BFF's Days Out

Lily and I have long planned to go on a getaway trip immediately after she passed the medical board exam, however due to our obvious incongruent schedule, it never pushed through. She's Marawi-based now practicing her craft as a general physician while I am here in the metro to reach the point where she's already at. Another plan came about last December---we plotted our itinerary--either at Anawangin, Zambales or Baguio City but her work inhibited her to come. Nevertheless, she promised to visit me here before she gets married!!! Hah!!

Yes, my bestfriend's getting married!! People are getting married while I'm the only person stuck in the state of lovelessness. Ouch. Lovelessness. The word strikes like a knife. Hahaha! Not that I'm in a hurry for it. No, no, no. Back to the topic,  it actually came as a surprise---that she agreed to tie the knot because the moment her groom expressed his desire to her family to marry her, she unhesitatingly opposed the idea for many reasons. But in our culture, once the bride's family saw the sincerity in the groom and his family while reaching the minimum requirement set by the former, then the wedding bells will begin to ring. Moreover, a boyfriend-girlfriend relationship is NOT a prerequisite for marriage. She tried talking to her parents out of it but most often than not, the family's wish always prevails. Besides, I think she saw no point in arguing. Among us, one shows respect to parents by following their will (I say whims) even if it is against one's own. Now I ponder, sometimes it's not a bad idea to become a bad girl. LOL! 

Two weeks before her wedding date, she arrived here and stayed with me for almost 5 days. We lost two days of bonding due to my duty schedule but I fully gave all my time to her on the remaining three days. Just like the old times, we talked about our current lives and the following phases to come. Since childhood,  Lily and I were at odds at some things but as we grow older, we managed to cut the opposite points and agreed to meet halfway. I guess that's friendship is all about, a two-way relationship between people who both want to be understood (specially during our teenage years when we fight at least once a week but we still go to school together and go home together even if we didn't speak to each other!!). That's how we become best of friends, because we have tolerated each other's slip-ups!!

Since we didn't have time for a well-planned out of town trip, we instead basked in each other's company hopping from one mall to another in search of perfect tops and shoes. I even accompanied her to the place where we buy scrub suits (seen in the rightmost, lowermost photo above). The usual girly stuff---clothes, food..and boys. Her boys, at that. Haha! There are a lot of things that happened while she's here, I don't think I'm authorized to divulge some as they will remain as bestfriend's secret but suffice it to say that her trip was a memorable one! A life-changing one we will never forget for the rest of our lives. I am extra thankful that I was there for her when she needed me most. She scared me to death, I've never seen her in that state before and never worried for her  like that in our entire two decades of friendship, but I believe I played my role as a friend. :'(

Bez, as you embark on another phase of your life, I wish you open your eyes and see the goodness that it will bring. When you were here, I feel bad that I can't relate to what you were going through because I never had that thing, you know (haha! loser!) and I can't seem to form the words that would at least appease you. I thought I lost the spontaneity of speaking. But I felt you. I know you very well, therefore I know you will be the happiest. I wish you all the love, joys and blessings in this lifetime. I may not be there on your momentous day but I am sending all my love to you! You will always be in my prayers. :) I will end this entry with a verse from The Holy Qur'an and I hope you will ponder on it as you find in your heart the beauty of  acceptance, letting-go and an ability to give love a second chance. 

“And it may be that you dislike a thing which is good for you and that you like a thing which is bad for you. Allah knows but you do not know.” (AI-Baqarah, 2:216)

Hand Me Tha' Scalpel

Back to some hospital lovin' stuff, I'm already on my third week in Surgery. This would be our second to the last major rotation, we still have one month remaining at Pedia after ORL and Ophtha. This is my second most loved rotation next to Pediatrics, perhaps because I've had too much amazement of the subject back when I was a clinical clerk. I also see surgeons as the COOLEST people in the medical field, they're neither the nerds nor the laid back guys. They're just awesome! As it turns out, I have a thing for Surgeons rather than Surgery itself. LOL! Kidding! Seriously, I am enjoying every single moment in this rotation just like when I was a clerk. 

