Chapter 30 New Places, New Cultures.

 Chapter 30   New Places, New Cultures.

My parents drove me to Brisbane to catch the coach at 6 p.m. on a Friday evening. I was so nervous about going away to a strange place, that I developed a rash on my arm just above the elbow, which was diagnosed by a chemist in Brisbane as ringworm. He  suggested I apply an antifungal cream.
 
     At the coach terminal in the city I got into trouble from the driver for having too much luggage. I tried to explain that I was going away for a whole year, but he wasn't impressed. I guess he had no idea what a big deal this was for a little quiet country girl. Apart from my four cases in the luggage compartment, I had a small white case and a blanket inside the bus with me.

    I waved my parents off. ‘Well, here goes!’

    I don't remember ever sleeping on a bus before, but I must have just dozed off when I was woken by an inspector at the tick gates. In those days the tick gates on the border between Queensland and New South Wales were strictly patrolled, and no foodstuffs or plant material was allowed over. I hadn’t crossed the border before, and the first thing I knew a man was shaking my shoulder.

    “Have you got any food, Madam?” Half asleep, I handed over peanuts, biscuits and grapes.

    The night turned colder as we drove south. I was carrying a blanket and I sure needed it that night. To make matters worse, the driver confessed that the heating on the bus was broken, and before we got to Sydney the gear stick fell off as well! Apart from comfort stops and meals it was an express trip. The next place I remember was Yass, in the heart of the Australian Capital Territory, a place well known for having the most extreme temperatures in the nation. Peering through the window at 1a.m, I could make out only that it was foggy in the freezing, dreary darkness.

    The only other stopping place of note that I remember was Sydney’s famous Kings Cross on Saturday afternoon. Some of the passengers terminated when the bus pulled in at the bus station, but like the rest of them, I sat idly observing the ordinariness of the place and waiting for the driver to return. Then alarmingly, I saw that my small blue case was out on the street. I’m sure it would still be there now if I hadn't got out and quickly thrown it back in with the luggage. Amazed at my own temerity and feeling guilty, I jumped back on to the bus hoping I hadn’t been seen. The last thing I wanted was to have an argument with the driver!

    Sometime Sunday afternoon we pulled in to the Melbourne bus station. We’d  travelled for two nights and a day, and everything I’d ever heard of this city’s dismal weather had been accurate. It was a bleak, wintry afternoon with light rain falling. The city was deserted, but a taxi driver on the rank nearby was only too pleased to pick up my cases, and I gave him the Swanston Street address, which I knew off by heart from studying the hospital paperwork so closely for months.

    I’d never felt so alone and far from home in all my life, and my first instinct was to cry. Instinct also told me that wasn’t an option.

    I sat in the foyer of the nurses’ quarters surrounded by my motley collection of ports, (excuse me, we don't say ports in Victoria, we say 'suitcases'), until the duty sister took me up to my room on the eighth floor. The view was breathtaking and at night was just a sea of lights. I loved it. It was so different to my previous world.

      Of course, there were some teething troubles. After some weeks I still had the rash on my arm and often woke in the night scratching. The antifungal cream had no effect so I lined up for the sick parade one morning. The kindly superintendent saw all the sick nurses and he was very understanding of my plight. A tiny jar of cortisone cream soon returned me to peaceful nights' sleep.

    One thing they had down to a fine art at this hospital, was enabling new students to find their way around. In all the long alleyways around the hospital there were three different coloured lines painted on the pathways. From memory, they could have been red yellow and blue. All you had to do was read the list of departments on the wall to find out which line to follow and ultimately you would end up at the appropriate department.

    In the first few weeks I knew nobody, and I knew nothing of the city, and nothing about the job. I knew, however, in which direction the inner-city was and that we were not far away from it. I saw the trams rattling past and I soon guessed that if I got on a tram going in a westerly direction I would end up in the city. In fact I found that it was cheap on the tram and in no time at all I could access a wonderful new world of sights to see and shops to explore.  On my days off I wandered around looking for theatres and had a lovely time going to movies. It wasn't long before I had seen Dr Zhivago, the Sound of Music, Born Free and My Fair Lady, all on the big screen. I was in seventh Heaven!

    I shopped till I dropped. My habit was to get on a tram to the city, get out at Bourke Street, wander at will, and when I was ready to go home, not knowing where I was, I’d find the nearest taxi and give the driver the address. I had no good clothes when I arrived in Melbourne and enjoyed stocking my wardrobe. 

    It got so bad that the girls would ask me when I got back, “What did you buy today, a couple more slacksuits--or a dress perhaps? A coat?" Well, Melbourne was cold... give me a break, I was a Queenslander!

    One thing I learned early in life was that to do a course meant being looked after. While you were a student someone would always be there to tell you what to do and teach you your new skill. It was like having your own personal navigator. For doing midwifery at the Royal Women's, accommodation was provided in beautiful high-rise modern nursing quarters, uniforms were provided and laundered, and new friends were laid on just waiting to be made. 

