Summer in June

It is getting very warm here in London. Very much so at the Halls especially when the windows annoyingly do not open all the way. I suppose it is a safety measure for the drunk freshers and Springfield hospital is just across the golf course. I have already removed my 10.5tog king-size duvet out of its cover. If it gets any more stuffy than it is now, I might resort to buying a fan!

Anyway, I am not complaining as I get to go out without any jackets or scarves these days and a bright sunny weekend is always very enjoyable. Hope it'll stay this way over summer.

Uncharacteristically, I read a book. I have just finished the DaVinci Code. It has been a long while since I read a book properly, or have I ever? Well, not surprising as this is a good book. I suppose reading it after watching Angels & Demons allowed me to imagine the plot better. Plus Greg's lent me an illustrated copy of the book. So it was all good.

Might pick up reading as a hobby now that I've injured my back yet again. The GP was right about the prognosis of the acute back pain - cocodamol, diclofenac and diazepam concoction was all I needed. Good news is that we got into the UH tennis finals against Bart's this Sunday. *fingers crossed*

Good old friend Daru is here in London once again; this time in Tooting. He's doing his elective for 2 weeks here at St George's. So we've been showing him around all the hot spots in London. The weekend out in Greenwich was great. It has been generally fun catching up the good old times. I'm afraid he's getting a bit phobic of curry now after being in Tooting for just more than a week. LOL

Lots to look forward. In less than 2 months, I'll be back home. YAY! This weekend we're heading to Windsor to see its famous castle. It'll be lots of fun spending time with our favourite German friends as they are very soon completing their exchange programme.

Stay sunny London!

Punting at Oxford

Finally I have made it to the much talked about University of Oxford; well, the city of Oxford rather. There happened to be the annual Oxford Bumps going on last weekend and we were invited by Graham to come and enjoy the festive event. Quite a few of the Oxford transfer students were meant to be there and it would be great to head there when there were people who know the place well.

In the end, Eva, Sophia, Moira and I went as a group up to Oxford, departing London on a bright early Saturday morning. Such a nice day :) We had a nice chilled evening the day before, having desserts and good post-dinner conversation at Sophia's backyard, and really hoping the weather would do us good while we were there.

On arrival, I was amazed by the buildings in the whole city. Each of the colleges were just simply beautiful and the grass lawns...amazing! One has to be there to experience the calmness you'd feel being on the campus sites. No wonder it is such a great place for studying.


We had a good look around the New College after meeting up with its alumni Katy and Stu. They took us to the "squeeky hill" which was rather amusing I must say. We also had the chance to go on a punt - with lots of Pimms! A good way to burn off our good lunch and G&D's yummy double-scoop ice cream. We punted for a good 4 hours. Relaxing and enjoying the scenic route under the bright British sunshine. Felt like summer already!

Each of us newbie had a go at punting. Confusing! But thanks to experienced Stu's good tutoring (with some booze to make him a bit relaxed), we all did a fairly good job as beginners. What fun!


Oxford being that small, we met up with Kasia and Tom whilst punting on the river. We later met up for dinner on the lawn of the New College. Pretty much a lot of us transfers were there.

A good day, despite having to walk very briskly to catch the last train back to London. A definite must to go back to Oxford again!

London Zoo

So after much discussion with the guys about what we should do over last weekend, we finally decided it was a good idea to pay a visit to London Zoo! Easy choice it was, considering there were not many good ones for the 2-for-1 promotion in this bright summer-ish season in London.

There were a lot of fuss before actually reaching the zoo itself. Although choosing to go to the zoo was easy, there were a lot of fine prints we had to go through before actually qualifying ourselves for the cheap fare. Anyway, we got it in the end after much confusion.

The London Zoo

To be honest, the zoo was just alright. Not super impressive really. Somehow the animals were very lazy! We had such a hard time spotting them - either in the shade or within the bushes. Most of them were already sleeping by 2pm. I have to say that we saw a lot of the animals' backside!

