Work

It has been a (painful?) month since I started working. Its very challenging although I was half expecting it to be as such. Maybe I just wasnt that ready. Maybe I am THAT clumsy. Or maybe Im just that sleepy.

I.can.not.be.sleepy.no.more.

The ever so famous post-call syndrome is at large.
The bullying at work.
Missed meals and stunted toilet calls.
The stress when an emergency happens.
Phoawarrh.
Arrrghhh.

Dear God please help me.

PS: Since Im a practising doctor now, its no good being sleepy. So I need to change the tagline for my blog. Suggestions?

GAH

BAH, it has been over two months since I last posted anything on this blog.

Shame on me.

To all of my friends who has been waiting to hear my latest updates, sorry I cant just be arsed. Its a real effort to find a working computer and internet combo when I'm jet-setting (I like this word very much fyi) half way across the world and back.

Truth is: I have been traveling. And traveling still.

Although I know its hardly an excuse- but trust me without a personal laptop and free wifi,/decent connection speed- connecting to internet is harder. If there's one thing I learn from crossing the continents it'll be: Internet is a luxury not necessity.

So.

In short:
i) I've been backpacking since March 09.
ii) I had taken 3000 pictures in 3 different continents in the last 3 months.
iii) I am guilty of my carbon footprint hence the reason why I limit my travel just in the UK recently.
iv) I made loads of new friends, amend few old connection and broke off with few.
v) I had my heart broken twice. And I'm still standing.
vi) For the first time in my life- I managed to reach the 45kg mark. Yeay!
vii) I passed my medical school and will be graduating on the 15th of July.
viii) After which I will go back home for good.
ix) Three of my very good friends are getting married this month and I'm having mine in 2012.
x) I'm tired.

I was thinking the other day- about this blog. Whether I should keep it/relocate to new server/ create a new one for now my title has change/ or just continue with this one after mini face-lift.

Answer is I dont know. Suggestion welcomed. Due to flippant nature of p53, only God knows what will happen.

Till then.
loves, p53 xoxo

TANZANIA

Life has been different.It is simple yet complicated.

Simple in the sense that I'm living the absolute necessities (no TV, no fast internet, no PS, no shopping trip).
But yet complicated- when inferior complex within myself questions my very own existence and the life that ensues.


Its a hard life in hosp for a student/doctor. Really.
Tanzania wont be a place where i want to live/work/raise my kids. Quality of life isnt so great here.Although it does make a good vacation destination (nice beaches of zanzibar, amazing wildlife in the safari, good learning opportunity with infectious diseases).

Tanz is one of the poorest african countries. Many live in sheer poverty. TSH (thats the currency) worth next to nothing.BIG BIG gap between the rich and the poor. Worse than any other countries that I've been to.

Otherwise, all is well. I'm still adjusting to the scorching heat. I'm as dark as I've ever been.

1st day: "are you from china?"
Today: "are you from nigeria?"

So there you go. haha.

till then pen off. xoxo. p53

Yippadeduh, yippededuh....

I'm leaving for my electives today. In less than an hour.

Here are the dates roughly...
Today- leave smallcity
Tomorrow- arrival at Tanzania
Next weekend- trip to Zanzibar
Next next weekend- safari trip (Serengeti +/- Ngongororo)
The weekend after- shopping in Dar Es Salam
4 weeks from now- leave Tanzania for Borneo.
4 weeks +1 - will be in KL
4 weeks +2 - arrival at Sabah
The first weekend- beach and snorkelling
The second weekend- climb Kinabalu
The third weekend- white water rafting +/- visiting orangutans
The fourth weekend- flight back to the UK.
Fin.

Yeah! I'll be globetrotting with just the basic necessities. No laptop- so expect scarce entries from here on. All possible methods of transportation will be used so maybe this trip is like a little "By any means" imitation. Haha.

Till then, love you all.
p53 xoxo

PS: Those who want postcards please leave address as comment. Its my pleasure to sent them.

Exam, result and thereafter

How impolite am I for not giving you readers some sort of updates especially regarding my exam? I apologize. From hereon in this entry, I'll try to tell as much as I could chronologically.

Prior to Jan 09, I was really scared of the finals exam. I felt as if there were so many things that I havent revise yet.

