Well, so much for waiting a couple of weeks.

Today, after my rather odd interview with KK hospital, I met up with my parents for lunch before my mom suggested we go take a look at the Netbooks again. I already more or less had my heart set on a Samsung N120 if I were to get a netbook, mostly due to it’s weight, size, matte finish, speed, and battery life. The sound system on the N120 is also pretty good for its size and range. All in all, this is pretty much what I need to pick up, chuck in my bag, and walk off to and from lectures.

This 160GB 1.66GHz 10″ little wonder set me back about $700 with an upgrade to 2G RAM and a small pile of free gifts. I think the freebies took up more space than the netbook. We have here a USB keyboard vacuum, earphones, two microstatic cloths, one Toshiba retractable mouse, and one of those ball things you attach to the bottom to help it cool down.

Since I paid for my own computer, mom bought me something as well to bring to Melbourne. This little digital photo frame. We actually got it pretty cheap since the store owners gave us a discount. The plan is to load it full of photos of me my family and friends, then display it on my desk for extra motivation to study. =)

I might be heading down to Melbourne again in early December to do a little recce work, find an apartment, and hopefully get to make a trip down to Monash to attend the FOBS (Foundation in Biomedical Science) day. It’s supposed to be one where we get to mingle with staff, faculty and students, as well as get a short tutorial on FOBS to prepare us for the test on week 2 or 3. Apparently, we need an 80% to pass, otherwise we’ll need to retake it. =\

Not looking forward to the test.

My mom and I have recently developed a nasty habit of pre-med school shopping. After getting the full offer last week, preparations for med school next year has gone into full steam, buying tickets for flights, textbooks, arranging for visas, health checks and police screenings. It has been a hectic week.

Not to mention, tomorrow morning I’ll be heading down to KK Women and Children’s Hospital for an interview. Over the next couple of weeks, I’ll probably be serving a short temporary tag on in the pediatrics’ emergency department to get some exposure and gain some context in which to better understand what I’ll be learning in slightly over 2 and a half months. And a little extra (which I’ll only blog about once I get into it…)

So today, mom and I went book shopping after a nice yummy brunch. We headed off to Yun Nan medical bookstore at Bras Basah and bought my first medical textbook! Kumar and Clark’s Clinical Medicine. I also managed to get Wheater’s Functional Histology, a book that was at least twice as expensive in Kino. The books were not only cheaper at Yun Nan, but the lady at the counter also gave us lots of very helpful advice on which books were good and which not to buy. While her tone was a tad condescending, I could really feel she was passionate about what she did, and really wanted to help. =) She was really knowledgeable about the books in her store, advising me which I would need, which were better or more popular, and suggesting some other books I might require in Year 1. Really nice lady.

We couldn’t find Netter’s Atlas of Human Anatomy there though, and she recommended we went to the NUS Co-op to find it. NUS was horrid to navigate about. Since neither mom nor I had any experience in NUS, we ended up spending most of our time driving in and out of carparks to nowhere and reversing out of dead ends. We did eventually find the medicine and science co-op and found a neat little stack of Netter’s. And having a quick flip through the pages, I can see what all the rage is about.

I have a suspicion that Netter’s was the book Hans Bacher was talking about when he spoke to me earlier this year about medical school. He mentioned he knew someone who did an arts degree, then went on to medical school, later becoming one of the world’s most famous medical illustrators. Netter is definitely one of them. And he graduated from design school too! His drawings are gorgeous and extremely detailed. I would have to struggle to turn off the drooling art student in me to study this book properly.

So after today’s purchases, my textbook stack has grown a little. Here it is next to my phone for some size comparison.

We later went on to Funan to 1. Buy ma’s outdated Korean drama, and 2. Drink arguably the best Ya Kun coffee in Singapore.

The shop turned out to no longer carry the outdated Korean drama, so after a quick coffee, we went about looking for luggage; an exercise that eventually turned into a hunt for a good netbook.

Now, I’m using a really pretty, fantastic, amazing Macbook Pro, currently. However, it does weigh a very hefty 2.5kg. As much as I love how it is awesome with pdf files and looks really pretty, I found myself looking at the much lighter, cheaper, and simpler netbooks. I’m terribly tempted to buy a Samsung N120 netbook simply to chuck in my bag and bring from class to class, then return home every night to write essays, make presentations, and do revisions on my larger macbook pro. Though I’m worried I might slowly lose the need to have two computers and eventually stop using either one. A decision on this would take a couple more weeks of thinking. Not like I’m pressed for time anyway…

So a bit more studying before sleep time. Tomorrow promises to be an exciting day.

