these last few days have been nothing but entertainment....it's as if my nyc experience has been fast forwarded, packed with a whirlwind of activities. it's perfect for the adhd-ness(is that word?) in me. i don't even know where to begin or how to begin describing the people/sights/things/sounds/colors/dancing/performing/wierdos that i've come across...
firstly, on friday night- well, i guess it was only 4:00 pm , but it gets dark so early here- i caught the subway to times square to meet up with chan and teresa. i almost forgot it was black friday- why is it called that?- then i was quickly reminded by the swarm of tourists, people selling tickets on the street, cameras, new york guidebooks in the middle of the times square. times square is so big and crazy that although i technically arrived at the times square station, i still had to walk 6 or 7 blocks before meeting them in times square, at the tkts booth. next to tkts is a set of red stairs....to...nowhere. yup. only in new york city can there be stairs to nowhere- that are red- and it's totally normal. oh yeah, also only in nyc will you see a pink plaid stretch limo, and a guy in a suit in the subway...wearing tabbies for shoes. yup. tabbies! i mean, it was wet out side today, but that's just hilarious!. anyway, so i meet up with chan and teresa and the line is actually moving quickly. our top three choices for shows to see are 1)rock of ages 2) spamalot and 3)boeing boeing. we ended up with rock of ages, once again, an 80s rock themed musical. we were the most asian/brown people there. the theater was full of old school older 80s rockers and new school 80s rockers. the story is about a girl from kansas who comes to LA to come to the city to live the dream. very standard story but incredible dancing and music. hit songs include journey's don't stop believing, foreigner's i wanna know what love is, and bon jovi's dead or alive, to name a few. the best part is they passed out fake lighters so we can all wave them in the air. the show was hilarious, not at all pretentious, and a blast! i highly recommed it to anyone who just wants to belt out great rock songs and be totally entertained.
after that we met dave, and a girl who graduated from JABSOm last year and is doing her residency on long island, at ps 450, a small bar. very chill, very fun.
i woke up the next day and wished i hadn't drank! sheesh! it's all good. we had a full day ahead- we wanted to go to ellis island, statue of liberty, shop in soho, ice skate at the rockfeller center, go to the museum of natural history, eat good food, see the graffiti art in harlem...i call teresa and she had gotten us tickets to the new york city ballet nutcracker that night!
one of the interns i worked with had forgotten her wallet at the hospital, so i had brought it with me on the shuttle back to save her a drive back to new jersey, so she came by and picked it up. she also gave me a cd full of surgery lectures! yippee! such a nerd. so exciting. we were gonna take the bus across the park to the west side, where the museum is, until she offered us a ride. sweet! it was weird to be in a normal, non-taxi car in new york city. her car looked exactly like every other med student/resident car i've been in- basically lived in. even across the ocean and nation! haha.
we crossed the park and went downtown a little bit to 81st, then realized we were really hungry and hadn't eat breakfast. i busted out my not for tourist book, as every time i've eaten at a restaurant from that book, i've been completely satisfied. first we wanted to go to garlic bob's...to find it no longer existed...then we wanted to go to another italian restaurant...to find out it was only open for dinner. we were STARVING and ninja by now, so went into the first restaurant we found open, which happened to be a large bumping italian style restaurant called carmines. mmmmm! two huge plates of pasta- one with clams and white sauce, the other with sausage, broccoli garlic and olive oil. so so good! and way too much food. in new york it's hard to take a box home because you're on the subway or you're usually not going straight home.
our inner hungry demons were satsified and off we cruised through the upper west side to the museum.
the museum was incredible. it has the normal exhibitions, separated by geographic location and era in history - such as 'african mammals' or 'the deap ocean' or 'pacific peoples', plus special exhibitions such as 'cosmic collisons', 'sea monsters', 'climate change' and 'horses'...the special exhbitions had certain show times, so we both chose cosmic collisons, and i chose 'sea monsters' while she chose 'lizards and snakes'. i'm so drawn to the ocean! while waiting for our 'cosmic collisions' show to watch she wandered off to the dinosaur section and i wandered to 'the deep ocean' section. it was dfinitely cool..but lots of the animals were fake and it's definitely more for 8 yr olds on their science field trip or 5 yr olds who love to soak up knowledge. cosmic collisions was awesome! it's a theater, but the theater is circular, and the seats all face the middle and are slightly reclined. the 'film' is the dome- shaped theater. it felt like you were floating through space and i learned about asteroids and the formation of the moon and earth and milky way. very cool.
it was great to see something bigger than me out there. i know it's cliche but it's so true that we (i) get caught up in my little world. i forget there's an entire earth and universe out there. even other states.
we then cruised through the museum shop- sometimes these are cooler than the museum themselves!- and i bought a book in the bargain section called 'why we love- the science and chemistry of romantic love', and 'spook', by roach, who also wrote stiff. of cousre i buy books:) such a nerd!
hungry again, (it's dinner time!- it's dark after all:), we pick a 'classic nyc pizza joint'- according to not for tourists, in the east village, ride the subway there , and walked through the village. so so cute. smaller streets and stores, more hip, a small theater, a puerto rican coffee shop, very cute. arturo's pizza was great, it has a jazz piano player, it's small warm and the staff is really nice. and of course the pizza was great!
off to the nyc ballet. i'm exhausted by this point but still excited. our seats were on teh first ring, basically a balcony, but to the immedate right of the stage, and our view was amazing! i could't take pics during the show but i took some before the show to show you the view we had. i've never ever ever seen the nutcracker, had no idea what the story was about, didn't know that tchiacovsky did the music to it. no wi know. the dancers were fucking ripped, danced on their toes, wore the tightest of all tights and still looked fabulous...the decoratoins and costumes were of course breathtaking- i couldn't decide what i like more- the dancing or the decorations/costumes.
anyway...i was so tired after the show i immediately went home and slept. i'm tired now..will write more later:)
Sunday, November 30, 2008
last few days
it's my last few days in nyc! holy shit it's gone by quickly. i don't have time to write so much now, but i will update in a little bit. since thanksgiving yumminess, i've been to rock of ages, a broadway musical, basically, 'what momma mia did for abba, rock of ages did for 80s rock'- it was an amazing hilarious show set to the soundtrack of music like bon jovi, reo speedwagon, whitesnake. fricken amazing! chan, teresa and i stood in line at tkts in times square and got great seats. after that we cruised to a midtown bar called ps 450, met up with dave then went home...
yesterday teresa and i had our cultural excursion, eating family style italian at carmines in the upper west side, going to the museum of natural history, eating new york pizza at arturo's in the village, then going to watch the new york ballet's version of nutcracker. holy shit amazing day! i'll tell you the details later.
today's my last day in my place, then i head to wendy's in brooklyn today. yay to chilltime with wendy. tomorrow, my last full day in nyc, i booked the 'sex and the city' tour- thank you malia for the idea! i thought it would be a great way to end my nyc experience. anyway, today i'm going to grand central station to check out the architecture and to macy's to gawk at the window displays...it's a rainy rainy day in nyc. yay!
yesterday teresa and i had our cultural excursion, eating family style italian at carmines in the upper west side, going to the museum of natural history, eating new york pizza at arturo's in the village, then going to watch the new york ballet's version of nutcracker. holy shit amazing day! i'll tell you the details later.
today's my last day in my place, then i head to wendy's in brooklyn today. yay to chilltime with wendy. tomorrow, my last full day in nyc, i booked the 'sex and the city' tour- thank you malia for the idea! i thought it would be a great way to end my nyc experience. anyway, today i'm going to grand central station to check out the architecture and to macy's to gawk at the window displays...it's a rainy rainy day in nyc. yay!
Friday, November 28, 2008
uptown, downtown
so everyone in new york has a dog it seems. maybe it's just because i live right by the park, but it surprises me that you can still have a dog in a big city with little space for them to run. most of them are small dogs. i wonder if new york city dogs think about different things than dogs in hawaii or guam. do dogs notice that there are so many people in the city or do they only know and see the concrete beneath their feet? and would new york dogs know how to swim?
wednesday was my last full day at the hospital. i really really like my team, and i did see come cool surgeries while i was here. honestly though, whether it's because i have senioritis, or possibly there's so much distraction in nyc, or maybe it's because i have some hesitations with interacting with some of the harsh surgeons here (i've also met cool surgeons too, don't get me wrong)- but forever reason i wasn't balls to the wall with this general surgery rotation. and i'm okay with that. i will have tons of time- haha- and i laugh because intern year is going to be intense- to get my game face on. anyway.
anyway, so i had a great thanksgiving. firstly, on wednesday night, my friend teresa flew in from LA to hang out for the weekend. she got a hotel room at paramount hotel on 46th and 8th, right by times square. she got the 'petite room', the smallest and most affordable room- affordable by new york standards, and representative of what it's like to have an apartment in the city- small. but it does the job for the weekend. so i navigated my way by subway to get her, then we met wendy at katz deli - a classic ny experience- for dinner. mmmmmm! it's very low key, with a huge deli counter, and they give you samples of meat while you're waiting. when you first walk in, they give you a ticket and you have to give the ticket back when you leave. since the sandwhiches are HUGE, we ordered a pastrami and a corned beef sandwhich. they also give you a plate of different types of pickles. these pickles are essentially whole cucumbers that taste like pickles with a different twist. i usually don't eat meat, but i had to make an exception for this experience. we almos ordered potato pancakes with apple sauce and sourcream too, but there was way too much food. the sandwhiches were basically plates of meat with some bread for decoration. we then cruised our way to this small spanish bar and we all got different kinds of drinks- i got one with horchata, rum and cinammon, teresa got one with mango juice and vodka, and wendy got a yummy limey-tequila drink. very very strong! after one drink we headed out. wendy, headed back across the river to brooklyn, and teresa and i went to my friend dave's house to hang out. i'm always a little nervous mixing my circles of friends but teresa is great and social and can take care of herself. awesome.
dave his friends and ourselves ended up going to this cool club called the green room. it was SO FRICKEN cold waiting to get it. holy shit. and a limo full of girls pulled up in just their little dresses, no coats, no stockings, nothing! i was in a skirt with sweater tights, boots, my big coat, a warm hat and gloves and i was still cold. making it in the club never felt so good. the music was really good and we danced all night, which is something i wanted to do in new york. very fun.
i've heard new yorkers say this before but they can all tell when a club or bar is filled with jersey folks. i guess people from the surrounding states come into the city on the weekends to shop and eat and go out- i personally can't tell the difference, but new yorkers know who isn't a new yorker. i guess it's equivalent to someone mistaking a chinese person for korean when you're in hawaii. it's what you're used to.
i woke up on thanksgiving day, made my way to the gym quickly, then got ready to head out. i took the subway to times square area, and it was crazy! the macy's day parade was going on. i hoped to catch a bit of it. on my subway ride i saw this group of litereally 50 or 100 girls dressed in bright orange abd pink dancy/gynmanstics outfits. definitely stood out amongst the dark coats and the dark subway. it was way to crazy, and teresa and i were STARVING, so we went to chinatown, and found a yummy dim sum place. we were both zoning out partly because we needed food badly and partly because there was so much to watch. we thought we stood out like tourists, even with my small black 'not for tourist' book, but there were way more obvious tourists. i don't know why i'm so uncomfortable with looking like a tourist- i think it's a safety thing. sometimes though i'm people watching on the subway and get caught staring so i quickly look away and hope they didn't notice.
we ate dim sum at this place on mott street- i think it's called ping's. all i know is it was packed, there were tons of chinese people, and there was a 'zagat' sign on the door - zagat is a guide to great restaurants in nyc. the kicker was that we saw tons of chinese people eating there. we got our table early, led downstairs to a hidden section of the restaurant. the waiters and waitresses with plates of yumminess came by trying to convince us to eat their plate of food. we ended up getting mostly plates of steamed dumblings, shumai, this yummy noodle dish- they were giant fried noodles- almost like donuts- wrapped in steamed noodles. we ended our meal with sesame mochi yumminess. we were way happier!
we also had bubble tea. it was freezing cold out but we had to get bubble tea while we were in china town. we wandered down canal street, through the tourist stores full of scarves, hats, ny paraphenalia, past the vendors with chestnuts, fruit, bok choy, seafood, flowers. we acquiesced to the cold and found refuge in the subway, taking a couple different trains to dave's place.
ohmygod we ate like queens! dave and aileen made red rice, chicken kelaguen, bbq chicken, steak, beef kelaquen, shrimp in coconut milk, daigo/cucumber salad, and latiya for dessert. it was a classic chamorro meal- about 9 or 10 folks from guam and their significnat others were there. also classic in the nappage that went on. so so great!
i got home at about 10 pm last night, and slept so happily:) so so thankful!
now i'm sitting at a coffeeshop , waiting to catch the 9 am shuttle to the hospital, where i'll basically just turn in my pager and scrubs, say my goodbyes. i'll take the noon shuttle back and this afternoon i'll make a run to the post office to mail some stuff back to hawaii to ligthen my load up. today is black friday, so i will avoid shopping like the plague. it's gonna be crazy as hell, as if new york wasn't crazy enough. teresa and i have plans to hang out with our friend chan from hawaii who's visiting his family in queen's.
only a few more days in nyc! it's gone by quickly. there's still so much i want to do, but i think i did most of them. just gonna soak up what's left...
wednesday was my last full day at the hospital. i really really like my team, and i did see come cool surgeries while i was here. honestly though, whether it's because i have senioritis, or possibly there's so much distraction in nyc, or maybe it's because i have some hesitations with interacting with some of the harsh surgeons here (i've also met cool surgeons too, don't get me wrong)- but forever reason i wasn't balls to the wall with this general surgery rotation. and i'm okay with that. i will have tons of time- haha- and i laugh because intern year is going to be intense- to get my game face on. anyway.
anyway, so i had a great thanksgiving. firstly, on wednesday night, my friend teresa flew in from LA to hang out for the weekend. she got a hotel room at paramount hotel on 46th and 8th, right by times square. she got the 'petite room', the smallest and most affordable room- affordable by new york standards, and representative of what it's like to have an apartment in the city- small. but it does the job for the weekend. so i navigated my way by subway to get her, then we met wendy at katz deli - a classic ny experience- for dinner. mmmmmm! it's very low key, with a huge deli counter, and they give you samples of meat while you're waiting. when you first walk in, they give you a ticket and you have to give the ticket back when you leave. since the sandwhiches are HUGE, we ordered a pastrami and a corned beef sandwhich. they also give you a plate of different types of pickles. these pickles are essentially whole cucumbers that taste like pickles with a different twist. i usually don't eat meat, but i had to make an exception for this experience. we almos ordered potato pancakes with apple sauce and sourcream too, but there was way too much food. the sandwhiches were basically plates of meat with some bread for decoration. we then cruised our way to this small spanish bar and we all got different kinds of drinks- i got one with horchata, rum and cinammon, teresa got one with mango juice and vodka, and wendy got a yummy limey-tequila drink. very very strong! after one drink we headed out. wendy, headed back across the river to brooklyn, and teresa and i went to my friend dave's house to hang out. i'm always a little nervous mixing my circles of friends but teresa is great and social and can take care of herself. awesome.
dave his friends and ourselves ended up going to this cool club called the green room. it was SO FRICKEN cold waiting to get it. holy shit. and a limo full of girls pulled up in just their little dresses, no coats, no stockings, nothing! i was in a skirt with sweater tights, boots, my big coat, a warm hat and gloves and i was still cold. making it in the club never felt so good. the music was really good and we danced all night, which is something i wanted to do in new york. very fun.
i've heard new yorkers say this before but they can all tell when a club or bar is filled with jersey folks. i guess people from the surrounding states come into the city on the weekends to shop and eat and go out- i personally can't tell the difference, but new yorkers know who isn't a new yorker. i guess it's equivalent to someone mistaking a chinese person for korean when you're in hawaii. it's what you're used to.
i woke up on thanksgiving day, made my way to the gym quickly, then got ready to head out. i took the subway to times square area, and it was crazy! the macy's day parade was going on. i hoped to catch a bit of it. on my subway ride i saw this group of litereally 50 or 100 girls dressed in bright orange abd pink dancy/gynmanstics outfits. definitely stood out amongst the dark coats and the dark subway. it was way to crazy, and teresa and i were STARVING, so we went to chinatown, and found a yummy dim sum place. we were both zoning out partly because we needed food badly and partly because there was so much to watch. we thought we stood out like tourists, even with my small black 'not for tourist' book, but there were way more obvious tourists. i don't know why i'm so uncomfortable with looking like a tourist- i think it's a safety thing. sometimes though i'm people watching on the subway and get caught staring so i quickly look away and hope they didn't notice.
we ate dim sum at this place on mott street- i think it's called ping's. all i know is it was packed, there were tons of chinese people, and there was a 'zagat' sign on the door - zagat is a guide to great restaurants in nyc. the kicker was that we saw tons of chinese people eating there. we got our table early, led downstairs to a hidden section of the restaurant. the waiters and waitresses with plates of yumminess came by trying to convince us to eat their plate of food. we ended up getting mostly plates of steamed dumblings, shumai, this yummy noodle dish- they were giant fried noodles- almost like donuts- wrapped in steamed noodles. we ended our meal with sesame mochi yumminess. we were way happier!
we also had bubble tea. it was freezing cold out but we had to get bubble tea while we were in china town. we wandered down canal street, through the tourist stores full of scarves, hats, ny paraphenalia, past the vendors with chestnuts, fruit, bok choy, seafood, flowers. we acquiesced to the cold and found refuge in the subway, taking a couple different trains to dave's place.
ohmygod we ate like queens! dave and aileen made red rice, chicken kelaguen, bbq chicken, steak, beef kelaquen, shrimp in coconut milk, daigo/cucumber salad, and latiya for dessert. it was a classic chamorro meal- about 9 or 10 folks from guam and their significnat others were there. also classic in the nappage that went on. so so great!
i got home at about 10 pm last night, and slept so happily:) so so thankful!
now i'm sitting at a coffeeshop , waiting to catch the 9 am shuttle to the hospital, where i'll basically just turn in my pager and scrubs, say my goodbyes. i'll take the noon shuttle back and this afternoon i'll make a run to the post office to mail some stuff back to hawaii to ligthen my load up. today is black friday, so i will avoid shopping like the plague. it's gonna be crazy as hell, as if new york wasn't crazy enough. teresa and i have plans to hang out with our friend chan from hawaii who's visiting his family in queen's.
only a few more days in nyc! it's gone by quickly. there's still so much i want to do, but i think i did most of them. just gonna soak up what's left...