Comes Jan 09, I was practically shitting in my pants- trying to cram in as much infos as I could into my almost exploding brain.

Then the exam week- 14 Jan- 22 Jan came. I couldnt sleep, lost my appetite and lost interest altogether with anythg non medical. How sad.

Had my first exam in one of the big halls in BIGCITY- which is also the hall where I will graduate provided that I pass every single thing.

Got all tensed up in between. Packed up my stuff one night and left smallcity and my studymates. Went to BIGCITY.

Second exam was in the same hall. It was freezing. No heating. It snowed outside. Bloody hell.

Then OSCE on 20 Jan. Almost cried after I finished it. 50-50% chance of failing it. WAAAAA....

21-22-23 Jan- passed in blur. I slept. Slept my sorrow away. By this time, some of my very good friends left smallcity for their elective in exciting places.

24 Jan- Had mother of all headaches. Very hungry too. So I ate I ate I ate and took paracetamol.

24 Jan (night)- 29 Jan (morning): LONDON trip.
- did all thing touristy- went to Greenwich prime time line, took pics along Thames, next to Big Ben, Westminster Abbey, Tower Bridge.
- watched two musicals at the West End: The Sound of Music and The Lion King. Super fantastic.
- ate a lot of different kind of food- indon, chinese, japanese, italian, mexican, malay- ahhh bless all Halal food in London; I gained 3 kg in the space of 5 days. Yeay!
- went to natural history museum and national science museum (both for the first time in 5 years of me living here in the UK)

29 Jan: result out... In the hours preceding the result time, I paced up and down the length of my kitchen, sweating like hell. I swear my heart almost stopped when I saw my result. I passed- marginally. pheawh. Few of my dear friends failed. My heart cried out for them. I rang my parents- told them the good news, and rang few other friends to tell them too.

30-31 Jan: Sleep, eat, internet, blogging, buying stuff off the ebay, tidying up my room, doing laundry, vacuuming, collecting things for charity, cook and BAKE!!!

1 Feb: Preparing my timetable for the next two months, ironing clothes, sending out work emails, filling in evaluation form of last block which I proscatinated for almost 2 months. hah.

2 Feb and thereafter: community and hospital placement and elective (yeay!) and graduation (double yeay!!) and going back home for good (yeay 3x).


***Important note: my face suffered the most. Blemished like never before. Arrhrggghh***

Shout out to all of this blog readers

I finished my exam!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

PMP, PT and OSCE.... done them all!

Shit scared of the result that will come out in 8 days.

Otherwise, here are some snippets:

i) I once asked for a good luck wish from my sugar-daddy (SD, hahaha, you're right), it went like this:

p53(me texting him): Wish me luck. xo
SD(his reply): Wish you luck.

And with that I knew better not to text him anymore for any well-wishes. Boys/men can be so stupid sometime. In retrospect it was funny though. I love him nevertheless.

ii) When I took the PT paper, the exam hall was absolutely f***ing cold. The head invigilator had the nerve to stand up before all of us (who by this time been shivering for at least 30mins or one blinking hour in my case) to apologize because -he said, and I quote- the examination hall was a BIT too cold.

BIT too cold??? My right hand (that's my dominant hand) had been numbed since like question number 56 (out of 125), so much so that I had to use my non-dominant, almost non-functioning (due to its sheer uselessness) left hand. Rubbish.

Then, my nose started to become sniffly.

Then, whatever I read became blurry- and my head couldnt make sense of any of the remaining question.

Shiiiiiiitttza!

Then, my brain froze and my body became hypothermia and I dropped dead due to cardiac arrest in seat no 80. (Editor's note: but p53, you didnt. Ed, of course I didnt, because I left the hall just in time to avoid all the potential complication).

Right, I better stop before this become an essay. Next point please.

iii) I'm gonna resume my normal life. By normal i meant:

- sleep alot- like 10hours/day during winter season-
- go climbing- gosh i've abandoned this hobby for the last 3months-
- try new baking recipes- and I havent bake for 4months- random muffins dont count-
- traveling? - will be going to london to see some friends-
- catch up on gossip girl etc- yeah!!!!-
-calling2 people- i love talking on the phone-
-beautification- ahhhh- bliss-

till then traaaa.... xoxo

Harrrrrroooowwwww!!!!

coz that's how I say 'hello' in my world.. haha...so better get use to it.

