00:00I was with a friend, also from Africa, and we were supposed to help this patient.
00:04He said, stupid Ausländer, and that was kind of bad.
00:10Faith, Mutesi is a 23-year-old nurse from Tanzania.
00:13She traveled to Germany to pursue her dream of caring for others.
00:17I wanted to become a nurse first because the closest person to me was my grandfather,
00:23and I got to see him sick at a young age,
00:26and that's when I realized the importance of compassionate care.
00:30I met up with a student nurse in Troisdorf, Western Germany.
00:34She is currently in the second year of a three-year nursing program.
00:37I'm doing a flagefachfrau ausbildung, which is a new system, not like the old one,
00:43where you could only focus on one thing, for example, an old home or a hospital or a psychiatry.
00:51But now you are given a chance to explore all that ambulante, old home, hospitals, psychiatry, paediatry, all that.
01:01So at the end, when you're about to finish, you know what you want.
01:05What Mutesi didn't expect when she moved to Germany
01:08was that some of the people she came to care for would reject her,
01:13not because of her skills, but because of who she is.
01:16Mutesi's nursing ambition started in Rwanda, where she studied German for nearly a year.
01:23Unlike others who struggled to make the trip,
01:25she had the support of an organization that took care of her visa and travel arrangements.
01:31When she arrived in Germany, the challenges were immediate.
01:34The language, the culture, the loneliness.
01:38But what no one prepared her for
01:40was the subtle, sometimes open hostility she'd face from those she was meant to help.
01:46I was with a friend, also from Africa, and we were supposed to help this patient.
01:51And our accents are not perfect, probably.
01:54And while we were about to help him, he said, stupid, Ausländer.
01:59And that was kind of bad.
02:02Most of the times you tell a nurse in charge or the head of the stations,
02:07you tell them, and they talk to the patient about it, they confront it.
02:13Like, they tell them this is not how it works.
02:16This is a reality many foreign-trained nurses face.
02:20Studies show that nurses of colour in European healthcare systems
02:23are more likely to face workplace discrimination,
02:27not only from colleagues, but also from patients.
02:29In Germany, over 60% of migrant nurses
02:33report experiencing discrimination or exclusion from patients.
02:38Fortunately for Mutesi,
02:40her colleagues at the hospital confronted a patient
02:42and told them that such behaviour was unacceptable.
02:47Although she is training to be a nurse,
02:49nothing could have prepared her for the experience of losing a patient.
02:53The patient looked okay.
02:56And when it was time for me to take the food,
02:58I find him dead and I broke down.
03:01And it was emotionally challenging.
03:03But it was, I was lucky.
03:06I was working with someone who kind of encouraged me
03:09and gave me advises on how to deal with these things.
03:12Her advice for other young nurses in Germany.
03:15Struggling with the emotional toll of the job is...
03:17It's okay to be sad.
03:19It's okay to be overwhelmed by experiences like this.
03:22But with time, everything is going to be fine.
03:26And you just have to give it your best.
03:29Despite the challenges,
03:31Mutesi remains resolute in pursuing her dreams.
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