Personally, I have been to reknowned zoos like the Singapore Zoo and Sydney's Taronga Zoo. I would definitely rate them higher than the one here in London. Singapore Zoo is simply larger, and the layout is generally more impressive and the animals were more active. I don't know if this is to do with the British weather.

Taronga Zoo, on the other hand, is a very unique one. Getting there by ferry with the view of the famous Opera House and The Harbour Bridge makes the entire trip very relaxing. The fact that the zoo is on a separate island makes it all very special.

Nevertheless, it was a good day out with the blokes and Sarah. We ended the day with a Szechuan dinner at The Old Place near Liverpool Street station. I still very much enjoy the aurbegine dish there.

Officially 4th Year!

The major 3rd year exam results finally got released today. You can't imagine how nervous I was when my friend sitting next to me in our Cardiology lecture received a text saying that results were already posted on the wall! My concoction of Co-codamol and Diclofenac for my recent tennis injury didn't help either - makes me sick =(

Anyway, suspense over. I passed :) And what makes me happy is I passed all my OSCE stations. That matters to me. And my big SSM project: I scored Excellent. That makes me a happy bunny =D

I'm officially a 4th year medical student now, although chronologically still 3rd year.

However, this is only 25% of the lot done. No complacency just yet. I need to work hard for the rest of the 75% coming up next year!

Sunday at Greenwich

I first realise that Greenwich is in London when good old buddy Azrul told me he wanted to go there when he was down here a few months ago. Nonetheless, we didn't end up going that time as it was too far away from the central for his short trip down to London.

Coincidentally, a week ago, our dear German friends invited us to head to the world-reknowned time line. Years of Geography lessons back in primary and secondary schools; I finally meet the line which divide the time zones of the world. Imagine the queue for the actual monument! We didn't bother to join in. Instead, we took a group photo by the queue and the monument itself.


To be honest, there was nothing really spectacular about the time line. It does have a significant function in the world though.


We had a great day out after all. The boat ride along River Thames towards Greenwich was scenic, and we had a good stroll around the Greenwich Market. The town on its own is worth visiting. It's got a good mix of the old and the new. Apparently, some of the areas are used for filming.


Another fun day out in London. More discoveries to come :)

Flat Outing

It's been 2 terms and a bit more, and finally the 6 flatties of Block C have come together for a meal in Chinatown. We have been planning this since the beginning of the academic year, but as all of us do different courses and have different commitments in life, it has been hard to get all 6 of us out together, let alone all the 6 of us all in the kitchen. It does happen occasionally, and when it does, it has always been lots of fun.

I am very happy this outing was a great success :)

We decided to give the Taiwanese restaurant Leong's Legends in Chinatown a try. I have personally frequented the restaurant a few times and I do enjoy the food there. In a way, it is similar to grandma's cooking. I was pleased that my British flatmates find the food amusing too. A good start for those who are planning to pay me a visit back home this summer. Can't wait for that!


After dinner, we ventured into an oriental store in Chinatown. Such a good way to learn more about Chinese food by browsing through what they sell there. We then headed for a couple of cocktails in a nearby bar to end the night and to shade ourselves from the English rain.


As Lisa would say, "Love it!". It's been awesome living with these 5 chaps. Looking forward to more flat outings and I do hope we will meet up when we separate at the end of this term

George's win!

Today was good. We won overall against Imperial College in the University Hospitals tennis tournament =D

I almost forgot how it feels to play a match after not playing properly for such a long time. Will slowly get myself back in shape and regain the touch.

Let's win more!

George's Salcombe Tennis Tour

Just got back from Salcombe for George's first ever tennis tour. It was a great weekend for everyone to gather and get to know each other better, and more so, have a good laugh and just chill.

Salcombe is tucked in Southwest England and is one of the most beautiful place I have been to so far. Apparently, it is quite a popular holiday destination where tourists, both local and international, flock to the beach in summer. The team managed to go when there were not too many people in town.