I know this was meant to be up yesterday, but time was not on my side…

Happy 10th month, baby.

Here’s a dancey song for you!

Hate begets hate.

How would you feel if someone told you that everything you were was stupid, ugly, and everything you touched would rot?

I don’t often buy the new paper, and when I do, it’s probably to satisfy this need for gossip and scandalous news running amok amongst the aunties of the marketplace. Today I bought a copy and amongst the articles that piqued my interest was a small commentary tucked away deep within the pages titled “Singlish ’sounds like chimps fighting over bananas’”.

The article was written by a youtube frequenter who noted some comments written on PCK (Phua Chu Kang) videos. These were written by a fellow named KaydenKolldy in which he asks “What kind of language is this? It sounds like chatering chimpanzees fighting over bananas. Do Singaporeans speak like this? PS You Asians are (expletive) ugly.” Then repeated this comment on several other videos to which he got replies like “You Australians are (expletive) stupid” or “(expletive) you (expletive). Don’t be a racist douche bag”. Another viewer tried to clarify KaydenKolldy’s understanding  of Singlish by explaining that “This is ‘Singlish’, a kind of English mixed with Hokkien and Malay”. To which the 23 year old Australian replied “Geez, it sounds horrible. You Asians see to rot everything you touch. Languages included.”

Now, I’m not going into how racist this young fellow seems to be, but more about the reactions from both sides. The author is right. Hate begets hate. But I strain to keep my tongue in check when I feel so insulted.

Insult. Why is that? I suppose pride is the source of this. I’m proud to be everything I am today. An ethnic Chinese. A Hainanese. A Singaporean. A woman. An arts student. A medical student. A not-entirely-straight human being. Thousands of people around the world worked hard over centuries for me to be able to stand here today as the person I am, with the culture I have. And to have someone come and spit upon everything I stand for just takes the icing off my cake.

I can’t help but feel like I have to retaliate. Protect this which is my life. I feel like if I just stand by and let comments like these pass, I’m perpetuating a growing trend of racism, sexism, bigotry and discrimination. Perhaps many others in the world feel this way. That we have to put in our comments. Protect what we feel is right. And try to sway these people with our words filled equally with anger and disdain. I feel slightly ashamed to say I do have a sense of gratification when I see these people get soundly beaten up by others in rows upon rows of text and compounded expletives. But at the end of the day, the world is just filled with more words, more shouting, more ****** and less understanding.

One part of me wishes I could come up with a device that can help me see the way others think, understand why they feel the way they do, and why I can’t seem to share the same sentiment. Perhaps the sound of chimps fighting over bananas is in reality the bickering we have over who is right in this war of words. The other part of me wishes I could come up with a machine to eradicate all those discriminatory thoughts from the world.

How would you feel if someone told you that everything you were was stupid, ugly, and everything you touched would rot? I feel pretty damned pissed.

A SHORT HISTORY OF MEDICINE: “Doctor, I have an ear ache.”
2000 B.C. – “Here, eat this root.”
1000 B.C. – “That root is heathen, say this prayer.”
1850 A.D. – “That prayer is superstition, drink this potion.”
1940 A.D. – “That potion is snake oil, swallow this pill.”
1985 A.D. – “That pill is ineffective, take this antibiotic.”
2000 A.D. – “That antibiotic is artificial. Here, eat this root!”

———

When a panel of doctors was asked to vote on adding
a new wing to their hospital, the Allergists voted
to scratch it and the Dermatologists advised not to
make any rash moves.

The Gastroenterologists had sort of a gut feeling
about it, but the Neurologists thought the
administration had a lot of nerve, and the
Obstetricians felt they were all laboring under a
misconception.

The Ophthalmologists considered the idea
shortsighted; the Pathologists yelled, ‘Over my dead
body’, while the Pediatricians said, ‘Oh, Grow up!’

The Psychiatrists thought the whole idea was
madness, the Radiologists could see right through
it, and the Surgeons decided to wash their hands of
the whole thing.

The Internists thought it was a bitter pill to
swallow, and the Plastic Surgeons said, ‘This puts a
whole new face on the matter.’

The Podiatrists thought it was a step forward, but
the Urologists felt the scheme wouldn’t hold water.

The Anesthesiologists thought the whole idea was a
gas and the Cardiologists didn’t have the heart to
say no.

In the end, the Proctologists left the decision up to some pain in the “you know what” in administration

———–

Three blondes are walking through the forest. They come upon some tracks.

The first blonde says, “They’re deer tracks.”
The second blonde says, “They’re bear tracks.”
The third blonde says, “They’re moose tracks.”

Then a train hits them.

If I had known anatomy books would be full of pictures, I might have taken this as my undergrad course instead.