Monday, November 24, 2008
brown brown
i'm sitting here at the airport in Providence, Rhode Island, and just had my Brown interview. The interview was fine, and I actually really like the program. The residents seem happy, you get kick ass, broad training, the hospital is gorgeous, the faculty love to teach and it's very academic...the only thing is that Providence seems to SUCK. There's nothing really to do- Boston is an hour away and NYC is 3 hours away, but the town is so so small and cold...I met an Ortho resident and his plastic surgery resident girlfriend who surf, they actually know my friend Joe, an Ortho resident in hawaii, who i've been surfing with. they said surf around here is 40 minutes away...mostly point breaks, but COLD. so anyway, i'll have to sit down and do my spreadsheet analysis on the program- my gut feeling is that while i can't see myself living here, if i ended up here i would be a kick ass surgeon. ahhh! such decisions.
last night i called a cab to take me to union state brewery in downtown providence for the resident social dinner thing, and the cab driver just happened to be picking up another girl who was staying at the comfort inn and interviewing. well first of all, i called one cab company and they didnt have an available cab so i had to call another one- that wouldn't happen in nyc! anyway, so the other girl who was interiviweing was cool, from philly, and we ended up splitting all cab fairs, catching shuttles and everything, together, and our flights even left at the same time. very nice to have a buddy. at the interview i also ran into two people i had interviewed with at georgetown. the folks you meet along the 'interview trail', as it's called...
so back to NYC. i fly into la guardia tonight, will chill tonight, or if i motivate, go to the gym. i have a couple days at the hospital, thursday off, then friday's my last day. wow it went so quickly!! i don't leave nyc till tuesday, so i have a few days to enjoy nyc....
i'm tired as hell! i've spent many call nights up for 30 hours straight and feel more tired now, after a night of socializing and a half day of interviewing. i think the difference is that at these social events and interviews, you're always 'on', talking to everyone, coming up with intelligent relevant questions, talking about yourself, selling yourself, analyzing residents and faculty...this whole process is much like speed dating. everyone applies to 20-40 programs, and each program gets 1000s of applicants, and interview about 50-75. the program figures out if they want you to work there, and oyu figure out if you could see yourself there. then the program makes a rank list of who they want, number candidates from 1-75 or whatever, applicants make their rank list, and this vortex of a computer program analyzes it and makes the best match for everyone.
anyway...i'm feeling lots of things right now.
1)anxiety- about this whole process. i have 9 more interviews! anxiety about how i'm gonna analyze everything and where i'll end up
2)excitement- everyday in nyc and the cities to follow bring a new set of adventures and people
3)longing- i miss the guy who i recently fell for in hawaii. i think about him tons and i hate it because i doubt he's thinking about me. i let him take the initiative on calling me when i left hawaii, since i had basically told him how i felt wiht no reciprocation or explanation. he took the initiative - a lot- for the first week. then i stopped hearing from him. he's going to be in nyc and today i got a text 'how's nyc? in d.c. still. heading up for tgiving'. for some reason i was really upset. that's all i get?! not a 'i miss you!' or 'let's hang out!' or 'can't wait to see you!'. why did i expect that? so i got mad! mad at him because i really like(d?) him at one point. now all the time we spent, conversations and interactions seem like a total joke, fake, and waste of time. aahhh...
4)wanted- i went out with my friend from the hospital on saturday and he calls and text me all the time. very endearing...almost too eager! now i feel like a guy- you want what you can't have and now that he's obvoiusly missing me...i'm pulling back. don't know where these feelings/actions come from but it's just how i am right now.
5)antcipation and comfort- for spending time with friends in nyc. my friend teresa comes in on wednesday, i'm gonna spend thanksgiving with my friend from guam, and then stay with wendy from sunday thru tuesday, when i leave.
6)stoked- on doing more nyc things!
7)homesickness- i miss the ocean and surf and friends and warmth and familiarity! i know it'll be back soon enough and for now i will enjoy this experience.:)
off to grab coffee before my flight boards:)
last night i called a cab to take me to union state brewery in downtown providence for the resident social dinner thing, and the cab driver just happened to be picking up another girl who was staying at the comfort inn and interviewing. well first of all, i called one cab company and they didnt have an available cab so i had to call another one- that wouldn't happen in nyc! anyway, so the other girl who was interiviweing was cool, from philly, and we ended up splitting all cab fairs, catching shuttles and everything, together, and our flights even left at the same time. very nice to have a buddy. at the interview i also ran into two people i had interviewed with at georgetown. the folks you meet along the 'interview trail', as it's called...
so back to NYC. i fly into la guardia tonight, will chill tonight, or if i motivate, go to the gym. i have a couple days at the hospital, thursday off, then friday's my last day. wow it went so quickly!! i don't leave nyc till tuesday, so i have a few days to enjoy nyc....
i'm tired as hell! i've spent many call nights up for 30 hours straight and feel more tired now, after a night of socializing and a half day of interviewing. i think the difference is that at these social events and interviews, you're always 'on', talking to everyone, coming up with intelligent relevant questions, talking about yourself, selling yourself, analyzing residents and faculty...this whole process is much like speed dating. everyone applies to 20-40 programs, and each program gets 1000s of applicants, and interview about 50-75. the program figures out if they want you to work there, and oyu figure out if you could see yourself there. then the program makes a rank list of who they want, number candidates from 1-75 or whatever, applicants make their rank list, and this vortex of a computer program analyzes it and makes the best match for everyone.
anyway...i'm feeling lots of things right now.
1)anxiety- about this whole process. i have 9 more interviews! anxiety about how i'm gonna analyze everything and where i'll end up
2)excitement- everyday in nyc and the cities to follow bring a new set of adventures and people
3)longing- i miss the guy who i recently fell for in hawaii. i think about him tons and i hate it because i doubt he's thinking about me. i let him take the initiative on calling me when i left hawaii, since i had basically told him how i felt wiht no reciprocation or explanation. he took the initiative - a lot- for the first week. then i stopped hearing from him. he's going to be in nyc and today i got a text 'how's nyc? in d.c. still. heading up for tgiving'. for some reason i was really upset. that's all i get?! not a 'i miss you!' or 'let's hang out!' or 'can't wait to see you!'. why did i expect that? so i got mad! mad at him because i really like(d?) him at one point. now all the time we spent, conversations and interactions seem like a total joke, fake, and waste of time. aahhh...
4)wanted- i went out with my friend from the hospital on saturday and he calls and text me all the time. very endearing...almost too eager! now i feel like a guy- you want what you can't have and now that he's obvoiusly missing me...i'm pulling back. don't know where these feelings/actions come from but it's just how i am right now.
5)antcipation and comfort- for spending time with friends in nyc. my friend teresa comes in on wednesday, i'm gonna spend thanksgiving with my friend from guam, and then stay with wendy from sunday thru tuesday, when i leave.
6)stoked- on doing more nyc things!
7)homesickness- i miss the ocean and surf and friends and warmth and familiarity! i know it'll be back soon enough and for now i will enjoy this experience.:)
off to grab coffee before my flight boards:)
Sunday, November 23, 2008
it's wicked cold
so i'm sitting at a coffee shop at a big table, and right now this kid, he's about 9 years old, fat jewish looking kid, runs to my table, makes a sliding stop and plops down at the chair across from me, with his apple juice box and i think he has adhd or something or maybe MR. he's kinda making funny robot or goat noises and doing the worm dance sitting down. funniest shit ever!! his mom is across the coffee shop saying 'chris...' over and over in that tone that you always know as 'be good or else'. anyway.
so what a great weekend! friday was a good day at the hospital, oh mygosh. i really wanted to write about it then but i didn't have time to make it to a computer. i thought it was gonna be a hernia friday- was going to scrub into 3 hernia cases. which i was excited about. after the first case, i'm at the elevator, starving and running to grab something to eat, when my chief comes by and says 'haane, come with me. we have a patient with a rigid abdomen'. which in surgery land, means straight to the OR for an expoloratory laparatomy (ex lap- open up the belly and look for what's going on.) he takes me to the peds ward. the patient is 16 years old, and i knew very little about her at his point, but later learned. so apparantely, this 16 yr old girl who had had a lap appendectomy at 10 years old, came in 10 days ago with 3 days of belly pain, 7/10, diffuse, and never vomitted but had really bad nausea. they worked her up and told her she had gastroenteritis (infection). sooo...she's taking prevacid, and her pain goes away, then slowly starts to come back for 10 days, get's really bad so comes back to the ER. she gets admitted, and she looked fine, then overnight...she got really really sick. vomitted, nausea, became pale, hypotensive, belly was rigid in the morning. she had tons of other clinically worrying stuff going on, but i won't go into it. on top of all of this, her mom is affiliated with the hospital and is very difficult to work with, refusing xrays and cat scans (very essential to diagnosis). she also didn't like the first surgeon so she requested a second surgeon. which is totally her perogative, but her daughter is also really really sick. and time is of essence right now. anyway...she ends up going to the OR after her mom agreed to a CAT scan and ends up she only has 90 cm of small intestine that's viable (normal people have about 300 cm) . the rest is dead. apparently there was a fibrous band from one of the ports of her appendectomy that strangulated her bowel. basically she's going to eventually need a small bowel transplant (you need a small bowel to live). and she's only 16! i feel so bad for her and her family...
anyway, so i ended up finding a kick ass deal on tickets to the broadway musical Wicked that night, and caught the shuttle home, bundled up (it's like 20 - 30 degrees- holy shit), and met my exboyfriend bill at the gershwin theater on broadway near times square. i'm so excited to be there at this point! it was good to see him, we hadn't really seen each other since college (when we dated), except for a split second of time two years ago after i took my step 1 board exams and i was a lunatic, so we caught up on everything. we go into the theater and our seats are 5 rows from the front, on the right side! we're so close! it was awesome. the show was incredible, from the set to the costumes to the dancing, the performers themselves, and being so close up, i couldn't help but look at all the detail- the costumes, the makeup, the setting. the story is about the life of the wicked witch of the west from the wizard of oz. i won't say more but i highly recommed it if anyone is in a city or goes to s city where it's showing. totally worth it. basically our seats were worth $200 each and i got them for $66 each!
i'm pretty hungry at this point so we go to this restaurant near nyu and washington square, called Otto Enoteca Pizzeria, where the chef is Mario Balati-one of the chef's on food network. it was 11:30 at night and this place was happening! new york really doesn't sleep. we ordered yummy pizza with mushrooms and good old margherita. but this shit is good! it's not classic new york pizza, by far, but it's excellent. we finished the night with milk chocolate chip gelato. mmmmm!
i was going to head home at this point, ready to have a full day ahead then get a text from dave my friend from guam and ended up freezing my way, i mean, making my way to meet him and his friends at a bar near his house in union square. then i went home. the bar was kind of a blast from the past, it was basically an old beauty salon, so they still had the chairs with the old school hair dryers over them, and behind the bar were the mirrors and chairs lined up. in the back there was a dance floor with wierd projected checkerboard pattern lights on the walls and they were playing 80s pop. the only thing is that it smelled like as and it was really crowded...so we left and went to this much more open bar playing good hip hop, with more room and a better crowd.
i woke up the next morning (saturday), headed to the gym quickly, then came back and got ready for the day. my friend from the hospital was gonna pick me up at noonish for lunch and shopping in soho. on the way back from the subway after going to the gym, i stopped into this hair salon, because i badly needed a hair cut especially since my interviews were going to be piling up, and the sign said 'cut and shampoo- $23'. which isn't bad- i pay $14 to 16 in hawaii at supercuts, so it wasn't that muchmore. i stop in and my columbian hair stylist spends 20 minutes talking to me about my hair, what he wants to do, why he wants to do it. he loves, LOVES, his job. i get my shampoo- aaah...so nice- hot water, head massage, especially in the cold, and get my hair cut. the hair cut itself took 15 minutes then he spent 20 styling it. he had such attention to detail, i couldn't believe it. i almost got ansy but then calmed down realizing that hair and fashion are one of NYC's claims to fame. i guess. anyway so i walked out of salon with a very styled hair cut. natural and flowy stil, thank God, but i felt so 'hip' especially in my gym clothes. ...
anyway, so i get ready and ryan picks me up and takes me to this malaysian place in chinatown. now driving in the city is CRAZY! i seriously thought he was gonna pick me up- he drove from new jersey- then was gonna park his car so we could take the subway around the city. anyway, we drove downtown- from 100th street at my place to around 9th street in chinatown/soho, parked and went to noynya, this yummy malaysian food place. we had shrimp puffs- shrimp wrapped in bacon, pad thai, coconut rice, ginger tofu, mango shrimp and thai iced teas. the food is a mix between thai and chinese, but different. i can't explain it. i was so glad i went to the gym- i go to the gym (or have been) so i can eat my way through new york. haha. anyway, we wandered to soho, cruised through urban outfitters, steve madden, this great shoe place called michael k- awesome old school nikes and pumas. there are tons of stores like this in soho- and it now makes sense why everyone in new york is wearing old school nikes (and boots on that same note). ended up stopping for coffee and sitting down to hide from the cold, then back to the car. the sign said '$10.14/half hour, and i was scared to hear the grand total. we were there for a few hours!. endedup being $30 for the few hours, which is still a lot, but not like $80 which is what i expected. anyway, ryan had been a gentleman, cool cat, this whole time and paying for everything, but i still felt bad!
he drops me home last night and i'm exhausted. i have my interview tonight/tomorrow, so i did laundry, packed, and just chilled, went to bed early and here i am at the coffee shop. my flight to providence leaves from la guardia at 1 pm, so i'll be getting a cab around 10:15, 10:30 (it's about 8:30 now). when i get to providence, it'll be around 2:30, i'll go to the hotel, then go to the dinner with the residents around 7pm. i was gonna try to do something this morning- walk through central park or something- i haven't done that yet!!. oh well...
great weekend:)
oh and my friend teresa is going to be visiting!
so what a great weekend! friday was a good day at the hospital, oh mygosh. i really wanted to write about it then but i didn't have time to make it to a computer. i thought it was gonna be a hernia friday- was going to scrub into 3 hernia cases. which i was excited about. after the first case, i'm at the elevator, starving and running to grab something to eat, when my chief comes by and says 'haane, come with me. we have a patient with a rigid abdomen'. which in surgery land, means straight to the OR for an expoloratory laparatomy (ex lap- open up the belly and look for what's going on.) he takes me to the peds ward. the patient is 16 years old, and i knew very little about her at his point, but later learned. so apparantely, this 16 yr old girl who had had a lap appendectomy at 10 years old, came in 10 days ago with 3 days of belly pain, 7/10, diffuse, and never vomitted but had really bad nausea. they worked her up and told her she had gastroenteritis (infection). sooo...she's taking prevacid, and her pain goes away, then slowly starts to come back for 10 days, get's really bad so comes back to the ER. she gets admitted, and she looked fine, then overnight...she got really really sick. vomitted, nausea, became pale, hypotensive, belly was rigid in the morning. she had tons of other clinically worrying stuff going on, but i won't go into it. on top of all of this, her mom is affiliated with the hospital and is very difficult to work with, refusing xrays and cat scans (very essential to diagnosis). she also didn't like the first surgeon so she requested a second surgeon. which is totally her perogative, but her daughter is also really really sick. and time is of essence right now. anyway...she ends up going to the OR after her mom agreed to a CAT scan and ends up she only has 90 cm of small intestine that's viable (normal people have about 300 cm) . the rest is dead. apparently there was a fibrous band from one of the ports of her appendectomy that strangulated her bowel. basically she's going to eventually need a small bowel transplant (you need a small bowel to live). and she's only 16! i feel so bad for her and her family...
