My Cousin Ling

She was my playmate when I was little, I remember playing with her barbie, lego bricks, polly pocket, play dough and paper dolls. When she stayed over at my place, we ran around my house playing hide-and-seek, climbing up the swing in my garden and also riding a motorbike and bicycle we had. She often let me have the motorbike, which I liked. My paternal grandfather always brought us out to the amusement centres, gave each of us money and we would spend the day playing, getting coupons and exchanging for toys. These playtime memories form such a significant part of my childhood, and I hold them close to my heart. Our grandfather also often bought us toys from what I remember, and we would share them and play together. We often did role playing, the nurse and the doctor, being cooks..

I guess its this early attachment we had in our childhood that she always seems so near, I always remember her as my cousin who I was really close to when we were little, who took my hand and guided me along. There is this bond between us I feel, that holds us together, although we lead busy separate lifes now. When we do get together and talk, memories of the past come rushing back..

She has been a source of inspiration to me, I often speak in awe of her. Not that she is aware of any of this, but she has been one of my positive role models in my life thus far. Friends I speak to from China are in impressed when I tell them that my cousin is staying in Beijing now, in a course many feel are difficult to enter in Peking University. She has been successful in her studies thus far, with many more other acheivements I shall leave out here. I am so happy for her.

Today is her 22nd birthday, I hope my playmate will have a great day and continue to shine like she has always been.

Happy Birthday Ling.

St John of God Hospital..

Just came back from my interview as a volunteer in St John of God Hospital, Subiaco. The interview went on rather smoothly, i would say. However, it did bring back memories of the medicine interview I had previously.. The lady asked me questions like "Tell me about yourself", "Name me 3 reasons why you want to volunteer at St John of God", " How would your friends describe you?", " What qualities do you have that will help you here?"

Getting this interview was not very easy on my part. There were application forms to fill in, confidentiality agreement, police clearance forms, and I needed 2 referrals - 1 written and 1 verbal as well, plus a copy of my passport and driver's license. So, I previously made 2 trips back to Canning college for the referral letter.. And now after the interview, there is going to be a full day orientation, which only occurs on Monday, two times a month. This means I would have to miss a day of PBL on monday! The nearest one is on this coming Monday, but unfortunately, I cant make that one because of mid sem exam on Tuesday! Really need to study.. Sigh.

Speaking of which, I had century egg porridge for supper last night! The porridge was pretty yummy, which I gulped down and then fell asleep shortly after.. Sigh. Talk about eating supper to study longer.. =) Sean went to Northbridge for supper and bought it for me.. heehee.. Only con was, I waited about 2 hrs for it! And it was slightly cold when it came, but it was yummY! Not to mention, I was lazy to heat it up at 2am in the morning..

I doubt i will be blogging much these few days, till after the exam! Just had a urge to pen down how my day has been, and to entertain the few of you who actually do read my blog! Things to look forward to after mid sem are a girls' outing on Saturday with Amanda and Shin, last Kendo lesson on Thursday, visiting my really adorable patient probably and before I forget, the Endocrine assignment due the week after. Oh yup, my friend Cheryl should be coming to Perth for a holiday!

Weekend of fun, cooking and REd!

It was Michael's 23rd birthday yesterday, and it was theme red! We (23 of us) wore red, and we had red food! Dishes prepared included strawberry spare ribs, red eggs, red bean soup, ang ku kueh, otah, kebabs (sausages and crab stick), red jelly, strawberry tarts, cookies and a cake full of strawberries on top! Planning for this celebration began about 2 weeks earlier, which is rather uncharacteristic of our usual planning! We racked our brains really early over possible red dishes, plans to get Michael into the common room, for him to wear a red shirt as well.. Things went on rather smoothly ultimately, which was great!

Cooking began at my house at about 820 am, Shin and Jasmini came to help out! We were mixing, rolling, marinating, measuring and cooking the various dishes and my fridge was really filled up! Zi yuan and Jason came over after and helped out too! I practically transported my whole kitchen over at about 230pm! 6 hours of cooking, and most time was spent kneading and being a manual blender for the cookies.. Rolling the dough out with a wine bottle, cutting out ginger bread man shaped cookies.. It was honestly alot of fun..