Kino was a treasure trove of shelves upon shelves of books and I managed to find most of what I was looking for (with the exception of Human Anatomy by Mary Marieb)

For those who are raising their eyebrows at the colorful coloring book, it’s not one of those with big pictures for kids to color in. The book contains the basics of anatomy and allows for students to color in groups of muscular tissue, systems, skeletal structures, etc so they can better understand and memorize the different groups as well as origin and insertion points of muscular tissue.

Quite a well drawn book by Kapit and Elson. Very detailed and concise. And quite highly recommended for those learning anatomy! I took a quite read through the first few pages while in the car and it has not only been really well done, but also made it very much easier for me to learn the concepts of anatomic planes, sections, and terminology.

This book should sound familiar to most people. It was the inspiration for the name of the popular television series Grey’s Anatomy. Gray’s Anatomy (the textbook) is a highly well known and used textbook in the world of medical schools (as far as I can tell so far) and I can definitely see why.

With gorgeous diagrams, fantastic paper quality, in depth explanations and descriptions all segregated into easy to search categories, it isn’t difficult to see why this is such a popular book.

Righto! Enough chit chat and time to get down to work again! =)

All from this wonderful site I’d recommend as time out brain food.

http://theunderweardrawer.homestead.com/scutmonkey.html

I think I’m going to start off as the Questionable Admission. Then gradually morph into the guy giving patients his apartment. =\

2 sets of eyes, 4 ears, and two right hands.

And of course, a whole stack of notepaper.

After inquiring a bit on the forums about what I would need to prepare myself for Year A of med school, the one answer that came out resoundingly was Anatomy. Now, I don’t know much about anatomy aside from what I picked up right till high school, and certainly do not profess having an in depth knowledge about the subject at all.

So I do what I’ve been doing for the past couple of weeks. Watch documentaries.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S9WtBRNydso&feature=PlayList&p=9A701D54E8896D0E&index=0&playnext=1

Youtube is host to an awesome playlist of lectures on General Human Anatomy from UC Berkeley. Having watched the first lecture, I can safely say I share the same enthusiasm as the professor about anatomy, and I’m simply itching to learn more. I have 3 months to shovel down as much of this as I can before starting school. Helps a lot that the professor is not only very clear and concise about her information, but also rather entertaining.

I’m contemplating buying some anatomy books before I begin school. They might serve to be helpful through the course of my study, especially if they are really clear and help me memorize the planes of the body easier. Time to head down to Kino soon…

This evening, Papa and Mama brought us all out to Taste Paradise at Mosque Street for dinner as a mini celebration of my getting accepted into medical school. Though dad is still a bit hesitant to celebrate, thinking that at any moment, Monash would withdraw its offer. Mom on the other hand is really excited too. =) It’s great seeing her so happy. I feel like this time, I’ve done them proud.

Lulu bought me my first stethoscope! =) the Littmann Cardiology III that I had been eying. I’ll do a proper post later on about this choice and how I came to this decision having compared the Classic and the Cardiology. Right now, it’s getting a tad late. Sleep, then tomorrow, back to studying!

Ten years ago, I wouldn’t have agreed with myself when I say

“Three months isn’t alot of time”

Well, it really isn’t.

After visiting AusEd yesterday to certify my University transcripts, I was then briefed on what other documentation and procedures I would need to complete before leaving next year. Three months seems like a very short amount of time, especially since less than 24 hours ago, I had already given into the probability that I would never get into medicine or leave Singapore to study.

So now, I’m left with a passport expiring within the next two years, no police check, no clue about my current vaccination status, and the list just keeps growing. Things that need to be done within November:

1. Extend passport to 2015 (or at least till my visa expires)
2. Head down to Cantonment Police Complex to get a police check (requires one passport size photograph)
3. Do a serology test (cause I don’t want to redo all my vaccinations)

My mom suggested we fly down to Melbourne over one November weekend to check out the school and accommodation in the suburbs surrounding the university. Must remember to bring a camera…

Currently, I’m waiting on AusEd to process my transcripts for the purpose of converting my conditional offer to a nonconditional offer. That should be done within a week.

I’m pretty sure I haven’t had a Boostrix or meningoccocus jab yet… Not entirely sure about hepatitis… They should just attach me to a drip and give me all of them over a couple of days.

Speaking of which, I need to go down to the blood bank to donate blood next week. Anyone else interested in going? They’re pretty short on A- blood, but I’m pretty short on iron. And I’ve been coughing my lungs out for the past week.

I want this!

The Litrmann Cardiology III Black Edition. Comes with free engraving on medisave.au!

Sweet!