To Ikea I Went

Today I didn't have classes and at first planned to stay at home to study for my upcoming msk exam this friday.

But in the end I decided to make a quick trip to Ikea (well as quick as I could) to get a new table lamp. Coz the old one was really irritating and impairing my ability to study :P excuses! haha but really, it was kinda dark and the bulb was sticking out of the shade so when I look straight ahead, it was too glaring. make me go @.@

Anyway, so off I went. It was good weather to me. Cloudy and windy.

I had to take the train to a suburb then take another bus to Ikea. And the murals in the train station there were really pretty. So I managed to take some photos to show you guys what I mean. (putting my camera to good use eh ^^)

Enjoy!

corridor to the other side

depicting the perth train - looks pretty real to me


interesting - her facial features are so sharp!

this is what happens when you have long hair in space! lol

giant at bridge?

omg love those fusion of colours there!

animals having recreation time, haha!

So what do you guys think? Really beautiful works of art, huh?

It's amazing how they encourage this sort of creativity here. A lot of imagination must have gone into this, these few pictures aren't really enough to show you the whole big picture!

Anyway, since I was there, decided to have lunch at Ikea. The lunch there is really delicious and cheap too (comparing to other food outside)!

And my absolute favourite there is Swedish Meatballs!

If you thought the ones at Ikea Malaysia are good, you haven't tried these yet!! Seriously, these are really to-die-for-melt-in-your-mouth meatballs!!

Chye reckoned it's because they added pork inside, thats why it's so tasty! hehe

I decided to have dessert too, but instead of the Daim cake which is as yummy as the one I had in Msia, I decided to try the chocolate mousse.

my verdict? too damn sweet even for me. I couldn't finish it, which was a pity =/

Anyway, so that was the part of my day which wasn't spent trying to force myself to concentrate on my lectures notes.

And yes, I'm very satisfied with my new table lamp now. :) Hopefully I will be able to study better!

Okay back to my notes! Wish me luck. kthxbai.

The Little Things

These are the little things that make my days here more worthwhile.

Funny, inspiring, teary, clueless

But they are all messages of love and care from my friends.

I shall hold them close to my heart. Miss you all dearly!

PS: Daylight Saving is over! Got to sleep an extra hour hehe.. And now the time is the same as malaysia too!

Entwined Hearts

Isn't this so cute?

I got this pair of hearts from IKEA sometime ago coz they were super cheap and for charity too!

They are now hanging on the handles of my walk in wardrobe. (yesh I have a walk in wardrobe, can you believe it??)

Btw, do you like how I photoshopped this photo? Looks cool, right?

I hope by looking at these hearts, they will remind me that even though we are thousands of miles apart, our hearts are always together. :)

Blushing Drinkers

Apparently people whose faces turn red when they drink alcohol may be facing more than embarrassment. The flushing may indicate an increased risk for a deadly throat cancer, researchers report.

Oh my! That is totally me! My face flushes so red even though I just had a little to drink..

You can read the whole article here.

Well I guess that gives me an excuse to drink less.. well not that I'm drinking a lot to start with, so that would be alright. :)

Anyway, just thought this will be an interesting article to share. Will blog more during the weekend.

Splinters Of The Heart

Yesterday I caught a glimpse of you. Was it really you?

You in that light purple shirt of yours that I really like. Sitting in a chair with your elbows on your knee, leaning forward trying to catch what the doctor was saying.

I turned around again, hoping against hope but... obviously you weren't there anymore.

Just an illusion. That makes my heart aches even more.

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Today we shared smiles for the second time. Even though we were strangers.

Why?

Maybe in the split seconds that our gazes cross, we realised that we have many things in common.

There was a tinge of real warmth in your smile. Unlike some other ones which I have encountered before this.

Do you think I will be like you in a few years' time?

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It's not funny.

I'm trying my best to be understanding but here you come stomping on my efforts. I know my attempts are pathetic but at least let me try.

Up and down. Up and down. Downs more than ups. The cycle goes on. I wonder.. for how long more?

Snapshot

Everybody please put your hands together and welcome this new member to my entourage!

I finally got myself a camera last weekend! yays. :)

And it's the Canon Powershot A480!!

10.0 Megapixels and 3.3 times zoom.

for a great price of AUD166! bargain right?

And I also got a 4gb memory card for AUD19 and a pouch for AUD16! So the total just comes up to just AUD201!! Absolutely loving it. ^^

And here's a rare pic of me in this blog. Testing it out in the big mirror in the toilet hehe.

