Rotorua

So today I had my TI year orientation day at Rotorua Hospital. Now, equipped with my pager, swipe card and ID I'm ready to hit the wards! Woohoo. Finished early at 3pm which was a plus. The staff down here were really welcoming (and yes, we did have to sing a waiata). Apparently the 4 medical teams fight over who gets the 2 interns xD guess I'll find out who I'm with tomorrow. Going to be 8am starts for the rest of the year it seems so better get used to it now.


The medical long case is the biggest assessment in TI year and I want to be really prepared for it. From tomorrow onwards, I'm going to do my very best to maximise all possible practical experience in the wards and ED. I want to start the year on a strong note which will hopefully set the pace for the rest of the year.

It's so hot today. Last time I checked the temperature it was 28 degrees! The mornings seem to be cooler than Auckland but it gets really hot towards the afternoon and evening. I guess summer really has come in a big way over here. Need to find where I put my short sleeved business shirt. Might have left it in Auckland by mistake.

Anyhow, time to find something to distract myself with before dinner.

A New Beginning

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Monday, January 7, 2013

Well it feels like years since my last post. I wonder how long I'm going to be able to keep up this blogging before I get lazy again. I guess I start blogging when I start having too much time on my hands. Even though I've been on break for over 2 months (yay for uni holidays) I seem to have been able to keep myself busy with something. Well, time to get back into it! You'll see that I've given my blog a little clean-up so it looks more visually appealing (well to me anyway). I've changed the title to something a little more meaningful too, heh. I guess I get bored of things too quickly these days.

There's so much to catch up with on here I don't know where to start! Well first things first. I passed all my 5th year exams! Woohoo, bring on Trainee Intern year (and the money, $_$)! I start on Monday in Rotorua Hospital. Kind of nervous too, I guess. Being that one step above a medical student, harbouring that extra responsibility and all that. I worry about being able to contribute to the medical team and not being a burden like I'm used to being. Especially after all those weeks of holiday I'd convinced myself I'd earned. Even though I've been trying to do some study these last few days I still feel like I'm scraping the surface of the endless volume of information I should know after 5 years of medical school. What's worse is that we might have to sing a Waiata (Maori song) on orientation day. Someone save me.

On another note, interning in Rotorua means that I get to freeload off my parents for a WHOLE YEAR (for those of you who don't know, I spent my intermediate and high school years in Rotorua, and my parents never moved since i went to uni)! Hooray. I know for most Aucklanders this is probably just a given for most of their university life but it isn't for me. It's nice to not have to worry about chores, grocery shopping and cooking every single day. Sure, there'll be time that I'll have to do the odd dishes, vacuuming or gardening around the place but that's nothing compared to living away in an apartment. And all the money I'll save. One the downside I won't be able to see little mikorikawa as much. I'm sure both of us will be having a busy year anyway. I guess there's always skype and other communication modalities ot keep in touch.

So what have I been spending the past 2 months doing? Well for starters I've been doing a bit of random gaming. I finished Kingdom Hearts, Halo and Halo 2. Old games, I know. Just felt like playing other than the ol' Starcraft 2. I bought a month of RuneScape membership for lols. Gosh that game has changed. Trying to monetize everything now. Used to be such a good game, now its just like the rest of them, although it does hold a bit of nostalgia for me . I got pretty bored over the holiday. Mikorikawa had a log going on at that time so didn't get to spend much quality time with her. Ah well, that's life. Can't have everything I guess (but doesn't hurt to try).

  















We did however manage to watch some movies together! We watched some movies from the Avengers series (Iron Man, Hulk, Captain America) and going to re-watch the Avengers with all that backstory fresh in our minds! I quite like superhero movies. We also watched Wreck it Ralph! I don't usually enjoy kids' movies, but this one was an exception.

   



I also watched some anime. Of the ones I watched, Sword Art Online and Accel World stood out particularly in terms of storyline  Definitely some of the best anime I've ever seen, along with Fate Zero, Death Note and Code Geass. I also watched Highschool of the Dead which is a good series if you like lots of bloody graphic zombie violence ^_^

Sword Art Online!

