We arrived in Khartoum, Sudan on May 8 and started operating at noon the following day. I was excited because I knew it was, in that moment, the right place to be, and that professionally, I could be useful. But there was also fear about what we were hearing about the situation. We had two days on the road to get to know each other as a team before we arrived at Bashair Teaching Hospital.
When the conflict started, a lot of hospital staff left, so volunteers had stepped in to restart activities. We received a beautiful welcome because everybody was super happy to have us there, but it would not be easy. There were also challenges with supplies. Plus, we were in the middle of a conflict. There were a lot of different feelings.
At the same time, we knew the needs. It’s as if something clicks in your head and you say to yourself, “Okay, we have water. Sometimes we will have electricity. Let’s make it work.”
Teaming up with volunteers from the community
The first week was incredibly challenging. There were no more than 10 patients in the hospital before we arrived. By the end of June, we had over 58 patients on some days. It seemed like an impossible place to work and, together with the volunteers, we made it possible. That is an amazing feeling. So many people were coming and saying, “I don’t need money, I just want to be working alongside MSF because I know it’s what my community needs.” It was incredible.
After a while, the volunteers really started to trust us and saw how we could grow together. They started to help us manage logistics, for example. We had somebody that was always responsible for the oxygen.