Ini tak payah caption lar

So!! Nonid to keep borrowing other ppl's cameras already! paiseh lo after some time haha.. thks though, Debbi! :)

The camera is pretty user friendly actually. After some fidgeting with it, I could understand how to use most of the functions!

And watch this space for more pictures in the future... Hope it won't totally be filled with words like now haha! toodles!

If I Had One Wish

LDR is not easy.

An occasional webcam can only substitute so much.

If I had one wish, I will wish you can be here with me.

But I must stay strong.

Coz what we have is something special. And it will be all worth it in the end.

Right?

Labour Of Love: Part I

Edited again: And yet again, I have replaced and added some photos to this post. It gets better eh!

Edited: Finally managed to get photoshop in this comp. so the photos have been replaced with better ones! haha, enjoy!

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Yesh I know my blog has been devoid of photos recently, that has been due to a combo of = lack of own camera + lack of photoshop on this new comp yet + lazyness on my own part.

Anyhow, with Debbi's camera (thanks!) + smothering the perfectionist in me by allowing these photos to go on my blog without photoshop, these photos are finally able to see the daylight. Do pardon me if the lighting and what not is not perfect.

Okay I will go get my camera soon! Saw some pretty good deals. What do u guys think? Which brand is better? Canon, Olympus or Samsung? Pls lemme know!

Better stop digressing. Anyway here are the photos of some of the food that I cooked in the past 2 weeks. I need more ideas! haha..

claypot chicken rice without claypot!

haha I love shitake mushrooms so much! yummy. Recipe here.

steamed chicken and stir fried vege

one of my standard favs.

pasta with boulognaisse sauce!

hoho chicken rice! cooked from scratch! yes i'm serious

Recipe available here. and because I was having a craving for chicken rice at that time. lol

this is the pasta that I said we copied from italiannies last time.

Very simple. Just pasta mixed with raisins and apple slices and with a dressing of mayonaisse. I added sausages though

and tada~!! fish and chips!

very simple to make using my mum's recipe hehe. if you wanna know can ask me :)

Okie that's all for now. Hope you all enjoyed the photos! And gimme more ideas for cooking pls. I don't like eating the same food again and again. haha. But I always take so damn long to finish cooking. It is indeed the labour of love for me. Must..be...more..efficient!!

And guess what. It's finally friday again! I hope I will have time/energy to blog more during the weekend. Cya for now!

Lost Generation?

As a sidetrack to normal blogging and a distraction for my bmedsci frenz having exams soon, check out this video!

Really cool and strong message. :)

Had a pretty good day today for once. Hope tomorrow will proved to be a good one as well.

PS: Good luck to those having exams tomorrow! ^^

TGIF

Thank god it's friday! This week has not been an easy one, really.

For msk, we are not allocated wards or teams. And we have this workbook of 14 clinical examinations we hvta fill in. So instead, we hvta see patients in clinics (which quite sadly, we are only allowed 2 rheumato and 2 orthopaedic clinics in this 1 month max) or else hvta hunt down patients in wards that we are not attached to.

NOT my fav job in the world. Kacau-ing doctors that I'm not attached to. haha but still I did it! I paged a random dr the other day and talked to a few other drs just to find patients. Can you believe it? I'm becoming more pushy assertive like how the angmohs are. >.<

And still I find it difficult to do it on my own. Coz I'm still a bit lost when it comes to msk clinical examination! Need to find ppl to gimme feedback. And hence the search for a partner.

Anyway, I partnered with 4 different ppl before finding someone who seemed like a good match. Two were too assertive (you get my point? without me being too obvious) and one was part of a big group so didn't think it was a good idea to separate him from his group. It was only today that I found a girl that was also looking for a partner and seemed rather nice. She's from sri lanka originally so kinda reminded me of my sri lankan friends back home in imu.

The ppl here learnt examination of the knee and elbow in 3rd year but it was all rather new to me. The knee examination is pretty complicated! Lucky she was nice enough to teach me. :) I must brush up more on it.. sigh.

So far, am not really liking this msk posting. I don't think orthopaedics are my cup of tea. Lifting obese legs off the bed is a struggle for me. =/ sorry I not enough strength lar. But at least the patients are more lucid. (some are too lucid that they will talk nonstop!)

Rheumatology is not too bad tho. I'm not too bad when it comes to examining hand joints for nodes or ostephytes or whatever. But other joints? not so good. Need more practice!! And don't forget confidence. The angmohs are pretty confident even if they know nuts sometimes. They can pretty much talk their way thru anything. I must pretend to be confident since I am not! YESH!

