doesn't feel the same anymore

Went back to hobart again for easter! Stayed at elvin3's the first night and then at jan3 for the next 2 nights. Was nice to see some of the people i didnt see the last time i went down. but as before, i'm glad i'm not in hobart - too much drama. i sometimes feel very distant from them now. guess people move on, and maybe so should we. 

the dynamics have changed. it feels so familiar yet strange at the same time. same people, different rooms, same doors, different keys. makes me wonder how much more change will it take before i stop going back there. same as rg5. it's not the same anymore. guess we've decided it's time to move on too. 

anw, met up with some friends but the highlight had to be the visit to MONA (museum of old and new art). there were so many interesting and erm thought-provoking works in there. everyone is equipped with an ipod touch as all the exhibits do not have written info about them. you need to read off the ipod. high-tech right? no more having to squeeze with people to read the tiny pieces of paper anymore! 

it's basically one man's personal museum. 0.o i know. a very rich man - david walsh. the exhibits aren't your usual sort. some were bordering on porn/art while others were gross. a few were thought provoking and i wish i could spend all day just reading the explanations etc for every exhibit but it would take too long. there was a picture of the holy virgin mary that included elephant dung as one of the media. 

That's the queue to enter. free admission + easter holidays = long long queue!

so what do girls do when we're in line and we're bored? cam whore! hahaha! 

fat porsche. literally. its a real porsche btw. with fat seats too. like really inflated and bulging. 

you'll never guess what this exhibit is. all 150 of them. 

yup. that's what it is. cast from 150 different women aged 18-78yo. nice. some of them looked utterly disgusting. made me rethink my career choice as a gynae. hahahaha! 

this was some waterfall which spelt the most searched words on google for the day. 

some machine with fast moving lights. 

i wished we queued to see the mummy! :( thought we could go back later but they were closing already. maybe next time! they only let two people in at a time which is why there was a long queue for that exhibit. meh. so sad. 

this last one is very interesting. it's affectionately called a cloaca. its basically a shit making machine. or rather an artificial GIT. food enters from the left, courtesy of the kitchen above. and it is digested and kept at body temperature and progresses through the various vessels till it ends up as poop. the machine poops at 3pm everyday. 0.o even more regular than me! LOL! i know this is very gross but the last container actually looks like chocolate milkshake. =S ok i feel like puking now that i've said that out loud. *shudders* 

there were heaps of other exhibits but my battery was running low so was trying to conserve it for the more interesting one (to me at least). 

so now i'm home, just nua-ing on my bed. sha7's only back on thurs so i have another 2.5 days to myself. time to start cooking! but i need my guinea pig to feed. :( come back quick! hahahahahah! 

Intern's Intern

hello world! it's been a month since i've updated my blog. seems like i've been abandoning it quite a bit recently. mainly because there's always facebook which seems to be more exciting than a blog. but anyway, just thought i should come clean up the cobwebs here once in a while. 

for those that didn't know, launnie sort of flooded a few weeks ago which was a little scary. not for me but for people in other areas. they had to evacuate some people from longford and the inveresk uni campus was shut down. we were basically whining why didn't it flood at the hospital because that would mean no uni! although it would probably be pretty disastrous. 

that's the cataract gorge flooding. it was intense! loved it! i think half of launceston was there on that day! we went there the day before because we thought it would be like this but the gorge just looked really full. like high tide sort of thing. who knew that a day later it would be raging! they had to close off bits of the park because the water submerged the picnic area, the pool, the playground and was up till the level of the toilets! which is pretty damn high up! the only way across was to take the chairlift. first time seeing a queue for the chairlift to be honest! but so scary! i keep thinking that my shoes will fall off if i take the chairlift. hahaha! irrational fear. gotta thank twitter that i got to see this. my classmate tweeted about it and i exclaimed to my housemate 'eh the gorge is flooded!! LET'S GO!!' XD so random. 