On our first two weeks, we manned the Surgery-ER where we did wound suturing and inserting IV lines, the usual stuff. There were less suturing here as compared to when I was a clerk, that's because of the existence of hierarchy (residents > interns) and there are separate Trauma interns to share the job with us. Reminds me of my good ol' clerkship days where I had seen practically ALL kinds of TRAUMA cases and had to suture ALL kinds of avulsed or lacerated wounds. Kanya kanyang style ng pagtatahi! The good thing about our first two weeks was how we are entrusted to do our own operations at the Minor OR. I never had that experience---breast fibroadenoma and polyp excision! Awesome! I thought I couldn't do it, but hey, I DID! High five for that! :) I was really nervous on the first day. My resident just made me palpate the mass and verbally instructed me how to do it. I figured it in my mind and continued with the surgery squeezing out all that confidence in me. I succeed with the first patient and the others except on our last day when a a certain patient's mass was so deep and quite large (~3 x 4 cm) and I kept hitting on arteries which bled quite profusely! I was so scared I had to seek my resident's help! She controlled the first bleeder by ligating the bleeding artery using cotton tie and came my lightbulb moment. Aha! Oo nga 'noh, bakit nga ba hindi ko naisipan yun. I am such a panic. So there, I used the same technique for the rest of those lecheng bleeders I encountered. 

Five days later, one of those patients followed-up at the OPD and I was thankful she had no complications. Haha! Otherwise, I don't think I can forgive myself.

Surgery is one helluva coolest and tough field! That's why I don't blame Surgery residents who feel so astig  even if they don't look like one! Haha! Peace yo! :) 

We are currently at the Wards under the GS2/3 services. That's the Colorectal and Hepatobiliary services. Good thing about Surgery here at PGH is that we are given the option which field we might wanna take. So I took GS2/3 rather than GS1/Trauma. GS1 comprises of head, neck and gastric cases. I avoided Trauma simply because with all conviction, I would explicitly say I loathe Trauma. I don't like the subject and I don't like the patients. Most often than not, they are those who are brought to the hospital because of their own fault. Usually vehicular crashes and/or stab wounds are the cases. These are the social liabilities that I feel like they don't deserve my time and energy. I am so mean at that, but I just feel exactly that way towards Trauma.

On our last week, we would be exposed to subspecialty fields however we are only to choose one among the four subspecs (Plastic Surgery, Thoracocardiovascular Surgery, Pediatric Surgery and Urology). I chose Pediatric Surgery. :)

I don't see myself as a Surgeon one day but I am happy that I'm enjoying this rotation. 

Plus, I always wear an extra smile on my face pa everyday. :)

Rx: Ice Cream.

There's no medical prescription to cure bad days. I tell you, only ICE CREAM can do the math! I deny having sweet tooth but with ice cream, it has got that magical feeling that wipes all the blues away!! Yes, magical, that's the term. Woot! :)

Homemade banoffee pie ice cream. It was made from FRESH BANANA mashed into the coffee-flavored ice cream. Voila! 

My bad. I forgot the name of that Japanese homemade ice cream store located at the 2nd floor of Robinson's Ermita, Midtown wing. The one with purple furniture? That is so visible. 

I had banoffee pie ice cream that came with a message: 

"To live is like to LOVE---all reason is against it, and all healthy instinct for it."

I didn't get it. Something wrong with the grammar, perhaps? 

Next time you have bad day after assisting a consultant who doesn't seem to get satisfied with  how you assist ("iha, hindi ganyan. i-retract mo pa." "'wag mo masyado i-retract, masisira ang tissue". ano po ba talaga? e kung kayo na lang mag-retract? try nyo lang po. LOL.), try some scoop of ice cream! :) If you have funds, try Caramia's gelato. I bet you'll forget you ever had a bad day! Nomnom! 

The Artist's Walk

As we are about to leave the hospital this morning with my co-interns, I walked the opposite direction as I wave my hand goodbye. I had in my mind to pass through the hallway at IM wards that leads to the hospital's main entrance which faces Taft Avenue. One of them noticed my unusual route and suggested to walk with him instead to the usual route we normally take, the one passing through ER and OBAS emerging to UP-College of Medicine building and then to Pedro Gil street. As we go along...

A: O, sa'n ka pupunta? Ba't dun ka dadaan?

Me: Wala lang, para naman maiba yung route ko. 

A: Nag-transfer ka ba ng bahay? Ba't sa Taft ka dadaan?

Me: Same place pa rin naman ako. Sa Taft kaya front ng building namin kaya okay lang din ako dun dumaan.

A: E mas mapapalayo ka pa dun....tingnan mo, kung dito dadaan..blah blah blah... (and we talked about energy expenditure and the distance and so on and so forth.)

Alam mo, artist ka nga.

Me: Ha? Hindi ah.