    In a few months I had a wonderful circle of friends. Some of them had cars and by contributing a dollar or two to the trip for petrol I was able to join in some wonderful forays into tourist spots around Victoria.

    One of my favourite days out was a day in the snow. We drove in a little Renault to Mount Donna Buang, where we frolicked in this cold powdery stuff I had never experienced before. We picked up old pieces of plastic that lay around and tobogganed down the slopes, ate chunks of freshly roasted chickens and drank champagne out of plastic cups.

    I had been amazed when the girls pulled the car up and bought alcohol from a bottle shop on a street corners, a bottle shop that anyone could walk into. I was used to the law that said you could only go into a hotel, (and we didn’t have bottle shops,) to buy alcohol after you turned 21.

    I had the time of my life. As we cavorted in the snow my camera took many tumbles, and later, the snaps were blotched with blue spots from moisture.

    The Royal Women's Hospital was undergoing a change when I went there. There were some brand new wards, and some very old wards. There were the new nurses quarters but there were also some very old ones. After preliminary training we were all given fourteen weeks of night duty and accommodated in the old night duty quarters. 

    Typical of old buildings the ceilings where up in the heavens and the fittings were antiquated. Not only was I living in ancient quarters, but I was rostered on one of the older wards. There was one night sister who supervised all wards and she was lovely. Fourteen weeks is a long time to have your routine turned upside down and I think I became a little crazy after a while. Because it was cold during the day I slept fairly well, but there was one day when exhaustion must have taken over, and I slept the clock around. When I woke up it was quite dark, the place was deserted and I soon realized it was 10:30pm, (not 10.30a.m) The quarters were deserted and I ran from room to room calling names but of course got no response. Soon the penny dropped and I twigged to what had happened. Hastily donning my uniform, I hurried on duty.

    Rushing up the stairs to the ward I came upon the night sister who greeted me with a big wide smile, "Oh sister, I was just coming to get you.”

     Despite the craziness, I have some fond memories of my time in the night duty quarters. One evening the girls decided to buy in a meal and I had my first taste of spaghetti bolanaise. I was a bit horrified about the smell of the parmesan cheese on top and didn't eat it again for quite a time.

    At that time I was a member of the world record club and was mostly into popular and folk music, but one of my younger friends was quite fond of classics and it's where I had my first experience of listening to classical music. I had bought a stereo record player, (luxury indeed,) with a speaker at the front and a speaker in the lid and eventually I owned quite a collection of LP s

    The Melbourne suburb of Carlton in those days, was known as Little Italy, and I enjoyed tremendously discovering the new Italian foods. It was a great adventure to buy pizza between a group of us and eat it in the quarters sitting room. My favourite of all though, was cheesecake, and it was a great treat for me to buy a slice from one of the delicatessens and bring it back to the quarters to eat. I had never tasted anything quite like it and the texture was so different to anything I had ever experienced.

    It wasn't just the food I enjoyed in Carlton. There were lots of lovely clothing shops, and I realized too late that they were only too happy to take advantage of a young woman not used to their slick sales ways. 

    They pandered to my rapidly inflating ego, gushing compliments like, "It makes you look so beauuuuutiful--You are beautiful woman!--You wear this coat so weeeeell"

    And I handed over my money!

    One friend I had in Victoria was Sandra from my training years at the BGH. She had left her training halfway through and married a soldier, and now lived near the army camp of Puckapunyal. Occasionally I phoned her and announced that I was coming to visit her for a few days. I can't ever remember asking her if it was convenient but I hope I did. Also I never took any food to eat, expecting them to look after me for the few days, which they always did. I visited them for my twenty-first birthday in July, and they graciously took me out to a bar for a few drinks to celebrate.

    I didn't go out on a lot of dates while I was down in Victoria, but one of the girls I was friendly with from the Mercy Hospital arranged for a group of us to attend the Mercy Hospital ball. She arranged blind dates for three of us, and we had a lovely night with three boys who were polite gentleman. My closest friend and I discussed emigrating to Canada to work for a year or so, but after a time the idea evaporated. I still see her on holidays occasionally at her home in Victoria where she lives.

    After night duty we were all sent out to the Henry Pride Wing for eight weeks. This was a postnatal recovery and recuperation part of the hospital, and was situated in extensive grounds at Kew, the garden suburb of Melbourne. It was absolutely beautiful there and we considered it as rest and recreation for the staff as well. Across the road was the Yarra River where we could hire a row boat and spend a leisurely afternoon drifting on the tranquil water. Large droopy trees dangled long leafy fingers in the shadowy river's edge. It was picturesque and peaceful and soothing to the soul.