moving on. we had dinner at buddha tha1 one random saturday night. we had the roast duck which was OH-SO-GOOD. nothing like what i've tried before. the curries were alright i guess. but the duck was YUMS. $27 for it but MUST TRY. ok now that i've gotten your hopes and expectations up, hope you don't end up disappointed. I would be sad. It was nice having a meal at a cosy little restaurant with friends. Went to coles after and then we had OSCE practice with the seniors. =) we are so kiasu. exams are so far away yet we're starting osce practice already! but there seems to be sooo much to learn! that it never seems to end! yikes! especially since we have no idea what is being tested! sobs. 

we were studying in the library as usual when sha7 asked me to google this website  and omg once i saw it, i was sooo hungry! he made me look at the foccacia and said 'looks good right?'. and that was it. i HAD to make it. regardless of how i think it might turn out. hahahaha! since i'm i don't usually bake and all i've made are steamed cakes. like the ji dan gao. XD anyway, off to coles we went to get yeast and after 2h of preparation, rising, baking etc. it was ready! it tasted so good fresh. like when i just pulled it out from the oven. would have been better if we actually had sea salt. did not sprinkle enough salt on it but still. i'm hungry while typing this. 

we tried making pumpkin soup/mash yesterday because we had pumpkin and we had to finish it before it went bad. so we microwaved it for 10min to cook and then mashed it up. we sorta free-styled from there. added honey, cream cheese spread (really anyhow sia!), mixed herbs, water and bring to boil. it tasted not bad actually! but i guess pumpkin is naturally sweet so it can't be that bad anyway. =) 

we've been practicing cannulation on each other! been poked twice already. i think ive got some vagovagal response when i see my own blood in the cannula bung. ugh. but not to the extent of passing out. venepuncture's fine btw. it's just cannulation. 'drank' 20ml of water yesterday through the cannula. hahaha! 

moving on to more boring stuff like uni. finished respiratory last week and currently on cardiology. it's so fun! i dunno why people said cardio wasn't as exciting as it sounds. the people are nice and friendly. been doing admissions, discharges, examining patients, mini tutorials on the run etc. more tiring than respiratory actually. i REALLY feel like an intern on cardio. hopefully i'll be able to hone my skills further. loving it so far. respiratory was good too! excellent consultants, reg and intern! miss them already! very inspirational people. wish i can be as charismatic as some of them. they just establish rapport so easily with patients! *grumbles* oh did i mention that i've changed my perspective on respiratory? HATED it before i did my rotation! stupid CAM201 made me swear off it for 1.5 years! it's actually not bad! might consider it to be honest. *ponders*

(off topic: the food during handovers every morning is yums. raspberry muffins, croissants, egg and bacon muffins, hot cross buns, fruit, yoghurt etc. it's enough to make me wake up at 7.30 for handover at 8) 

but i have to say that i have become more outspoken this year. trying to get the most out of my rotations! just stick my head out there. haha! but one thing for sure. probably not gonna do psych in future. not my cup of tea for now. =S 

time's going by so quickly! before you know it, it's EASTER!! 3 more weeks! btw the time difference between singapore and tasmania is now 2h instead of 3 because we just had daylight savings last weekend. of which i regret not going to bed earlier to enjoy extra 1h sleep. mehh. 

sorry for the lack of updates over the past 2 weeks! been busy preparing for the pee-ee-gee interview! and i've got good news for you all! I GOT IT! yay! so now i have a 4 yr bond to serve in exchange for about SGD55k. not too bad i guess. together with a return ticket for electives this yr! woots! plus i'm already guaranteed a job so with the employment contract comes relocation benefits etc. =) so happy! now i can concentrate on my studies! been so stressed about it. they were so friendly and informal! felt totally at ease in there! could have just been chatting with friends!

will update soon about our short trip to melbourne for the interview! i didn't take pics because its all in joelen3's camera! so maybe once she uploads i'll kope and blog. or maybe just blog without pics before i forget!