A: Artist ka. Mi tawag jan eh. ARTIST'S WALK. Yung mga artists daw, ginagawa nila yan. 

Me: Ang alin?

A: Yang ginagawa mo. Naglalakad. nag-iiba ng ruta. Wala lang. Para mag-reflect or something. 

Me: Arte lang ako, hindi artist!! Hahaha! Sandali, ba't mo alam yung mga ganyan?

A: E, artist ako eh.

Me: Kapal mo! Self-proclaimed artist ka! Well, photographer ka nga naman. Sige na nga, artist ka na nga.

A: Seryoso. Artist's Walk tawag dun. :)

He's not wrong about the love for walking I have in my system. It is something that I have developed along the years out of necessity (haha, MSUans can relate!). There is a sense of contentment and mirth I get from walking. It's like an astral projection that allows my mind to wander as I take every single step. I plan in details what I will do for the day as I walk towards my destination. I get a clear picture of my expectations and how I will overcome the obstacles I am half-expecting. 

But me being an artist? That's quite debatable. Haha! I never drawn a perfect picture way back kindergarten. I never perfected Home Economics artsy projects. I used to ask my gradeschool classmates to sketch a pretty gown or dress for my paper doll. My Humanities I painting project was so bland and boring considering it was just a simple apple to paint!!!  Do I need to emphasize how much of a failure I am in that department? 

I'm no artist but I am a HUGE fan of artists and their works. I love arts and the sense of nostalgia or wistfulness that it brings. I have artist friends and I admire them for their God-given talent which I unfortunately lack. :)

BFF #2

Bestfriends.

Celebrating singlehood.

Celebrating love.

Celebrating two decades of friendship. 

Celebrating life.

Our story here. 

Warning: NEVER LAUGH at our old dugyutin faces way back grade school and high school! 

Remaining Days

Kick-off party for the remaining 100 days of internship!!

ONE-HUNDRED FREAKING DAYS INDEED!

BFF #1

MY BEST FRIEND'S AROUND!!!!!!!

THIS IS GONNA BE A LOOOONG NIGHT!!!

I'M SO EXCITED I HAD TO WRITE IT IN ALL CAPS AND REALLY BLOG ABOUT IT AND PUT A LOT OF EXCLAMATION POINTS!!!!

Ahem.

Excuse my manners. :)

I just miss this person A LOOOOOOOT!!!

#feelingsikat

Yehess!!! This blog which I started for more than a year now has reached a whooping 10,000++ views!! LOL! Thank you to my untiring audience! Although most readers do not drop their comments, I am happy to know that sharing a tiny piece of my life publicly don't go futile. :) 

This year, I hope to write substantially as this blog was originally meant for. Bismillahi Rahmani Raheem. :)

Nomads On Expedition. Again.

I do not like being unsettled, I never liked the nomadic way---changing from one place to another. Traveling is different from living at different places for shorter terms. I started my nomadic life since I entered med school where I had to rent a house with three roommates. I lived comfortably in that niche for three long years until I had to look for another house for clerkship  where I happily lived for a year. Then I found a beautiful condo unit here in the metro with three other roommates where we struggled to live for 3 months. Some problems arose so we decided to separate ways and now I am gleefully living in another unit of the same building! I guess that story deserves an entry as a form of gratitude to the people who caught me wholeheartedly when I was badly bruised. :)  

In addition to the seemingly life-long pressure chamber I'm into, board exam is just around the corner!! So my med school friends and I hurriedly bus-rided to Fairview to house-hunt and see for ourselves the location of the review center. It was a long bus-ride from Ermita to Fairview!! After seeing the rooms, I picked the 7-person capacity room. It would seem crowded but the moment we begin reviewing, all of us would shift into a serious mode  having a single goal: TO PASS (or even, top! echoserang char char!!). So I believe it wouldn't be noisy after all. :) *fingers crossed* 

Because I felt the tension in the air among those reviewees we met there, I felt my heart drumming as I figured I would be in their shoes in few months' time! OMG!

So, to calm my almost throwing-a-tantrum child-self, I treated her to a P15 worth of sorbetes on a sugar cone. Happy heart! :)

Last Saturday was the 4th session of our monthly board review series at the Buenafe Auditorium of UP-College of Medicine. The subject was Microbiology and was productive as I unexpected it to be. Previous ones, the first two because I was absent on the third session, were really boring lectures I had to bring coffee inside the hall to keep me alive.