anyway, so i ended up finding a kick ass deal on tickets to the broadway musical Wicked that night, and caught the shuttle home, bundled up (it's like 20 - 30 degrees- holy shit), and met my exboyfriend bill at the gershwin theater on broadway near times square. i'm so excited to be there at this point! it was good to see him, we hadn't really seen each other since college (when we dated), except for a split second of time two years ago after i took my step 1 board exams and i was a lunatic, so we caught up on everything. we go into the theater and our seats are 5 rows from the front, on the right side! we're so close! it was awesome. the show was incredible, from the set to the costumes to the dancing, the performers themselves, and being so close up, i couldn't help but look at all the detail- the costumes, the makeup, the setting. the story is about the life of the wicked witch of the west from the wizard of oz. i won't say more but i highly recommed it if anyone is in a city or goes to s city where it's showing. totally worth it. basically our seats were worth $200 each and i got them for $66 each!
i'm pretty hungry at this point so we go to this restaurant near nyu and washington square, called Otto Enoteca Pizzeria, where the chef is Mario Balati-one of the chef's on food network. it was 11:30 at night and this place was happening! new york really doesn't sleep. we ordered yummy pizza with mushrooms and good old margherita. but this shit is good! it's not classic new york pizza, by far, but it's excellent. we finished the night with milk chocolate chip gelato. mmmmm!
i was going to head home at this point, ready to have a full day ahead then get a text from dave my friend from guam and ended up freezing my way, i mean, making my way to meet him and his friends at a bar near his house in union square. then i went home. the bar was kind of a blast from the past, it was basically an old beauty salon, so they still had the chairs with the old school hair dryers over them, and behind the bar were the mirrors and chairs lined up. in the back there was a dance floor with wierd projected checkerboard pattern lights on the walls and they were playing 80s pop. the only thing is that it smelled like as and it was really crowded...so we left and went to this much more open bar playing good hip hop, with more room and a better crowd.
i woke up the next morning (saturday), headed to the gym quickly, then came back and got ready for the day. my friend from the hospital was gonna pick me up at noonish for lunch and shopping in soho. on the way back from the subway after going to the gym, i stopped into this hair salon, because i badly needed a hair cut especially since my interviews were going to be piling up, and the sign said 'cut and shampoo- $23'. which isn't bad- i pay $14 to 16 in hawaii at supercuts, so it wasn't that muchmore. i stop in and my columbian hair stylist spends 20 minutes talking to me about my hair, what he wants to do, why he wants to do it. he loves, LOVES, his job. i get my shampoo- aaah...so nice- hot water, head massage, especially in the cold, and get my hair cut. the hair cut itself took 15 minutes then he spent 20 styling it. he had such attention to detail, i couldn't believe it. i almost got ansy but then calmed down realizing that hair and fashion are one of NYC's claims to fame. i guess. anyway so i walked out of salon with a very styled hair cut. natural and flowy stil, thank God, but i felt so 'hip' especially in my gym clothes. ...
anyway, so i get ready and ryan picks me up and takes me to this malaysian place in chinatown. now driving in the city is CRAZY! i seriously thought he was gonna pick me up- he drove from new jersey- then was gonna park his car so we could take the subway around the city. anyway, we drove downtown- from 100th street at my place to around 9th street in chinatown/soho, parked and went to noynya, this yummy malaysian food place. we had shrimp puffs- shrimp wrapped in bacon, pad thai, coconut rice, ginger tofu, mango shrimp and thai iced teas. the food is a mix between thai and chinese, but different. i can't explain it. i was so glad i went to the gym- i go to the gym (or have been) so i can eat my way through new york. haha. anyway, we wandered to soho, cruised through urban outfitters, steve madden, this great shoe place called michael k- awesome old school nikes and pumas. there are tons of stores like this in soho- and it now makes sense why everyone in new york is wearing old school nikes (and boots on that same note). ended up stopping for coffee and sitting down to hide from the cold, then back to the car. the sign said '$10.14/half hour, and i was scared to hear the grand total. we were there for a few hours!. endedup being $30 for the few hours, which is still a lot, but not like $80 which is what i expected. anyway, ryan had been a gentleman, cool cat, this whole time and paying for everything, but i still felt bad!
he drops me home last night and i'm exhausted. i have my interview tonight/tomorrow, so i did laundry, packed, and just chilled, went to bed early and here i am at the coffee shop. my flight to providence leaves from la guardia at 1 pm, so i'll be getting a cab around 10:15, 10:30 (it's about 8:30 now). when i get to providence, it'll be around 2:30, i'll go to the hotel, then go to the dinner with the residents around 7pm. i was gonna try to do something this morning- walk through central park or something- i haven't done that yet!!. oh well...
great weekend:)
oh and my friend teresa is going to be visiting!
Thursday, November 20, 2008
artsy fartsy, ansy dancy, kicky my assy
okey dokey artichokey
...
today i had a half day at the hospital. well, first off, i got to sleep till 6 am (sleeping in!), then headed to basic science lecture clutching my coffee w/ cream and sugar from the street cart, met up with my team, then caught the 9 am shuttle...there were awesome cases going on! i'm so bummed that we were late, and that i had to leave at noon. there were big cases, lots of them.:(
i have this thing where i can't scrub into cases late, or i can't leave early. i need to be there for the whole thing, from meeting the patient to reading the chart to scrubbing in to following the patient to PACU. the residents told me i can just leave early if i have to, but i feel disrespectful you know? it's like starting a song you really love and not listening to the whole thing, reading a chapter and not finishing it, just kissing a boy and not ...hahah. j/k. not really. it's like learning a language but only learning nouns. i don't know- you get the point: i'm all or nothing. so i spent the morning reading sabiston (sabiston is a big surgery test book), caught the noon shuttle back and met with the program director. i did some errands, like dropped a box in the mail- my luggage was 65 lbs, and since i'll be travellling tons on the way back, i need to drop 15 lbs at least so i dont 'get charged everytime i board a flight, which'll be like 6 flights at least. my plan is to mail back my danskos (heavy ass clogs) and clinic stuff as soon as i finish. anyway...it was sooo sooo nice to be outside during the day! in the sunlight! and today there was sunlight- it felt so good- sunny but crisp. supposedly there were snow flurries this morning. yowsers. supposed to get to 20 degrees just outside of nyc and 30 degrees in manhattan tonight. shit that's fucking cold.
anyway..did my errands, then found my way to the MoMA. i took some pictures and i'll post them later. I like that you can take photos in the museum. i put on my killers albums and wandered through the sculptures, the architecture, the photograph areas. stopped at the cafe and ate yummy creamy polenta w/ walnuts and fontina w/ sparking water as i read my 'rough guide to nyc' book...wandered through the MoMA design store, then to rockfeller center and nbc studios. they were filming something right outside of nbc studios and they were really hardcore about not letting people pass by. wandered past radio city music hall, through h&m, then back to the subway...i had some time to kill before my 'cardio video dance class', so went back to the 96 station to my korean nail salon and got a pedicure. my feet were killing me so it felt nice. too bad i couldn't wear slippers afterwards, but at least i know my toes are pretty.
i went to this cardio video dance class- it was hard! but really really fun. i hope i can remember the routine. the teacher was this girl, she's probably betwteen 25 adn 35 but was PETITE as hell, wearing knee high socks, baggy basketball shorts, and old school nike dunks, and an italian soccer (futbol) jersey. spunky as hell and a fucking kick ass dancer! the first 30 minutes was spent warming up, freestyling, then the last 30 minutes we learned the routine. i love this shit. i can't wait to go out dancing now!
i decided to stay for the pre-season sports conditioning class, and now, after 2 hours of working out i am sore as fucking hell. but it feels good.
anyway, the other day in the OR, this guy comes in to relieve the scrub tech, and he's cute as ever. filipino w/ really nice eyes. i can't help but stare at him- well i guess only his eyes, since we were all wearing masks and hats. he knew my chief, who was in on the surgery, and we all started talking, talked somemore in the OR lounge over lunch. he's so cute! found out he's a filipino boy from jersey. he recommened things to do in NYC and where i should go out...the other day i was grabbing lunch and he came down and sat next to me, and after chatting, we exchanged numbers and he asked me to hang out. very cool guy. we're gonna hang out on saturday. i'm stoked. he's very cool, into hip hop, an ex-dj, and just seems like a cool cat. i told him he has to convince me that new york city is a way better city to live in than honolulu:)
so...tomorrow' friday. i have plans to hang out with bill, my ex-boyfriend from college and hopefully we can see wicked on broadway. i'd love to see it. i'm gonna try to scout tickets out at TKTS in times square or just go to the venue and see if anyone is selling cheap ticktes. otherwise they're like easily $100. pray for me!!
sweet...another nyc weekend coming up. i'm leaving to providence, rhode island, on sunday afternoon for an interview. will be back on monday night. cool.
okay, off to eat my dinner! i'm STARVING!
...
today i had a half day at the hospital. well, first off, i got to sleep till 6 am (sleeping in!), then headed to basic science lecture clutching my coffee w/ cream and sugar from the street cart, met up with my team, then caught the 9 am shuttle...there were awesome cases going on! i'm so bummed that we were late, and that i had to leave at noon. there were big cases, lots of them.:(
i have this thing where i can't scrub into cases late, or i can't leave early. i need to be there for the whole thing, from meeting the patient to reading the chart to scrubbing in to following the patient to PACU. the residents told me i can just leave early if i have to, but i feel disrespectful you know? it's like starting a song you really love and not listening to the whole thing, reading a chapter and not finishing it, just kissing a boy and not ...hahah. j/k. not really. it's like learning a language but only learning nouns. i don't know- you get the point: i'm all or nothing. so i spent the morning reading sabiston (sabiston is a big surgery test book), caught the noon shuttle back and met with the program director. i did some errands, like dropped a box in the mail- my luggage was 65 lbs, and since i'll be travellling tons on the way back, i need to drop 15 lbs at least so i dont 'get charged everytime i board a flight, which'll be like 6 flights at least. my plan is to mail back my danskos (heavy ass clogs) and clinic stuff as soon as i finish. anyway...it was sooo sooo nice to be outside during the day! in the sunlight! and today there was sunlight- it felt so good- sunny but crisp. supposedly there were snow flurries this morning. yowsers. supposed to get to 20 degrees just outside of nyc and 30 degrees in manhattan tonight. shit that's fucking cold.
anyway..did my errands, then found my way to the MoMA. i took some pictures and i'll post them later. I like that you can take photos in the museum. i put on my killers albums and wandered through the sculptures, the architecture, the photograph areas. stopped at the cafe and ate yummy creamy polenta w/ walnuts and fontina w/ sparking water as i read my 'rough guide to nyc' book...wandered through the MoMA design store, then to rockfeller center and nbc studios. they were filming something right outside of nbc studios and they were really hardcore about not letting people pass by. wandered past radio city music hall, through h&m, then back to the subway...i had some time to kill before my 'cardio video dance class', so went back to the 96 station to my korean nail salon and got a pedicure. my feet were killing me so it felt nice. too bad i couldn't wear slippers afterwards, but at least i know my toes are pretty.
i went to this cardio video dance class- it was hard! but really really fun. i hope i can remember the routine. the teacher was this girl, she's probably betwteen 25 adn 35 but was PETITE as hell, wearing knee high socks, baggy basketball shorts, and old school nike dunks, and an italian soccer (futbol) jersey. spunky as hell and a fucking kick ass dancer! the first 30 minutes was spent warming up, freestyling, then the last 30 minutes we learned the routine. i love this shit. i can't wait to go out dancing now!
i decided to stay for the pre-season sports conditioning class, and now, after 2 hours of working out i am sore as fucking hell. but it feels good.
anyway, the other day in the OR, this guy comes in to relieve the scrub tech, and he's cute as ever. filipino w/ really nice eyes. i can't help but stare at him- well i guess only his eyes, since we were all wearing masks and hats. he knew my chief, who was in on the surgery, and we all started talking, talked somemore in the OR lounge over lunch. he's so cute! found out he's a filipino boy from jersey. he recommened things to do in NYC and where i should go out...the other day i was grabbing lunch and he came down and sat next to me, and after chatting, we exchanged numbers and he asked me to hang out. very cool guy. we're gonna hang out on saturday. i'm stoked. he's very cool, into hip hop, an ex-dj, and just seems like a cool cat. i told him he has to convince me that new york city is a way better city to live in than honolulu:)
so...tomorrow' friday. i have plans to hang out with bill, my ex-boyfriend from college and hopefully we can see wicked on broadway. i'd love to see it. i'm gonna try to scout tickets out at TKTS in times square or just go to the venue and see if anyone is selling cheap ticktes. otherwise they're like easily $100. pray for me!!
sweet...another nyc weekend coming up. i'm leaving to providence, rhode island, on sunday afternoon for an interview. will be back on monday night. cool.
okay, off to eat my dinner! i'm STARVING!
quickie
...quick update! so i finally discovered the main mount sinai campus and the wonderful libary, coffee shop and sitting area, all under this beautiful atrium- basically a huge lobby where the roof and walls are all glass so you feel like you're outside. i think i'm part plant, because i really need sunlight i've realized. i need it during the day to sleep at night, and also just to feel normal. i feel like a vampire or a night hawk, since i leave my apartment and it's dark and leave the hospital and it's dark. i guess this is what residecny is going to be like no matter where i go.
anyway, yesterday...i woke up late again!!! my alarm clock went off at 5:45 am, and i really could NOT be late this time, since we had grand rounds. i literally threw some clothes on, threw my bag together, brushed my teeth, skipped the makeup and forgot my watch, threw on the coat and sprinted to the shuttle, my lungs burned with the ice cold air. and fuck i'm so glad i made it. i realized i had turned down the volume of my phone the other day to avoid having it talk to me - 'your cell phone now had coverage'- in the middle of the OR. embarassing as hell.
i scrubbed into the coolest case yesterday! it was a laparascopic low anterior resection for benign polyps in the rectosigmoid- aka putting a few small holes in the belly, and taking out part of the intestine using small instruments with long handles, then reconnecting the intestine through both the ass and a bit larger hole in the belly. and it was for a non-cancerous stalk of tissue, which had the potential to lead to cancer but wasn't yet cancer. all the sewing of the bowel was done with instruments- gone are the days of hand sewn stitches apparently. anyway, the beginning of the case was tough for me- as the camera holder and as the med student, i had to fight to 1) stay awake and 2) not retaliate against the constant commentary about how my camera holding was NEVER correct. after that part, the case was great. since i've had a track record of not being able to do anything in these cases, including closing, i figured i'd ask if i could close- nothing to lose, right?all they can say is no. and yup they let me close. at least i was doing something! dont' get me wrong, i'm learning tons by watching but also learning how to stay awake by watching. i stay awake by doing. anyway...
last night i took the 6 train to 33rd and met my high school friend, eun ju, for yummy haole style bbq. buffalo wings and corn on the cob!! mmm... it was good to catch up with her and reminisce about care-free, problem-free high school days. traded updates on everyone in our class...she then walked me back to the subway, and we got off at 59th, where i headed to urban outfitters and wandered. dope (but expensive) store. i saw tons of things i wanted to give as gifts, but since the store was closing, i decided to think about it, make a list and go back later.
i got back to my apartment and called one of my mentors back in Hawaii to chat about my interview trail. it was good to talk to him. it's easy to get one-track minded on this whole process of deciding where to go for residency, so i appreciated his perspective.
anyway! can't write much now. will write more later;) haane
anyway, yesterday...i woke up late again!!! my alarm clock went off at 5:45 am, and i really could NOT be late this time, since we had grand rounds. i literally threw some clothes on, threw my bag together, brushed my teeth, skipped the makeup and forgot my watch, threw on the coat and sprinted to the shuttle, my lungs burned with the ice cold air. and fuck i'm so glad i made it. i realized i had turned down the volume of my phone the other day to avoid having it talk to me - 'your cell phone now had coverage'- in the middle of the OR. embarassing as hell.
i scrubbed into the coolest case yesterday! it was a laparascopic low anterior resection for benign polyps in the rectosigmoid- aka putting a few small holes in the belly, and taking out part of the intestine using small instruments with long handles, then reconnecting the intestine through both the ass and a bit larger hole in the belly. and it was for a non-cancerous stalk of tissue, which had the potential to lead to cancer but wasn't yet cancer. all the sewing of the bowel was done with instruments- gone are the days of hand sewn stitches apparently. anyway, the beginning of the case was tough for me- as the camera holder and as the med student, i had to fight to 1) stay awake and 2) not retaliate against the constant commentary about how my camera holding was NEVER correct. after that part, the case was great. since i've had a track record of not being able to do anything in these cases, including closing, i figured i'd ask if i could close- nothing to lose, right?all they can say is no. and yup they let me close. at least i was doing something! dont' get me wrong, i'm learning tons by watching but also learning how to stay awake by watching. i stay awake by doing. anyway...
last night i took the 6 train to 33rd and met my high school friend, eun ju, for yummy haole style bbq. buffalo wings and corn on the cob!! mmm... it was good to catch up with her and reminisce about care-free, problem-free high school days. traded updates on everyone in our class...she then walked me back to the subway, and we got off at 59th, where i headed to urban outfitters and wandered. dope (but expensive) store. i saw tons of things i wanted to give as gifts, but since the store was closing, i decided to think about it, make a list and go back later.
