"The ambulance station is like a second family to me"

For nine years, Petra has been volunteering with the Lebanese Red Cross. Today she is an ambulance driver during both day and night.

It is the end of the day in Lebanon, but as the sun sets over the mountains, work begins for a small group of volunteers. Coffee is prepared and cookies in several versions are being passed around on the small plastic tables. Now there is just the waiting time before something urgent happens.

The group of people in red clothes are all volunteers for the Lebanese Red Cross here. It is an ambulance station from where the ambulances are sent out to emergencies, and the station also has a small medical first-aid clinic.

All the people working the night shifts work for free. One of them is Petra. She started volunteering here nine years ago, when she was in her second year of university.

“I saw all the road accidents and how the ambulances were helping. I wanted to help”, she says.

When still in university, the volunteering was particularly tough.

“I used to take night shifts here and then go to university in the mornings. During my lunch breaks in university, I could have a small nap,” Petra says while laughing a bit about it.

A challenging task

One day she was ready to become an ambulance driver. A job that requires good stress management and focus.

“When I started to drive the ambulance after having volunteered for a while, I felt like the responsibility became more and the job was even more important.”

Today, she knows more about herself and her personal limits.

“It is difficult at times. Every emergency has its own secret. Some emergencies are normal transport and other emergencies are more hard for me.”

Petra has a special soft spot for the elderly people:

“It is very special for me to help old people. Very difficult, because I really feel something, when I am for instance helping an old man.”

All types of peoplePetra Ambulance driver Madad

The European Trust Fund Madad is funding some of the training for the ambulance station. It is important that the work runs smoothly, as there is currently a lot of pressure on the ambulance system in Lebanon.

Petra also experiences that a lot of people come to the clinic to receive help in case of emergencies. A lot of Syrian refugees will visit the medical clinic at the station to receive first aid or help with burns or similar.
“Because they don’t have money to pay if they get burns and such, so they come here to have this care,” she explains.

“Red Cross is helping everyone. Really everyone we can help”

In order to stay neutral, all the volunteers have to use another name so that they are not easily identified as within a certain religion or from a certain place.
“My other name here in the station is Mickey. I got it, because I used to wear my hair in two buns, like Mickey Mouse ears," Petra laughs and points to the sides of her head with her hands.

A second family

After nine years, Petra believes that she belongs in this station.

“It has started to become my identity. At first, it was like a hobby. And after that, even though I am personally now working in another field that is not medical, I believe that this is where I belong.”

She continues: “I like it because I am helping people. And I now have many friends here. This is like my second family. Actually, probably it is more like my first family, because I spend more time here than at my house.”

It gives her strenght and a belief in her country that everyone spending their nights in this station are volunteers.

“I am happy that we still have this type of people here in Lebanon,” she concludes.

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