So, whats up everyone?? I'm fine thank you.

Im so sick and tired from all the revision, its unbelievable. EMQs, PTs, OSCE, Skills, Revision sessions... the list never end...Hope I'll pass (see I am NOT even aiming for anything more than pass)

So, updates from the first week of 2009.

i) Today I attended revision day at my base hospital and one of the consultants is so handsome, it was worth turning up just to look at him. His presence was THAT overwhelming, my heart fluttered. *drool*

ii) A joke (laugh laaa.... so funny)

*****

Anne Robinson (on the weakest link): In medicine, what "p" is said to be better than cure?
Celebrity A: Prescription.

*****

iii) A new dress code/regulation for coming FINALs was emailed to students. My friends were talking about it over dinner at a restaurant where I was sitting at the other end of the table. So this was me trying to chip in (as per a student who didnt know about the said email)..

Friend A: ........dress code.....haha......ni..qop.....of course......... (..... : something2 I couldnt hear clearly coz she's at the other end of the table)

ME: Haaa..... bikini top? Of course la you cannot wear that. Its the exam for God's sake.

Friend B, C, D and E turned to look at me (with such look that means "Is this girl retarded or what?")

ME: What? Dont say anyone is planning to wear that!!

Others: hahahahhahahahha

ME: What?? Its not funny la wearing bikini top to exam. Its gonna be frigging cold somemore.

Friend A: Ni-qap* lah, not bikini top.

I swear if I'm in a pantomime at the very moment, background music will go: Kuang.. kuang...kuang...erk! and there'll be a cue card for "LAUGH as loud as you could".

*Niqap is a type of extended hijab worn by Muslim women to cover their face.

iv) I did many questions (like almost 2000 EMQs already) but I have a doom feeling that the more I do, the more muddled up I am. The last set I did I was so frustrated with myself for scoring only 55%. So stupid right? The questions was not so difficult but they certainly were very tricky- like I know the answer roughly but not accurately just yet. Really fed-up.

v) Im actually very scared of the FINALS.

Alex- the winner of Xfactor 2008

Quick update:

Alexandra Burke won the 2008 X-Factor. YEAHHHHH!

She deserves it really. She has such strong voice.

All songs that she sang tonight were super amazing (not to mention the fantastic duet with Beyonce.. whoop, whoop)

PS: I'll upload her winning performance soon. Watch the space.

PPS: THANK GOD Eoghann didnt win. NYAH.nyah.

Weekend

I am convinced that I have African Sleeping Sickness. 

All weekend I was sleepy.

 

Then my BFF pointed out to me that i) I'm not an African, ii) I've never been to Africa and iii) I'm always like that- so this sleepiness bouts are not entirely new.

I slept alot. 

On Saturday, I only wake up because I had an avoidable errand to run.

On Sunday, I stayed in bed for my hours- blinking my eyes and day-dreaming (9am-11.45am) until HM#1 came into my room (at 11.45am) asking me whether I was still up for revision at 12noon. And I said to her (from beneath the duvet): But it's not 12 yet. 

Yet I'm still tired. 

Differentials anyone?

Updates

Apologies for the apparent hiatus   from the blog (only 4 entries in NOV???!! what??!!). I can give excuses (like thousands of them) but I dont want to. Its just plain lazy/buzy.

As per today, its exactly 6 weeks to my FINALS. FINALS of medicine. That's why I've been rather oocupied. 

You guys will be glad to know that I do revise. Although the rate is not promising, I'd say suffice. Tbh knowledge-wise, its still all over the place. Help me God. Heavily relying on my wittiness/prettiness (haha!)/prayers from my parents. Like seriously.

Starting from today, I'll try to put up entries unrelated to FINALS (dont fear the F word, gosh- im still in denial). 

Of course

Thanks to God, I'm ALLright now. Healthy bunny. The flu-like illness that I had for the last three weeks has now settled. Last week was the worst. I actually had rigors. Rigors like rigors should be: shaking the bed and all. Madness I tell you. Never in my life I experience such thing, so of course I was so upset (the hypochondriac in me more like it) thinking that it was actually the end of world. Thinking that I was about to die. That was on Thursday of last week.