It would be such a pain to get to Salcombe if we needed to take the train and bus. But thanks to George's mini-bus and Sarah (the vice-captain and driver), we could get there directly - through the small roads, and up and down the hills in the countryside. Joe's mum was extremely generous to allow us to crash her holiday home. It was huge and we woke up everyday to the scenic estuary in Salcombe. Such an awesome retirement place.



So we headed to check out the beach on the sunny Saturday morning and played a game of frisby. Managed to tire ourselves out and got all sandy and wet! But it was great fun.


Then we had some tennis with the folks from the Salcombe Tennis Club. We played on synthetic grass courts, which made me feel at home. While playing tennis, there was the view of the green grassland and hills...and to make things even better, we had BBQ as well.


There was of course the team's pub crawl in Salcombe. Lots of drinking. All I can say is that I downed a pint of lager...and more. And my repertoire of drinking games has certainly increased after this trip. There was an epic throwing of captain Joe into the river. Hilarious!

One thing I must say is that the seafood here is awesome! So fresh that whatever you make out of them, they were simply delicious. A dinner of seafood pasta in cream sauce and some white wine. Yum!

Will definitely come back here for a cottage holiday, if not somewhere similar along the coast. Lie stress-free in the sun, by the beach. Owhhh...

New term, new aspirations

It's been 4 days since the term started. I'm on my Cardiology firm now. Many have told me to see it as a Cardioholiday. I can see why though; there seems like there's not much scheduled, and no one's actually following our progress at all.

But I have been inspired by Dr P's concept of adult learning, something which I should adopt from this term onwards. Before coming into the firm, I thought I know something about Cardiology. After attending today's clinic on Inherited Heart Diseases though, I figured out that I know nothing! Almost all patients were diagnosed with diseases I have not come across yet like Brugada Syndrome. I obviously need to read up and start working.

I'm yet to blog about my awesome week break after exams. The Denmark trip to Aarhus and Copenhagen was amazing! And after that, Chun, Hsien and I went down to Southampton to visit the Soton girls. We had so much fun. Well at least for me, I had lots of laughters whilst catching up with the girls. Lots of happy food too. Fun times :)

Tomorrow, I'll be off to Exeter for the Southwest England tennis tour with SGUL. Looking forward to it!

I shall blog on my trips once I'm back to London again.

x

Exams over :)

It's surreal that exams are over now. It's been the talk for almost the whole year. Third year finals. It was BIG. I'm just glad that it's over.

The past few weeks have been non-stop work. Balancing SSM commitments and revision is a task really. I thought it would be a doze at first, but not when I'm expected to produce a good piece of work.

I'm just getting myself to enjoy the beautiful British weather now, and of course my exciting holiday in Denmark in a few hours time. Yipee =D

2 down, 1 to go!

OSCE's done!!!

Well, not the most jubilant moment just yet. There are certain things I could have done better. But nothing can change now. Will definitely reflect on them after exams and do better in future OSCEs. At least now I know how it's like to do an OSCE here. Not very much different from the ones we had back home, just that things have to be done quicker and more is expected out of us. Fair enough - 3rd year - we're supposed to be able to come up with sensible differential diagnoses (on the spot! in 5 minutes!).

Anyway, it's cramming time for the final written paper on Friday. Read read read...and it's annoying how the weather has been so beautiful when we're having exams. Hope it'll stay that way after exams. Lying on the grass, cup of tea, book...how nice :)

I can do it!

Oh revision!

Looking out of my window.
How I wish I could be out there in the SUN.

Positive thinking.

Countdown.
This time next week.
Tea & Danish pastries in Aarhus (by the harbour) =D

I can do it!

Being adult

In medical school, it is extremely easy to be overwhelmed by the ocean of information we need to browse through, most of which we do need to retain to be qualified. At this stage, it's about knowing a bit of everything, and probably everything about some things. Doing this can be extremely stressful.

