"I was a nurse volunteering at Bedford Hospital in the Diocese of St. John (South Africa).  I was in Umtata for one year and enjoyed every minute of it. I am so glad to have been able to have this experience and the opportunity to help out in a way that was possible for me. My job in Umtata was a pretty basic one. I was working in the Spinal Unit at the hospital. That means that I was working with paraplegics and quadriplegics. Many of our patients sustained their injuries from car accidents, gun shot wounds, stabbings, or from Tuberculosis, a disease we don’t even think about in the United States any more. My main job was to help the nurses on the floor with nursing care. However, I spent a lot of time training the nurses on how to use new higher tech equipment than they had used before, and introducing some new organizational methods to the daily routine. I also learned a lot while in South Africa. The nurses and patients are incredible people and have given me a new way to look at life."