I came back from my GP practice (having sitting in consultation with my GP tutor- which was fine at the time, until I had my lunch and couldnt eat- which was out of the norm for me- like completely- then the rigors started) feeling very dreadful and shaking (with teeth clattering of course) all my way on the train. 

Then, I decided (one of my wisest move that day) to text HM#1, plaeding her to pcik me up from the train station as i felt as is I was about to pass out. 

Can.not.walk.back.home.feeling.so.fucking.cold.like.i.was.about.to.freeze.to.death.

Stepping into her car, she asked one question: Are you alright?

And the gate gave away. Tear gate thats it. The feeling was just so overwhelming- I felt so awful, so tired, so shaky, so pissed-off, so ill, so depressed, so dead, so cold. I just sat there at the back seat and cried. Like a baby. Talking baby. (Ranting about how stupid my GP -my actually GP's gp- my own doctors as I couldnt get any urgent appointment- hello- I'm dying here!!)

She was used to it though (me crying, not me being unwell). There was BFF too in the car. And that of course only lower down the threshold for emotional outpouring. They were concerned of course. For the facts that i) I looked very unwell ii) I cried without inhibitation iii) I kept on cursing with alot of the F words.

Primary Care Trust (Out of Hours) service was contacted. Appointment was booked two hours later. Hot soup was consumed while waiting. I was triaged (nurse) and examined (by doctor of course). Antibiotic was prescribed. Chemist was visited, prescription was obtained. First dose of Abx was taken. Dinner and was put to bed by HM#1.

End of drama.

All this while (last three weeks) I've been having headache that worsen when waking up from sleep in the morning/coughing/sneezing/bending down. I was convinced that I MUST have some sort space occupying lesion as that kind of headache is characteristic of raised intracranial pressure. Or at least my hypochhondria alter-ego thought that.

Coryzal symptoms tied up with headache, the diagnosis given by the doctor was: sinusitis. I was like: really? sure it is not something more serious? I'm septic already!

Temp: 38.9c and RR 18bpm and pulse 110bpm. 

Thats classified as SIRS (systemic inflammatory response sndrome).

"Alter ego: I'm dying here. Im dying here, helllllllooooo...."

Duh, give it a try. 

The next day I felt much much much better. Like magic I woke up that morning (Friday) without headache and temp. Id been having headache for the longest time, I actually forgotten how does it feels to NOT have headache. Feels good, let me tell you that.

Friday went by so quickly. Drowsy from the lemsip. 

So did the weekend.

This week I feel much better. There is actually bounce in my walk. I skip while I walk when I'm happy. I start singing again. And humming to tunes. Making small talks that I was too uninterested to make before with the staff of the GP practice I am at right now (gosh- they must think that I'm a snobbish asian girl who simply dont talk to other member of staff apart from doctors). I wake up in the morning, looking forward to things that lay ahead of me that day (as opposed to cursing of course). I wake up without headache (I know, i mentioned it already- but this is a very important point). I find it nice to receive phone calls from friends (as opposed to feeling dreadful having to put up an upbeat tone or declining the calls). I watch ANTM and Gossip girls. I start gossiping and going shopping again. I start to like my crushes again. 

I'm almost normal.

Yeah.

Of course, thanks to GOD.

*Of course, the title of this entry: count the no# of times that I said that phrase. 

Wish me well

I am very ill. So please do wish me well.
Yesterday, I didn't go in at all. In fact on Thursday (the day before yesterday), I skipped the afternoon half because of this constant headache I had.

On Friday morning, I went to the skill lab to practice some skills. OMFG- how tedious and how I just couldn't concentrate. Then I said to HM#1 (who I love dearly) that I wanted to have some hot soup. Off we went to a small village cafe about half an hour drive from the base hospital.

Back home afterwards, I had some Paramax (Paracetamol + Metaclopramide). Yeah- that was how unwell I was. Nauseous for no apparent reason. Unless you guys want to consider intracranial problem. No, lets not go down that route.

I slept very early (not a surprise, I know) and I was very crossed with myself for missing Little Britain USA. Again.

