Evening Telegraph (First Edition)
Surviving after the apocalypse
A DELVE into the depths of history has helped secondary school pupils come up with the kit to survive in a post-apocalyptic Angus.
In a novel project forming the latest exhibition at Montrose Museum, teenagers from the town’s academy scoured the collections of the visitor attraction for items to help re-establish community life – including using a croquet mallet against marauding zombies on the nearby Mid Links.
The project involved 13 pupils aged between 13-17 from the academy’s ASN classes.
Angus Alive heritage and learning lead Caroline Taylor said: “I got the idea for the project because I’m really into science fiction and zombie films and have often thought that museums would be ideal places to hide out during the apocalypse because of the selection of objects we have.
“I thought it would be an interesting project to do with a local high school to help them view our collections in a new light – how many of these items were practical things that people used in the past?”
Caroline added: “The pupils thought that their priority would be weapons to defend themselves against attackers/zombies and also to hunt and gather supplies to survive.
“Using that as a starting point we reviewed several items from Montrose Museum’s collections with a focus on weaponry and defence.”
After the Apocalypse runs at the museum until mid-March.
THERE are few things that palliative care workers d read more t ha n t he inevitable dinner party question: “So what do you do for a living?”
Silence, an awkward shuffle from side to side, and then the individual that plucked up the courage to ask such a question stares intently at their shoes as the answer is given.
Deans Buchanan, the lead consultant in palliative care in Tayside, observed that the two questions to follow are pretty much always the same. “What is palliative care? Isn’t that depressing?”
By Fiona Barnett’s definition, palliative care is a service which looks after and cares for people “who have a life-limiting illness where there isn’t a cure anymore but they could still be undergoing some form of treatment”.
Her work as a clinical coordinator for specialist palliative care services in Dundee sees her based at Roxburghe House (pictured right), a purpose built specialist palliative care unit.
She said: “What we do is about encouraging people to still live and to enjoy as much of their life, for however long as that’s going to be.
“We deal with a lot of the psychological components because when active treatment stops that can be a huge thing.
“For the patients themselves they can experience that loss of what they thought their lives were going to be in the future.”
There does seem
to be an expectation that due to its proximity with advanced illness and dying, working in such a role can be depressing.
Deans is keen to emphasise that this isn’t necessarily true.
He said: “Often you’re working in situations that are sad but, for me, they’re not depressing because we’re bringing something positive to those situations.
“In terms of sustaining my own working life and working in areas of humanity which are by nature sad, having that focus on being able to bring something positive and purposeful into those situations is really the thing that sustains you at work.
“There is a natural understanding that 100% of human beings reach an end point in their life.
“As a medic you need to realise that it’s only going to happen once so you’ve got to try to make it the best experience for that person and their family.”
For Fiona, getting the opportunity to do a job like this is “deeply humbling”.
She said: “We see people who have probably heard the worst news they’re ever going to hear in their life.
“I have worked with and looked after some of the most amazing people who have let me into their life at their most difficult times, whether that’s when they’ve just been newly diagnosed or whether