#Everyday heroes: Flight attendant Tamer Özogul helps out in clinic

Tamer Özogul is stationed as flight attendant with Eurowings in Stuttgart. Before that he was a specialist nurse in a psychiatric clinic. In the current corona crisis, Tamer Özogul has now swapped the flight attendant's uniform for that of a male nurse and is helping out in a clinic. In a short interview, Tamer told us how his everyday life is currently shaping up.

Tamer, how has the Corona Pandemic changed your everyday life?

After the initial rigor mortis, it quickly became clear to me that I had to somehow make the best of the situation. So far, I have only met my friends "online" and, especially in the early days, I have done a lot of things that had been left behind. For example, my tax return was ready in no time and the apartment has rarely been as shiny as it is at the moment. I can do sports at home, but of course I also spent many evenings comfortably on the couch.

What is your current job and how does it differ from your job as a flight attendant? What is especially important to you?

As a trained specialist nurse, I decided to return to my old job for three months after the announcement of short-time work. Exactly where I am needed most urgently. I am now working in a gerontological psychiatric acute care unit of a large local psychiatric clinic. There I mainly care for mentally and physically ill people of advanced age, who are often limited in their orientation or in an exceptional mental situation.
The work there is quite different from my flying life, but there are also some parallels: for example, there is shift work and working in a great team. Here, too, we have to coordinate well with each other, we must always be able to rely on each other!
Furthermore, no day is like the other. In both professions I deal with people and there are many aspects of social competence such as empathy, patience, cordiality, attention, self-confidence, to name but a few.

What are you looking forward to when the crisis is over?

All the things that seemed so obvious until now: Meeting friends, going out to dinner, going to concerts and especially travelling. I love being on the road, getting to know new countries and cultures. I'm particularly looking forward to flying, because last year I deliberately fulfilled a long-cherished dream by training as a flight attendant at Eurowings and was looking forward to an exciting summer with lots of holidaymakers and great flights. But that will probably take a while yet. Nevertheless, I am looking forward to the future with confidence, because we will fly again and thus overcome borders, bring families together and transport holidaymakers to their dream country –#WeWillFlyYouAgain.