It was great to see that Michael was surprised, at why everyone was in red, at why his sister was there, and that he liked the collage hao printed for him.

Had gelato at night, although I was really full, from cookies, and pineapple from the kebabs we made.. Crepe with Snickerone gelato! SOunds good? After that was cleaning up.. hiyah, the day hasn't ended yet!

Sunday: I finally confirmed my new home today, and met the kind landlords who offered to help Shin and I move. Most pressing matter at hand though, is to find a 3rd housemate! I hope we can find one nice girl to move in with us!! VOlunteering was pretty great, I did tea time myself! Just that lady who called me a bloody Asian.. doesnt sound nice huH!

ANZAC day tomorrow, more to look forward to, like visiting my patient for the first time! Like trying to get work done, like hoping my money box account doesnt decrease in value further.. We shall see!

expectations

Just read a quote which I didnt quite get at first.. hee.. It read " A doctor who treats him or herself has a fool for a doctor and an idiot for a patient." HAhaa.. Think it is pretty funny!

Well, the weekend is here again! Weeks are just flying by, faster than I can relish every moment spent, I wish time can come to a standstill sometimes, then i can truly appreciate all the wonders of the world, and all the people I cherish. To take in all the beautiful sights in the world at the very moment time stops, yet have all the time in the world to reflect and think about what I have done wrong all this while, and improve! WIshful thinking, perhaps. Like how i wish days before mid sem exam were 48 hours long instead.. Oh well..

Yesterday, I filled up my calendar with things I have to do the next few weeks, my schedule is currently pretty packed. I am starting to feel the need for absolute strict discipline in my work and life.. I dont want to run astray like a wild animal, losing all direction, all focus and everything I earned so far. I want to control my time well, maximising both study and play time. I dont want to let anybody down too, especially those who hold so much hope in me, in my future. In addition, I dont want to let myself down, making the same mistakes I did before, and losing everything I cherish most currently.

My commitments are plenty, desires and hopes as well. To handle them well, is all i want to do.

My painted face for Prosh! 

PROSH 2005!

I saw devils, fairies, policemen, Tigger, gypsies, students in labcoats and other outrageous outfits. I missed out on a teapot like Mrs Pott in Beauty and the Beast. Jasmine, Nicole and I went as witches.

Woke up at 2am, and went over to Trinity (college) to Jasmine's room at 330 am. I volunteered to have my face painted first and it was my first time letting my friends paint my face! My other experience was in primary school, where I was an owl in Noah's Ark, my school's choral production. Nicole and Jasmine painted my face white and jasmine drew the web on after! She improvised, using lipstick when the black didn't really stand out... Now I have a slight problem removing it somehow..

What is PROSH? PROSH is a fundraising day UWA students have, where lessons are cancelled and we roam the streets in costumes and raise funds for selected organisations! This year, organisations included the Leukaemis Foundation and Cystic Fibrosis Association! Children are among the main beneficiaries!

The three of us had a stack of PROSH papers and a tin can and Sean fetched us to the city at about 630am. The streets were already full of Uni students and most of the walking pedestrians were already attacked by the invasion of queerly dressed students. We finally found our spot to park ourselves at, a one way street in the city! That spot was really good, cos the traffic lights turned red pretty fast, and when it did, the 3 of us sold papers to the cars that stopped. Many of them wound down their windows and signalled us over, which was really great! On average, we could have sold about 4 papers per traffic light.. Not to mention the rather steady flow of pedestrians walking up the street..

What amazed me about Prosh was that most of the public came to us wanting to donate, most of them already knew what Prosh was! We just had to shout, " Would you like a Prosh paper?" and majority of them responded, even the random tourist on further elaboration. What struck me even more was the generosity of the public, about 5 of them paid a $5 note and 1 gentleman gave us $10! Mind you, they walked towards us with the bill ready in their hands! We completed our stack at 830 am and walked back towards the main shopping area! We even helped this other girl sell a portion of her papers!

Subway for breakfast was great! We received a few compliments about our dressing, that it was coordinated, scary, pretty nice! Glad that those came, as we prepared really last minute! Went back to Trinity after and took alot more photos!

