The weekly question – Why did you choose to do your placement in the destination you’re in?

Thursday, August 25th, 2011

We think that one of the hardest parts of organising an elective is actually deciding where to go. Whether you’re tempted by the tribes of Africa; the mountains of Asia or the flavour of South America, wherever you decide to go, your elective overseas will no doubt enrich both your professional and personal development in a safe, supported environment.

We currently work in seven locations around the world and like to talk to students in depth about each destination before they make a decision – this way they can work out which placement is most suited to them. So the question we chose to ask the houses this week is “Why did you choose to do your placement in the destination you’re in?”

Abby 2011 2 150x150 The weekly question Why did you choose to do your placement in the destination you’re in?

A Sri Lankan beach

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My travels in Arusha… safari, Mt Kilimarjaro and Zanzibar

Sunday, August 21st, 2011

Now, time to discuss the leisure aspect of your Arusha placement. First and foremost, visit the Paradiso orphanage. Babu (Grandfather) and Bibi (Grandmother) welcome you with open arms, along with there eighteen (and counting) children. Laugh, sing and play with kids, eat chapattis!

Dave 2010 173 150x150 My travels in Arusha... safari, Mt Kilimarjaro and Zanzibar

Zebras are brilliant!

Of course I am going to talk about safari…… “Bright Visit” was the safari company I used. The coordinator and cook were impeccable and we had so many breathtaking experiences. I had the opportunity to visit Lake Manyara, Serengeti, and Ngorongoro crater. All three were amazing and filled with lots of wildlife – they were a beauty I can not put in words.

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The move to Dar

Wednesday, April 21st, 2010

The relocation of the programme from Zanzibar to Dar es Salaam has finally been completed and the first students arrived over the Easter weekend. The Dar programme boasts the biggest Work the World house so far with a capacity to comfortably accommodate 37 students at anyone time, and we’re already completely booked up for some of the summer!

P9240123 150x150 The move to Dar

Arriving on ferry to Dar

The move was quite a mission! 6 lorries and several ferry trips were needed, so Dave flew over to Dar to help Majenda and Baptista. “Apart from a small problem with the ferries – in that they were closed for the public holidays at the exact time we had planned to transport all the furniture over – everything went like clockwork (well African clockwork anyway!) and for a few days we were truly on the move!”

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What do the students do at weekends?

Thursday, April 1st, 2010
Nicole 50x50 custom What do the students do at weekends?

Nicole's question!

This week, our office manager Nicole had a question for the different houses….

“What do the students get up to during their weekends?”

Ruth Poon Hill trek Annapurnas Nov 2008 28 150x150 What do the students do at weekends?

Poon Hill trek

Sunil was the first to come back with the lowdown on the two Nepal students – Sundeap said that “at home we would normally just hang out with friends, but in Nepal we always make set plans. Sometimes it works sometimes it doesn’t and so we just go with the flow!”. Rosie added that “the most exciting trip so far was our trip to the peace pagoda on the other side of the lake. It was amazing, but we didn’t realise how long we had been there. At 7pm all the boats back to Pokhara had left and we got stranded. In the end we had to swim across……… ha ha, not really…… Sundeap shouted enough for a boat to eventually come and get us back to the right side of the lake.”.

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What are the biggest cultural challenges…

Tuesday, March 16th, 2010

Now that the houses are getting busy again and our new programme managers in Ghana, Nepal and Dar & Zanzibar are settled in, we’re getting lots of stories back about student experiences living and working overseas. Although in some ways there are many similarities to living and working in a developing country regardless of the destination you are in, there are also some fascinating differences triggered by the culture of each country. To highlight these differences and help anyone out who is still trying to decide which destination suits them best, each week I send the same question to each of our programme managers to discuss with the students at dinner. The responses are always hugely varied and regularly make fascinating reading….

This weeks big question was “What are the biggest cultural challenges you have found living overseas?”

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Dental Outreach in Zanzibar is growing by 300% in 2010

Thursday, March 11th, 2010

The Dental Outreach Project taking place on Zanzibar this summer is shaping up to be quite an event. Following the great success of the team in Zanzibar last year, it looks like we are going to be able to expand upon the project by over 300%. This is great news for both us and the village of Kivunge, who were our hosts last year, as it means we can provide more much-needed free dental care to the villagers, including those schoolchildren that were unable to obtain treatment last time round because of inevitable time constraints.