Hence, that's why I'm up very early on weekend (big no-no in my life). Cross my fingers and hope that something good will happen today.

Snippets

Here are snippets of life from the past few days: hospital and non-hospital related.

i) I started with a new team last Monday and I seriously could NOT ask for a better team. One month of hospital placement with a stroke/ elderly medicine team. The SpR, the ST doctor and the FY1 are all fabulous. I love them. Yet to meet my consultant (although I know him from previous teachings) as he is on his week-off for Eid celebration.

ii) Talking of which, we celebrated our Eid on Tuesday. Yeay! I didnt take any day off, no point really as there were no mosque close by that I could have gone to for Eid prayer. So I went to hospital instead. (No kidding).

iii) On Tuesday I received a lot of Eid wishes and that made me happy. I talked and examined alot of patients and that made the patients happy. I taught some 3rd year juniors some CT thorax and murmurs and that made them happy. I got off my ward early and that made me even happier. Then I had big dinner with housemates (they cooked traditional dishes and I baked!) and of course that made me super happy. Then when I thought I couldnt be any more happier than I was at the time, my crush called me. And that made me float. Really.

iv) So today I brought some of the cookies for my team and staff at the ward. I grinned from ears to ears with the reception that I received for my humble little cookies. 

v) Ward was quiet today. Except for a patient who screamed (very loudly!!!) when ST tried to cannulate him. He said and I quote: "I dont want anything doing with me anymore, just let me be. If its my time, then let me die. Stop... stop... stop everything (voice diminished)..."

Questions: When do we know when exactly to stop? When patient is competent, can we doctors still intervene against patient's wish, in the name of -patient best interest-? What happen to our oath if we dont do anything to this patient? Is it a passive euthanasia if we let the patient be? Does prolonging patient's life means prolonging patient's suffering?

vi) Alrighty, that was btw a patient with rectal cancer who bleeded PR last night (passing maleana and clots of fresh blood). He was an 80y-o (4years hx of cancer) and refusing any further interventions (fluids, bloods, endoscopy etc). This was a same patient who reported seeing things that werent there (?hallucination due to secondary mets in brain). Bless his soul. I dont want him to suffer anymore, but I dont want him to die either. Tough call. 

vi) One of my friends came to my ward (her ward was opposite my ward) and she was surprised to see that my ward is very modern and new and spacious and nicely done. And that my team is super friendly. Ha. Just my luck.

vii) Then later today I cooked soto for dinner. Very delicious yet very time consuming and patience-testing dish. So many different steps (make the rice, then the soup, then have to shred the chicken, then boil potatoes, then mix with mince meat, make meatballs, fry them, make fried onions, prepare cripsy vermicelli, prepare spicy chilli soy-sauce, omg why did I choose to make this in the first place???) Luckily I got help from couple of very nice people, even then all the cooking took 2 hours to complete. It look like this [picture credit]

Good day? yes. hope everyone is also having a good time no matter what you guys are doing. 

xoxo gossip girl eh, xzxz sleepy medic.

Updates

Hi to all, 

How is everyone? Hope weekend brings only joy to everyone's life.

Okkkaaay...

I finished one month placement in a block called Student Selected Block (SSB).

Glad that I started with SSB first (i mean if say for example I were to start straight to hospital placement with a surgeon- which will definately crush my world and make me miserable). 

During SSB I had chance to laze around (like seriously) and eased myself in a very relax and slow-mo way into learning atmosphere (remember that by the time final year started I had NOT done any serious reading -on medicine and surgery- for at least 5 months: yeah- all due to short project, big project and summer holiday). so phew!

The essence of SSB is for students to do as much as (or as little as- like me- BAD!!!) they like to gain insights into the medical world. Sound cliche I know, but we are talking business here man! There were compulsory sessions to revise skills (which was an utter waste of time me thinks because we all fecking know already ALL the bloody skills). Then there were human simulation sessions (SIMs) that were exciting at times and got stressful at the others. In SIMs, students were asked to managed a dummy for various emergency situation. The SIMs can speak, blink his eyes, has circulating blood, receive IV drugs n fluids and for f*** sake has a cardiac arrest!!! 