Just did the MBTI test again! And i THINK i'm the same as I was 8 years ago! ESTJ! although i cannot find a previous blog post that might have had my previous result. Meh. It honestly sounds like me and it was pretty funny because Rob1n was saying how i can do any specialty, except maybe psychiatry! and i agree with her because i'm struggling with psych at the moment! i have no idea what all the salient points are, how to assess the MSE accurately, even just the appearance! =S I don't pick up cues like body language etc well. I'm more of a facts person. So i pay attention to what he's saying and not how he looks. which i guess causes me to lose like 50% of the info that i can gather. 

i made dan do a quick one and he was the exact opposite to me! INFP! we were reading the descriptions and i was like 'you've got something against my TJ personality' because it keeps mentioning things like 

One real problem area for the INFP is their intensive dislike of conflict and criticism. The INFP is quick to find a personal angle in any critical comment, whether or not anything personal was intended. They will tend to take any sort of criticism as a personal attack on their character, and will usually become irrational and emotional in such situations. This can be a real problem for INFPs who are involved with persons who have Thinking and Judging preferences. "TJ"s relate to others with a objective, decisive attitude that frequently shows an opinion on the topic of conversation. If the opinion is negative, the TJ's attitude may be threatening to the INFP, who will tend to respond emotionally to the negativity and be vaguely but emphatically convinced that the negativity is somehow the INFP's fault.

 anyway, it's friday tmr which is goooodddddd... i love the weekends. thats the thing i look forward to on mondays. haha! plus its a public holiday in launceston next wed cos of the launceston cup! =) and i've got no class on tues till 7-9pm CBL. but i've gotta be on the wards. but still.. ;) 

off-topic: watched black swan (as you all alr know) and green hornet. omg green hornet is SUCH A WASTE OF MONEY! i guess it's a good laugh but it's pretty lame. not sure why ja7 chou agreed to act in it. but hey, his english wasn't too bad. watched the mythbuster green hornet special after that and realised that most of the stunts wouldnt work. =( guess it is hollywood after all. 

it's so sad. there's nothing to do on the weekends. no salamanca to rock up to, you've gotta pay parking in town, been to the gorge 3 times already. there's a sunday market at evandale but apparently you've gotta pay to get in too. -.- lame. pay pay pay. so what do we do on weekends? wash laundry, watch movie, study, cook. then prepare for the next week of uni. probably should go to wing&co and get ourselves some nice asian stuff. 

anyway! last weekend was REALLY COOL! festivale (food/wine fest) was on so we headed down to have a taste/eat/gorge/binge ourselves out there. had crayfish wood-fired pizza (of which we couldnt taste the crayfish AT ALL), van diemen's beer, olliebollens (dutch doughnuts), salt&pepper calamari, fish&chips, angus steak sandwich, mexican platter of ribs, nachos, chicken wraps etc, nutgrove rum&raisin ice cream and rosti. yumyum. 

and then on sunday, dan came up and then we met up with one of the new singaporeans studying in launceston and went around launceston! =) headed up to the gorge again and walked around. it was a beautiful day = good weather, lovely people.

headed to the museum after to have a look. it was basically a mini science centre + train museum. it was pretty interesting. maybe i should go to the one with the dinosaurs etc one day. wanna go to MONA too! but that's all the way in hobart. damn. why must everything interesting happen in hobart when im gone! like how they opened a burger got soul there on sandy bay! ugh.

after that, we headed to the tamar island for a while. saw black swans (hah!) but it was like a boardwalk thing. there was a bbq pit halfway along the walk. guess it would be a quiet and pretty. 

i feel like my body is falling apart. my back hurts (old issue) and my elbow started hurting again today (old issue). not sure what i did this time around for my elbow to hurt. =S didn't lift anything heavy so it should be alright. seems fine now but it was giving me problems this afternoon. sigh. 22 yrs and counting. someone quick do some regenerative medicine research so that i can have some spare parts in years to come!

anyway, i might be doing some research at the hospital! gonna meet with the research lady next week. so exciting! =) i think i'm developing an interest in O&G so might explore the idea of some O&G research projects which is good i guess. at least now there's something to look forward to. haha! although O&G is my last rotation this semester so we'll see if i think the same way after it. =)

just a week in and i'm tired but happy

so here i am, lying in bed, on the first thursday of the new academic year, feeling REALLY tired already. although i haven't been doing much clinical stuff because of the rotation i'm on atm. but everything's been VERY organised unlike Hobart which is aweeesome. you have no idea (well actually you probably do) how irritating it can be when the admin stuffs up.