Accel World!
And Blogger just crashed (and somehow saving a blank copy of this post), making me type out all of that text AGAIN. How annoying. Oh well hope that doesn't happen again. Now I've lost my train of thought. I just re-read my last blog post 3 months ago and remembered how I'd wanted to buy an iPhone 5. Well in the end I decided to save myself $300 and get a Samsung Galaxy S3. What can I say, its an excellent phone and not regretting the purchase one bit. It is a bit big but the huge screen size is really great when browsing the web and using maps, which I do so a bit when I'm out. And it's got NFC (which iPhone 5 doesn't) which I reckon is the way of the future. Apple will probably release their next iPhone with NFC as its main selling point, knowing them.

There was a whole lot more I wanted to add to this post but I'm just going to end it here while I'm ahead.


I suppose it's about time I wrote something here, since it's been about 2 months since my last post and circumstances have prevented me from keeping this thing updated.


My last few posts have been moderately suggestive of activity in my life that could not be disclosed due to the nature of this blog (ie. public). And what can I say, the 13th of June marks the day that I started dating mikorikawa ^^. I can't go into much detail about what's been going on these past 2 months but I can say that this has certainly been a new experience for me. Having a girlfriend has definitely opened my eyes to some of the flaws in my personality, heh. I'm still getting used to having someone; sometimes I do go about things as if I was single since it's just simply what I've been doing for so long. I've found I had to learn to re-evaluate previously familiar situations with this new context, otherwise I might end up being misinterpreted >< Such is the nature of this world, people do like to jump to conclusions rather quickly about such issues I find. Anyhow, it's a learning experience for me and I'm definitely going to do my best to make the most of it.

My mid-year break was largely spent studying and hanging out with mikorikawa and was possibly one of the most enjoyable 2 weeks of the year. 2 weeks of freedom, good company and moderate productivity; I can't recall the last time I felt so comfortable with my life and it goes without saying those two weeks went by very quickly. You might remember my post "My Type of Girl" from a while back, I honestly didn't think I'd find someone like her and I was quite prepared to enjoy single-dom for many, many more years. It's not that I didn't have confidence in myself as a person, but it was that my expectations were pretty damn specific. There really aren't many people who can understand me as a person and I've long accepted that reality. I just feel lucky to have mikorikawa since it's nice to be able to share your thoughts with someone who really understands and accepts you.

Uni's been pretty steady over the past few months although it has been hard for both of us since I've been down in Rotorua for most of the time doing Orthopaedics and now Medicine. Ortho was quite a relaxed and enjoyable run; it came to a surprise that that's the only ortho teaching we'll have in med school. I could do without the extra rheumatology, though, heh. Totally failed that station at the OSCE. Medicine has been really interesting and quite intellectually stimulating, although there's a hell of a lot to know and sometimes ward rounds go on for 6 hours! Lots to see and do, I'm already looking forward to doing medical runs as a House Officer xD you're always kept busy and there never seems to be a dull moment. I've grown to quite like Rotorua Hospital too, the close-knit and friendly environment really has grown on me. Pity that the city lifestyle has already gotten a fairly firm grip on me, I can't imagine myself working and living in a town like Rotorua in the long term. I can understand why so many people want to live in Auckland. There are just so many more opportunities. Even though I know as a medical practitioner you have the freedom to train anywhere in the country I don't think I could give up Auckland that easily. I find when you live in a town like Rotorua your social connections are far too restricted and you can't meet people who can really relate to you, simply because there are too few of those people there. Being different from most people I find this affects people like me a lot. So what if I don't want to join you drinking on Friday night. I'm not going to change myself just because the majority of the country places value in getting drunk and having a wild social life. Not that I mind being alone, I'd just rather not be if I had the choice.

I don't know how this rambling started, I guess I'm just trying to justify myself staying in Auckland since my parents keep nagging me to stay and live in Rotorua after I graduate. I really don't know where I'm going to end up in 3 years time but I do have a feeling I want to be in Auckland. Auckland has become my home. Going back "home" to Rotorua feels like leaving, and coming back to Auckland feels like coming back for real. Guess such feelings can't be helped when you're attached to a place you call your home.

Anyway I should be sleeping now, just finished skyping the dear one and gotta make it to the 8am ward round tomorrow.

Synchronicity

Posted on

Thursday, August 4, 2011

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Hi, I'm Jeff! Welcome to my blog, where I share random thoughts and things about my life. Enjoy :)