my humblest apologies to the chap in the comments box who has been asking about Nurses' Day and when it's being celebrated. so here's a heads up regarding the day meant to make Nurses feel appreciated. note the keyword in the prior sentence: MEANT. because i really don't feel the love for the nursing staff during Nurses' Day and frankly speaking, i'm not a big fan of the day itself anyways.

now, the original Nurses' Day that's celebrated all over the world is on the 12th of May, the birthday of the 2nd most recognized Victorian woman in English History, Florence Nightingale. Miss Nightingale was the pioneer of nursing, establishing proper sanitary conditions for an army hospital during the Crimean War. she went on to develop radical ideas of maintaining hygienic living conditions for the various hospitals in England. she's also quite the feminist herself, constantly struggling to sort out her thoughts on the expectations of upper-class Victorian women in the English society. which brings to mind: Corset burning demonstrations anyone?

but back to Nurses' Day. in 'i-want-to-be-outstanding'Singapore, we celebrate Nurses' Day on the 1st of August. the 1st of August apparently being the day when French nuns, equipped with nursing skills, arrived in Singapore to teach the locals how to administer TLC (tender loving care) to the health-care-deprived people. these nuns produced Singapore's very first nurses, complete with starched caps and bleached white pinafores.

now, fast-forward to modern Singapore. Nurses' Day, in a corporate sense, is a convenient excuse to celebrate National Day too. the Singapore National Day being on the 9th of August, is just nearly a week apart from the local Nurses' Day. So instead of getting two corporate gifts, you get only ONE slightly more expensive gift from the organizations. i remember a Nurses' Day several years back when i received a gaudy orange gym bag with the organization logo emblazoned on it. inside the gym bag were several other goodies like tupperware and a handy nurses' guidebook complete with pharmaceutical listings and step-by-step CPR charts. needless to say, i gave the gym bag and tupperware to relatives with a more disastrous fashion sense. the good thing is that all on-coming traffic will avoid them like the plague, thus reducing the chances of a traffic casualty.

Nurses' Day is also the time when the hospital likes to put up performances to showcase 'our multi-talented staff'. most of the time, these so-called volunteers are being coerced/forced/coaxed/bribed to participate. so much for 'multi-talented' eh? during these performances, you'll get to watch people whom you'll never expect to see (eg. heads of departments, the janitor, the lady from the staff cafeteria who sells mee rebus) doing bizarre things like salsa, a hip-hop dance routine, sing a pop song, act out a cheesy skit, etc. most of the time, these performances are cringe-worthy. there's a reason why some of these people whom you'll never expect to see, don't want to be seen. but obviously, the organizers never gave a regard to this.

these performances also seem to warrant a need for another competition: The (insert random organization here) Idol. every single organization seems to need a voted person who can sing well enough and survive critique from a panel of 'judges'. it's silly when an 'Idol' competition actually exists in your place of employment. it's even sillier when all your colleagues are egging you on to join it simply because you're slightly more sociable and artistically-inclined. it has happened to the average person like me. and it can happen to you.

lousy corporate gifts, bad performances, mandatory volunteer-ism to participate in these bad performances, and nary an off day in sight. who said that being a nurse on nurses' day is worth it?

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