i got back to my apartment and called one of my mentors back in Hawaii to chat about my interview trail. it was good to talk to him. it's easy to get one-track minded on this whole process of deciding where to go for residency, so i appreciated his perspective.
anyway! can't write much now. will write more later;) haane
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
i love my team
my team rocks. my chief, this chill ecuadorian guy is funny as hell, uses fuck like every other word, is 28 and married the girl he's been dating since he was 18, and just a good guy. the intern from jamaica is sassy, smart, loves to eat good food and listens to reggae. we are all fascinated by each other. we're all from different places and have totally different upbringings. the intern from jamaica is 23 siblings- yup! she's one of 4 on her mom's side and one of 19 or something on her dad's side. she goes to dance class and gave me the name of the place she goes in manhattan, called the alvin ailey dance school. i definitely gotta make it to one of the classes- there's one called 'absolute beginning hip hop' and another 'snap pop and lock' class. hell yeah! this morning we all caught the shuttle at 6 am as usual, and this time it was only us three in the shuttle- usually there's a couple other randoms, including a very sour anesthesia dude and a couple bubbly 3rd yr med students. our driver, julian, who i talked to today for the first time is from columbia and has the cutest baby face. he took us to a columbian bakery right by the hospital on the way and i ate a bunuelo (similar to ones on guam!). mmmm!! so fricken good. i'm eating my way through new york city i think.
the day in the OR kinda sucked to be honest. i rounded with one asshole, pompous attending who said he doesn't think 'indigent people in America should be fed or get health care'- WTF?!?!?! i almost puked in my mouth and then almost punched him but kept it to myself. this was as he squeezed the hell our of an abcess on the gastrocnemius of a 10 yr old boy without warning him or making him feel comfortable. i know what kind of surgeon i don't want to be!
the next couple cases were lap choles. i like them because i want to be good at the, and the best way to learn right now is to see as many as possible. except this attending was rushing the resident, impatient, saying 'you're killing me!' over and over, and wouldn't let me do ANYTHING. only yell at me no matter how i held the camera and then pimp me- but in a way that was mocking me, like asking trick questions and stuff. fuck that. i'm over being a med student. he wouldn't even let me close skin. i know i sound like i'm ranting and raving and possibly entitled to do whatever i want, but at the same time, he has no reason to be an asshole. i basically felt like a monkey in a clown show or something. i skpped the third case- an inguinal hernia and opted to read for the afternoon. i'm trying to read sabiston.
i also got another interview!! yippee! at kaiser permanente LA. sweeet....also scheduled an interview at Brown University in Rhode Island for Monday, and made travel plans.
got home, made plans for dinner with a high school buddy for dinner tomorrow night. did laundry. went to a 'pre-season sports conditioning' class. this class was an hour long of PE class. remember PE, and having to run a certain amount of laps, having to get in line and do drills and getting in small groups to do stuff? it also reminded me of volleyball practice. it made me feel competitive again, which i liked! i miss team sports. it brought back high school memories of PE teachers such as Mr. Capule and Mr. Linkenhelt. I was pretty athletic in high school and pretty competitive, but never really the best at what i did. I think i was lucky and persistent, and that's why i was able to play volleyball as much as i did. much like medicine- i've been lucky and persistent. plus i loved volleyball so much, also much like medicine. i will work my ass off as long as i love it and if i set a goal, but i'm not a 'natural' at anything, you know?
anyway, haven't gottten to explore too much these past few days...still some thing son my list:
MoMA
the Village
Urban Outfitters/Macy's
take a Dance class
go to a Broadway show
find good underground hip hop music
walk around Central Park
Eat good Korean Food
Chinatown
Try different New York bagels
if possible, see a sporting event
Find the grafitti wall on 106th street in Harlem/ Harlem during the day
See the statue of liberty from battery park
see the rockfeller tree lighting
go out dancing on a friday or saturday night
maybe buy boots!
the sex and the city your
people watch in the bronx
my time is running out!! especially since i'll be heading to providence for the day and night on sunday afternoon. it's almost work to do everything on ths list. i can't complain though.
...okay today i missed hawaii. a lot. the weather got fucking cold. i love the islands. a lot. so i listened to reggae music on my ipod today;)
i know it'll pass. and realize i'm really really lucky to be where i am right now! the opportunity to spend a few weeks in nyc and to see different cities in the U.S...pretty dope.
the day in the OR kinda sucked to be honest. i rounded with one asshole, pompous attending who said he doesn't think 'indigent people in America should be fed or get health care'- WTF?!?!?! i almost puked in my mouth and then almost punched him but kept it to myself. this was as he squeezed the hell our of an abcess on the gastrocnemius of a 10 yr old boy without warning him or making him feel comfortable. i know what kind of surgeon i don't want to be!
the next couple cases were lap choles. i like them because i want to be good at the, and the best way to learn right now is to see as many as possible. except this attending was rushing the resident, impatient, saying 'you're killing me!' over and over, and wouldn't let me do ANYTHING. only yell at me no matter how i held the camera and then pimp me- but in a way that was mocking me, like asking trick questions and stuff. fuck that. i'm over being a med student. he wouldn't even let me close skin. i know i sound like i'm ranting and raving and possibly entitled to do whatever i want, but at the same time, he has no reason to be an asshole. i basically felt like a monkey in a clown show or something. i skpped the third case- an inguinal hernia and opted to read for the afternoon. i'm trying to read sabiston.
i also got another interview!! yippee! at kaiser permanente LA. sweeet....also scheduled an interview at Brown University in Rhode Island for Monday, and made travel plans.
got home, made plans for dinner with a high school buddy for dinner tomorrow night. did laundry. went to a 'pre-season sports conditioning' class. this class was an hour long of PE class. remember PE, and having to run a certain amount of laps, having to get in line and do drills and getting in small groups to do stuff? it also reminded me of volleyball practice. it made me feel competitive again, which i liked! i miss team sports. it brought back high school memories of PE teachers such as Mr. Capule and Mr. Linkenhelt. I was pretty athletic in high school and pretty competitive, but never really the best at what i did. I think i was lucky and persistent, and that's why i was able to play volleyball as much as i did. much like medicine- i've been lucky and persistent. plus i loved volleyball so much, also much like medicine. i will work my ass off as long as i love it and if i set a goal, but i'm not a 'natural' at anything, you know?
anyway, haven't gottten to explore too much these past few days...still some thing son my list:
MoMA
the Village
Urban Outfitters/Macy's
take a Dance class
go to a Broadway show
find good underground hip hop music
walk around Central Park
Eat good Korean Food
Chinatown
Try different New York bagels
if possible, see a sporting event
Find the grafitti wall on 106th street in Harlem/ Harlem during the day
See the statue of liberty from battery park
see the rockfeller tree lighting
go out dancing on a friday or saturday night
maybe buy boots!
the sex and the city your
people watch in the bronx
my time is running out!! especially since i'll be heading to providence for the day and night on sunday afternoon. it's almost work to do everything on ths list. i can't complain though.
...okay today i missed hawaii. a lot. the weather got fucking cold. i love the islands. a lot. so i listened to reggae music on my ipod today;)
i know it'll pass. and realize i'm really really lucky to be where i am right now! the opportunity to spend a few weeks in nyc and to see different cities in the U.S...pretty dope.
Monday, November 17, 2008
divaliscious....you know what i'm sayin' right?
so i just took the 6 train uptown to 103rd street, one stop away from 96th, where i catch the subway, but it feels like a whole other world. uptown from my place is spanish harlem (east harlem) then harlem harlem. it has tons of african american and hispanic history, but also known for being a rougher part of town. i've been wanting to try puerto rican food so chose this spot called 'la isla' on 103rd and 3rd, recommended by both the director of my program and the not for tourists guidebook. i had my ipod playing 'single' by ne-yo, my new favorite jam, but i can hear this middle aged african woman saying 'divalicious', using it in a sentence over and over, talking to an adolescent hispanic girl sitting down. everytime she said divaliscious, she threw her hands across her body and did this worm thing with her torso. a couple people around her started smiling and she said 'see, i made you smile!' and i couldn't help but smile...see in new york city, i noticed, no one smiles. it's wierd. i want to smile sometimes at shit i see or things i'm thinking but i have to stop myself. it's wierd that i smile. anyway...i smiled at this one...
so i get off the subway, an walk the 2 blocks to the restaurant...there's one african-american young guy with a doo-rag working at the counter, an older puerto rican gentleman in a chef's outfit sitting at one of the booths, an adolescent, like 12 ish, puerto rican guy eating a mcdonalds hamburger waiting in line, and a 20 something african american couple eating at the bar stools. there's a hot line of soupy food and rice, and a line up of various fried foods, whole chickens and sausage in the window. it actually looked like a chamorro buffett, which is kinda cool considering guam and puerto rico are both territories and have hispanic roots. as i'm waiting the guy at the counter says 'hold up chica, i'll be right with you', in between his spanish conversation with the boy in front of me. as the boy is leaving, the guy at the counter says 'now go to school okay. you must go to school, okay?'. the boy nods his head and i look up at him and he's smilng (someone is smiling!!!) so i smile back at him. i get the counter and not really sure what to get, hadn't really thought about it and decided to just be honest. i asked him to put together a good puerto rican dinner for me, chicken, rice and whatever. i ask him to explain what everything is in the window, and i pick a few things. he starts flirting with me, asking if i had gone to the gym, (which i just had) , because 'damn you obviously do'. he asks who's making me go to the gym, because 'girl you don't have to go if you look like that'. he asks what i do and i say 'i work in a hospital', and he says 'what you do? you a nurse?' and i simply say 'i work in a hospital' and he says...'you gotta be nurse.' then starts singing 'night nurse' by gregory isaacs and i can't help but smile....he asks how long i've lived in new york and i say 'i'm here for a month' and he asks where i'm from and i say hawaii and he says 'ohio' and i say louder 'hawaii'...and he says, 'wow you're the first person i've met from hawaii. good looking people'...he asks if i 'have someone to show me around the city, ..you know...like SHOW you AROUND the city...you know waht i'm sayin right girl? like a relationship?' and i tell a white lie and say 'yeah, i actually do'...and he goes 'okay girl. just making sure you're taken care of'...he rings me up as he puts my food together, which i can't help but notice is enough for 1 small family or one large man, and says 'damn i don't want to charge you too much but i gotta keep my job' and i say 'hey do whatcha gotta do, k?' and he laughs. it comes out to $8.25 (staying true to the not for tourist book which had one dollar sign next to the restaurant)....i thank him and walk out wiht my feast in a brown bag, covered by a black plastic bag. oh yeah, every time i've ordered food to go, they always put it in a brown paper bag then a plastic bag....
i walk back to the subway station and it's obviously different than the 86th upper east side station. this station has a few african american and puerto rican peeps, with a small group of asians and haoles in their northface and gap clothing- they stood out. on lexington and 86th, almost everyone is white or asian. interesting.
my bag of yummy puerto rican food is sitting next to me at starbucks right now as i blog away. yumminess awaits me for dinner!
so yeah!
today i accidentally slept it. damn. i woke up at 6:15am, and had set my alarm for 5:10 so i can catch the 6 am shuttle. i immediately call my chief and let him know i'll be catching the 7 am shuttle. the morning is a blur- i swear my body is not used to this schedule yet or maybe it's the cold and dark that's making it tough for me to get going in the morning.
i get to the hospital and meet up with my team. they said they almost told me not to come because there's almost no cases. i'm kinda relieved because i don't feel so bad for being late, but also bummed because it means NO CASES. i wanted to be in the OR today. we meet for 'breakfast rounds', then head upstairs to our call rooom/kitchen to wait for the first case at 11:15. the dope jamaican intern, the other intern, who i found out is from haiti and i start chatting about 'what would you do if your boyfriend/girlfriend because paralyzed from the neck down?'. oh man..what a topic to discuss. themes of being a romantic, of sexual needs, of true love, of cultural values...which turned into a 'what's your ideal relationship?' and we all went around and talked about it. one of the interns at one point said 'we're all from the islands, let's talk about what it's like on our different islands'. dope as shit!
i end up scrubbing with this little surgeon into an inguinal hernia repair and an ivc filter placement. he's a great teacher, it's just he and i (no resident), so he tuaght me quite a bit and let me do a lot. i'm loving hernias right now. they're the bread and butter of general surgery and i'll be doing tons of them next year so i'm stoked to review them. as a student up to now, i've been scrubbing into the 'bigger', 'cooler' cases, which is great, but now maybe i should start seeing the bread and butter of cases so i can get used to them.
i was really tired after the cases, so i took a nap, then after an hour or so of reading sabiston online, one of the interns and i caught the shuttle back to manhattan. i quickly got ready for the gym, and made it to the 7 pm cardio kickboxing class. i couldn't decide between that class or the boxing class. i loved the boxing class, but wanted to try something new. this one kicked my ass in a different way! this class was more combos and agility and flexibility, whereas the boxing class was more strength and circuit training. i think i like the boxing class better. it was much more athletic and less 'dance-y'.
so from there i went on my puerto rican food search...and here i am!
i think i'll go home and eat:)
oh yeah! i got one more interview- at loma linda in LA. yay! i also got two rejections:( one of them being UCSF. that's okay. i'm pretty happy. i have 13 interview offers, 10 or 11 of which i'm taking. which i hope is more than enough to make a decent match list. i'm starting to see the light. i just have to make it through these interviews!
so i get off the subway, an walk the 2 blocks to the restaurant...there's one african-american young guy with a doo-rag working at the counter, an older puerto rican gentleman in a chef's outfit sitting at one of the booths, an adolescent, like 12 ish, puerto rican guy eating a mcdonalds hamburger waiting in line, and a 20 something african american couple eating at the bar stools. there's a hot line of soupy food and rice, and a line up of various fried foods, whole chickens and sausage in the window. it actually looked like a chamorro buffett, which is kinda cool considering guam and puerto rico are both territories and have hispanic roots. as i'm waiting the guy at the counter says 'hold up chica, i'll be right with you', in between his spanish conversation with the boy in front of me. as the boy is leaving, the guy at the counter says 'now go to school okay. you must go to school, okay?'. the boy nods his head and i look up at him and he's smilng (someone is smiling!!!) so i smile back at him. i get the counter and not really sure what to get, hadn't really thought about it and decided to just be honest. i asked him to put together a good puerto rican dinner for me, chicken, rice and whatever. i ask him to explain what everything is in the window, and i pick a few things. he starts flirting with me, asking if i had gone to the gym, (which i just had) , because 'damn you obviously do'. he asks who's making me go to the gym, because 'girl you don't have to go if you look like that'. he asks what i do and i say 'i work in a hospital', and he says 'what you do? you a nurse?' and i simply say 'i work in a hospital' and he says...'you gotta be nurse.' then starts singing 'night nurse' by gregory isaacs and i can't help but smile....he asks how long i've lived in new york and i say 'i'm here for a month' and he asks where i'm from and i say hawaii and he says 'ohio' and i say louder 'hawaii'...and he says, 'wow you're the first person i've met from hawaii. good looking people'...he asks if i 'have someone to show me around the city, ..you know...like SHOW you AROUND the city...you know waht i'm sayin right girl? like a relationship?' and i tell a white lie and say 'yeah, i actually do'...and he goes 'okay girl. just making sure you're taken care of'...he rings me up as he puts my food together, which i can't help but notice is enough for 1 small family or one large man, and says 'damn i don't want to charge you too much but i gotta keep my job' and i say 'hey do whatcha gotta do, k?' and he laughs. it comes out to $8.25 (staying true to the not for tourist book which had one dollar sign next to the restaurant)....i thank him and walk out wiht my feast in a brown bag, covered by a black plastic bag. oh yeah, every time i've ordered food to go, they always put it in a brown paper bag then a plastic bag....
i walk back to the subway station and it's obviously different than the 86th upper east side station. this station has a few african american and puerto rican peeps, with a small group of asians and haoles in their northface and gap clothing- they stood out. on lexington and 86th, almost everyone is white or asian. interesting.
my bag of yummy puerto rican food is sitting next to me at starbucks right now as i blog away. yumminess awaits me for dinner!
so yeah!
today i accidentally slept it. damn. i woke up at 6:15am, and had set my alarm for 5:10 so i can catch the 6 am shuttle. i immediately call my chief and let him know i'll be catching the 7 am shuttle. the morning is a blur- i swear my body is not used to this schedule yet or maybe it's the cold and dark that's making it tough for me to get going in the morning.
i get to the hospital and meet up with my team. they said they almost told me not to come because there's almost no cases. i'm kinda relieved because i don't feel so bad for being late, but also bummed because it means NO CASES. i wanted to be in the OR today. we meet for 'breakfast rounds', then head upstairs to our call rooom/kitchen to wait for the first case at 11:15. the dope jamaican intern, the other intern, who i found out is from haiti and i start chatting about 'what would you do if your boyfriend/girlfriend because paralyzed from the neck down?'. oh man..what a topic to discuss. themes of being a romantic, of sexual needs, of true love, of cultural values...which turned into a 'what's your ideal relationship?' and we all went around and talked about it. one of the interns at one point said 'we're all from the islands, let's talk about what it's like on our different islands'. dope as shit!
i end up scrubbing with this little surgeon into an inguinal hernia repair and an ivc filter placement. he's a great teacher, it's just he and i (no resident), so he tuaght me quite a bit and let me do a lot. i'm loving hernias right now. they're the bread and butter of general surgery and i'll be doing tons of them next year so i'm stoked to review them. as a student up to now, i've been scrubbing into the 'bigger', 'cooler' cases, which is great, but now maybe i should start seeing the bread and butter of cases so i can get used to them.
i was really tired after the cases, so i took a nap, then after an hour or so of reading sabiston online, one of the interns and i caught the shuttle back to manhattan. i quickly got ready for the gym, and made it to the 7 pm cardio kickboxing class. i couldn't decide between that class or the boxing class. i loved the boxing class, but wanted to try something new. this one kicked my ass in a different way! this class was more combos and agility and flexibility, whereas the boxing class was more strength and circuit training. i think i like the boxing class better. it was much more athletic and less 'dance-y'.
so from there i went on my puerto rican food search...and here i am!
i think i'll go home and eat:)
oh yeah! i got one more interview- at loma linda in LA. yay! i also got two rejections:( one of them being UCSF. that's okay. i'm pretty happy. i have 13 interview offers, 10 or 11 of which i'm taking. which i hope is more than enough to make a decent match list. i'm starting to see the light. i just have to make it through these interviews!
