ITS BEEN A YEAR.

It's been a while, time flies. Ups and downs of life, that's the phrase to describe what all of us have been through for the past 365 days, and now, we are one year older with another year old of sweet and bitter memories embedded fondly, deeply inside our mind. It's been a year since i last stepped out of AIMST as a foundation graduate, and i have now gained what i want to enter the the Medical programme. We've all been through repeated waves of problems and difficulties from studies to friendship, and that has definitely made us a stronger person for being a year older. Guess that's just what life is all about, forever changing and we're learning from it.

Well, set myself aside, our beloved nation Malaysia has also gone through lots of moment throughout the year. From the fleeting to the gravity-defying, from the heart-warming to the heart wrenching. We turned 50 with great joy, pomp and ceremony on Aug 31st. On Oct, a gravity-defying moment was recorded when our first Angkasawan Dr Syeikh Muzaphar Shukor blasted off into space on board the Russian Sotuz spacecraft. These shows that proud moments have been happening in this country, which made us to stand taller in the eyes of the world, making us feel prouder to be a Bangsa Malaysia.

It's been 19 years i have been living on this world, and i have been jotting every single bits of these moments into my memories hoping to get all of them in my mind. Well, since i'm currently 19 and have started a blog on my own, my walk of life will now officially jot down the 19 achievements i have made throughout year 2007.


19 Achievements in Year 2007

1. Managed to complete my foundation programme with promising results.
2. Got accepted into the Medical Programme which is my all time dream come true.
3. Scuba dive in Redang for the first time in my life. (It was only a discovery dive.)
4. Got my first prosumer camera with the money i earned and fell deeply for photography.
5. Accomplished my blog, the walk of life by regularly updating it. (Oh, regularly?)
6. Learned the CORRECT way of ironing clothes!
7. Survived for another year with the lousy food in my campus.
8. Done my first beach jump with Kenneth at Batu Ferringgi.
9. Visited Ipoh, Perak for the first time on a work trip.
10. Dealed online for the first time of my life through Lelong.com.my.
11. Discovered almost half of the good food in Penang.
12. Stopped washing my clothes after the Dobi Shop opened in my hostel.
13. Finished 3 seasons of Grey's Anatomy in 1 week time.
14. Continuously studied till 6am in the morning for 1 whole damned week.
15. Flying over to the Borneo Island for the first time of my life, Sarawak.
16. Tried and got addicted with authentic and original Sarawak's Curry Laksa.
17. I lost weight, unintendedly.
18. Earned my first 4 figured salary starting with the number 2 with an SPM cert.
19. Plot out and trying to succeed my New Year 2008 resolution!


Heres some highlights of year 2007, let the pictures speak my words. Enjoy. =]


My first time stepping into the town of Kuching, Sarawak.


Long house, i miss you!


Having to spend 2 weeks with friends to discover the beauty of Sarawak.


The place where i put on my own oxygen tank and scuba dive for the first time in my life, Pulau Redang.


Malaysia's 50th birthday celebration at Ikano.


On a work trip to discover the little town of Ipoh.


Finished my foundation studies at AIMST.


Its a beautiful campus ain't it?


Discovering good food in Penang.


My first beach jump at Batu Feringgi.


Gone through another year of hostel life which serves terrible meals.


Got my first camera and starting to explore the world of photography.


Succeeded our first blood donation campaign. Syabas batch 13!


Successfully entered the 13th batch MBBS programme.


Well, probably there's more than 19 achievements i have made throughout the year, but i guess these are the major ones i can think of right now. Till then, wishing you guys a happy happy New Year 2008! This post will mark an end to year 2007 and lets all usher year 2008 together, hoping it to be a much much better one! Happy New Year, guys. =]

MERRY X'MAS.

Wishing you guys a merry merry christmas there! Regards. =]

HAPPY HOLIDAYS!

Some tiny little updates on my life for the past few days, will be posting them all in detail once i've settled down. Busy packing up to leave for my friend's house tommorow morning. Heh.

So, first of all!


My finals over!! No more midnight studies, for at least the coming few months! Paper wasn't really that tough, hopefully able to pass them all. Wouldn't wanna repeat those stupid subjects next year, or i should say i have totally no time to repeat them AGAIN. Hah.

Secondly,


AIMST annual Christmas Party organised by students. Well, didn't managed to attend it due to some stupid reasons. Sad.


Our very own get-together party on Wednesday night with the CGES (Centre of General and Extracurricular Studies) lecturers before leaving for our holidays. Will be officially joining the School of Medicine next year, oh yeah! Anyway, the party was truly a great one. Well done and syabas to the whole of Batch 13! =]


Revisited the lovely island of Penang with on Friday. Fullfilled our craving for the all-time favourite oh-chean(Friend oysters) at Lebuh Kimberly, which i've mentioned before from my previous post, and also dropped by at Gurney Plaza and Queensbay Mall. Another great Penang trip i'd say.

