Solidarity : An image plus words to bear my soul to all of you.
Models: Nadine Naguib and Dallas Bakalech
A few weeks ago, when the threat of COVID19 seemed like a world away, I took this photo of the beautiful Nadine and Dallas together, holding hands, looking up and away. Little did I know this might have been one of those things that seemed pretty at the time but would change in significance as time went on.
With the ongoing pandemic, and all of us bunkered down in our own homes, following the recommendations for social distancing to flatten the curve of the spread of COVID19, small business particularly those in events and arts will take a big hit. Being a photographer, I am one of those unfortunate businesses. Fortunately for me, my timeline for business building fell into a parallel course as that of the response to the developing pandemic. Since the end of last year, I had decided to hold off on getting my business and marketing up and running to focus on my primary career.
For those that don’t know me personally and don’t catch my little double-life IG and FB stories, I am what Canada calls an #InternationalMedicalGraduate or #IMG. I earned my degree of Doctor of Medicine from somewhere other than Canada. I am a proud alumna of the University of the East Ramon Magsaysay Memorial Center, one of the top-ranked medical schools in the Philippines. I am licensed by the Philippine Professional Regulations Commission to practice there. I completed my clinical hours in anesthesiology as a specialty. And since moving to Canada, I have been helpless when it comes to serving my fellowman as I am nothing in the eyes of the system here. Despite my education and substantial training, I am nothing. I had therefore decided to leave the comfort of a steady income and live on my savings to pursue my medical career here in Canada. Despite the dream of both building a career in Medicine and Photography in parallel timelines, I realized that I needed to hold off on that creative part of me and devote as much energy as I can to taking the first of the series of qualifying examinations to get the ball rolling.
On the weekend of International Womens Day, I did a marathon of photoshoots to wrap up before I close up. And in the days that followed, one COVID case became two, two became four, and so on. My social media feed was flooded with COVID19 news, infographics, pleas for more personal protective equipment, and news how the health care manpower in my home metropolis that was recently put on lockdown was stretched thin. The next horrible news was from my sister who was getting ready to transfer my aging parents to a less crowded property of our relatives’ in the suburbs in case she was called into the front lines as their roster of younger surgeons was slowly becoming depleted. She and our cousin, already deeply entrenched as part of the infantry of Emergency Medicine specialists were discussing worst case scenarios. The worst news yet came in the form of an email stating that my already scheduled licensure examination was put on hold. COVID19 was a real threat to my family, and it has also now impacted me. That pushed me over the edge and made me feel more useless by the minute.
I look back at this image these beautiful ladies and I made together. To see their hands clasped and eyes looking to something akin to a dream makes me feel hope—hope that our generation will get through this. In solidarity, I joined a facebook group of IMGs like me, ready and willing to serve if need arises despite our lack of a license to practice in Canada but with the training and knowledge latent in our minds and the willingness to serve in our hearts. It is an understated truth that the health care system of the country I lovingly now call home is failing both its own graduates and those willing to serve but cannot find means to get into the system. Not all IMGs are as lucky as me and my husband (in an ideal situation where we have no other mouths to feed but our own and with savings enough to get us through a year of unemployment and dedicate our time fully to study). Over a hundred slots for residency training in primary care medicine were left unfilled in the last matching round of a system which is devolving into crisis, finger pointing instead of finding a solution. Hundreds, if not thousands of IMGs are here in Canada, willing to serve (as I found out in the newly formed Facebook group, calling all of us to be ready to volunteer our “unlicensed” selves when the time comes). Instead of blaming the system, I am standing ready in case the system does stretch to the breaking point, as is what is happening in the Philippines. I acknowledge that the problem does exist but I will be here, studying to get into a seemingly broken system and serve when time comes. For now, all I can do is study to be ready for the examination and be hopeful like the image I took a few weeks ago, hold the hands of those who, like me are willing to serve, but are unable to.
#IMGcanHelp #OneIMGCanada #WeTheIMG #photography #pinkandblue #glamour #stuidophotography #readytoserve