Screening in a school 150x150 Dental Outreach in Zanzibar is growing by 300% in 2010

Screening in Kivunge

The Dental Outreach Programmes are designed to bring free assessments and treatment to villages and schools that don’t have access to dental healthcare. We started offering them in Ghana and India as a way to create a sustainable project that utilised the skills of dental placement students, whilst also providing hands-on dental experience for our elective students. Visiting rural communities we quickly realised how much dental care they need – as many as 70% of the children we screened last year needed to be referred to our free clinic for actual treatment.

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Jambo!

Monday, January 11th, 2010

We made it! It was touch and go at Gatwick – another snow storm was on its way in – but just as Omar started to get a worried frown on his face, it was announced that we were cleared for take off.  Finally flight EK10 was on its way to Dubai!

A 7 hour flight to Dubai, a 3 hour stopover and a 5 hour flight to Dar later, we finally met up with Baptista, our Tanzanian Country Director. With him were Majenda, our Dar and Zanzibar Programme Manager, and Jay, our India Programme Manager. They had been waiting in Dar for three days for us to arrive and were very relieved that the snow had not stopped us.

Baptista negotiated our way through the airport and onto a Precision Air flight to Mwanza. 2 hours later we were greeted from the plane by Freddy, our Arusha Programme Manager, and James, our Lake Victoria Programme Manager. Finally, 24 hours after leaving Brighton we were all together and on our way to the Lake Victoria house – our home for the next three nights.

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The Big Picture winners are announced!

Monday, November 16th, 2009

Sana Ghaznavi Arusha 2 The Big Picture winners are announced!

Sana's winning photo

The Big Picture

Overall Winner  – Sana Ghaznavi!

Prize: £250

We have had some amazing entries for this years competition, but it was unanimously agreed that the image that captured the spirit of living in another country, was Sana Ghaznavi’s shot of a young Maasai boy at sunrise.

Sana’s image was taken “in the summer of 2009. I did a medical elective with Work the World in Tengeru, a rural village outside of Arusha, Tanzania.  As a part of my elective, I went to live in a Maasai village, where I learned about traditional Maasai medicine, and met the village’s medicine man (a spiritual healer).  I had a great time during my stay.  The experience has given me insight into a culture and way of life vastly different than my own.”

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Is a medical placement in your gap year of any benefit?

Tuesday, October 6th, 2009

Our sister company Gap Medics has officially launched! We asked our Work the World Tanzania students what they thought about the opportunity to gain medical or nursing experience in your gap year…

facebook image 150x150 Is a medical placement in your gap year of any benefit?Over in Zanzibar, medic Emily commented that “doing a Gap year medical placement overseas would help in university applications. It shows you are dedicated to pursuing a career in medicine and would help you stand out from the crowds.” Sarah Burn agreed that “it demonstrates commitment to the subject”.

Deborah had some concern that patients and doctors “may get confused about the competence of the student and give them more responsibility than they can handle because they do not understand that they have not started med school yet” and we agree. In such a busy and often difficult environment you could easily find yourself misinterpreted and out of your depth. That’s why at Work the  World and Gap Medics we place such a heavy emphasis on good placement supervisors. If they understand your skills and why you are there, you should never find yourself in a difficult situation that you cannot cope with. More importantly patients are not put at risk,

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ET Phone home!

Thursday, September 24th, 2009

We’ve been thinking of ways to save money while you are overseas, and our top tip is cutting call costs.

Calling home on your mobile is going to be expensive. There are lots of deals in place that can save you money while you are abroad, but the best thing to do is buy a local sim card. Get your phone unlocked before you go and it will save you heaps of money.

The other option is to head down to an internet cafe and use SKYPE. Connections can sometimes be a bit rubbish because of slow internet connections, but it’s definitely worth a try as it’s free (or practically free if you are calling someones phone rather than their computer or skype compatible phone). If you find a cafe with a webcam and you know that your family or friends have one on the computer at home, it’s doubly worth the effort. The first time  I did this I was amazed – I hadn’t seen my family for months and to be suddenly chatting away to them all as if we were in the same room was amazing!!

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