And lastly,


Am leaving for holidays tommorow! A very long one indeed. Will be back to the beautiful city of Petaling Jaya this Sunday. So, for the time being, farewell to AIMST and also to the quiet town of Sungai Petani! We shall meet again on next year's January! Enjoy your holidays, folks!



Till then. Take care. =]

A TOUCHING ARTICLE.

A post that i've came through the internet today, i was so thoroughly moved. Here I wish to share it with the rest of you the article that made tears well up in my eyes..

---

Learning to become a doctor



A third-year medical student reflects on a life-changing emotional experience

Dreams and reality are often very different things. As a medical student I imagined myself one day taking on the role of a gallant knight, a protector and safekeeper of the sacred flame of life, creating miracles and wonderfully healing the sick. I wanted to make a difference and save lives. A road accident during the summer holidays gave me a chance to live my dream - but it was very different from what I had imagined. This piece reflects on my experience, and on how a brush with real medicine has changed me as a third-year medical student at Monash University.
The smashed machine was the first sight I encountered. A once fast, shiny road-bike now lay on the ground, a metal carcass. I remember running towards it, scared. Next to it a body lay still.

I had seen dead bodies before; cadavers allow us to release anatomical knowledge with the stroke of a blade; they are the ultimate learning tools. But what confronted me was no practical class - this was very real. I looked at the woman lying there. She was young, about my own age of 20, still with P-plates on her bike. It could have been one of my friends lying there. She was dressed up, perhaps coming home from a club somewhere, with makeup and nail polish delicately applied - real human qualities that gave a glimpse into a life that, only minutes earlier, was full. Draped over the top of a young human was viciously snapped; blood and vomitus overflowed from her throat onto her chest; her arm was destroyed. I knelt down beside her.

It was as if I was looking through her. I looked into her eyes but, quite simply, no one was there. Despite the horror of the scene, she looked almost peaceful. Was she just unconscious? Could there be a flicker of life still inside her? Was this my chance to save a life, to make a difference? What happened next was bizarre. I became machine-like, visualising a giant first-aid flowchart in my mind's eye, and began to apply my medical knowledge. Yet again the theory did not match the reality. My only previous attempt at resuscitation had been on a mannequin with a plastic torso and head. This woman had real lungs and a real heart. I turned her on her side and tried to unblock her airway; I had no gloves. Using a mouth-to-mouth protective device that I carry on my keyring, i tried to shield my hands as I attempted to scoop blood and vomitus out of her mouth. I then tried to give her air: "5 breaths in 10 seconds, and watch the chest rise", my training had taught me. But her chest did not rise. AT first I got angry and blamed it on the device I was using, but then I realised her entire airway was obstructed. I searched for a carotid and radial pulse but found neither - the beat of life had stopped. I tried cardiopulmonary resuscitation but she wasn't responding - it wasn't supposed to be like this. Yet I continued until I felt a gentle tap on my left shoulder. It was one of the ambulance officers - I had missed their dramatic arrival, hearing my own thoughts and deaf to everything else. Never before had my mind been so clear or sharp. My adrenalin level was so high that it took tactile stimulation to reawaken me to my surroundings - a feeling I still never forget.

Despite efforts by the ambulance officers, the girl was pronounced dead at the scene.

It was in the day that followed, spending time with my general practitioner, that I began to learn a little about what being a doctor really means. I came to him upset that someone had died, upset at how horrific it was, upset that I had failed, upset that I had done something that may have exposed me to to HIV, hepatitis B or hepatitis C infection, even upset that the damn thing was upsetting me! He sat and listened. Being able to speak to someone who had witnessed similar trauma was amazingly comforting. He told me that the three hardest things to cope with in medicine are death itself, the death of someone young, and the death of someone under your care. I had copped all three "right between the eyes", at a time when I hadn't the experience or the training to know how to respond or feel.

My GP had no magic pills or portions to rid me of the churning inside me. Nor did he need them - all I wanted was for him to understand what I was feeling. I was given an insight into what caring for someone really means. He reassured me that people don't expect doctors to be miracle workers - all a family really wants in this type of situation is for a doctor to "be there and to care". My GP suggested that I attend the funeral service if I felt comfortable doing so. He believed it would give me a sense of closure and that it would help me to be around others with similar feelings. I sat with him in his office after all his patients had gone home, looking through the newspapers for the funeral details.