What is adult learning?

Learning is lifelong; adult learning is about identifying your own learning issues or objectives, and setting feasible targets to achieve them.

words of wisdom from Dr P

It is very true indeed. No one really controls our learning these days. It's all about self-initiative. The keener you are (OR show) in the clinics, wards and theatres, the more you'll learn from your experience in clinical training.

I aspire to adapt to this concept of learning: having my own objectives in life. Another important thing I've learned only after 2 terms is that there needs to be at least ONE work-free day per week where the day has no association to Medicine. Having a break and not feeling guilty about it will make the learning week more efficient.

So for the new term --> work hard on weekdays, PLAY harder on weekends :)

Random thought of the day.

Easter Experience

Lent ends today and nope I didn't give anything up in particular. Will probably think of one for next year. Chocolate will be too difficult for sure, especially at the rate I'm going now. To be fair, it's fuel for exam revision :) Otherwise, I won't be on such a high dose (right!).

On a Tuesday evening, about 40 days ago, it was a happy day worth remembering. Lots of flour, eggs, sugar and milk...plus fruits, honey, golden syrup, double cream, nutella, etc were brought together to make it a Pancake Tuesday! Had a kitchen party at the halls - nothing else but pancakes. YUM! I remembered being TOO full, and Moira trying to make the biggest pancake of the night. Fun.

Pancake brings happiness!

If it wasn't for exam revision, it would have been a great holiday weekend. Like my lovely cousin Jin who's all tanned now after her amazing trip immersed in the Portugese and Spanish warmth, I'd probably be out and about in the fine spring weather we have now. I'm still amazed (and probably jealous) by the tan she's gotten. Nice! But not long from now, I will be enjoying my Danish pastries by the harbour.

So met up with Jin for a nice Sunday dinner in Putney by the river. We decided to head to The Real Greek for a change. It was a lovely walk from the tube station across the bridge. Enjoyed the view of the quiet town by the riverside with the sun setting past 8pm now.

Fancy Greek dinner

It's also Jin's birthday tomorrow. Happy Birthday Jin!

Got back to the halls tired - it must be postprandial sleepiness. But I must survive some revision at least. Probably going through more bones, muscles, nerves, and blood vessels (more than my liking) - which reminds me why Internal Medicine shall be my preferred option, for now at least.

Then, Greg popped into my room with a surprise!

He's gotten me a HUGE easter egg. How nice! Another reason why living in halls is so fun.

I shall enjoy my egg then!

Happy Easter

"No less than an excellent..."

says Dr P.

Had a meeting with my SSM supervisor before lunch today. She had a read through the first draft of my work and thought it was alright, but I seem to lack the X factor to really impress her just yet. She keeps hinting that there is still ample room for my analytical mind to feature in my write-up. At this moment, it's not yet an "excellent". In her records, only 2 out of 50 students over the past many years who've done SSMs with her had scored that top mark.

Pressure!

It is indeed very difficult to put more effort into my write-up in this period with the killer final exams coming up in less that 2 weeks now. Plus excellent or not, it won't count towards my final degree while exams count =S

Why bother then? Settle for a pass, good pass or very good? I wouldn't want that, would I? Difficult to say. There's always that inner drive to strive for excellence in everything I do, so I shall push my way through. How in the world am I going to do this --> I'm not sure. Let's pray hard and hope for the best.

Stress.

My dearest 5000 words.
Make them matter.

Daru meets London

The London Eye by night

Good old buddy Daru has finally arrived in the UK for his clinical elective. He's still the same hyper (in the good way) funny Japanese mate I know since I first became his 'working buddy' in IM a few years ago. Can't believe he's in his 5th year now! Time flies. Very soon he'll be a doctor. How exciting!

Somehow, he brings back memories of times in Brunei and it was just fun talking about all the fun things which happened in Kagawa. Memories of the little Kagawa trip we had back in 2007 :)

Good times.