All interns are excused every second Saturday of the month since November 2011 to attend the 4-hour lecture on basic medical subjects. It's an opportunity to leave the humid environment of the ER when the review falls on a duty day. Hahaha! :)

As always, I took notes. 

P.S.

LAST FOUR GRILLING MONTHS OF INTERNSHIP!! WAAAAH!

An addition to my Eiffel stuff! A planner gifted by @rocayaaa! Thank you soooo much! :)

Now I have two planners for 2012, I get a bit confused where to write my daily activities. LOL! This Eiffel planner won the daily routine while Mr. Coelho's is for outpouring of emotions aka diary. 

I've listed down in random order the things I would do after passing the physicians licensure exam. 

Inshaa Allah, all of these shall begin after August this year! Waaah! I can feel the chills down my spine!!

Ending 2011 Right. :)

I never anticipated that I would end 2011 on a road trip. It was merely a wish I do not know how to put into reality considering the meager time I have for myself. After my IM (Internal Medicine) rotation which demands interns to stay 90% of their time inside the hospital, I longed for a vacation where I could just forget the hospital and just relax.Oooohh...relax. The word. I initially swayed my best friend Lily to come here in Manila so we can set off into an adventure but she lacked time as well. FYI: she's also a doctor which justifies her reasons for not coming. So when my cousin Ate Hannah buzzed about an impending three-day family trip to Subic and Baguio, I never thought twice and asked about the details. Luckily, I was already rotating at Rehabilitation Medicine which is benign so I planned for my great escape!! Hohoho! 

It was my first time at Subic and Baguio, hence the pure excitement!! The weather was perfect for a road trip! The sky was azure blue as the sun smiles on its mighty throne!

We stayed at The Lighthouse Marina Resort, Subic Bay. The place was impeccable! Just perfect for hanging loose! 

Star sighting: actress Dawn Zulueta and her husband's entire family were also there. She kinda irked us for being snob, but hey, she could just be in one of her mood swings! So, um, forgiven?  

Hosni and I ready to zooom!!

Subic is quite synonymous to Zoobic Safari and Ocean Adventure but unfortunately, I wasn't able to experience those as we arrived late in the afternoon already. Instead, we joined the boys on their jet skiing spree! I looked so ridiculous because I'm not even on a jet skiing gear! SO WHAT? I had fun!! I bet my cousin Hosni couldn't stand me screaming my lungs out as he sways the jet ski to full speed I had to really hold on tight! That was superb!!!! I will definitely return to Subic one of these days and experience everything! :)

Breakfast buffet at Sands Restaurant, Lighthouse Marina's premiere resto. The food was excellent I was able to try and discriminate different types of cheese! My favorite? CHEDDAR still! Hahaha! 

We had to leave Subic early the following day in preparation for the long road trip to Baguio City! We had an heads up that it's chilling 12 degrees celsius in the Summer Capital of the Philippines!!! To my ultimate surprise, beads of sweat were rolling down my forehead as we explore the Philippine Military Academy and The Mines View Park! And I thought to myself, all those people wearing winter clothes here in Baguio as if it's raining snow were all fooling themselves! Hahaha! And oh, Session Road was filled with heavy volume of people almost equal to those in the metro! 

Photo collaging on the web with a slow laptop and slow internet results to such disaster! I'm sorry baby Fia! 1/4 of her plumpy cute face is obliterated by an unwanted road photo! Sorry babe! 

The traveling team! The Khalil-Ayo, Ayo-Tomawis Families and I! LOL! 

Sabreen was highly ecstatic as she runs and giggles! Kulang na lang mag-somersault and bata! Haha!

 Emoterang Asma beside the beach where we jet skied. 

My nieces made the trip extra memorable! Although they'd sometimes throw tantrums, their adorableness overrides their tantrums you'd just want to carry them in your arms so they's stop crying! Cuteness overload! 

There. I'd end my entry with this hilarious photo of the year! Haha! We paid ten bucks each to wear the traditional Igorot costume! Kalurkey!

I'd be forever grateful to my cousins who made my year end with a huge bang!!!! 

Hoping for more travel sprees this 2012! Cheers yo! And, HAPPY NEW YEAR! 

This is the hallway that connects the two wings of the Outpatient Department building. I find it very dramatic as the rays of the sun penetrate the glass roof creating shadows behind those pillars. To put it in a movie, this is where a couple break their vows of love as the other walks away leaving the other soaked in tears.