If you’re arriving here for the first time, welcome to our blog! We are six third year midwifery students, currently in the packing stages of our two “Global Citizenship” trips – travels to both Nepal and Uganda to learn, hopefully contribute and get a glimpse of life and birth in communities that are very different from ours.

During our travels, we will be posting about our journey, our everyday and our thoughts and feelings about what we are experiencing. We hope to be able to use this blog as a method of contact with our families and friends at home as well as providing you with a glimpse of our lives and the others we meet along the way.

In Nepal, we will find ourselves in Kathmandu for several weeks at a regional hospital, working on the maternity unit. We will then be travelling to Pokhara and eventually Jomsom to start our health trek. We’ll have a few others along for the ride at that point and plan to visit rural communities along our route to talk about whatever women’s health issues they would like to discuss. By late May, we’ll find ourselves back in Kathmandu again, where some of us will depart for home and others will head onward to Uganda.

In Uganda, we will be doing much of the work that has been done with this program over the last ten years. After a few days adjusting in Entebbe with our whole group, we will split up to go to two sites: Masaka and Mbale. In those sites we’ll be working in the regional referral hospitals there, catching babies and supporting women. Around our halfway point (some time in June), we’ll catch up with each other in Kampala or another “midway between” city to carry out some teaching workshops, work a shift or two at a large referral centre and generally revel in each other’s company.

In recent days, we’ve been asked what we want to accomplish on these trips. I believe it is different for all of us. For me, I want to learn to provide excellent care with few resources. I want to learn how to manage emergencies. Most of all, I want to understand what life looks like for women in low resource countries, and speak to them about what could be done to help. I know this program is the reason why many of us were excited at the prospect completing our midwifery education at UBC. It seems surreal to know we’ve made it this far, and yet, it feels as though we’re on the brink of something huge.

Welcome to our blog. We hope you’ll enjoy the ride!