Joan turned with a look of surprise,
So,she was French.
"A Letter from home?"Joan asked gently.
"Ah, yes" Elise answered with a relieved smile."My younger sister finally wrote back. I have been waiting nearly three weeks for her letter."
"Three weeks?"
"The Atlantic is not a small pond," Elise laughed.
"Living away from home is hard," Joan commented, then paused "Oh, sorry for my rudeness, I'm Joan Blackwood,
A nurse at the women general ward, I'm originally Scottish, so excuse the nostalgia I felt when you opened that letter"
"No worries, I'm Elise Fournier, a nurse at the maternity ward and I'm from France" like she noticed something, she said "You surprised me when you said you're also a foreigner, and Scottish at that although you accent doesn't sound Scottish"
"That's because my mother is an American, so I think I grew up influenced by her. She came to Scotland for a job but ended up marrying my father, " Joan replied calmly.
"Oh my, a love story"
"haha"
They quickly hit it off thanks to Elise's easy-going nature and Joan's straightforward personality.
It appears that Elise joined the hospital last summer, much earlier than Joan.
But she wasn't a trainee as she already finished her training much earlier.
With Elise's company, lunch break finished in an instant, then the afternoon shift passed uneventfully, with the same routine and same people. Although Edith feels different than usual, she feels kind of upset.
Joan returned to her room with a towel on her damp hair. She hurried to dry her hair amidst the room's cold humidity, before applying moisturizer to her hair and skin, she got used to doing it in her room a few days after she moved in.
The first thing Joan did was to relieve her stress, using her usual reading accompanied by a cup of tea and sweets. After an hour or so, Joan closed her book and rested her eyes for a few minutes, then she began her daily studies session. As she opened the French phrasebook, a folded piece of paper slipped from between the pages.It contained several common expressions written by a previous owner.
Bonjour.
Merci beaucoup.
Comment allez-vous?
The handwriting faded with days.
Joan copied the phrases into her notebook and repeated them quietly under her breath.
The pronunciation looked strange compared to English.
More than once she found herself wondering how many years it would take before she could read an entire page without a dictionary.
Still, she did not mind.
Learning medicine has taken years.
Learning a language would likely require the same patience.
Writing her weekly articles, and ending it with her sorting daily reports whilst flipping through the Annual Hospital Reports she borrowed last time.
Male, age 42.
Bloodletting performed.
The patient rested comfortably afterward.
Deceased two days later.
The patient became unusually quiet following treatment.
Excessive fatigue after the procedure.
During these two days, Joan compared the terminology used in older medical texts with the concepts she already knew, paying particular attention to how physicians described symptoms and treatment outcomes.. Though she was still at the beginning, she already had studied it systematically, so this is just an icing on the cake.
Joan will take her time to learn their ways, and will not let her arrogance get the best of her. After a few days she will write her first report and wait to see the results. Of course, she doesn't have high hopes for her first try, it's more of testing the water, then looking for a quick response.
How strong do think the response from the medical community would be?
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