I really enjoyed Prosh! My first experience, and probably wont be my last i hope. Dressing up was exciting as well, I remember Sean putting loads of powder in my hair to give me gray hair! I remember the generally positive response of the public and of course, I will always remember the fun I had on this witchy wednesday!

What a DaY!

My back aches from carrying my bag, which contained my Moore textbook and an instant anatomy textbook, labcoat and lab book.. I went for tutorial unprepared, hoping that all would turn out well, cos my tutor is a year 5 med student who is pretty nice. I walked into class 5 mins late, unprepared (I was supposed to read 2 articles) and it turned out that my tutor was on a hospital rotation he couldn't change! So the lecturer took over and my pre-tutorial was blank! Amazingly, the tutorial went on pretty alright, I was just super silent throughout!

What happened was I went to Claremont with Jasmine, Nicole and Jason before tutorial, after anatomy lab. We want to go for Prosh tomorrow, which is a day that is dedicated to fund-raising for children, by selling a newspaper our students wrote. We collect our tins at dawn tomorrow and the newspapers and head out to the streets to sell them, asking for donations! All lessons are cancelled in the morning, but I have absolutely no lessons tomorrow! I missed out on Prosh 2004, and I am ready to do some fund raising tomorrow! So, people usually go for Prosh dressed in crazy costumes so we went to the party shop in Claremont to get an idea of a theme!

We boarded bus 23 when it came, and happily sat till the bus made a left turn.. Our destination was striaght ahead and then we realised we shouldnt have boarded that bus! We back tracked after and when we reached the party shop, we went in and saw many possible costumes we could come up with.. Like a caveman, cheerleader, angel, Hawaiian girls! I guess I was trying to minimise cost, since its a one-off event too! Guess what? We decided on witches! We bought a witch hat, cape and witch make-up with a crooked nose each, and black nail polish! It cost us about $19 per person in total.. Will post some photos soon!

Tomorrow at 3.30am, we are going to have fun and dress up! Not forgetting the broom! Well, we rushed back after because I had a tutorial at 3 pm and Jasmine and Nicole had stuff to do too.. We boarded bus 98 and usually Uni has 2 possible bus stops we can stop at and Jasmine and I decided to stop at the second one. Jason and Nicole left at the first and we were approaching the 2nd, when the bus made a left turn! Doesnt it sound familiar? We got brought to the Medicine faculty which was further away! Sigh. More walking with my heavy bag, and I was rushing for my tutorial!

HAha.. Now that the day is finally over, I cant wait for morning to come in a way, going for Prosh! Heard that there will be a PROSHcession, where the different faculties made floats! The medicine theme this year is Carribbean! Hope the 3 of us look great tomorrow and have heaps of fun!

Quotes..

I love reading quotes. I feel that alot of quotes are so simple in wording, yet the meaning behind them is often so deep and meaningful. Quotes on time, success, discipline, friendship, tried finding excellent quotes on these topics before. Different quotes apply to different situations, and some might mean alot to a particular person, and be insignificant to another.

I am supposed to be studying right now. I feel that I have a serious discipline problem! It is a problem I have been facing, which I find so hard to correct! Timetables hardly work for me i admit. Despite planning and planning.. Many aspects of my life needs discipline, like watering my plants outside my house.. (My landlord wants them alive because his mum gave it to him, and we havent watered it the whole of last year.. I started watering them this year and leaves started sprouting! Really happy.)Like doing groceries, laundry, going for lessons, being on time for appointments..

However, in some aspects of my life, I really lack discipline! Like how one of my aims this year is to keep accounts.. Succeeded for 1 month, but after that my money mysteriously disappeared. Like keeping to my timetable.

Have always wanted to find a good quote on discipline, think I might have one to share today..

'Discipline - Success doesn't just happen. You have to be intentional about it, and that takes discipline.' - John Maxwell

I hope this stays in my mind, and spurs me on to keep to my goals!

Happy Me!

