yesteryear

something i came across in the new england journal of med: msl ~ now why didn't i think of that?!
(no, don't answer that please)

reading the article made me ponder a bit about how foreign medical lingo can be to the uninitiated. as nuls tried to comfort all of us some years back when we were all pulling our hair out and literally sprawling on abs' living room having panic attacks... we've actually come a long way since first year, let alone high school graduation. the lightbulb within glowed. and then it fizzled out as reality crept back with the imminent stormy raincloud called Exams. horrible things that come every bi-annually nowadays, thanks to my faculty screwing up our cirriculum. we've had a new course outline for the same course (if lucky) every frigging year for the past 4 years, yet they support their changes with wanting to maintain the high standards our faculty was known for. yeah... that was true maybe back in the 1970s.

it's a tad disconcerting when i take a step back and look at myself through the eyes of a stranger. to read what i rattled off for my long case presentation ~ whoa! tis a bunch of gibberish if i took off my "medicine" hat. moments like that make me feel like i've somehow learnt something ~ and then moments like the past few days make me ponder if i would be better off getting a job that only asked for high school qualifications and hope that i marry someone who would be able to support the two of us for the rest of our lives.

a friend in pretty much the same boat as me wrote a dreary entry and i might've interpreted it the wrong way, clouded by my own whinges but i really am grasping at straws at the moment. what i'd give to have my focus back. that feeling of ...interest. what happened to being excited by homework!? come back, Feeling, come back! >.<

i remember one teacher of mine at buckley ~ ms kathryn davis. she moved to bulgaria after 7th grade but she was one huge inspiration to me. she made biology fun! we had projects like the edible cell, the human body t-shirt, the "journey through a cell" essay... i wish i had pictures. my edible cell was made outta jello, i remember going over to carla's place further down woodland hills to make our anatomically correct t-shirt with plastic tubing as the GI tract sewn on. i remember trying to fill it with water dyed with blue food coloring and having the thing leak. i remember my essay ~ we were shrunk to the size of a sugar molecule and was the only scientist in the world with the chance to explore the contents of a human cell. we would be injected into the bloodstream of a subject and have 12 hours to explore before being picked up by the needle again. that was our assignment. i made friends with a cute girly sugar molecule called SM with a pink ribbon and she was my chauffer for the whole time. we even cried when parting time came! *nostalgia.. ahhhhh!*

i guess we can't have "fun" assignments like that forever. i guess we all have to eventually grow up and learn to crunch numbers, analyze journal articles and leave institutions dressed in ridiculous black gowns and hats with a flowery stamped piece of paper. and all that for what? to slog away like most of my friends back in singapore now, at the beck and call of superiors and patients alike. to be the scum of the scum in the heirarchial ladder after managing to climb to what one thought was the top upon completion of med school. wow. i'm so looking foward tot that! rrriiighht. expectations, i've learnt through the years, aren't worth it anymore for they cause more heartaches, dash more hopes and bruise more ego than ever anticipated. although i might be immensely bored when i get there, joining peter pan in nevernever land has never been more appealing. i'm tired of the real world :(