On top of all that, we had to do compulsory sign-ups fo career taster (read: spend a day or half a day with a consultant asking them a lot of questions about their specialty and hopefully taste what the specialty can offer). I was personally frustrated that specialty like genetics and hematology are not included in the list. Instead we had this long list of rubbish. And due to compulsory nature of having to do at least one career taster per week, reluctantly I had to sign-up for the rubbish ones (you can choose, but the choices are very limited, and all the interesting ones- I know how roughly the specialty works as I had spent time in doing projects- like oncology etc). Neurophysiology- wtf? Plastic surgery. At least now I know for certain that I wont ever choose to specialize in either  of them. 

If there was one good thing that come out of the career taster rubbishness; it'll be spending a morning with a newly appointed, not to mention super cute, Anaesthetist. He is so charming, its untrue. Seriously, I swooned and drooled. So bad, p53. But hey ho, anaesthetics is again NOT an area of interest. Radiology, however, seem promising (never thought that it'll be!) so I will definately consider it in case of me being complacent and as lazy as I am right now comes 5 years time. 

So that's roughly an SSB block in smallcity's base hospital. I heard in other base hospitals, they hardly have anything (what? two weeks of nothingness?) and close to 200 students were placed at this tertiary cancer centre of excellence. Dont know which one is better, our SSB or theirs. I still choose our SSB despite its utter crappyness over complete nothingness that will only send me straight to depression-land. 

Ok guys, weather is nice. I'm gonna go out and soak some sun and probably hit on some guys. Whoops.

Ps: Eid celebration program is in place. Whoops whoops... I baked some cookies last nite and managed to find matching scarf and shoes for my eid dress the weekend before. And now, who should I pick to be my arm candy (read: date) for the big kick ass eid celebration party in BIGCITY?

Eurotrip Summer (Part 1)

I have always wanted to backpack in Europe, be it on the train, hitch-hiking or road-trip by driving. Its just one of the things that I must do during my five years stay in UK (yeah- something that I promised myself). It is also one of the things that are on my to-do-before-I-die-list. So- yahoo, bring it on.

The wise thing do is to planning for the trip long before the actual trip. The idea was, but the preparation was not. Should I go alone? Or should I go with a friend? Friend- which one is better- a male or a female? Where to go? Where to start? Budget? Means of transportation? And a lot of other small things but just as important. However with all the things going in 4th year and what seems like something very typical of me- all trip-related planning was done not long before the departure date itself. Spur of a moment kind of thing.

One of the most important issues prior to the departure date was: Should we (by this time I decided to go with Miss A, my travel partner) book everything beforehand? Or should we rough it and leave it all to fate? Bear in mind this is peak summer season we are talking about (smack bang right in August!) After careful deliberation following readings of few travel books, we decided to book everything- for our peace of mind.

Details:
When: August 2008
Where: Started in the UK then the other European countries.
Means: Train (with Interrail Pass for under 26- 10 days in 22 days)
Accom: Hostels
Budget: As much as the cost of a flight ticket back to home country in peak season (roughly 800quids- trust me- worth every penny!)
Baggage: Only small backpack allowed- for ease of traveling (about 25L each- light and can be carried on cabin)

Ok now the fun bit.

Route: A smallcity in UK- BRADFORD- YORK- MANCHESTER- BUDAPEST- BRATISLAVA- VIENNA- KRAKOW- PRAGUE- MUNICH- SWITZERLAND- PARIS-BRUSSEL-MANCHESTER- A smallcity in UK

Right after we moved out of our house in smallcity, we headed to Bradford to honour the invitation of HM#1’s parents. Good stuff: we ate a lot (in preparation of halalless eastern European countries) and watch tv like there was no tomorrow (no tv in hostels or even if they have one, most likely it’ll be in a foreign language).

Then we went to York to visit a good friend. Big country house/mansion. Her dog barked every single time he saw me. Bad dog. We had so much fun doing the new York Maze. It took us hours though. I still remember the brilliant time we had having (home-cooked) dinner in her garden just when the sun was about to set. I will miss her when I get back to my home country- seriously.

From there on, we got to Manchester. I saw few good friends and complaint about how long has 4th yr been. I topped up on carb before we flew to Budapest.