i've seen 2 psych assessments and they have been a real eye-opener for me - how some people buy so much into their delusions that that becomes their reality. or how an intelligent person can do things that seem ridiculous to us. but i guess that is the beauty of psychiatry. to find out what's going on in their heads.

apart from uni which is really tiring because we start mostly at 8am and i usually stay in school till about 6 to use my computer/study etc. then we'll head back home (yay 300m away) and cook dinner! which has been spaghetti, jap curry, tomyum soup & fried egg etc. although i think we prob need to go grocery shopping and stock up on a week's worth of food. got enough meat (minced beef to be exact) to last us till tmr. then we are going to go vego! LOL! unless we go buy meattttt. ok we got 3 more eggs i think but thats NOT meat.

i think most of you would have seen photos of my house on facebook so shan't post them here lest someone attacks/burglars my house! HAHA! Well most people who read my blog are friends so they would have me on facebook. yay!

talking about facebook, i think i MIGHT change my profile name to something else. something difficult to find so that it is difficult to find me unless i tell you my profile name/email address. keeps it away from unwanted eyes. might do a friend cull too. but i'm debating about that. i guess it's nice to keep everyone on my list. who knows, maybe 5-10yrs down the road, i might need someone's help! would be nice to say 'heyy rmb me?' hahaha! what's your thought on that?

PS. i actually had to do a blog post as homework on our e-portfolio gateway. so can't believe i posted there before updating my own blog! =S

so it's 10 days into the new year. nothing really exciting to report at the moment. except that i'm going for wisdom tooth extraction tmr! one week before i fly off! that's probably a bad idea cos i wouldn't be able to eat my last minute nice foods! ice cream diet anyone?

so here are my resolutions for 2011:

1. pass 4th year without any scares
2. gym regularly (at least 3x/wk) - probably need shay to drag me there!
3. find my love for running again/start running group
4. start launceston soka group
5. chant regularly - morning & evening
6. practice osces regularly
7. study not for exam sake
8. hopefully get offered PEG (fingers crossed)/if not gimme my intern place in launnie --> PR!! 
9. travel around more! 
10. keep in contact with friends everywhere
11. (find a GOOD bf)

the last point is not a necessity. but if it's going to happen, PLEASE LET IT BE A GOOD ONE THANKEW VERY MUCH. 

PS. my hair's a really nice reddish purple now! =)

I'M OFFICIALLY A 4TH YEAR MEDICAL STUDENT!!!!!!

30+ more hours!!!

Long awaited update.

I haven't been updating much at all. Haven't felt the need to. After a while everything seems so mundane when actually it probably isn't really.

Anyway, we celebrated mooncake festival for the 1st time this year! Had my CTA programme (Well Women's Check) session in the evening so we only celebrated at 9+pm because they all waited for me to come back! So sweet! Chri5tina bought mooncakes from W1ng & Co so we had baked mooncakes while Tes5a made proper tang yuans this time! She failed miserably back in 1st semester because she bought korean glutinous rice flour which didn't work at all! Turned out tasting more like mantou soaked in syrup. XD So we all brought our cups of green tea onto the lawn, played with sparklers, had mooncake and camwhored as usual. It felt nice. I'm going to miss this crazy bunch of people so much. Travi5 passed me part of his snowskin mooncake the next day because I wanted it. OMG so niceee. *faints* I'm a very satisfied girl. 