So I gathered the people he knows from St George's and set up a dinner date to welcome him to London and UK. It feels like coming to London for the first time again when we brought him around to the landmarks of London. Sometimes, it's easy to forget how beautiful a place can be.

Dinner at Hare & Tortoise

(and satisfying my craving for salmon sashimi was just great!)

Salmon Box

Hope he'll enjoy his stay here in the UK. I'm sure he'll have fun in the wards and picking up all those clinical skills he's been keen to do all this while.

On that note, I should seriously concentrate on exam revision now. It scares me how close we are to the real thing!

Impossible is nothing.

Let's hope for the best!

Revision time :)

Sainsbury's basics
88p smoked salmon shavings
--> my new discovery, thanks to Lisa for her creative invention of smoked salmon and egg fried rice. Reinvented that tonight, adding in garlic and mushroom, and cooked with butter. Yum!

The other half of the packet had already been used to make my smoked salmon and mushroom omelette for my lunch yesterday. Good stuff :)

Finally produced and printed the first draft of my SSM. Hopefully there are not too many changes that I need to make when my dear Dr P sees it on Thursday. I expect some grilling of course! Will need to have a mental preparation of how to present those journal critically to her while I'm on my 280 bus ride to the hospital.

Set.

I should really crack on with revision now!

Fancy grocery shopping?

Yes?

There might be some Japanese traits in you! An international online survey conducted by ACNielsen ShopperTrends showed that 58% of Japanese do enjoy and are excited about shopping for groceries...and that's the highest percentage among those surveyed, with Hongkongers being the least enthusiastic.

Ironically, I do love grocery shopping. I reckon it is therapeutic! Not that I'm anyhow Japanese. It's just a really good mini-vacation away from work. That's probably why I don't seem to find it a chore. It's also a productive use of my time as what I end up buying will feed me and make me happy for the next few days at least. Plus, happy thoughts run through my mind when I look at those fresh produce and think what amazing dishes I can make out of them. Colourful packages too --> chocolates, fruits, biscuits, cakes etc. Yummy!

A food lover perhaps.

I've always loved going into bakeries as well, even when I don't even need anything from there. Just the smell of freshly-baked bread and pastries stimulate my amygdala and prefrontal cortex...Too medical perhaps. But yeah, you know what I mean =)

London's a great place to be when you enjoy food. There's such a huge repertoire of culinary specialists from different parts of the world who can simply tantalize your taste buds. Most of the times, it's a price too high to pay for students like myself. But well, sometimes digging out a couple more quids to taste the difference is worth it.

Food for thought.
Comfort food.
We are what we eat.

Craving

Saturday in Tooting

Sun's out, weather's warm --> lovely Saturday

Decided I should head down to read my journals in the sun.
*bask in the sun*


Tooting at 6.30pm


So made myself a fancy dinner tonight as a motivation.

Oven-baked chicken breast stuffed in green pepper

And now:
Write up, write up!

Work on Friday night

Didn't manage to get a good night sleep last night. Probably my sleep-wake cycle is really confused by my poor sleep hygiene over the past week. Oh well, what to do - trying to work at times I think best. *I think I might like night shifts better than morning/day work*

Anyway, it's a bright day coming up! Started my day with a nice lunch. It's one of my favourite easy meals - chicken with mushroom dark rice...easy and yummy!

My chicken with mushroom dark rice

Then I was all ready to meet Prof L. I must say that he's amazing! Took an hour of his Friday afternoon to answer my questions about my SSM when he is not even my tutor. Thanks to him, things are much clearer now =D

Prof L's explanation:
This will get me going with my SSM tonight
(Immunology looks fun, doesn't it?)

Managed to get a few things done while I was out and about today:
- hair cut in Chinatown
- bought a new travelling bag for my weekend travels and tennis tour --> Adidas =)
- pampered myself with a slice of blueberry cheese cake from Starbucks
- had good Thai dinner with the Brunei hall gang
- took down some travel notes in Waterstones for Aarhus
- last but not least --> week's supply of groceries from good old Sainsbury!

