Cornelia Gatlan with fellow nurses and doctors

This picture was taken in the 1960s, when I was a nurse at the hospital, in Braila. I was in a room of this hospital with a part of the hospital’s collective, nurses and doctors.

After finishing my studies at the School for Nurses, I worked for two years as a nurse at Sfantu Spiridon Hospital in Iasi. I had asked to be appointed to work there, because Iasi was the city of my childhood. I worked in the maxillofacial ward in the beginning, and afterwards, I obtained a transfer at the skin and venereal diseases section of the same hospital, which housed several clinics. The job was good and, since our class was the first to graduate from the Nurses School, I was appointed head nurse.

However, although things were going pretty well, I was feeling homesick and wasn't comfortable with being away from home. I had a good job, I had a lot of fun; in these respects, my life here in Braila has never been as good as in Iasi. But most of my former classmates were returning home at that time from where they had been appointed to work, and my father managed to obtain some sort of transfer between me and a nurse from Braila, who wanted to go to Iasi, where her parents lived.

Her name was Duduta Ionescu, and she married Doctor Ionescu from Braila, who was the manager of the Hospital no.1. My parents had rented Duduta my old room in Braila during my stay in Iasi. She wanted to go to Iasi, and I wanted to return to Braila. She didn't leave in the end, because she fell in love with Doctor Ionescu; as for me, I did return home to Braila, and initially worked for about five years at the Hospital no.1 on Calarasi Street, which is still there today.

After that, I got transferred to the newly-founded Hospital no.3, in the Hipodrom quarter, where I worked until my retirement. I was employed there for many years as well. I don't want to boast, but my work was highly esteemed everywhere I went. I spent 31 years working in hospitals.