The immigration officer asked me: Do you have enough money?
Me: Sure (my mouth smiled then, when my brain was actually saying: Wtf is he thinking about?? Hell yeah I got enough money- did I not tell you just now that I was there on vacation?)
Immigration officer looked at me quizzing and then decided to let me through. (After few days, I found out why: a lot of illegal immigrants from Romania wears black scarf- like I did on arriving in Hungary). Ohh…. Hmm… we did see a lot of beggars when we were there –presumably Muslims from Romania/Bosnia? - Some with kids and all. Haih.

Budapest looks nice generally but some parts do look rundown. The city area is divided (by a river) into the Buda and the Pest area. One of the bridges crossing that river looks stunning at night. Interesting place includes: the castle, the funicular, the parliament and the massive, absolutely romantic looking park in the city- lots of couple were there for wedding photographs.

We met my best gay friend unexpectedly in Budapest- what a small world, by that time he was already two weeks into his trip- looking all tan and gay-ish (meaning happy).

Then we took a very early morning train to Bratislava. See the thing about using train pass you have to really organize and plan your route so that you can maximize its use. (unless of coz you get yourself an unlimited one month pass which gonna cost you 260quids). So a day trip to Bratislava it was. After which we headed straight to Vienna on the same day.

Bratislava is even more so run-down compared to Budapest. It was practically empty at 8.30am –time of arrival. It is a small, walkable city (with maps scale of about 1 km from east to west and north to south). Some part of the castle is currently under construction, so we spent our afternoon in the castle’s garden- lunching and reading. Other tourists found us interesting (or at least that’s what I thought) or probably pretty (no doubt about this) as most of them stared at us like the new see a-muslim-person before (ala Eminem in his Slim Shady song). The big cathedral is quite impressive in term of its height and I can only imagine how the long tall stain glass will look like from the inside (imagine because it was Sunday, and we didn’t go in as there was a mass taking place). We took bucket load of pictures considering how small this place is.

Then off to Austria late that evening.
(to be cont’d)
p53 xoxo

Weekend Alert

So many things happened the weekend just past, I don't even know where to start. And half of these things are so personal, I can't just write them all down.* Although if the weekend could be translated into a biography, it'll certainly attract many many readers. So many drama!

The weekend was all about my friends, BIG CITY, some one leaving on a jet plane (woo!), a flawed proposal, a fake smile, my best friend's wedding(!), roses, shopping, wedding gifts, my crush, another wedding announcement, Angelina Jolie and James Mc Avoy, Wimbledon's final and food GLORIOUS food.

The myriad of emotions that rushed over me all weekend was tough to explain here. I'm very weird in that sense; for everything that happened my feeling is usually OTT. Intensified close to being an emotional wreck at times.

As I don't feel comfortable telling all the stories here, I'll include excerpts from few songs instead to enable you guys to imagine what had taken over me- emotionally.

• Then again it's good to get a call
  Now and then just to say hello
  Have I said I hate to see you go..... (for the one leaving on the jet plane!)
  
• No, this is how it works
  You peer inside yourself
  You take the things you like
  And try to love the things you took
  And then you take that love you made
  And stick it into some
  Someone else's heart
  Pumping someone else's blood
  And walking arm in arm
  You hope it don't get harmed
  But even if it does
  You'll just do it all again....(is this how love should evolve in my world?)
• Love each other or perish.... (ok, this one is not from a song, a quote from a fav book of mine)

*I'm not good in expressing myself that way...

Updates

Ok, first thing first.
Sorry for the long hiatus from blogging. Did I tell or not tell you guys that I went for a holiday?

(Which will then bring us to point number two) I had just come back from a holiday in Morocco. Was there for 8 days 7 nights with HM#1 and HM#3. It was damn hot. So sunny that I practically had my sunglasses on most of the (day)time. The sun however provided a very good source of light for taking pictures.

(Hence point number three) We took like close to one thousand pictures in between three of us. I will share the pictures later in future entries. There are several pretty impressive pictures, especially the panoramic ones.

(Back to point number two) Morocco is brilliant:- Things come cheap, food is ALL halal, sceneries are amazing, shopping (or more accurately haggling) at the souks were just amusing for me. It was a very hot- tip: stay indoors, like for example air-conditioned museums or simply hotel room.

