"A great, great person", "a good boss" and "a wonderful friend" were among the words of praise that flowed for Janice Karena who retired lastweek after more than three decades of sprucing up the wards and corridors of Wairarapa Hospital. When Mrs Karena, pictured, stepped away as head supervisor for theDHB-contracted cleaning firm OCS, it was from a hospital vastly different from the one she walked into on her first day 32 years ago. "I'd worked as a cleaner at Dannevirke hospital, and when I came up and asked for a job here they took me on straight away," she said, "It was a lot different to what we have now - I started as a cleaner in the old Ward 6, the isolation ward, which was a grubby old place." Since then the DHB had built a brand new hospital and contracted out its cleaning services - the two biggest changes Mrs Karena had seen. She reckoned the matrons used to rule the roost - but her old workmates said the cleaners were equally a force to be reckoned with. "Cross the cleaners... and they'd let you know about it." Cleaner Lesley Omundsen could hardly put into words how much she owed to her departing colleague. "Janice has always been there for us and it's really sad that she's leaving. I wouldn't be here if it wasn't for her." Mrs Karena plans to spend her retirement gardening and seeing more of her granddaughters Monique, 12, and Te Pineamenei, 2.