Sunday, November 16, 2008
blustery day in manhattan
it was coooold today! it was 45 degrees!
another day of adventures today. i once again woke up overwhelmed with the possibilities of how to spend my day in nyc. it's almost stressful. seriously! i decided that i should do more 'outdoors' stuff today that required sunlight, since ill be at the hospital all week, and i can do some of the 'indoor' stuff during my evenings- indoor stuff being window shopping, museums and eating.
oh my god before i forget, today in little italy, this fire engine comes rushing down the crowded street and of course the sirens are blasting....then i hear a dog bark! i thought it was a dog on the street that was freaking out....then i see the fire engine and there's a dog on the fire engine! i dalmation- the fire dog! hilarious.
anyway, so i grabbed coffee and breakfast at my new favorite coffee house down the street. i take the 6 train the the last downtown stop- city hall and brooklyn. today i wanted to walk across the brooklyn bridge then eat pizza in brooklyn at grimaldi's and coffee at henry's. the walk across the bridge is pretty phenomenal. the bridge itself is gorgeous, with wood planks at your feet and of course tons of tourists. there's a walking lane and a biking lane. my goal was to walk across the bridge and resist the temptation to look back at the manhattan skyline until i got to the halfway point. i did it! from the bridge you can see the statue of liberty/ellis island in the distance, the manhattan bridge and of course the manhattan skyline of skysrapers. i make it to brooklyn and am pretty hungry by this time, and on a mission to find grimaldi's. i had the address so i typed it into my google maps and followed the directions. except...of course i got lost. i couldn't find it! i could see it on the map but my path wasn't lining up! i was by far the miniority in the area, with 80% of the people being african american. on my walk i stopped and watched a lacrosse team practice and passed by the nyc technical college. brooklyn itself is not that pretty or remarkable, but i was on a mission to find grimaldi's. after an hour of walking essentially in cirles, i aborted my mission and walked back to manhattan. i think i had put in 4 or 5 miles of walking by this point! as i get back to manhattan over the bridge, i see this couple who had just gotten married. very very cool. the couple was older too- i'll post pictures. the husband was holding up her dress as she walked so it didn't drag. very cute..there were two photograhers snapping away, plus to gorgeous wedding-goers in long black dresses and black coats that almost touched the ground.
i catch the 6 train uptown to canal street and wander through china town a little bit, but still on my mission to eat good italian food....i find little italy, and wander down mulberry street past italian restaurants and cafes, italian people with heavy italian accents, tourists, italian stores and everything is green, red and white, even the fire hydrants and parking meters. i pass st patrick's, the cathedral in the center, and i pass a street vendor selling italian goodies- including bsicotti- by the pound. i choose a couple options for italian food in my books and one of them is closed for lunch and and the other is actually about a mile away, which is too far, so i come back on mulberry street and stop into this pizza joint- i chose it because there were locals there. or at least local looking folks with new york accents. i order yummy pizza and am happy! at some point i'd like an italian pasta dish, but i had to get new york pizza!...i save the rest for dinner. i see shirst that say 'hug me i'm half italian' plus all the touristy 'i heart new york shirts', etc. i almost bought this key chain, it was of a boxing glove, which was black, red and green and had 'italia' written on it. i opt for the postcards instead...as much as i wanted gelato and an italian espresso, it was way too cold and i had way too much coffee already.
i take the train home, stop into gourmet garage, this chain health food store, pick up some breakfast items and snacks, make it home and i'm so happy to be home! and here i am a few hours later at the coffee shop blogging away...
another day of adventures today. i once again woke up overwhelmed with the possibilities of how to spend my day in nyc. it's almost stressful. seriously! i decided that i should do more 'outdoors' stuff today that required sunlight, since ill be at the hospital all week, and i can do some of the 'indoor' stuff during my evenings- indoor stuff being window shopping, museums and eating.
oh my god before i forget, today in little italy, this fire engine comes rushing down the crowded street and of course the sirens are blasting....then i hear a dog bark! i thought it was a dog on the street that was freaking out....then i see the fire engine and there's a dog on the fire engine! i dalmation- the fire dog! hilarious.
anyway, so i grabbed coffee and breakfast at my new favorite coffee house down the street. i take the 6 train the the last downtown stop- city hall and brooklyn. today i wanted to walk across the brooklyn bridge then eat pizza in brooklyn at grimaldi's and coffee at henry's. the walk across the bridge is pretty phenomenal. the bridge itself is gorgeous, with wood planks at your feet and of course tons of tourists. there's a walking lane and a biking lane. my goal was to walk across the bridge and resist the temptation to look back at the manhattan skyline until i got to the halfway point. i did it! from the bridge you can see the statue of liberty/ellis island in the distance, the manhattan bridge and of course the manhattan skyline of skysrapers. i make it to brooklyn and am pretty hungry by this time, and on a mission to find grimaldi's. i had the address so i typed it into my google maps and followed the directions. except...of course i got lost. i couldn't find it! i could see it on the map but my path wasn't lining up! i was by far the miniority in the area, with 80% of the people being african american. on my walk i stopped and watched a lacrosse team practice and passed by the nyc technical college. brooklyn itself is not that pretty or remarkable, but i was on a mission to find grimaldi's. after an hour of walking essentially in cirles, i aborted my mission and walked back to manhattan. i think i had put in 4 or 5 miles of walking by this point! as i get back to manhattan over the bridge, i see this couple who had just gotten married. very very cool. the couple was older too- i'll post pictures. the husband was holding up her dress as she walked so it didn't drag. very cute..there were two photograhers snapping away, plus to gorgeous wedding-goers in long black dresses and black coats that almost touched the ground.
i catch the 6 train uptown to canal street and wander through china town a little bit, but still on my mission to eat good italian food....i find little italy, and wander down mulberry street past italian restaurants and cafes, italian people with heavy italian accents, tourists, italian stores and everything is green, red and white, even the fire hydrants and parking meters. i pass st patrick's, the cathedral in the center, and i pass a street vendor selling italian goodies- including bsicotti- by the pound. i choose a couple options for italian food in my books and one of them is closed for lunch and and the other is actually about a mile away, which is too far, so i come back on mulberry street and stop into this pizza joint- i chose it because there were locals there. or at least local looking folks with new york accents. i order yummy pizza and am happy! at some point i'd like an italian pasta dish, but i had to get new york pizza!...i save the rest for dinner. i see shirst that say 'hug me i'm half italian' plus all the touristy 'i heart new york shirts', etc. i almost bought this key chain, it was of a boxing glove, which was black, red and green and had 'italia' written on it. i opt for the postcards instead...as much as i wanted gelato and an italian espresso, it was way too cold and i had way too much coffee already.
i take the train home, stop into gourmet garage, this chain health food store, pick up some breakfast items and snacks, make it home and i'm so happy to be home! and here i am a few hours later at the coffee shop blogging away...
damn not having internet but that's okay
yeah! i haven't been able to make it a coffee shop in a couple days. my mom even called me 'cause she was worried. i posted a blog about friday day just now.
hot and cold. that's how the weekend weather. yesterday was 60 degrees. i had my big ole coat with really warm wool lining and sweat my butt off all day. anyway!
so ...friday night i took the 6 train downtown to union square/14th and met a friend from guam at his apartment. i wasn't sure what to expect. we went to the same high school but he's a few years older so we never really cruised, but know each other from summers and christmases of going home and hanging out with everyone. he lives close to nyu, in this beautiful apartment that he bought (he's in finance). after a few moments of catching up, the festivities begun! all kinds of people were at his party. some new lawyers, a couple of undergrads, people he works with in finance, friends he met spending his summers at a timeshare in the hamptons....we hung out, had some drinks, with nba playing on in his big screen tv, then all migrated outside, took a few cabs about 10 blocks down the street to this smallish bar. i don't remember what it was called. we were early, and it was 11 pm by now! damn people in ny party late! the music was dope, and a few other people from guam rolled in! it was so good to see them. one was in my class in high school, another i played volleyball with, and a couple more i hadn't seen....anyway, i spent the night people watching, talking story, meeting different people. i met this little asian guy from LA, i think his name is hartman, and talked to him for a long time, as i watched this catfight drama play out. so...my friend is incredibly good looking, and single but has some 'go to' girls or whatever you want to call it, and they were all there. haha. dangerous. they both looked very different- one was about 22, half black-half white, and just loud and social, dressed to kill in her high heels and little dress. the other was this more alternative-ish (i'm probably not even describing it correctly), but bascially she and short brown hair and bangs, very straight bangs that almost covered her eyes, and dressed in this svelt short dress and high belt and boots, and the whole night they would take turns pissing on their territory on him, and it was pretty funny. his guy friends and i were watching it and laughing about it the whole night. his friends are good people, i just had that feeling. we ended up closing the bar down, then at 'blue burger', an open all night in'n'out wanna be- SOOOOO good. i have some pictures, i'll post them. caught a cab home and passed out at 5 am.....
and here i had big plans to spend ALL day exploring! it's all good!
i rolled out of bed at 10 am - late for me- very very late- i'm usually up at 7 am at the latest, no matter what, but it's so dark here, so i can sleep in. i went to the gym quickly to get the alcohol out of my system, clutching a warm cup of coffee on my way back to my apartment, then got ready for my day...i realized i hadn't sat down yet to have a GOOD new york meal! that was one goal for my day.
i took the 6 downtown train first to time square, via grand central station and the 7 train. time square is the center of adhd-ness, billboards, big stores, flocks of toursists, peeps trying to sell you tickets to comedy shows on the street, with the smell of honey roasted nuts wafting in the air, nypd on horses, in buses and in cars, mtv, people dressed in costume, and fucking madness. of course...the first store i find myself wanding into is roxy. haha. there's surfboards and surf dvds playing so of course i'm drawn to it. this 17 or 23 year old asian girl with lots of energy greets me 'welcome to roxy!. oh mygod i looove your coat. you got that at the gap right? i looove it. ...are you half asian? sorry to ask but you are so pretty. your eyes, and your hair...you're pretty!'... she's cute and bubbly and i thank her for her compliments. as i'm paying for my 'roxy new york' tshirt i ask the guy if there's surf around her. he said there's surf in long island, on the jersey shore and at rockaway. i have no ideas where these places are. i almost got excited and thought about making a day trip to surf in new york, but then i stopped when he said it's way toooo cold right now. i'm spoiled by hawaii surf!!
anyway...so after wandering through the hurrican of commericialism and tourism of times square...i take the train to soho.
i have surgery lectures on my ipod- they're great to listen to on the subway. i also have black star, which i've been really addicted to for some reason. it's like the soundtrack to my trip so far. soho is this hip artsy neighborhood, quiet streets alternate with high end fashion, small artsy fashion hipster clothing, some run of the mill brand name boutiques like quickilver and old navy, smaller streets, (i have pics)...it's fun to wander and windowshop. lots of artists in the neighborhood which is really dope. i have this set of index card-like things called 'city walks' which takes you on walks of all parts of the city, all about an hour long, explaining sights along the way and making suggestions for restaurants. i found this AWESOME store called evolution, basically a mix of art and science, with everything from wall posters of human anatomy, to crystalized bugs, to stones, to books about anatomy through the centures, to life sized skeletons. fucking cool. i found this '3d human torso puzzle'- fucking awesome. it's a human torso, with detachable organs, 22 pieces, and made for kids to learn the anatomy of the belly and chest. they had one for the muscles of the human body and the eye ball. but the belly is by far the dopest. you basically take out the liver, spleen, intestins, lungs, heart, etc of this torso then put it back together....i'm a dork.
after couple hours of wanding, i'm hungry but it's pushing 4 or 5 and i'm meeting leah for dinner (my best friend from college). since little italy is 5 minutes away, i wander in that direction.
let me just say, i'm terrible with directions. if i can't see the ocean or mountains, i'm fucked. i even have my google maps and gps on my blackberry and i still can't find things. i even have real maps and i still get lost. i just don't have it in me to follow directions!
essentailly i never found little italy because i went the wrong way and didn't realize it. i gps my way back to the subway, and i'm starving at this point. i'm torn between wanting to find a good place to eat in my guidebooks and just grabbing anything i can get my hands on. i end up sucking it up and waiting till i got back to my neighborhood, where i can grab something i know is good.
i make it home and have a couple hours before meeting up with leah. i'm exhausted!
after rejuvinating, i cab it across the park (i'm on the upper east side of the park) to the upper west side to this wonderful restaurant called cafe A- a byob french-caribbean restaurant, small and intimate and everyone is really really nice. i'm wearing my most new york outfit that i have- i had the tights on! everyone here wears tights or leggings under a skirt or sweater dress, with boots and a long coat. it's pretty sexy and i'm tempted to get boots but dont' know if i'll wear them again after this trip. but i did find myself some tights. the last time i wore tights was when i was forced to take ballet at the age of 4. my tights always had runs and snags in them. typical, huH? it fit me because i was also the most clumsy.
anyway, so as i'm waiting for leah, this homeless guy comes up to me and asks me for a dollar, telling me he has hiv, etc etc. yes i feel bad for him, but i also can't help everyone who asks for help, so i have a policy to not help any one who asks for money on the street. i tell him i can't help him and he tries to talk me into helping him. i tell him my policy and he still tries to convince me and ...then leah and her boyfriend come up just at the right time. it's so good to see her!!
we had the best dinner. i pass on the wine because i never want to see alcohol again. we order family style- this squash stuffed with edamame, garbonzo beans and yumminess, the baked pear with soy cheese, meatless meatloaf with rice, and this sausage dish...mmmm! the table next to us is a celebration of some sort. it's the most eclectic group of people ever. and the music at this place is fucking awesome! everything from depeche mode to duran duran and madonna to hall and oates. excellent...
it was leah's friend dale's bday last night- dale, leah and i worked at stanford sierra camp together in college. we hang out for a little bit at the party- right down the street, before i checked out and got a cab home. i was exhausted!!
was a good day:)
hot and cold. that's how the weekend weather. yesterday was 60 degrees. i had my big ole coat with really warm wool lining and sweat my butt off all day. anyway!
so ...friday night i took the 6 train downtown to union square/14th and met a friend from guam at his apartment. i wasn't sure what to expect. we went to the same high school but he's a few years older so we never really cruised, but know each other from summers and christmases of going home and hanging out with everyone. he lives close to nyu, in this beautiful apartment that he bought (he's in finance). after a few moments of catching up, the festivities begun! all kinds of people were at his party. some new lawyers, a couple of undergrads, people he works with in finance, friends he met spending his summers at a timeshare in the hamptons....we hung out, had some drinks, with nba playing on in his big screen tv, then all migrated outside, took a few cabs about 10 blocks down the street to this smallish bar. i don't remember what it was called. we were early, and it was 11 pm by now! damn people in ny party late! the music was dope, and a few other people from guam rolled in! it was so good to see them. one was in my class in high school, another i played volleyball with, and a couple more i hadn't seen....anyway, i spent the night people watching, talking story, meeting different people. i met this little asian guy from LA, i think his name is hartman, and talked to him for a long time, as i watched this catfight drama play out. so...my friend is incredibly good looking, and single but has some 'go to' girls or whatever you want to call it, and they were all there. haha. dangerous. they both looked very different- one was about 22, half black-half white, and just loud and social, dressed to kill in her high heels and little dress. the other was this more alternative-ish (i'm probably not even describing it correctly), but bascially she and short brown hair and bangs, very straight bangs that almost covered her eyes, and dressed in this svelt short dress and high belt and boots, and the whole night they would take turns pissing on their territory on him, and it was pretty funny. his guy friends and i were watching it and laughing about it the whole night. his friends are good people, i just had that feeling. we ended up closing the bar down, then at 'blue burger', an open all night in'n'out wanna be- SOOOOO good. i have some pictures, i'll post them. caught a cab home and passed out at 5 am.....
and here i had big plans to spend ALL day exploring! it's all good!
