Mogamat Alwie Gasant has provided 40 incredible years of service to the Groote Schuur Hospital; he has been honoured by the Heroes of Groote Schuur for all his hard work.
Cape Town, South Africa (07 December 2021) – Mogamat Alwie Gasant, a Senior Admin Clerk in the Groote Schuur Fees Department, is set to retire in the new year after 40 years of service. He is being celebrated for his time at the hospital by the team at Heroes of Groote Schuur.
Heroes of Groote Schuur is a Facebook page dedicated to highlighting the amazing people who work or visit the hospital. The page highlights the incredible work being done by the staff of the academic hospital. The page has truly been a highlight during the pandemic as we have met so many of the people who work behind the scenes to keep the hospital operational.
The pandemic has taught us that a hospital is more than the nurses and doctors, it is also the cleaners, porters, maintenance staff and of course, the countless admin teams that keep everything running smoothly.
Mogamat Gasant is one of those inspiring people who will now be hanging up his work attire and retiring after working at the hospital for 40 years. This is his story.
“In December I will have been here for 40 years, and I’m retiring at the end of January. I’m looking forward to spending time at home.
I worked in medical records for 24 years and after that I moved to the Fees Department, and I’ve been there for 15 years.
My English wasn’t good when I started working here. I was very shy to speak English. My home language is Afrikaans and I was very scared to talk to anybody in English. And there was a guy in medical records who said I can talk to him and he will correct my language and help me with English.
So I did that and I started learning more. And then I started reading. And after that I told him I love photography and would love to do photography as a hobby. Through the Cape Town library I started to go fetch books on photography and study them. A friend gave me a camera and I would read the books and then practise with my camera. And I became more and more interested in reading because I wanted to learn how to operate the camera.
I only had a Grade 10 when I came to Groote Schuur. I lived with my Ouma because my father was mentally ill and he couldn’t take care of us, and my mother died when I was 7 years old. Then when I was in Grade 10 my Ouma passed away, so I just left school and went looking for work at that time.
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Through reading and books and photography I thought, ‘Why not complete my studies?’ So I finished the equivalent of matric in 1998 and I got a qualification bonus. And I took that money and decided to go further than that. So I got my National Diploma in HR.
I am married with four kids, and our first grandchild is on the way.
The best part of my job for me is helping other people. People always phone and ask me to organise their folders.
I still enjoy my photography. I like to take pictures of weddings and I also help out here with photography at the hospital.” – Mogamat Alwie Gasant, Senior Admin Clerk Fees Department
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