(Next point) I'm back to doing my project in Base Hospital. Watch out the space for more ranting about it later.

Vain entry

I feel awful today.
I woke up to what I think could be deemed as the worst case scenario ever.
I currently have a lot of spots on my dear face.
I really mean a lot.
This is the worst it has been since like lower secondary school.
shit. shit. shit.
Spots on my forehead.
Spots on (both!!!) of my cheeks.
Spots around my nose.
Bloody hell.
To top it all.. the skin around my mouth area is super dry.
I almost didnt go to hospital today. Just want to sit in my dark room and die.

Dont say I didnt warn you.

Good start to a day!

Hey hey, rise and shine to all.
I would like to share a story. A good one to kick start my (long, tiring) day.
I received a call from my crush this morning. A wake up call more like it. He is SO cute!
Ahhh...I felt totally good after speaking to him.
So lets hope only all the good things gonna happen today.

P.S: If you remember, I'm running 10K today. I'll let you know how did I get on.

**These pics were added later (when I finished the run and almost died! I was in the latter wave, hence had to run midday, crazieeeee)**

You'll never walk (or in this case, run as we supposed to) alone!

There were 30000+++ runners on that day. I finished in the 20000-ish place. Hahaha.

10K Manchester Great Run

Yeah, I'm participating in that (yup, in a couple of days time). Training wise, if you ask me, I would say so and so. There were days where I ran more than the others. Its pretty damn hard. I keep on having different problems at different locations. First there was problem with my ankles (which is long standing anyway). Then there was problem with my knees (which sucks! big time, because it was really hard to concentrate on the run when sharp stabbing pain kept on shooting from my knees to my ankles to and fro). Then I tried running with ankles AND knees support, which didn't help at all. BOO! Then I settled on running every other days for a short distance, because the longer I run, the more moaning I will do later. And seriously, you guys wont want to be around when I'm cranky as its awful.

Now I think I have trained enough. 3K easily. And from there on: wogging (walk+jogging)! I keep on having chest pain (crushing!) which I don't think anything serious. All exercise related. Possibly be due to ?anaemia. I promised to one of my running mates that I will get it all checked up after the run (if I go now, the GP will say don't run -yeah- like defeat the whole point right?).

So all in all, running is bad. Personally, look at me, I'm falling apart. Osteoarthritis will come insidiously when I'm slighter older. Let not even start on microfractures. Oh, wait a minute, have the arches on both of my feet collapsed? Damn. I will reduce the amount of running very considerably after the Manchester Run. Running is such a high impact sport that now I kinda don't understand how people can do marathon without any problem. But I supposed the will power defeat it all. Yet another area that I'm lacking in for endurance sport like this.

On a different note:-

• I finished my community placement. Really enjoyed myself there. My report was rated 'Above Average' --> how could it possibly be that? It was supposed to be an excellent. I have a theory here, to get an excellent score student has to be present at the evaluation session (just so to put pressure on the supervisor). I got excellent for both of reports where I was present at the final evaluation. On the other hand, I got 'Above Average' for those that were marked in the supervisor's own time. My standard of work had been very high for all four written reports (hence I do believe I should have gotten 4 Excellents) However this time, I was not as furious as the first 'Above Average' relatively because I did have an awesome placement with my supervisor.
• I started on my BIG PROJECT (3 months: 10000words) at my base hospital. My supervisor this time around is a bit loopy. Is he really? I picked him out of all consultants in my hospital, and instead of doing a project with nice, not to mention good looking consultant, I chose to do it with a consultant which I find very amusing. Full of life! More to come about this BIG PROJECT. Watch the space!!
• I had my exam last Monday, and I swear to God that it was the most difficult exam in medic school yet. I was so frustrated by the end of it, I felt numb to all stimuli, I almost felt suicidal (if that's possible!). Don't fucking ask about microbiology, I don't give a shit about it, and so do my friends (make it all medic students from my uni). Whats up with all the histopathology shits that were included? I was so pissed off. If I knew that it gonna be that difficult, seriously, I wont even bother to study in the first place. Doom for failure right from the start.
• Please, however, wish me luck. I do hope I will pass.