And I feel I don't have enough time to study! Everyday it's come home from hospital, take super long time to cook (I dunno why, I'm slow I guess) then shower then sit down in front of computer and stone. Okay not stone lah but do what I need to do that day like write up stuff or whatever but then it willl be time to sleep - wei no time study eh!! :O

Must try to squeeze out some time. okay. Speaking of that, this is a pretty long post for once and I need to write out the clinical examinations we did today before I forget. Can't wait to finish that logbook!

Ciao for now! Weekend is here hurray!

Take A Break

Okay better to update my blog now or else Yannie say will abandon my blog ade T_T haha can't believe I'm updating my blog so little now.

What's the best effective way to kill a blogger's enthusiam? Clinicals years! lol.

Anyway, we went to have a late dinner at this lovely italian restaurant called Ciao Italia which gets the thumbs up from me! The carbonara is to die for, the taste is so.. genuine!! The bosses of the restaurant are italian so this is the real deal hehe.

Then we went to the casino just for fun. The guys won some money and I tried my luck at one of those machines thingamajig. I almost lost all of my 2 dollars (yes I know I bet very small but sorry lar, I tak cukup duit ade) but at the very end, I got a big win and won back my 2 dollars. I declare it a sign from the powers-to-be that they wanted me to stop playing hahaha.. :P

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MSK didn't start out very fun for the first day. Was pretty stressed out coz they bombarded us with so much stuff in a short period of time. @.@

But today's sessions were so much better. Was able to get a better handle of things. I need to chill a bit and don't put so much stress on myself.. yeah. Wish that I can have more 'me' time and study time too..

Okay that's it for now, my hair is dry already so time for me to say hi to my lovely comfy bed. And bye to you guys!

PS: Yannie, is this post satisfactory? :P up to expectations? *raises eyebrow*

PPS: I keep feeling like wanna put "Have a kit kat" after my post title lol

Messy

I do not want to get involved in this sticky affair.. It's none of my business, really.

Yet my heart asks me to help another poor soul. But good advice is always bitter, isn't it? Never easy to listen to.

And I can't bring myself to cause your whole world to come crashing down upon you. I can't be too harsh, too direct. I can only hint around the subject and give my views.

However it's only yourself that can wake yourself up from the nightmarish world that you have imprison yourself in. A world built on your own fantasy and ideals.

I wish you good luck.

Past Week

Oh noes, I really must force myself to update more. Cannot go on like this. Sei! all my readers run away ade! haha..

Anyway, it's been a busy week, as usual. Busy will be the most overused word in my blog for the next few years I think. aihs.

So, geriatrics is finally done! Can't believe 1 month just whooshed past so fast! Next up will be MSK which means I hvta get used to things again. New teams, new wards. Lucky still at the same hospital though. It's just a 15 min bus ride so it's pretty convenient.

Oh ya, I got a pretty good mark for my case report which is great! The doctor commented that I was motivated and hardworking.. which really made my day. :) I'm happy that my hard work paid off. Not in the sense of studying (coz slack quite often blek) but in the sense of on time for ward rounds and enthusiam I guess.

Must continue to keep the fire burning!!

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We finally had the imu annual gathering today. It was a bbq at Maltida Bay. Food was plentiful and we made brownies too! hehe yeah my famous fudge brownies :P

We met some of the 5th years, 6th years and interns and residents too. Too many that I'm confused about the names and who's who. lol. We probably shld have more gatherings in the future so that we can bond better yeh. *winks*

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Oh ya, we finally went to get the coffee table from Bibiana too. Thanks so much! Now we finally have a place to eat dinner haha..

And I have been dilligently cooking the past week. Trying to save some money coz spent quite a bit while settling in. And ready served food here so damn expensive! haih. But if I cook myself, so much cheaper le. I will post up the photos of some of the food I cooked ya when I get them from Debbi. Probably shld consider getting a camera soon. Saw some reasonably priced ones earlier.

So anticipate the food photos! I have been pretty creative! Online recipes are fun! keke.

PS: yesh sorry for the boring uncreative title. My brain juices are dry ade!

One Day

Last Sunday marked the full 6 weeks I've been in this new place called Perth.

People often like to ask us: "how is Perth so far?" I guess it's not too bad. Lots of ups and downs though.

But I know I'm getting there. It's just a matter of time.

One day, I will be able to view this place as home and not feel like a stranger trying to blend in. trying to find my way around. trying to camouflage myself.

I await that one day. yes.