Back to the CTA programme, we basically pretend to be doctors and we have these role players who allow us to poke/prode/examine them intimately. We have to take a history, perform breast examination, abdominal exam, speculum exam and bimanual exam on them. It was so scary at first because we didn't know what to expect and practice with the mannequins didn't help much because it was so different from the real thing! I kept hitting the cervix with the speculum on the models which freaked me out because I kept thinking that I would do the same thing! Thankfully the ladies were really really nice and as they had to do amongst themselves as part of the training, they know how nervous we are and are super nice about it. They tell us what not to do, or if it's hurting and if we can't find the cervix, they will tell us to try again etc. Just such a wonderful experience. At least now when I'm in clinical practice I wouldn't be as afraid of doing it. I know they have plans to implement a male version (think DRE etc) so that would be cool if we get to do it too! Besides the wonderful learning experience, all these ladies prepared dinner for us too! It was a mini picnic in the clinic! Had awesome cakes, sandwiches, fruits, cheese, nuts etc. I love Australia because everyone's so happy and willing to help! 

We celebrated Hari Raya too! The Malaysian society organised a potluck/buffet thing so we just went up for free food! Hehe! Apparently sponsored by UMNO hobart. 0.o seriously. UMNO in hobart?! HMM. Whatever. Doesn't bother/concern me as long as I get free food. HAHAHA. The food was asian (duh) but ran out pretty quickly. =( Most of the curry didn't have meat left. Pfft. Went up Mt Wellington with yeesha7, zaide3, and ka1 aun after that! Super impromptu and random! Probably only time when I would actually look presentable up the mountain! Usually wrapped up like a ball! 

L-R: Zaide3, me, Yeesha7 (future housemate next yr)

compared with below. 

Now you know what I mean?

Alright. I shall leave you with this now. Will update more soon (which means when I'm procrastinating study). ^^ 

Contradicting Oneself to the Point of Confusion

i'm honestly updating every 2 weeks huh. But there's really nothing much to report. Apart from the gossip at Jane. Which is highly inappropriate to be put online. Dang. So yes. Really nothing much at all apart from me stressing out again. Haiz. 

I don't understand how people can try so hard to be accepted to the point that he/she reeks of desperation. I actually feel sad despite what we've been saying. Not sure if he/she knows what people actually think of him/her. Almost split personality - one contradicts the other and either one is used when it is more convenient/appropriate. Very disturbing.

Last Rotation

well well well.. guess what? it is my last rotation already! and i am mighty excited! why? because it is finally new information that i've not learnt before! psych, o&g, paeds! although this just means that I have to keep up to date otherwise I will not be able to internalise it quickly enough!

but so far its been interesting! contraception, miscarriages, abortions, psych history, o&g history and examination, neonatal exam etc.. hehe! I'm looking forward to the structured timetable.. finally.. i'm quite glad i'm going to launceston because it is so much more structured than hobart. at least i know what i have to know. SDL is probably not a very good thing for me. eeks!

Autopsy - Dead or Alive

Warning: Possibly gruesome post ahead! 

Finally saw my 1st autopsy today! It was strangely dissociative watching them remove the skull cap, brain, organs etc. I felt squeamish when I looked at the body. It was different from the cadaver lab. This person only died yesterday. This person still had hair. This person had a case history file. This person had a family. This person had a name. This person was a person before.

Not sure how much I'm allowed to share here but there wasn't much to be seen apart from slightly scarred kidney, signs of acute pancreatitis (saponification), fatty streaks in aorta. Cause of death ?OD. So they'll have to wait for toxicology to come back in a few weeks. And blood is drawn from the femoral artery post-mortem! This is because substances like caffeine (?!) can be released from the heart into the blood if taken from there.

It was weird seeing them slice up the organs, take samples, dump everything into a black plastic bag in the abdomen and sew it all up again. All of a sudden, the body looks presentable once more. What was an empty (literally) carcass was full again.

Just for your info, they remove the brain as one part, including the brainstem and cerebellum. Then they remove the abdominal organs from the tongue down to the ovaries/prostate. HMM just realised something. WHAT HAPPENED TO THE INTESTINES?! Didn't see it being chopped up! Didn't realise the bladder was SOOOO BIG and expandable!! It's like a giant plastic bag! Almost!

It's different looking at fresh organs as compared to preserved stuff in the cadaver lab. Everything' still squishy and soft and liquid. The person was foaming at the mouth which was a sign of pulmonary oedema. And we got to see the aspiration pneumonia in the lungs because the contents were the same as that in the stomach.

