In Jordan, the working environment was also at once recognizable and alien, but in a different way. The operating rooms in Amman had zero frills—this was a still-developing country and the equipment was older and heavily used—but they had most of the things I am used to as a surgeon, and the level of care seemed very good. One of the surgeons I met was Iraqi. He’d trained in Baghdad and practiced there until the chaos following the American invasion in 2003 forced him to flee with his family, abandoning their home, their savings, and his work. Before Saddam Hussein, in the last years of his
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