It's all good.

Strive

Will get a good warm shower now and start working on my report again. Seems endless. Let's do it! x

Chocolate fun!

Andy bought the flat a cake today =D It's a chocolate fudge one. Yummy! How fun. Love random days like that. The nurses are finishing their term tomorrow, so there are more reasons to celebrate.

Happy evening

I wonder whether I could well be overdosed with chocolate and tea --> things which get me going on with work.

1300 words for now, more to come later tonight I hope. I think I have lost my bet with Suba; guess I'm treating her a meal when I'm up in Bradford next month. Can't wait for exams and SSM to be done! <-- I think I've mentioned this line way too many times already.

On another note, I'm quite excited about meeting Prof L tomorrow as well in central to finally get my head around certain bits and pieces that I simply just don't understand about my Immunology project now. Then probably pop by to do some shopping and perhaps a nice Friday evening meal. London is bright and happy today.

Hope this is a sign of a great summer ahead.

Happy thoughts

Last lecture-day for the term

Just had 8 hours of lectures today! All the lecturers said the same thing at the start of their lectures: "I'm sorry I have to rush through this due to the time", "I usually teach this topic in more than 2 lectures", "Back in my days, we had a term of this", "You'll have to go back and read more about this", "I'll put them up on Moodle as time is running out". Medical education is evolving today. For the better or worse? Well I suppose some guidance is better than none. SDL works for me, so I'm not complaining much.

I'm basically fully saturated now having gone through such a diverse range of lectures today. Feels like there's so much I don't know for exams coming up real soon, now that it's April! Everyone in lecture today is really stressed out about it as well, talking about cramming and what to focus on. *No pressure* I believe I work best at my own pace, and I shall do so.

Glad I had that cup of tea at Moira's...and having non-medical conversation just gets life a bit more normal. It's funny how easy it is to slip back into talks about medical stuffs when you're around medical people. I guess that's probably due to the fact that we spend most of our life literally reading medical stuffs and living in a medical environment.

Lisa's got me more excited about going back home this summer. There's this plan of Andy and her coming over for a vacation. Just thinking about it - there's lots I want to do. It'll be amazing! That's a must-plan trip after my exams!

For now, I've got to get going with writing up. 750words down...much more to go!

Perseverance

SSM

*sigh*

This is so tough! It's been a few days now that I have tried to get going on writing up my 5000-word SSM report, yet my train of thoughts seem to be so slow. I've only managed to churn out 3 paragraphs of work since yesterday. How unproductive.

Sometimes, I wish I had chosen an easier topic. But well, I'm quite surprised myself that my interest seems to be in Immunology - which basically means reading lots of new journal articles which I need to read over several times to just get the basic idea of it. It's interesting though, just quite a pain in the arse when exams are less than 3 weeks ahead!

SSM is getting into me. My hours are totally crazy now! Sleeping at 5am and waking up in the afternoon. I can be a zombie soon if I don't get this fixed. I'm even getting nightmares from what I read. Unimaginable perhaps. Well, in short, it involved hunting and chopping up people so I can get their samples for research. Too much thinking.

My work station

So I know I should stop procrastinating and get on with it. I have set myself deadlines and perhaps a possible "self-reward" if I can get this done by the end of this week. Many exciting holiday plans to look forward to too, well after exams.

Motivation

Let's do it! I can do this X

Living it up in London

Time has passed, so fast that I have lived through so many transitions in life.

Here I am now - in London! I have to say that it has been an interesting journey to fight for what I have always wanted to do in life. It is a dream come true, and I shall continue fighting hard to achieve my dreams.

I am now a 3rd year medical student here in London enjoying my clinical years, and hopefully more to come.

It was just a weird instinct but I think I will start blogging again =) Perhaps starting on the first day of the Year of the Ox (my year!) for good luck.