It was exciting! Wouldn't mind seeing more if I can. =)

Singapore Night 2010 - Happy Birthday Singapore!

Yesterday was Singapore Night! It was fun not having to run around trying to make sure everything's in order! So that was good. =) Sat at the VIP table with sherwin, jo, vasaant, foong, nicolle ang, michelle ang, jeremy bay, jerem7 chng and of course our VIP kok wee! So we got to attack the food first! :P 

The food was good. Had rolls, beehoon, ham, roast lamb, steamed fish, vege panache, green curry chicken etc. Dessert was nice too. I love hotel desserts. I swear I can go to a dessert buffet and eat non-stop if not for the fact that I would put on SO SO SO MUCH weight! 

Performances were awesome and ended up having to go up and play table games! Eat 3 warheads with a straight face! Was sooo hard! Ended up had to eat 2 more because there were too many people left on stage. Then gotta dance with a straight face too. WAH that was a challenge because 1. I DON'T DANCE. 2. how to dance to poker face with a straight face?! But it was good clean fun. =) 

Managed to grab a few photos with people so that was good. Was looking back at past Singapore Night photos and I'm like O.M.G.W.H.A.T.S.W.I.T.H.M.Y.H.A.I.R! Can't believe I actually had those hairstyles!!! EEKSSSS!!! 

Here's what I mean. 

2008 with Marcu5

2009 with fellow medlets! 

2010 with el3anor

See the vast difference? Never knew it was this bad till i scrolled through all photos on facebook! LOL! 

Anyway, we played with the helium balloons too! And I SOUND SOOO WEIRD! Like pikachu! It was fun and I really don't regret going!! Would I drive down from Launnie next yr? Maybe if I crash together with the other Launnie people! =) 

SGH Posting in Dec!

i'll be at sgh from 6-31 Dec! doing internal med! yay! and i thought i would be unsuccessful again this yr! pretty excited about it. lol!

I guess it was good that I didn't get the surgery posting because that was meant to be 1st two weeks of Jan which doesn't look like a good idea what with me having to move up to launceston as well. so thank goodness i didnt get it! =)

School's been boring but otherwise exciting

err ok. its been one month. school's been pretty slack. much slacker than last semester. tutorials cancelled here and there. been into theatre twice - once to see hernia repairs and another to see amputation of gangrenous toe and debridement of chronic ulcer.

but it's been pretty exciting in other aspects! although i didn't take photos with my own camera. they're all in other people's cameras.

was vivi's birthday on friday so we went for dinner at infusion restaurant which was so good. best food i've had in a long long long while. although a little pricey i guess. but it was nice to meet up with the soka people over a meal and just chill. although i had only seen them a week before at meeting. haha!

went to my fellow's house today for lunch! om nom nom! we had oysters, smoked salmon, fresh salmon pate, baked bread with olives/sundried tomatoes/cheese, cheese platter, biscuits, berry/coconut cake, berry terrine, fresh cherries etc! OMG i was SOOO FULL!

singapore night's coming up so that's gonna be interesting! might be performing but we'll see how it goes. secret! haha!

gotta meet up with our researcher on wednesday so that we can do our assignment too! pretty full on huh! plus i'm on call this friday (last one whee~!)!

carlin's engagement party this coming saturday up in launceston so i think we're gonna drive up together with darren joelen3 elvin3 etc so hopefully i don't have to drive! hahaha! don't really fancy driving back in the dark after the party. but i've got first aid course in the morning till 12pm so we can leave after that and make it to launnie for his party at 5pm. =)

then this sunday would be carm3n's gohonzon enshrinement at 10am! it's gonna be busy busy week!

Back in Hobart again. Hopefully this semester would be so much more exciting than last semester with convention and exciting topics to be learnt etc! Although the lectures tmr don't look too good. Law, negligence etc. Only exciting lecture is tropical medicine. Even then, that is 3h long. =S

Watched the girl with the dragon tattoo on the way back to sg and I must say that is one of the best movies I've watched in a long while. It made me buy the last book in a trilogy (so I'm currently missing the middle part of the story) because I want to see what happens in the end (and because it had a 20% off at popular). Not sure about the movie rating. Wouldn't be surprised if it was M18 or R21. Was it even shown in Singapore?! 