i rolled out of bed at 10 am - late for me- very very late- i'm usually up at 7 am at the latest, no matter what, but it's so dark here, so i can sleep in. i went to the gym quickly to get the alcohol out of my system, clutching a warm cup of coffee on my way back to my apartment, then got ready for my day...i realized i hadn't sat down yet to have a GOOD new york meal! that was one goal for my day.
i took the 6 downtown train first to time square, via grand central station and the 7 train. time square is the center of adhd-ness, billboards, big stores, flocks of toursists, peeps trying to sell you tickets to comedy shows on the street, with the smell of honey roasted nuts wafting in the air, nypd on horses, in buses and in cars, mtv, people dressed in costume, and fucking madness. of course...the first store i find myself wanding into is roxy. haha. there's surfboards and surf dvds playing so of course i'm drawn to it. this 17 or 23 year old asian girl with lots of energy greets me 'welcome to roxy!. oh mygod i looove your coat. you got that at the gap right? i looove it. ...are you half asian? sorry to ask but you are so pretty. your eyes, and your hair...you're pretty!'... she's cute and bubbly and i thank her for her compliments. as i'm paying for my 'roxy new york' tshirt i ask the guy if there's surf around her. he said there's surf in long island, on the jersey shore and at rockaway. i have no ideas where these places are. i almost got excited and thought about making a day trip to surf in new york, but then i stopped when he said it's way toooo cold right now. i'm spoiled by hawaii surf!!
anyway...so after wandering through the hurrican of commericialism and tourism of times square...i take the train to soho.
i have surgery lectures on my ipod- they're great to listen to on the subway. i also have black star, which i've been really addicted to for some reason. it's like the soundtrack to my trip so far. soho is this hip artsy neighborhood, quiet streets alternate with high end fashion, small artsy fashion hipster clothing, some run of the mill brand name boutiques like quickilver and old navy, smaller streets, (i have pics)...it's fun to wander and windowshop. lots of artists in the neighborhood which is really dope. i have this set of index card-like things called 'city walks' which takes you on walks of all parts of the city, all about an hour long, explaining sights along the way and making suggestions for restaurants. i found this AWESOME store called evolution, basically a mix of art and science, with everything from wall posters of human anatomy, to crystalized bugs, to stones, to books about anatomy through the centures, to life sized skeletons. fucking cool. i found this '3d human torso puzzle'- fucking awesome. it's a human torso, with detachable organs, 22 pieces, and made for kids to learn the anatomy of the belly and chest. they had one for the muscles of the human body and the eye ball. but the belly is by far the dopest. you basically take out the liver, spleen, intestins, lungs, heart, etc of this torso then put it back together....i'm a dork.
after couple hours of wanding, i'm hungry but it's pushing 4 or 5 and i'm meeting leah for dinner (my best friend from college). since little italy is 5 minutes away, i wander in that direction.
let me just say, i'm terrible with directions. if i can't see the ocean or mountains, i'm fucked. i even have my google maps and gps on my blackberry and i still can't find things. i even have real maps and i still get lost. i just don't have it in me to follow directions!
essentailly i never found little italy because i went the wrong way and didn't realize it. i gps my way back to the subway, and i'm starving at this point. i'm torn between wanting to find a good place to eat in my guidebooks and just grabbing anything i can get my hands on. i end up sucking it up and waiting till i got back to my neighborhood, where i can grab something i know is good.
i make it home and have a couple hours before meeting up with leah. i'm exhausted!
after rejuvinating, i cab it across the park (i'm on the upper east side of the park) to the upper west side to this wonderful restaurant called cafe A- a byob french-caribbean restaurant, small and intimate and everyone is really really nice. i'm wearing my most new york outfit that i have- i had the tights on! everyone here wears tights or leggings under a skirt or sweater dress, with boots and a long coat. it's pretty sexy and i'm tempted to get boots but dont' know if i'll wear them again after this trip. but i did find myself some tights. the last time i wore tights was when i was forced to take ballet at the age of 4. my tights always had runs and snags in them. typical, huH? it fit me because i was also the most clumsy.
anyway, so as i'm waiting for leah, this homeless guy comes up to me and asks me for a dollar, telling me he has hiv, etc etc. yes i feel bad for him, but i also can't help everyone who asks for help, so i have a policy to not help any one who asks for money on the street. i tell him i can't help him and he tries to talk me into helping him. i tell him my policy and he still tries to convince me and ...then leah and her boyfriend come up just at the right time. it's so good to see her!!
we had the best dinner. i pass on the wine because i never want to see alcohol again. we order family style- this squash stuffed with edamame, garbonzo beans and yumminess, the baked pear with soy cheese, meatless meatloaf with rice, and this sausage dish...mmmm! the table next to us is a celebration of some sort. it's the most eclectic group of people ever. and the music at this place is fucking awesome! everything from depeche mode to duran duran and madonna to hall and oates. excellent...
it was leah's friend dale's bday last night- dale, leah and i worked at stanford sierra camp together in college. we hang out for a little bit at the party- right down the street, before i checked out and got a cab home. i was exhausted!!
was a good day:)
friiiiday
11/14/08
It’s Friday! I have all of NYC to myself this weekend!
today I rolled out of bed at 5:10 am- still trying to adjust to the time difference, got the 6 am shuttle, fell asleep on the way listening to my Osler’s lecture on vascular surgery on my ipod on the way, met with my team. I like my team. one girl is from Jamaica, she’s an intern who went to tufts. really smart girl. once in a while she’ll bust out her accent which I absolutely love. the chief is from Ecuador. if you close your eyes, he sounds like owen Wilson. if you look at him really closely, he even looks like him. or maybe if you just squint your eyes and imagine him with blonde hair. we rounded on a couple patients, one of whom was a 22 yr old girl, really pretty girl, with crohn’s disease who had just had part of her intestine taken out. she now has a connection from one end of her intestine to the skin on her stomach- it’s called a stoma or an ostomy. eventually we’ll reconnect her. the other one was an old guy who had diverticulitis- it happens in lots of people, especially older people, when you get a weakness in the wall of your large intestine, so you get small outpouchings in the wall of your intestine. sometimes they get inflamed, and you get tons of pain. and you get small holes in your intestine, which is bad. it’s like someone took a dump in your abdominal cavity.
I saw my first open heart surgery today since I was an MS1!! so fricken cool. It was an aortic valve replacement. the whole surgery is so orchestrated with tons of essential teammembers- the perfusionists running the bypass machine, the anesthesiologist and two anesthesia nurses, the circulating nurse, the surgeon of course and his assistant surgeon, the scrub tech in charge of the buffet table of sterile surgical instruments. the patient was a jehovah’s witness, so she doesn’t believe in receiving blood products. which is hard as a surgeon, b/c you always expect some bleeding, and especially with a major surgery. so what they did was take out some of her own blood before the surgery, give her tons of saline, so she has the same volume of fluid circulating in her body, but when she bleeds, she’s losing more fluid than blood cells, then at the end of the case, they give her back her blood. cool, huh? the surgeon cuts open her chest, saws through her sternum (breast bone), cuts through the thin sac that covers the heart, puts two tubes into two different chambers of her heart, circulates her blood through the bypass machine (which basically is an artificial heart, lungs, and set of kidneys- aka her lifesource), stops her heart, opens up her heart and operates. the whole time her heart is cooled down to ice cold. after the valve is replaced, the body is warmed back up, and the heart starts to beat on its own. so fucking cool!
I then scrubbed into a hernia repair. bread and butter of general surgery. the guy was a Chinese gentleman who was mountain climbing in china, and noticed the bump on his lower right belly, pushed it back in, but then it started to hurt him so he came to the hospital.
I had the option of scrubbing into a lap Nissen, a lap chole or another hernia,…I was so tired!! I would fall asleep on any of the laps, so I thought I’d go and lay down for 10 minutes then scrub into the hernia. an hour later…and I missed the surgeries. I felt kinda bad, but at the same time, this is my last year of being able to do this. next year I will have no choice but to keep going…so I’m just gonna be honest with myself and realize I’m here to learn what I want and not necessarily to work my ass off. I have no problems with working my ass off when the time comes. for now, I will be good to myself. maybe I’m just rationalizing, but whatever.
caught the 5 a clock shuttle, and debated about whether to head to the gym. considering my entire back and legs are sore to the point where sometimes I feel like I’m walking like I need to use the bathroom or maybe I got smacked on the ass really bad, I thought I’d rest. did my laundry in the basement of my building, chatted on the phone, made plans with leah to meet for dinner tomorrow night- she’s on the bus from boston right now, got ideas from malia about how to spend my whole weekend, and made plans for tonight to meet up with a friend from guam at 3rd ave and 13th street for his birthday party….woohoo!
ooh! I got another interview! at brown university in providence, rhode island. it’s while I’m here in nyc, so it’s 3 hours by bus or an hour by plane. never been to rhode island, -it’s the smallest state I think? whatever.
today I felt the calmest I have since I’ve come here. whether it’s the fact that I’m in nyc, or that I’m in a new city, or that I’m interviewing and it’s stressful to figure out where I’ll be for the next 5 years, or that it’s cold, or that I do miss the ocean and familiarity, I’ve felt like a hurricane inside. I expected this, because I felt the same way my first week up at uc davis. I wonder if I’ll ever learn to calm the fuck down when I travel or go to new places. it’s a fine line between excitement and anxiety, you know? there’s also that always looming possibility of feeling totally alone, which I haven’t felt yet, thanks to email/blackberry/phone/distraction of the city. I know it’s bound to happen, but hopefully I’ll know how to deal with it- call someone! I’m terrible at reaching out to my friends when I really need them, out of fear of ‘bothering them’. I know it’s ridiculous but it’s the only child/stubborn independent person in me. there’s also the upcoming thanksgiving holiday which I’m hoping to find someone to spend it with.
despite this underlying current of anxiety, I’m mostly trying to make the very best of being here. I know I am already. gonna keep on keeping on! off to get ready for the night!
It’s Friday! I have all of NYC to myself this weekend!
today I rolled out of bed at 5:10 am- still trying to adjust to the time difference, got the 6 am shuttle, fell asleep on the way listening to my Osler’s lecture on vascular surgery on my ipod on the way, met with my team. I like my team. one girl is from Jamaica, she’s an intern who went to tufts. really smart girl. once in a while she’ll bust out her accent which I absolutely love. the chief is from Ecuador. if you close your eyes, he sounds like owen Wilson. if you look at him really closely, he even looks like him. or maybe if you just squint your eyes and imagine him with blonde hair. we rounded on a couple patients, one of whom was a 22 yr old girl, really pretty girl, with crohn’s disease who had just had part of her intestine taken out. she now has a connection from one end of her intestine to the skin on her stomach- it’s called a stoma or an ostomy. eventually we’ll reconnect her. the other one was an old guy who had diverticulitis- it happens in lots of people, especially older people, when you get a weakness in the wall of your large intestine, so you get small outpouchings in the wall of your intestine. sometimes they get inflamed, and you get tons of pain. and you get small holes in your intestine, which is bad. it’s like someone took a dump in your abdominal cavity.
I saw my first open heart surgery today since I was an MS1!! so fricken cool. It was an aortic valve replacement. the whole surgery is so orchestrated with tons of essential teammembers- the perfusionists running the bypass machine, the anesthesiologist and two anesthesia nurses, the circulating nurse, the surgeon of course and his assistant surgeon, the scrub tech in charge of the buffet table of sterile surgical instruments. the patient was a jehovah’s witness, so she doesn’t believe in receiving blood products. which is hard as a surgeon, b/c you always expect some bleeding, and especially with a major surgery. so what they did was take out some of her own blood before the surgery, give her tons of saline, so she has the same volume of fluid circulating in her body, but when she bleeds, she’s losing more fluid than blood cells, then at the end of the case, they give her back her blood. cool, huh? the surgeon cuts open her chest, saws through her sternum (breast bone), cuts through the thin sac that covers the heart, puts two tubes into two different chambers of her heart, circulates her blood through the bypass machine (which basically is an artificial heart, lungs, and set of kidneys- aka her lifesource), stops her heart, opens up her heart and operates. the whole time her heart is cooled down to ice cold. after the valve is replaced, the body is warmed back up, and the heart starts to beat on its own. so fucking cool!
I then scrubbed into a hernia repair. bread and butter of general surgery. the guy was a Chinese gentleman who was mountain climbing in china, and noticed the bump on his lower right belly, pushed it back in, but then it started to hurt him so he came to the hospital.
I had the option of scrubbing into a lap Nissen, a lap chole or another hernia,…I was so tired!! I would fall asleep on any of the laps, so I thought I’d go and lay down for 10 minutes then scrub into the hernia. an hour later…and I missed the surgeries. I felt kinda bad, but at the same time, this is my last year of being able to do this. next year I will have no choice but to keep going…so I’m just gonna be honest with myself and realize I’m here to learn what I want and not necessarily to work my ass off. I have no problems with working my ass off when the time comes. for now, I will be good to myself. maybe I’m just rationalizing, but whatever.
caught the 5 a clock shuttle, and debated about whether to head to the gym. considering my entire back and legs are sore to the point where sometimes I feel like I’m walking like I need to use the bathroom or maybe I got smacked on the ass really bad, I thought I’d rest. did my laundry in the basement of my building, chatted on the phone, made plans with leah to meet for dinner tomorrow night- she’s on the bus from boston right now, got ideas from malia about how to spend my whole weekend, and made plans for tonight to meet up with a friend from guam at 3rd ave and 13th street for his birthday party….woohoo!
ooh! I got another interview! at brown university in providence, rhode island. it’s while I’m here in nyc, so it’s 3 hours by bus or an hour by plane. never been to rhode island, -it’s the smallest state I think? whatever.
today I felt the calmest I have since I’ve come here. whether it’s the fact that I’m in nyc, or that I’m in a new city, or that I’m interviewing and it’s stressful to figure out where I’ll be for the next 5 years, or that it’s cold, or that I do miss the ocean and familiarity, I’ve felt like a hurricane inside. I expected this, because I felt the same way my first week up at uc davis. I wonder if I’ll ever learn to calm the fuck down when I travel or go to new places. it’s a fine line between excitement and anxiety, you know? there’s also that always looming possibility of feeling totally alone, which I haven’t felt yet, thanks to email/blackberry/phone/distraction of the city. I know it’s bound to happen, but hopefully I’ll know how to deal with it- call someone! I’m terrible at reaching out to my friends when I really need them, out of fear of ‘bothering them’. I know it’s ridiculous but it’s the only child/stubborn independent person in me. there’s also the upcoming thanksgiving holiday which I’m hoping to find someone to spend it with.
despite this underlying current of anxiety, I’m mostly trying to make the very best of being here. I know I am already. gonna keep on keeping on! off to get ready for the night!
Thursday, November 13, 2008
underrepresented underrepresented miniorty
so today i went to the 'visiting student elective program for underrepresented miniorities' luncheon to meet the program director and the other students in the program. there were 4 african amerian women, 1 puerto rican woman, 1 puerto rican guy and myself. the director is puerto rican himself, the administrator is african american. i felt like both the whitest and the most asian/pacific islander person there. i guess i've never really truly felt like a miniority, because everwhere i've been has been pretty diverse. or maybe it's just that i'm adaptable and can kinda make myself a niche no matter where i am. the program director was gregarious and personable, offered his help in anything we needed,...and made suggestions of good home-style puerto rican restaurants to eat at! mmm. i'm so excited! i really want to eat all kinds of ethnic food while i'm here. there's a falafal joint right down the street and pizza places everywhere.
anyway, one thing i learned about the program was about this county hospital in Queen's, called Elmhurst. It's where all the trauma comes in. Apparently it's so diverse that at any one point, there are more than 40 different languages being spoken there. people go straight from the airport to Elmhurst. The pathology (disease) that is seen there is supposedly incredible to- tropical diseases like malaria to urban disease like asthma (as an internal med doc). plus i can only imagine what kind of penetrating trauma they get (aka gun shot and stab wounds). anyway.
i also learned that i'm actually staying in east harlem, not the upper east side. the main mount sinai hospital is at a cross roads of the wealthiest white people in the world, on one side of 96th ave, and the poorest of the poor on the other side. i'm on the latter side of 96th, at 101. the director of the program grew up 2 blocks from mt sinai, went to mt sinai for med school and residency. and is now working there. very very cool.
