told me many times about the great pain in his leg and back, and he could not do anything to resolve the pain in his back, and while massage helped a bit, it turned out to be only temporary, and he had to live and endure in his pain. His daughter worked at an entry level job at Citibank, perhaps part time if I remember correctly, and he had almost used up all his savings from his work. He also had told us had worked as a truck driver for many years, which was one of the causes of problems. He even managed to pick up Hokkien through his life in Singapore. All in all, I feel that this week was rather fruitful, especially in contrast to last week’s trip down to the hospice. Yay.