Initiation

Readers, it has been a while since my last post. The reason for this was my 3 day skiing/fishing trip to lake eildon and surrounds.

Day1:

Woke up at a very early hour I haven't seen for a long time: 7am and made my way up to Marysville for some skiing at lake mountain. Lake Mountain is a cross-country skiing resort as opposed to my usual downhill skiing locations such as buller and hotham. The last time I cross country skiied was probably 7 or 8 years ago, so my falling down and getting up skills were definitely sharpened. Perhaps this was due to my trying to "edge" the cross country skis, probably not the best idea. They didn't turn or carve (as they do on downhill skis), but instead turned the edge i put into the snow into a pivoting point and me into a projectile. My girlfriend also had exceptional trouble, and was both unable to turn and unable to slow down. Patchy snow cover didn't really help this cause much either, snow was 5cm thick and cover was probably as low as 50% in most areas. And to that end.. I believe I have had enough with cross country skiing. From now onwards I shall stick to what I know, downhill skiing.. and perhaps try some boarding. To even out our skills a bit more, next time she can ski, and I'll board, and together we'll tear up the slope, knocking over everybody in our way.

Stayed at a nice B&B in Marysville that night called Delderfield. I would highly recommend anybody who passes that way to spend a night or two there, Ian and Jacqui the hosts do a splendid job, with a nice wood fireplace, spa bath, candles, maintain a lovely european style garden and a magnificent breakfast the following morning. They were currently repainting and replanting, and trying to replace many of the items they lost in the Black Saturday fires. The most amazing thing was Ian stayed during the fires to battle it out, which is why Delderfield still remains as one of the few buildings left in Marysville. I told him he was brave to stay and battle the fire, and he replied "nope, just stupid, it was bloody scary!"

Marysville is totally different from what it used to be, it really is just "flat" now, literally! There isn't even a supermarket in town any longer, just a bakery, cafe and ski hire. The trees are all scorched and carry the history of the fires in their charcoaled trunks. Seeing this first hand was totally different to watching it on the news through a small box. The extent of the damage is phenominal, but at least the insurance companies are paying up!

Day 2:
Lake Eildon here we come, armed with fishing rods, powerbait, in addition to aluminium foil, onion, lemon and butter. Upon arrival we spent the next hour getting our bearings, and finding a good fishing spot. We chose the cemetery area of the main pondage. A few bites, but no fish. Fed up with this lack of progress and annoyed at the people smoking 5 metres upwind from us, we left for the bridge, where we spent the remainder of the afternoon into the night. Still no trout! Yep, we didn't end up using the foil, onion, lemon and butter! That night we went through our red rock deli chips, frozen dumplings and a myriad of other small foods.

Day 3:
This was the day we had to catch a fish, the last day of the trip! Woke up at 7am, ready to fish at 8am. 9am, nibble nibble nibble, caught, then got away. 9:15am same, 9:20am same again, then finally at 9:30am got one. Landed a 20cm little one, i mean at least we caught one right?! Even though it's too small to eat. That was our last nibble of the day, then it got warm and the fish stopped biting, ducks and other birds looking for a fishy meal didn't help our cause either.
At 3pm, futility dawned upon us so we went to the sorry shameful location that every fisherman goes when they must catch a fish to calm the spirit, the trout farm!! Seriously, that's desperation! We got 3 from the farm, each measuring about 40cm nice plate sized ones, but we had to pay for them which dulled the fun. Meanwhile the little sucker from 9:30am was still kicking around in my little esky (now fish tank). The best thing was, in the fish farm there was an additional pond called "Desperados".. which made me feel a bit better when I realised that at least I hadn't sunken to the lowest tier just yet. Hopefully next time we won't have to pay $14/kg for our fish! On a side note, they were very tasty and worth every cent!


TRIP OVER, now the only thing left was the PMCV match.

I woke up at 7am that morning, obviously wasn't out yet, and went back to sleep. The next time I woke up was 10am, rushing to my computer cursing it for its slow start up.

The result of your match is Eastern Health (Box Hill Hospital).

The first thought was thank god, I'm not going to Echuca or somewhere in the sticks!
Next thought was: Damn, this is great 10minutes from my house, this year is gonna be swell.
Final thought was: Who else is going there, it seems like most of my friends are at the Austin.

Trolling facebook for the next few hours I found a few more friends heading to asian central, and I think we'll have a great time! Huzzah for getting the closest large hospital to my house!

Korean BBQ to celebrate (of course, in Box Hill)

I have spent the whole day re-watching the Lord of the Rings trilogy! Nothing beats the copy and paste orc armies en masse, the constant 8/10 pain grimace on Elijah Wood's face, and the "my pweshesss~~". The books were better as always with more detail, but I stand by what I said 6 years ago, I am just happy that I could see the nazgul, the little hobbit hole round doors, pointy elf ears and moving trees! I think Peter Jackson did alright undertaking such a risky task of making an age old classic (the Grandfather of all fantasy novels), with the greatest number of supporting books, and the most extensive made up languages. Oh yeah, and if you didn't realise from the title, Sindarin is the common elvish language, and no I'm not one of those who knows the entire elvish language (although I will confess being interested in it in my high school years).