Just stepped home from Hollywood Senior Citizens Village.. Today was my first day volunteering there, as a tea lady primarily. I was supposed to reach at 930, decided to be early than late, and reached about 925 am. When I stepped in, there were already about 4 people sitting in the recreation room, waiting for tea to be served. I waited for a staff member to arrive, and then got led into the kitchen, where she (Debbie) taught me how to make tea! We then pushed the trolley into the recreation room, and then she said, " That lady over there is Mrs X, she drinks white coffee" and "That gentleman over there is Mr Y, he drinks tea" and she went on and on! I was like.. I mean, how am I going to remember? Even as I type now, I can barely remember! Then she started pouring out cups of tea and coffee all with milk, and i couldn't even differentiate them. Then guess what she did? She just served them, saying, they will drink anything, and told me to just ask them individually the next time. Sigh! Each of them then got a slice of pizza to eat!

I stood there feeling quite useless as they ate and drank, and then this other lady told me to unload and load the dishwasher.. My first time using the dishwasher. Hee.. And apparently I loaded the cups wrongly.. OOPS! Most of the ladies then told me that they enjoyed tea alot and thanked me for it.. For the little I did, that warrant such gratitude shown, made me feel so honoured, to be able to serve them a simple cup of tea or coffee. My action is almost insignificant, but meant something to them.

I particularly remember this lady. After tea, she asked me where the recreation room was. I was not very sure actually, cos I thought that there could be 2 of them. This kind gentleman cued to me that where we were was indeed the recreation room. I told the lady, "This is it" and she said thanks. I headed off to the kitchen, pushing the trolley back and she walked behind me and came into the kitchen, asking me again where the recreation room was. I brought her to it, and the kind gentleman was still sitting there. That lady asked me once more where the recreation room was, and I repeated myself. THEN, she asked me whether she should sit there and wait for the next activity, I said " Probably so" and you know what? She replied saying, " You mean you dont bloody know?" The gentleman gave me a grin then. As I walked past the room again, I avoided her path of vision, and the gentleman waved me goodbye. I know she didnt mean to be difficult, many of them have poor memory, and have problems with the days even. Maybe I should know the area better and the activities they have lined up after tea!

I headed off to my next destination, Mrs Grace's room. The first time I met her, the volunteer coordinator asked her whether she had anything for me to do, and she said she had loads of dusting to be done. The coordinator was very amused by that and told me that she had never expected her to ask me to do her dusting! I was perfectly fine with that, and was ready to do some spring cleaning, which actually my room requires too. Mrs Grace is a really kind lady. She often said she felt really bad that I had to do her cleaning, and she said, "You have no idea how grateful I am that you can do my dusting" and also "I am so pleased.." I often replied that it was not a problem at all. She felt so bad she couldnt make me a cup of tea cos she was expecting visitors. I couldnt believe it when she told me she was going to turn 98 2 weeks later. She asked me to guess, and I was about to guess 80! Mrs Grace is going to be an elderly I will most probably visit weekly! She said she has more dusting to be done next Sunday!

As i thought about the comments they made, when I served them tea or dusted their furniture, it is just this kind of satisfaction I enjoy and yearn. To be able to help, with my able mind and body, I know, this is something I have always wanted and loved to do. Can't wait for next Sunday!

That's me at The GAP - where Australia and Antartica used to be joined together millions of years ago! 

I wish I did..

My third attempt at starting a blog. I have been reading my friends' blogs and this has let me to know what has been going on in their lifes. Many of them probably think I don't read them anymore, but hey, I really do. I am trying to read these blogs on a regular basis, simply because these friends mean so much to me. I cherish their friendship deeply, and although we are hardly in touch, I still often think about them. Maybe my blog will have that same effect on some of my friends, for that, I really have no answer to that.

My second attempt at writing a blog was pretty successful actually, for a while. Managed to write in it for a couple of months regularly, before I questioned myself whether I really wanted people to know my innermost thoughts and feelings. However, I realised over time, that only people who really care, bother to type the url of your blog and be updated on one's happenings. I guess, its like watering a plant. Only if you really care about the plant, will you wake up in the morning each day and water that plant, which can otherwise die away and be forgotten.

For that, I start my third blog attempt.

[For my dearest friend Ling, I wish I had followed your blog. Not knowing that you were feeling so down, really affects me. I wish I can be the friend I hoped I can/had been. I wished that I have read it and gave you a ring once I saw it. I wished I did.]