Transcriber: Pari ‌Szi Reviewer: David DeRuwe
When I was still in primary school, my best friend’s parents were doctors.
They initiated a weekly first aid class,
which was also related to one of Germany's main rescue organizations,
the St. John Accident Assistance.
So naturally, we joined and started to learn about first aid.
At first, it was simple stuff, like how to dress a wound
or how to splint a broken arm.
After obtaining our first qualifications,
we took shifts during school breaks to attend any classmates who got injured.
We were schoolyard paramedics.
Instantly loving the work,
I also joined up with the youth wing of the Saint John Accident Assistance.
Receiving further training at the local station,
I grew to love the sense of community and purpose.
This volunteer engagement was one of the pillars of my youth,
which I continued through most of my school days.
When I started my undergraduate studies in a different city,
I also got involved with the local station.
Receiving further training,
I became a member of the German Civil Defense
and the city’s emergency response team
and finally became a professionally qualified paramedic.
This included being on call as supplemental capacity for emergencies
and medical support for local events like sports
or even a 60,000-people music festival once a year.
Through my volunteer work,
I’ve experienced a multitude of different situations,
some being utterly heartbreaking, totally hilarious, stupid,
surreal, or completely mundane.
It was reanimating a man in front of his wife
because it turned out he’d suffered a brain bleed;
or calming down a scared elderly lady,
simply because her blood pressure meter had measured slightly higher than usual;
or trying to get an aggressive drunk guy into an ambulance
because he’d fallen and cut his head open
while he was trying to shove us out his door.
On the other hand, once at the music festival,
a guy climbed up some scaffolding and tried to do a backflip.
Needless to say, it didn’t work out as planned, and we carried him off,
surprisingly, only with a broken wrist and a slight concussion.
And while it certainly wasn’t pleasant for him,
that was one of the highlights of our shift.
(Laughter)
Another time at the festival, we picked up
a girl from the festival grounds who was wearing a Pikachu Pokemon Onesie,
and who had drunk herself into unconsciousness.
Bringing her back to our tent,
which was heavily heated due to our many hypothermia patients,
she regained consciousness and immediately started to pressure vomit,
which kind of made it look like she was doing a Pokemon attack.
(Laughter)
But why am I telling you all this?
Through my work as a paramedic,
I got to see people at their most vulnerable and intimate moments.
I heard life stories I would never imagine myself somebody could have.
Also I got to see their homes.
Sometimes it was a display cabinet of weird collectibles,
and sometimes it was the most horridly messy apartment
I could never imagine the person could live in.
But all were distinctly personal stories of which I suddenly was a part of.
Growing up in a very protected German middle class bubble,
these experiences made me more conscious about other parts of my society
and all the twists and turns a life can take.
It made me appreciate more the life I had and more aware of the lives of others.
It made me realize that sometimes Social Security services, EMS,
and everything in between don’t always work as they should be.
Going through my academic training and various internships,
which proved to be another bubble altogether,
these experiences helped me view problems with a different perspective.
It made me more conscious
of the sometimes adverse effects some decisions might entail.
Good policy ideas don't always make good policy.
But how can we alleviate such risks and become more conscious of them?
In light of the war in Ukraine,
a discussion has started in Germany about a mandatory service here,
not only military but also technical and medical rescue services and the like.
I strongly believe that experiences such as these
would be highly beneficial to all young people,
both to learn about themselves and others.
Furthermore, these formative experiences provide lessons and tools
one simply cannot learn in the classroom or lecture hall,
and could therefore provide a pathway out of our bubbles.
I know a lot of students
from the Institute intend to work in various fields and capacities
of policy production and implementation,
and while training as a paramedic and trying to save lives
might be a somewhat radical step,
I hope and believe that we all, to the best of our abilities,
strive to experience challenging situations like these
in order to step out of our bubbles
and grow and become more empathetic professionals
and better policy practitioners in the future.
Thank you.
(Applause)