Following all that heavy action, and spilling multitudes of black orc blood I needed some light comedy relief. Looking through my movie archive, "He's just not that into you" popped up! Overall not a bad movie, slight Love Actually / Hitch storylines and subtleties going throughout. Bonus points for a good cast: Scarlet Johansson, Jennifer Anniston, Ben Affleck, Jennifer Connelly, Drew Barrymore and Bradley Cooper. Entertaining, but somehow lacks the same punch that Love Actually or Hitch delivered.




Feeling a craving for irish cream and coffee, I went to the local IGA for some mascarpone, savoiardi. Using copious quantities of whipped full cream, baileys, and kahlua, I transformed this into my first ever Tiramisu. Unfortunately there's no photo of it here (image on left is from google), because in a matter of seconds an entire tiramisu molded in a one quant dish disappeared with just 3 people. I made a second one, but i probably won't plate it up (photo opportunity) until the atherosclerosis from this first one has gone down. Only one problem with today's tiramisu, not enough COFFEE and perhaps a little too much cream or mascarpone but then again it is tiramisu (Healthy and tiramisu are not words closely associated). For the next one I make, coffee essence in addition to espresso and kahlua will be used, i'll try with light cream, I just hope the consistency will stay unchanged.

Only the 5th day of the holidays, and starting to get bored.

The amount of facebook game high scores has significantly decreased post-exams. I seriously think that facebook survives on students' exams and assignments. It is the ultimate procrastination tool: chat, game, blog, event planning, people stalking all in one compact website.

The examinations this semester were.. quite unusual! The questions were typical and expected, but having to answer them through the *flat-line beep* *charging up* "Clear!" *shock*. Somebody had a heart attack outside our examination hall door and they were unable to save him. People closer said they could here the paramedics discussing whether or not to continue CPR defib, disturbing! But, hey.. this is our lives, this is what we're training for!

Finally watched the new Transformers yesterday. Not much talking, lots of action, mountains of metal being tossed around. I mean, that's why we watch it right? We want to see the raw metal brawn! I loved it!

Finished Assassin's Creed again, such a great game, can't wait for the second one which shall be out soon. Graphics and cut-scenes are just brilliant! While the camera angle sometimes gets in the way of fighting (especially when you're surrounded by templars and are relying solely on counterattacks), after playing it enough you get used to it and can fight even without looking. Towards the end of the game, short blade with its enhanced damage, combined with defence break kills much faster, has more agility than the long sword. You also get the chance to use instant kill throwing knife if they are out of melee range.

On the note of games, when is Starcraft 2 going to come out?! It's been on hiatus for a while. I want to see what it's like, but then I want a game that's well made. The designers have a lot to live up to if they're going to vaguely try to match the same level as the first one.

I hear the snow is good this year, so I guess I'll hit it next week. Why can't I go this week? My sister has decided to scoot off with some of my ski gear and won't be back til Friday. Miss the good snow! Last few years were disappointing, no powder just man-made sticky snow, or rock solid old snow, even on the black runs. Why do I like skiing so much? I am addicted to the exhilarating speed, and the sound of snow spraying up!

Follow my story as I proceed through my final semester as a medical student to a junior doctor.

Although I am sure that most of the readers for this blog will be friends, a bit about myself first:

I am a (typical?) final year medical student at the University of Melbourne, who spends too much time doing non-medical things (ie. procrastinating), such as going out with friends, talking on the phone, listening to music, watching anime, reading books, planning overseas holidays and lining up for 90 million oz lotto on the morning of a 3 hour written O&G exam.

I have lived in Taipei, Sydney, Adelaide and Melbourne, each location imparting to me what I would like to think of as a gift. Taipei imparted to me the gift of culture and language, Sydney one of dedication and structure, Adelaide one of encouragement, and Melbourne one of free thought and change.

How am I the way I am now? I don't really know, because during primary and secondary school, I have always been the antisocial, arrogant, book-reading, computer nerd, who would try to skip Physical Education. Perhaps some of this was a result of frequent moving and changing of schools during my childhood, perhaps I never liked school. Whatever the reason, all I remember is that after entering university, I changed totally, as if I had thrown away my previous self in exchange for a more sociable, more enlightened self.

I have no doubt that this change is constantly occurring, as I continue to become more aware of myself, others and this world.

oh yeah.. and that one question, Why did I choose medicine?
The honest answer would have to be, I thought doctors were cool and have always admired them from an early age.
Could I have done something else? Probably!
Do I still want to do medicine? Sure, but perhaps not for the same reasons as I started with. These reasons are still not totally clear to me yet, but all I know is I have things to offer, things I want to change!
Do I want to specialise? Most likely. I am interested in physicianship, and possibly paediatrics, but we'll see!