I sat through the service and listened to the account of a life I knew nothing about. I looked around at the web of friends and family she had interwoven. I was now a part of that web - she had touched me too. At the conclusion I introduced myself to her father, and told him that his daughter did not die alone, that I was there caring for her. I told him that the last few days had taught me more about caring for people, and about being a doctor, than I had learned in all my days at medical school. I told him that I was there for him and his family. With that, the tall, lanky man hugged me tightly, crying and thanking me for being there, for stopping and bothering to care. It was devastatingly sad, yet enormously relieving, and I was proud. He wanted to care for me and to share his feelings with me, something I had not expected. The simple knowledge that their daughter did not die alone was comforting to the family. They knew that if there had been a chance for her, I was there to give her that chance.

I am starting to understand what being a doctor is about. To really care for someone connects people in such a wonderful way that it can even make death seem a little less scary. Sometimes just being there can make all the difference.


Ryan J Hodges
Third-year medical student
Monash University, Melbourne, VIC

Hodges, R. (2000). Learning to become a doctor, Medical Journal of Australia, 173: 158-159.

IT'S UP!

Well, yeah. My new header is up! What do you guys think? Haha. Btw no, the cloud is not real. I brushed it out with Photoshop CS3, so it's artificial. Heh.



And just a little update on me; 2 papers down, 3 more to go! Oh yeahhh, holidays are coming near! Schedule's gonna be fully packed till the day i leave SP. Will let you guys know what i'm doing here soon. For now, gotta go study first. Ciowz! =D

NEW HEADER!

Stay tuned. ;)

TAKE FIVE!

Since my exam's coming in a few days time, i'll be taking a short 1 week break here. During these time which i will be fully concentrating on my studies and solving some little stuffs which if not solved, will complicate my life here later on. Never like this kind of feeling especially during my study week. Sigh. Anyway! It's not really that serious, i was just blabbing for the sake of blabbing. So, just forget about what i've said. Heh. And oh yeah, great news! Guess what? I'm going to Tokyo, Japan for my holidays on February! Woo yeah! Well, bet you guys know that Tokyo practically means gadgets, sashimis, cars and chicks! Can't wait to snap lotsa photos and post em' all here. Haha.

So yeah, i'll be back to the blogosphere soon. In the meantime, if you guys have any questions or comments on my post or whatsover, just leave it in the comment box beside my blog. I'll check on it from time to time and reply on them. So for the time being, take care and, wish me luck for my exams. *Though i only need 50% to pass them.* Haha! Cheers. =]

I'M DONE WITH WORLD RELIGIONS!

Just finished my World Religions paper, i'm all relaxed now. Haha. Anyway, more pics as promised this time, from my photoshooting session around the campus after the violin concert last week. Managed to get a few decent shots, though forgot to bring my tripod together with me. Most of the shots here are taken handheld. Enjoy the view of muh campus. =]


Interior.


Exterior.


Main admin building.


Water fountain in front of the main building.


Random shot.



Dennis mah senior and Wilander the dental student.


That's all for now, more pics to come up soon once i've done editing em'. Study week's coming soon, and that means i'm only one week away from the finals. So as usual, gotta go study now. Have a nice day, guys. Hope you enjoyed. Ciow.

VIOLIN CONCERT.

As promised on the previous post, i'm back with more on my current university's event updates. Well, this time it'll be the concert of the world reknowned violinist Dr. L. Subramaniam. I'm trying to cut all the craps on his biography and so on here, so if you wanna know more about him, just log onto www.wikipedia.org and search for his name. He's so popular that Wikipedia actually has his profile translated into a 42 languages! So, if you can't read English, that's a good place to start with.



Alright, back to the concert. It was held on the 30th of December, last Friday at the Great Hall of our very own Semeling campus. According to the The Star, he came to Malaysia in conjunction with India’s 60th independence and also to mark 50 years of diplomatic ties between India and Malaysia. He performed 3 concerts here in Sungai Petani, Ipoh and Kuala Lumpur respectively where all of the concert's admissions are by invitations only.





After getting know that the Grammy nominee's coming over to my campus, i went over planning to snap some photos. Most of the shots turned out blur due poor lightnings at the auditorium. Well, those shots posted here are the only ones i managed to "save".


The Emperor of Violin in action.


Dr. L. Subramaniam's troupe.


A great medical doctor turned musician.

The concert lasted for around 2 hours. Went shooting with a few friends around the campus after that. Many of the shots turn out to be great. Will update more once i'm done with the them. So gotta go study for my finals now. You, continue your walk of life. Ta.

AIMST'S EVENT COVERAGE.

Coming up next on shaun-ng.blogspot.com will be a coverage post on the world reknowned violinist, Dr. L. Subramanian concert at the Great Hall of AIMST Univesity. Have a great weekend. =]


*If you've read through StarTwo, 30th November 2007 edition. You'll know who's Dr. L. Subramaniam.