Watched The Lovely Bones on the way back to Hobart. Beautiful movie. Watched Dear John too. That was pretty typical. Rather similar to A Walk To Remember by the same author. Slight twist at the end though. Shan't spoil it further. 


Alright. Better head to bed. It's going to be a long 5 months. 

Down to Crunchtime!

5 days to exams! *gasp*

Trying to finish up all my readings by tonight so that I can actually sit down and start studying properly tmr. I'm pretty sure I'll pull through it in the end but it just seems like an endless painful journey. Argh. 2 more weeks. Just 2 more week. Char Kway Teow here I come!

And I'm a little disappointed that I'm going to miss vernic3's wedding by 1 week!! NOO!! =( you guys must take loads of photos on my behalf ok?

Alright. Back to the books for 45 more minutes before dinner. =(

It's coming to an end!

OMG it's almost the end of semester! Everyone else starts SWOT-VAC today while we poor medical students still have one more week of lectures to go. argh. This is horrible because the lectures are winding down - instead it is becoming more intense! Pui!

Anyway, I've finally finished the primary care project which was a competition of sorts and guess what? WE WON!! So now I've got a $50 voucher for the co-op bookshop which I have no idea what to do with it. Might sell it to some other person and get it for cash instead! We'll see how it goes. Can't say that I didn't expect to win but actually winning it was quite a surprise because we weren't really aiming for it. LOL!

We came up with a research plan about the gluten-free, casein-free diet in improving core autistic behaviours in autism spectrum disorder as compared to usual therapy alone. Was pretty interesting because we gave out gluten-free, casein-free, SUGAR-free cupcakes at the end of our presentation! Hehe! So fun!

So now that the project is over, we've got to do a reflective piece which is a pain in the arse because they've changed the format from previous reflective pieces and honestly, what's there to reflect on about DOING a project?? HMM. It's due on Tues. Bleah this weekend would be spent writing that.

And thankfully I passed my diabetic case history!! Which means I wouldn't have to worry too much next rotation about passing my CAT and case history because I've already completed my requirements! Woots! That's really good news to me. Must thank St3ph for the 2 case histories we had to refer to. =)

OH has anyone been to the PIXAR exhibition?? I was thinking of going there when I'm back! Any good?

Happenings thus far

i just realised how infrequently i've been updating my blog to the point that i almost forgot that i have a blog. eeks! 

heaps have been happening but i just can't be bothered to blog about them but i'm sure in 5 years time, i would regret not having said something on this back then just because my brain would have forgotten it (as usual. i've got terrible memory for things like this). 

so what's been happening?

1st May: International Night at Jane

I didn't have a new costume this year so I was asking my angmoh friends if they have any ethnic costumes since they have so many costume parties etc! And jenn7 happened to have some! She had the cheerleader (US), the poofy dress that i wore in the end (oktoberfest beer girl? jap maid cafe?) and a kimono but because christ1na and another girl were wearing yukatas so it probably didn't look too special i suppose. so that is why i went with the crazy poofy dress. seriously, if not because i'm in australia and things are crazy and people go all out, i would never be caught dead in that in singapore! HAHA! 

ended up being one of the finalist for the best dressed competition! LOL! there wasn't a final winner but it was just fun to go up and stage and have to say something about it. best part of it was that i couldn't even decide what i was trying to be! this other girl turned up in a cosplay costume and that's how we found out she's actually a cosplayer!! and she said her friends made it for her. OMG it actually looked soooo good that we thought she bought it!

had a rather awesome post-event dance floor in the table tennis room. =) relatively better music than usual. HAHA! that's good enough. whoops! 