     If it was a restful place for the staff, it must have been restful for the mothers. The multiparas, (mothers who had already had at least one baby), from the Womens’ went there on their second or third day after confinement, transported by ambulances that were especially equipped in the back with three-tiered stretchers on each side. Each ambulance carried six mothers with their babies in their arms. It was a great place for mothers to relax too as they wandered leisurely along the pathways in the sunny gardens.

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     Back in Ward Thirty-four at the main hospital, my education teetered on the brink of a steep learning curve. A postnatal ward with an antenatal annexe, I was shocked to find when allocated to the anti-natal section, I was expected to take blood for the pathology tests. I soon learned how much blood to take for each test, and after being shown once how to find a vein with the needle, I was expected to do the job.

    I'm pleased to say I quickly became proficient and was often told by the mothers, “I didn't feel a thing!" As a matter of fact when I got back to Queensland I considered applying for a job in a pathology as I had enjoyed that work.

    Another day in an antenatal ward in my early training is memorable for the terror it caused me on the day. A woman was well overdue to have her baby, but labour was reluctant to start. The charge sister instructed me to give her a glass of orange juice containing a tablespoon of castor oil. This was a popular first treatment to induce labour at the time.

    A short time later the poor woman came into strong labour with frequent, severe labour pains.

    “Hurry Sister! Trolly! Down to the labour ward!” 

      I hurried, but it was like trying to get away from that angry bull of my childhood nightmares. By the time I’d transferred her on to a trolly and into the lift she was noisy, distressed, and threatening to ‘push’. The lift was antiquated, and oblivious to any need for haste. I could see me coming in for some unscheduled experience.

    I tried to stay calm. “Breathe in and out through your mouth, dear.”

     I wanted to scream, ‘DON’T PUSH!’
   
    Eventually we bumped to the ground floor. I still had one obstacle to overcome. In all wards at the Women’s Hospital there was a chest-high heating arrangement in the middle of the wards resembling a large table. Around this stood all the trained staff disgussing work, (and gossiping,) and I left the trolley just outside the labour ward doors, flew to their side, excused myself, and relayed my story. The head sister clucked her tongue at my stupid panic, put on a pair of gloves to examine the patient, and reluctantly followed me out to the trolley. 

    She never did get to do that examination however, and as she disappeared into the labour ward pushing the trolley herself, and calling for assistance, I retreated back up in the lift, thanking God once again for his mercy.
   
    Ward 34 was a big Ward, accommodating about 10 mothers in the main postnatal section. Interestingly, these were all the married mothers. There was an enclosed veranda along the side of the ward that took another six mothers. These unmarried girls were known as A-Mums, as their private affairs were handled by the almoner. The almoner visited them after they’d given birth, and if they hadn't already agreed to adoption they were strongly pressured to do so. Most of us thought that was the right thing to do. There was no supporting mothers benefit in those days either, so a mother who kept her baby was a brave soul. Not only did she have to cope with the cost of raising her child herself, but she had to contend with the stigma of being an unwed mother, and a social attitude that was against her. Also it was unlikely she would get any assistance or maintenance from a disinterested baby's father. I remember one girl who made the choice to keep her baby. She was a university student and we were all disgusted, thinking she had made a great mistake. 

    I must say the onus was on the girl to take care of herself. I know I grew up taking for granted the attitude that men would indulge (in sex,) before marriage and that was acceptable, but women did it at their own risk. I do admit though, in the back of my mind that whole concept didn't make much sense. When I think back to those years, I realize I was naive, and like most of the other hospital staff I had a 'holier than thou' attitude. I guess that's how society was evolving.

    Of course the main point of training in midwifery was to learn how to deliver babies, and we had workbooks for various skills which had to be signed off by trained staff or tutor sisters during that 12 months. I guess the focal point of our training was our time in the labour wards. A second labour ward was situated in the newer multi-story section of the hospital. A further challenge was the language difficulties we experienced because of living amongst a population of largely Greeks and Italians. When a 'foreign lady' was in labour it was necessary for the staff to know some of the words in her language to help her through the pain stage. One of the few I can remember was 'respire', (? Spelling), which was Greek for breathe. We shouted it long and often. The worst thing was sometimes we mistook a Greek for an Italian lady, or vice versa.

    Of course sometimes we had fun during our training, especially if it was an exercise in an empty ward. The first thing we learnt though, was how to bath a baby, and we learned on one of the newborns whose mother was willing to participate. I'll never forget the baby's  name, (Jason Bacon).

    And of course the nitrous oxide provided lots of laughs when we had practice breathing on the mask. For the mechanics of delivery we were all given a cardboard box with a hole in two sides to represent the pelvis, and a brand-new rag doll with a pretty face but an elongated soft head. With the doll and box we learned the positions the baby went through during the birthing process. I named my doll Penelope, and brought her home at the end of training like a new baby