....so today i got to sleep in an extra hour, went to a lecture on parathyroid surgery at the main mt sinai campus (literally 2 blocks from my place), then caught the shuttle to englewood. i only had time to scrub into one case, a laparascopic gastric banding, which i had never seen, so was pretty cool. the surgeon was a young greek woman, from the bronx, and she used the words 'shit' and 'fuck' more liberally than i would expect. the assistant surgeon was one of the older surgeons i had met yesterday. cool surgery. it took literally 30 minutes. the idea is that you put essentially a rubber band around the stomach and create a stomach pouch the size of an egg, so you can't eat that much, then you can adjust the size /tightness of the band as the patient needs to. cool, huh?
i caught the noon bus back to manhattan to make the 1 pm luncheon. that ended at 2:30 and i was so excited to have the afternoon off! what to do! i caught up with my ex-boyfriend, bill, who's in law school at NYU and we made plans to meet up next week. i was so excited to explore, i got ready, and just as i put my coat on, packed my bags and got ready to head out the door, i got really really tired. i dropped everything and laid down to take a nap. it's amazing what a 20 minute nap will do. i felt so much better...i headed out the door to the metropolitan museum of art, called the met. i took the subway, walked a few blocks to the museum, which is an impressive buliding. i took lots of pictures, but forgot my camera and connection at home;( i'll post them tomrrow. i wandered through the nineteenth century european art section, the modern photography, the spanish collection, with my headphones on, listening to the killers/the wicker park soundtrack and the garden state soundtrack. i spaced out, felt like i was high or something. i found the matisse paintings- waterlillies and dandelions. other than that, i kinda wandered aimlessly, not really sure what i was looking at and definitely not cultured enough to know the power of what i was looking at, but it was pleasnt nevertheless...
made it back to my apartment, ate leftover panini, chatted on the phone a bit and here i am.
tomorrow's friday. i suppose i'll get out at 5 pm. it's a friend from guam's birthday tomorrow night. he's been living in the city for years now. he's having a little pre-party then we're going out. yay! nightlife in nyc. not sure exactly where we're going, but i'm excited.
i have the weekend off! not sure how to spend the day(s) but i'd love to eat italian food in the bronx, see the financial district, go shopping at h&m, hit chinatown, browse soho, amongst the many many millino things to do in this city that never sleeps. my friend wendy is in boston till monday, my ex-boyfriend bill has a big law project due on monday so won't be able to hang out till after than, my friend chan comes into town sometime on sunday or monday, and chris comes into town in a couple weeks. definitely lots of playmates after monday. will explore on my own till then!
oh yeah! i got one more interview! the most important one: Hawaii:)
anyway, one thing i learned about the program was about this county hospital in Queen's, called Elmhurst. It's where all the trauma comes in. Apparently it's so diverse that at any one point, there are more than 40 different languages being spoken there. people go straight from the airport to Elmhurst. The pathology (disease) that is seen there is supposedly incredible to- tropical diseases like malaria to urban disease like asthma (as an internal med doc). plus i can only imagine what kind of penetrating trauma they get (aka gun shot and stab wounds). anyway.
i also learned that i'm actually staying in east harlem, not the upper east side. the main mount sinai hospital is at a cross roads of the wealthiest white people in the world, on one side of 96th ave, and the poorest of the poor on the other side. i'm on the latter side of 96th, at 101. the director of the program grew up 2 blocks from mt sinai, went to mt sinai for med school and residency. and is now working there. very very cool.
....so today i got to sleep in an extra hour, went to a lecture on parathyroid surgery at the main mt sinai campus (literally 2 blocks from my place), then caught the shuttle to englewood. i only had time to scrub into one case, a laparascopic gastric banding, which i had never seen, so was pretty cool. the surgeon was a young greek woman, from the bronx, and she used the words 'shit' and 'fuck' more liberally than i would expect. the assistant surgeon was one of the older surgeons i had met yesterday. cool surgery. it took literally 30 minutes. the idea is that you put essentially a rubber band around the stomach and create a stomach pouch the size of an egg, so you can't eat that much, then you can adjust the size /tightness of the band as the patient needs to. cool, huh?
i caught the noon bus back to manhattan to make the 1 pm luncheon. that ended at 2:30 and i was so excited to have the afternoon off! what to do! i caught up with my ex-boyfriend, bill, who's in law school at NYU and we made plans to meet up next week. i was so excited to explore, i got ready, and just as i put my coat on, packed my bags and got ready to head out the door, i got really really tired. i dropped everything and laid down to take a nap. it's amazing what a 20 minute nap will do. i felt so much better...i headed out the door to the metropolitan museum of art, called the met. i took the subway, walked a few blocks to the museum, which is an impressive buliding. i took lots of pictures, but forgot my camera and connection at home;( i'll post them tomrrow. i wandered through the nineteenth century european art section, the modern photography, the spanish collection, with my headphones on, listening to the killers/the wicker park soundtrack and the garden state soundtrack. i spaced out, felt like i was high or something. i found the matisse paintings- waterlillies and dandelions. other than that, i kinda wandered aimlessly, not really sure what i was looking at and definitely not cultured enough to know the power of what i was looking at, but it was pleasnt nevertheless...
made it back to my apartment, ate leftover panini, chatted on the phone a bit and here i am.
tomorrow's friday. i suppose i'll get out at 5 pm. it's a friend from guam's birthday tomorrow night. he's been living in the city for years now. he's having a little pre-party then we're going out. yay! nightlife in nyc. not sure exactly where we're going, but i'm excited.
i have the weekend off! not sure how to spend the day(s) but i'd love to eat italian food in the bronx, see the financial district, go shopping at h&m, hit chinatown, browse soho, amongst the many many millino things to do in this city that never sleeps. my friend wendy is in boston till monday, my ex-boyfriend bill has a big law project due on monday so won't be able to hang out till after than, my friend chan comes into town sometime on sunday or monday, and chris comes into town in a couple weeks. definitely lots of playmates after monday. will explore on my own till then!
oh yeah! i got one more interview! the most important one: Hawaii:)
the rest of yesterday's blog
okay...so what was i saying? lots of good looking peeps at nysc, lexington and 86th, right?
so the manager takes me for a tour of the gym, i'm like a fat kid dying to lose weight in a candy shop- what? nevermind that. i'm basically just ready to get my workout on. i swear i had all this pent up energy. no sex, no workout. haha. anyway.
i'm focused on running on the treadmill when we run into one of the trainers who convinces me to take his 30 minute ab class. holy shit it kicked my ass! it's 30 minutes of 1-2 minute boot camp type exercises. damn i was dying. but in a good way...after the class was over, and my entire abdomen was as hard as a rock but sore as fuck, i decide to take the boxing class that follows right after...i though 'eh, why not?'. oh man....it was taught by the real deal. a puerto rican gentleman who looked like a fricken rockstar. the class was ITENSE! the first 30 minutes was stuff like wall squats, jumping jacks, high knees, burpies...i ask this guy next to me "hey how long is this class?'- thinking it had to only be 30 minutes- oh no. it was one hour. the last hour was boxing combos with bags. i punched the instructors mitts so hard one time my wrist actually hurts. i think next time i'll go a little lightly, considering my hands are gold at this point in my career, or i guess the beginning of my career.
i limp my way to the subway, and am so hungry i could eat all of new york. maybe just the pizza. i find a fresh salad place, grind a panini and salad and headed to the coffeeshop to blog...
anyway. what a day! i was tired as hell yesterday. i did sleep like a rock, and this morning i felt much better- i think it was exercising that made me sleep and feel better.
so the manager takes me for a tour of the gym, i'm like a fat kid dying to lose weight in a candy shop- what? nevermind that. i'm basically just ready to get my workout on. i swear i had all this pent up energy. no sex, no workout. haha. anyway.
i'm focused on running on the treadmill when we run into one of the trainers who convinces me to take his 30 minute ab class. holy shit it kicked my ass! it's 30 minutes of 1-2 minute boot camp type exercises. damn i was dying. but in a good way...after the class was over, and my entire abdomen was as hard as a rock but sore as fuck, i decide to take the boxing class that follows right after...i though 'eh, why not?'. oh man....it was taught by the real deal. a puerto rican gentleman who looked like a fricken rockstar. the class was ITENSE! the first 30 minutes was stuff like wall squats, jumping jacks, high knees, burpies...i ask this guy next to me "hey how long is this class?'- thinking it had to only be 30 minutes- oh no. it was one hour. the last hour was boxing combos with bags. i punched the instructors mitts so hard one time my wrist actually hurts. i think next time i'll go a little lightly, considering my hands are gold at this point in my career, or i guess the beginning of my career.
i limp my way to the subway, and am so hungry i could eat all of new york. maybe just the pizza. i find a fresh salad place, grind a panini and salad and headed to the coffeeshop to blog...
anyway. what a day! i was tired as hell yesterday. i did sleep like a rock, and this morning i felt much better- i think it was exercising that made me sleep and feel better.
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
my last blog
...is not complete! it wasn't saved! damn. i'll finish it up later. my computer battery's about to run out!
ahhh....back to the OR for gsurg
i'm so happy! i got to in the OR for a gen surg case for the first time in a couple months. i feel like i'm in my element. diverticulitis, cholecystitis, colon cancer, breast lumps....oh so great. i guess i really am meant to go into general surgery.
today i started my day at 6 am, catching the shuttle (uneventfully) to englewood. morbidity & mortality(which they call 'outcomes' as a euphemism- sp?), grand rounds, basic science...i could barely stay awake. sheesh. i think the time difference is rocking my pineal glad right now. then...to the OR! yippee! first case was this cute old school italian surgeon (who says my last name as real italians would say it) and i- doing a lap chole. he was so calm. the case went beautifully. and he let me put the grasper in and grab the gallbladder and retract it. not much, but i'm so stoked to do that as a med student. i've been playing in the laparascopic lab at home, so i got really excited. i was going to scrub into a lap resection of terminal ileum for crohn's, but this ex lap and hartmann's for perfed diverticulitis came in and i got STOKED. this case went beautifully toO! good vibe, great teaching, calm and rhythmic. we finished up (and i couldn't help but admire the good looking latino and african american scrub techs:), then the chief and i rushed to catch the 5 pm shuttle. it was dark by 5pm! i passed out immediately in the shuttle.
i needed a work out BADLY. i hadn't worked out in like 4 days. which is a lot for me honestly. i think that's why i've been feeling tired too!.. in my 'not for tourists- nyc' book, i found the new york sports club. they're EVERYWHERE. they had this introductory deal for 2 weeks, which is almost perfect for my stay here. i liked that the club manager called me to arrange a meeting ...i rush home from the shuttle, throw on my 'cold weather work out clothes'- not bikinis and shorts here and catch the subway to 86th and lexington..the club is huge! and gorgeous. and tons of classes! all times of day. the manager and staff are super friendly- unlike lots of the staff at 24hour fitness- sorry 24 hour, you guys are cold sometimes- the gym is like 7 milion stories and half-stories tall, with 2 group class rooms, a spin room, a whole resistance band section...and lots of good looking peeps.
today i started my day at 6 am, catching the shuttle (uneventfully) to englewood. morbidity & mortality(which they call 'outcomes' as a euphemism- sp?), grand rounds, basic science...i could barely stay awake. sheesh. i think the time difference is rocking my pineal glad right now. then...to the OR! yippee! first case was this cute old school italian surgeon (who says my last name as real italians would say it) and i- doing a lap chole. he was so calm. the case went beautifully. and he let me put the grasper in and grab the gallbladder and retract it. not much, but i'm so stoked to do that as a med student. i've been playing in the laparascopic lab at home, so i got really excited. i was going to scrub into a lap resection of terminal ileum for crohn's, but this ex lap and hartmann's for perfed diverticulitis came in and i got STOKED. this case went beautifully toO! good vibe, great teaching, calm and rhythmic. we finished up (and i couldn't help but admire the good looking latino and african american scrub techs:), then the chief and i rushed to catch the 5 pm shuttle. it was dark by 5pm! i passed out immediately in the shuttle.
i needed a work out BADLY. i hadn't worked out in like 4 days. which is a lot for me honestly. i think that's why i've been feeling tired too!.. in my 'not for tourists- nyc' book, i found the new york sports club. they're EVERYWHERE. they had this introductory deal for 2 weeks, which is almost perfect for my stay here. i liked that the club manager called me to arrange a meeting ...i rush home from the shuttle, throw on my 'cold weather work out clothes'- not bikinis and shorts here and catch the subway to 86th and lexington..the club is huge! and gorgeous. and tons of classes! all times of day. the manager and staff are super friendly- unlike lots of the staff at 24hour fitness- sorry 24 hour, you guys are cold sometimes- the gym is like 7 milion stories and half-stories tall, with 2 group class rooms, a spin room, a whole resistance band section...and lots of good looking peeps.
Tuesday, November 11, 2008
jfk-dca-lga
ohmygosh what a crazy couple of days!! i didn't have my computer on me, not wanting to lug it around, but now i think it's worth it. lots has happened!
yesterday morning i woke up at 5:15 am so i can get some breakfast at the corner coffee shop before catching the 6:30 am shuttle to Englewood, NJ so I can make my orientation at Englewood Hospital. The shuttle is run by Mt. Sinai and Englewood is an affiliated hospital. The next shuttle supposedly wasn't till 9 am, and I had to be there by 9:30- my google maps on my blackberry said it was only 11 miles away, but i didn't know what new york traffic would be like. i pack my bags for the next two days- my orientation, my trip to d.c., and my interview- roll my small suitcase down the street, grab some yummy oatmeal with cinnamon and milk ($1.50) and wait for the shuttle...except i'm not sure exactly where to stand. i was sent an email that said 50 E. 98th street, but I wasn't sure which corner, what the shuttle would look like...6:30 comes and goes so I call the security office....long story short, after spilling some coffee on my skirt, freezing in the nyc morning weather, finding out that the shuttle times were at 6:00, 8:15, and 9:00, running around from garage to security personnel, to different corners of the block, hopping in a cab thinking i had totally missed my shuttle and having the cab driver circle and drop me back, i finally make it in the shuttle...it's a nice passenger van with englewood hospital written nicely on it, with 2 other gentleman in scrubs. the drive to englewood is over the george washington bridge, and we approach a huge tree lined street- the trees are beautiful and golden- to a beautiful hospital. i meet the surgery administrator, the 'chief' resident- an R2, the OR nurses, get a tour of the OR , how to get scrubs, get my pager....and everyone is really really really nice. apparently the rotation is known as 'surgery camp', because the attending basically put in all the orders, and manage the patients day to day, and the residents- an R2 and two interns, essentially scrub into cases and learn to operate. it's a private hospital with 300 beds, slightly smaller than Queen's, and all the patients are private. I'm told I don't have to come in on weekends and I can take call if I want- they really just want me to learn how to operate, go to the conferences and soak up as much as possible. I meet the Director of Surgery on the way out, a grandfatherly like Vascular Surgeon. I'm excited because I haven't had much vascular surgery experience and I think I can learn alot. ....Apparently UPenn med students rotate through this hospital, but none are around while I'm there. The food is really really good. I felt like I was in Whole Foods when i was there! The chief resident (an R2) is a nondesignated preliminary resident- basically he has a spot for 2 years then has to reapply to categorical spots, is a really laid back guy from ecuador- very honest, chill, and real. i appreciate that. i can't wait to really start tomorrow...
so after my gourmet salad, i catch the noon shuttle back to manhattan, with my suitcase and my neatly packced suit and shoes and leather bound notebook tucked away, my nice black coat and hat, and all the essentials, and catch a cab to JFK airport. sweet! i'm really early. I find a :10 minute manicure kiosk in the airport and get my nails prettied up for my interview. I'm nervous for the interview!!! So i read my CV, my personal statement, review possible questions to their possible answers, and jot down questions I want to ask...as I'm getting my manicure I see that Obama just arrived in D.C., which is where I"m going and I get a little stoked. Simple pleasures of not being from the East Coast and being "in the same state as our president-elect!". ...After an hour long plane ride (aka nap) we land in D.C., and it's 6 pm. I have to be at dinner at 7 pm. I catch a cab to Adams Inn, the bed and breakfast recommended by Georgetown, where they gave us a discount. I've been to D.C., but it was a while ago and it was only for a weekend. D.C. is gorgeous, I'm kind of in awe that I'm passing by all these landmarks I only hear about. I kinda wish I had more time to explore D.C. We get to the bed and breakfast, and it's on older colonial style home, next to all the older homes 'you only see in movies' if you're from the islands, rush up to my room, take a quick shower in the shared bathroom, put on my best looking yet most conservative nice outfit that's not a suit, and get to dinner. I'm nervous. Do I look alright? Am I a right fit? What do I talk to these other applicants about? How do I know who's a resident and who's an applicant? I meet a bunch of folks- 4th year med students in my exact shoes, running around/flying around for interviews, nervous about the match, excited about the interview, but not really sure what to expect...this was also there first interview too, for most applicants. I run into a girl who's a 4th year med student at Davis- who I had met and connected with! Very nice to see a familiar face. Met people from multiple medical schools, all with different stories. I pass on the margaritas (we're at Cactus Cantina), but definitely do not pass on the burrito and fajita bar. Met R1-R4s, and go through the whole formality of questions "are you happy here?", "how many cases do you log a year?"....it's a very very necessary yet scripted set of interactions. which is fine...
i meet this really cool guy from columbia, at tufts medical school, and find out we have a mutual friend. I feel a dope connection, which is nice in the midst of the social mileu of nervous med students, buzzing ortho interns, and friendly general surgery residents and typical conversations.