3rd May-14th May: Rural GP Placement

I was one of the lucky 2 people to be sent off to Flinders Island for my placement! Which means that I had to travel up to Launceston and catch a plane over! It was a 40min ride and it was so exciting sitting in one of those mini plane with 1 propellers on each wing! We were so excited about it all! Heard all the wonderful reviews about the doctors and the place and we couldn't wait to explore it! 

Sat in with the GPs and took BP, wt all day and it was so fun listening to the pt's history and then coming up with a initial diagnosis which was the same as the doctors! like loin-groin pain and you think of renal! hahaha! it was nice to be in a GP setting where you see pts that you've known for a long while. 

the food at the hospital was GOOD. For only $2.40, you get like fish and chips, beef stew, meat loaf, chicken curry, beef lasagna etc! We basically ate all day at the hospital. We would have brekkie at 8.30, morning tea (yummilicious sandwiches) at ~11am, lunch at 1pm, arvo tea (choc cake/ginger slice/scones etc) at ~3pm, dinner at 6pm, sometimes supper at 8pm. LOL! how's that for being greedy? 

thankfully we went for a roadtrip of sorts on the weekend so we had a look at the various beautiful beaches all over and went for a 3h bushwalk on Sunday! we were just commenting on how we did our week's recommended exercise in a day! 30minx5days = 150min and we bushwalked for almost 3h! haha! there are more photos on facebook!

oh and i forgot to mention that steph and i were cycling along the road after class one day because our GP strained her back and cancelled all her afternoon appointments! it was so funny because while we were cycling, all the drivers would wave at us as they would wave another driver but i couldn't take my hand off the handle bars so i just sorta flicked my hand up. i love flinders people! they're so friendly! anyway, we were cycling along when we passed this farm with sheep and the sheep starting running away from us. i went 'mehhhhhhhh~' and then ALL THE SHEEP STOPPED RUNNING AND LOOKED AT ME!!! OMG! it was soo funny! we couldn't stop laughing and then steph 'mehhhh~' too later on at another bunch of sheep! i think i might have moo-ed at some cows but they didn't react. :(

too bad it was low tide when we got the bluff beach because it was sooo pretty when we saw it the last time we were there doing a home visit. but we got to walk along the beach and were looking for nautilus shells because they were apparently washing up! couldn't find any! it looked something like the one below but it had brown bumps along the outer edge of it where the 'crests' of the lines were. 

we went scottish dancing on thursday night because ALL medical students who come to Flinders have to join them as a 'tradition'. HAHA! it was fun because we didn't know how to move and we were being a hindrance to our partners instead! Might upload some videos on facebook as evidence! LOL! 

It was more like a holiday because although we had to do our diabetic case history, we had 2 weeks there and we only interviewed our patient on the friday of the 1st week and had road trip over the weekend which meant that we spent the 1st week not really doing much! Watched the entire BBC series of P&P (its nice! i want a copy of it! anyone has it??), season 2 of charmed (damn corny), wild child, the guardian, the hangover, princess and the frog (PAM! i actually watched it! and i wasn't as bad as i thought it would have been!), accepted etc. can't rmb what i watched over the course of 2 weeks. 

we had other procrastination ideas such as making onion rings because we had excess onions and for some reason there was a huge container of cornflour in the house so we just tried! not too bad! fried some bananas too! yum yum! it was fun! =)

flew over to cape barren on the second thursday as well! went to visit to the community health centre and then went crystal fossicking! no idea if the stones i picked up are worthy of anything or just plain rocks. some people can find killicrankie diamonds (killicrankie is the name of a place on Flinders Island). but its like 2 pieces after fossicking all day with proper tools. i would rather find the shells to be honest. sat in the co-pilot seat on the flight back and it made me want to be a pilot again! some day some day. its so cool being able to listen to what goes on between the control tower and the pilot! and looking at all the various knobs, buttons etc

this plane could only sit 6 passengers INCLUDING the pilot. =D

Knobs, knobs and more knobs.

Co-piloting!

All in all, placement was such a wonderful experience and it is something I will never forget. hopefully. 

Dr Son1a with us in her surgery! =) She's got the coolest laughter ever and she's just so nice! Would definitely go back again if given a chance!