I check out at 10 pm, make it to my bedroom, which is comfortable and feels like a home. I have big plans to re-read my application, my research protocol - they're bound to ask me- but end up passing out. much needed....
the next morning - i can't believe it was only this morning!- i wake up for my big day- my first interview! i'm not hungry, and actually haven' tbeen hungry this whole trip- mainly out of nervousness. i've also been going through bouts of nausea this whole trip. anyway, i wake up, try to breathe deeply as I get ready, put on my suit and shoes, and pack up again. I'm so worried! will the cab come in time? is it okay that i'm bringing my suitcase to the interview? is my hair neat? i call my cab and make it to georgetown university hospital in the dark- it's 6:30 am when i get there and i don't have to be there till 7 am. i wish i could see more of the ride! i can see the outlines of gorgeous architecture and trees, but can't quite see it in full. i also wish i had taken pictures of everything, but am too nervous to worry about that...
so interview days starts!
30 well-dressed medical students, almost all of us in black suits and neutral shirts with the few bold ones in pinstripes (including my new friend from tufts in a brown pinstripe suit), or the few women in high high heels and brightly colored undershirts. they have breakfast waiting for us in a conference room, it's a very small conference room and we're all squeezing by each other with cups of coffee and georgetown folders, trying not to spill and trying to socialize. all nervous. the chairman and residecny program director speak with us at 7;30am for half an hour....i won't kill you with the details of the day, but essentially, after an hour long tour of the hospital, we get back to the room and wait to be called out individually for our three separate interviews: one with the chairman and residency director (2 different people), one with two chief residents, and one with a faculty member. this goes on till 1pm- mentally jumping back from socializng with the residents and med students, to 10 minute interivews with each set of people...by the end we're all sitting down and the room has quieted down- it's tiring to socialize! i'm the second to last person to be interviewed by the chairman and residency director- perhaps the most important interaction, and by this time it's a 5 minute interaction.
i got asked the typical questions amongst the three interviews: strengths? weaknesses? tell me about your research. tell me about something that's not on your application. no surprises such as 'present your most memorable case to me' or 'tell me a joke' or 'what was the last book you read'.
we then go to the faculty club for another really nice lunch...
by this time i've formulated some impressions of the program. it's an excellent program. i like the residents, the chairman is great, i can go on...i actually have a spreadsheet to systematically evaulate my experience. which i will do tomorrow while the impressions are fresh and i'm not too tired.
my overall hunch on the progra,m however is that i will rank it high. i hope they like me.
my tufts friend and i connect periodically through the day. boston is only a few hours away and he invites me to come for the weekend while i'm here. maybe i will. we exchange numbers and i'm excited to have made a new friend.
i catch a cab ride with another applicant, whose flight is leaving national airport around teh same time as mine.
in reflecting on these interactions, this is new to me. we all connect because we're in the same boat, but we really know nothing about each other. once in awhile we get tidbits of each other beyond the standard 'where are you from? where have you interviewed? where did you get interviews?. like those who are married, those with kids, those with boyfriends/girlfriends...but mostly, we know nothing about each other. yet i'm still able to make an impression of who i like and who i can see myself hanging out with. i guess the residetns and program director is doing the same thing with us.
anyway, i'm exhasusted, get to the airport early again, to find that my flight to jfk was going to be cancelled or delayed because george w. bush had just landed in jfk so flight traffic was backed up. fortunately there's a wide upen flight to la guardia, another nyc airport, and they put us all on that one. i'm kind of in a daze right now, exhausted as hell. i make it back to my apartment via cab.
i realize that while i like my apartment- it does the job- it feels empty, and esp without internet connection. but the moment i step out of my apartment i feel less lonely. i guess 'cause there's lots going on in the city, and starbucks is right down the street, which is where i am now blogging away. i will call some friends soon..i start my day at 5:30 am tomorroow! i will catch the 6 am shuttle and meet up with my team, go to grand rounds/conference and scrub in the afternoon.since the last shuttle is at 5pm, we're all out of there by 5 pm unless you're on call....
so yeah! that's my last couple of days!
i'm excited to explore the city. I have an interview in newark at umdnj- new jersey medical school, this weekend but after talking to some applicants, some who went there, some who are from the area and know the area, i think i'm going to cancel it. i honestly can't see myself living in newark! it sounds drab and like an armpit. i also heard you do become a good surgeon, but...it's not an academic center and the city doesn't sound at all appealing... plus i have 7 or 8 more interviews lined up. which is sufficient to make a match list...instead i will explore the city. my best friend from college is coming down from boston for the weekend too!
phew!!
thanks for reading:) i'll carry my computer more often:)
I
yesterday morning i woke up at 5:15 am so i can get some breakfast at the corner coffee shop before catching the 6:30 am shuttle to Englewood, NJ so I can make my orientation at Englewood Hospital. The shuttle is run by Mt. Sinai and Englewood is an affiliated hospital. The next shuttle supposedly wasn't till 9 am, and I had to be there by 9:30- my google maps on my blackberry said it was only 11 miles away, but i didn't know what new york traffic would be like. i pack my bags for the next two days- my orientation, my trip to d.c., and my interview- roll my small suitcase down the street, grab some yummy oatmeal with cinnamon and milk ($1.50) and wait for the shuttle...except i'm not sure exactly where to stand. i was sent an email that said 50 E. 98th street, but I wasn't sure which corner, what the shuttle would look like...6:30 comes and goes so I call the security office....long story short, after spilling some coffee on my skirt, freezing in the nyc morning weather, finding out that the shuttle times were at 6:00, 8:15, and 9:00, running around from garage to security personnel, to different corners of the block, hopping in a cab thinking i had totally missed my shuttle and having the cab driver circle and drop me back, i finally make it in the shuttle...it's a nice passenger van with englewood hospital written nicely on it, with 2 other gentleman in scrubs. the drive to englewood is over the george washington bridge, and we approach a huge tree lined street- the trees are beautiful and golden- to a beautiful hospital. i meet the surgery administrator, the 'chief' resident- an R2, the OR nurses, get a tour of the OR , how to get scrubs, get my pager....and everyone is really really really nice. apparently the rotation is known as 'surgery camp', because the attending basically put in all the orders, and manage the patients day to day, and the residents- an R2 and two interns, essentially scrub into cases and learn to operate. it's a private hospital with 300 beds, slightly smaller than Queen's, and all the patients are private. I'm told I don't have to come in on weekends and I can take call if I want- they really just want me to learn how to operate, go to the conferences and soak up as much as possible. I meet the Director of Surgery on the way out, a grandfatherly like Vascular Surgeon. I'm excited because I haven't had much vascular surgery experience and I think I can learn alot. ....Apparently UPenn med students rotate through this hospital, but none are around while I'm there. The food is really really good. I felt like I was in Whole Foods when i was there! The chief resident (an R2) is a nondesignated preliminary resident- basically he has a spot for 2 years then has to reapply to categorical spots, is a really laid back guy from ecuador- very honest, chill, and real. i appreciate that. i can't wait to really start tomorrow...
so after my gourmet salad, i catch the noon shuttle back to manhattan, with my suitcase and my neatly packced suit and shoes and leather bound notebook tucked away, my nice black coat and hat, and all the essentials, and catch a cab to JFK airport. sweet! i'm really early. I find a :10 minute manicure kiosk in the airport and get my nails prettied up for my interview. I'm nervous for the interview!!! So i read my CV, my personal statement, review possible questions to their possible answers, and jot down questions I want to ask...as I'm getting my manicure I see that Obama just arrived in D.C., which is where I"m going and I get a little stoked. Simple pleasures of not being from the East Coast and being "in the same state as our president-elect!". ...After an hour long plane ride (aka nap) we land in D.C., and it's 6 pm. I have to be at dinner at 7 pm. I catch a cab to Adams Inn, the bed and breakfast recommended by Georgetown, where they gave us a discount. I've been to D.C., but it was a while ago and it was only for a weekend. D.C. is gorgeous, I'm kind of in awe that I'm passing by all these landmarks I only hear about. I kinda wish I had more time to explore D.C. We get to the bed and breakfast, and it's on older colonial style home, next to all the older homes 'you only see in movies' if you're from the islands, rush up to my room, take a quick shower in the shared bathroom, put on my best looking yet most conservative nice outfit that's not a suit, and get to dinner. I'm nervous. Do I look alright? Am I a right fit? What do I talk to these other applicants about? How do I know who's a resident and who's an applicant? I meet a bunch of folks- 4th year med students in my exact shoes, running around/flying around for interviews, nervous about the match, excited about the interview, but not really sure what to expect...this was also there first interview too, for most applicants. I run into a girl who's a 4th year med student at Davis- who I had met and connected with! Very nice to see a familiar face. Met people from multiple medical schools, all with different stories. I pass on the margaritas (we're at Cactus Cantina), but definitely do not pass on the burrito and fajita bar. Met R1-R4s, and go through the whole formality of questions "are you happy here?", "how many cases do you log a year?"....it's a very very necessary yet scripted set of interactions. which is fine...
i meet this really cool guy from columbia, at tufts medical school, and find out we have a mutual friend. I feel a dope connection, which is nice in the midst of the social mileu of nervous med students, buzzing ortho interns, and friendly general surgery residents and typical conversations.
I check out at 10 pm, make it to my bedroom, which is comfortable and feels like a home. I have big plans to re-read my application, my research protocol - they're bound to ask me- but end up passing out. much needed....
the next morning - i can't believe it was only this morning!- i wake up for my big day- my first interview! i'm not hungry, and actually haven' tbeen hungry this whole trip- mainly out of nervousness. i've also been going through bouts of nausea this whole trip. anyway, i wake up, try to breathe deeply as I get ready, put on my suit and shoes, and pack up again. I'm so worried! will the cab come in time? is it okay that i'm bringing my suitcase to the interview? is my hair neat? i call my cab and make it to georgetown university hospital in the dark- it's 6:30 am when i get there and i don't have to be there till 7 am. i wish i could see more of the ride! i can see the outlines of gorgeous architecture and trees, but can't quite see it in full. i also wish i had taken pictures of everything, but am too nervous to worry about that...
so interview days starts!
30 well-dressed medical students, almost all of us in black suits and neutral shirts with the few bold ones in pinstripes (including my new friend from tufts in a brown pinstripe suit), or the few women in high high heels and brightly colored undershirts. they have breakfast waiting for us in a conference room, it's a very small conference room and we're all squeezing by each other with cups of coffee and georgetown folders, trying not to spill and trying to socialize. all nervous. the chairman and residecny program director speak with us at 7;30am for half an hour....i won't kill you with the details of the day, but essentially, after an hour long tour of the hospital, we get back to the room and wait to be called out individually for our three separate interviews: one with the chairman and residency director (2 different people), one with two chief residents, and one with a faculty member. this goes on till 1pm- mentally jumping back from socializng with the residents and med students, to 10 minute interivews with each set of people...by the end we're all sitting down and the room has quieted down- it's tiring to socialize! i'm the second to last person to be interviewed by the chairman and residency director- perhaps the most important interaction, and by this time it's a 5 minute interaction.
i got asked the typical questions amongst the three interviews: strengths? weaknesses? tell me about your research. tell me about something that's not on your application. no surprises such as 'present your most memorable case to me' or 'tell me a joke' or 'what was the last book you read'.
we then go to the faculty club for another really nice lunch...
by this time i've formulated some impressions of the program. it's an excellent program. i like the residents, the chairman is great, i can go on...i actually have a spreadsheet to systematically evaulate my experience. which i will do tomorrow while the impressions are fresh and i'm not too tired.
my overall hunch on the progra,m however is that i will rank it high. i hope they like me.
my tufts friend and i connect periodically through the day. boston is only a few hours away and he invites me to come for the weekend while i'm here. maybe i will. we exchange numbers and i'm excited to have made a new friend.
i catch a cab ride with another applicant, whose flight is leaving national airport around teh same time as mine.
in reflecting on these interactions, this is new to me. we all connect because we're in the same boat, but we really know nothing about each other. once in awhile we get tidbits of each other beyond the standard 'where are you from? where have you interviewed? where did you get interviews?. like those who are married, those with kids, those with boyfriends/girlfriends...but mostly, we know nothing about each other. yet i'm still able to make an impression of who i like and who i can see myself hanging out with. i guess the residetns and program director is doing the same thing with us.
anyway, i'm exhasusted, get to the airport early again, to find that my flight to jfk was going to be cancelled or delayed because george w. bush had just landed in jfk so flight traffic was backed up. fortunately there's a wide upen flight to la guardia, another nyc airport, and they put us all on that one. i'm kind of in a daze right now, exhausted as hell. i make it back to my apartment via cab.
i realize that while i like my apartment- it does the job- it feels empty, and esp without internet connection. but the moment i step out of my apartment i feel less lonely. i guess 'cause there's lots going on in the city, and starbucks is right down the street, which is where i am now blogging away. i will call some friends soon..i start my day at 5:30 am tomorroow! i will catch the 6 am shuttle and meet up with my team, go to grand rounds/conference and scrub in the afternoon.since the last shuttle is at 5pm, we're all out of there by 5 pm unless you're on call....
so yeah! that's my last couple of days!
i'm excited to explore the city. I have an interview in newark at umdnj- new jersey medical school, this weekend but after talking to some applicants, some who went there, some who are from the area and know the area, i think i'm going to cancel it. i honestly can't see myself living in newark! it sounds drab and like an armpit. i also heard you do become a good surgeon, but...it's not an academic center and the city doesn't sound at all appealing... plus i have 7 or 8 more interviews lined up. which is sufficient to make a match list...instead i will explore the city. my best friend from college is coming down from boston for the weekend too!
phew!!
thanks for reading:) i'll carry my computer more often:)
I
Sunday, November 9, 2008
a few moments
just got back from my first subway ride on my own, and from meeting wendy for healthy japanese food in union square: salmon with ginger sauce, curried vegetables, brown rice- good food, good conversation. good to see her. she's awesome!
here a few of my favorite moments from today:
-waiting at a corner to cross the street, this white guy in a northface jacket is looking across the street, also waiting...just as the green man comes alive, he waves a girl to come over, hands over head, waving her over furiously. this pretty latina girl dressed up with a dress, tights and boots - everyone in nyc seems to be wearing this!- walks over and he can barely contain himself, and as he walks to meet her practically in the middle of the street, says 'hey baby. hit it!' and leans over to kiss her and she kisses him. so so cute. awww...makes me want to vomit in my mouth. j/k.
- on the subway these two guys get on the subway and say 'hey ladies and gents, it's doo wop time' and run through the crowded subway singing (and collecting money, of course), and at the end say 'just smile! it won't mess up your hair' or something ridiculous. 'cause everyone is avoiding eye contact with them. i want to smile because it's funny but i'm solemn because i was told by a new yorker to not make eye contact and to not trust anyone in new york.
-getting a new york bagel with cream cheese!! mmmmm.
-having a doorman! wtf. i have a doorman. who's the nicest guy in the world, especially because he didn't flinch one second when i asked him this morning "where can i get sundries..you know like toilet paper!". nice guy. but oh yeah, i dont' trust him.
okey dokey, off to my place to pack for the next couple whirlwind days...and to get some sleep.
i'll post pics later!
here a few of my favorite moments from today:
-waiting at a corner to cross the street, this white guy in a northface jacket is looking across the street, also waiting...just as the green man comes alive, he waves a girl to come over, hands over head, waving her over furiously. this pretty latina girl dressed up with a dress, tights and boots - everyone in nyc seems to be wearing this!- walks over and he can barely contain himself, and as he walks to meet her practically in the middle of the street, says 'hey baby. hit it!' and leans over to kiss her and she kisses him. so so cute. awww...makes me want to vomit in my mouth. j/k.
- on the subway these two guys get on the subway and say 'hey ladies and gents, it's doo wop time' and run through the crowded subway singing (and collecting money, of course), and at the end say 'just smile! it won't mess up your hair' or something ridiculous. 'cause everyone is avoiding eye contact with them. i want to smile because it's funny but i'm solemn because i was told by a new yorker to not make eye contact and to not trust anyone in new york.
-getting a new york bagel with cream cheese!! mmmmm.
-having a doorman! wtf. i have a doorman. who's the nicest guy in the world, especially because he didn't flinch one second when i asked him this morning "where can i get sundries..you know like toilet paper!". nice guy. but oh yeah, i dont' trust him.
okey dokey, off to my place to pack for the next couple whirlwind days...and to get some sleep.
i'll post pics later!
arrival in nyc
so....
here it is! round two of my away rotations for my 4th year of medical school. except this time, add in a new city, cold weather, 5 or 6 more cities for interviews, interviews themselves, and a board exam. it's like my last experience on crack. so i'm gonna blog about it.
first thing though: my place doesn't have internet! so i'll try to blog on microsoft word and post them when i make it to coffee shops. there's a starbucks with free wi-fi on 96th and madison, which is 5 blocks from where i'm staying. i hate to come to starbucks given the selection of cute coffee shops around here, but it'll do for the wi-fi.
anyway! some background on the last 6 wks since my trauma surgery rotation in davis ended: i spent two weeks doing plastic surgery, two weeks off, and two weeks during orthopedic surgery. essentially 6 weeks of play, receiving interview offers, anticipating and preparing for this trip....but mostly alcohol, surf, exercise, sleep, friends. and oh yeah, throw in that i started to really like a guy...who as for now, turns out to be just another one of those 'oh well, at least i'm learning how to do this intimacy /communicating feelings thing'. but that's another story. it's all good.
last time, i could get away with packing a small-ish suitcase because sacramento was 90 degrees. and i didn't have to bring a suit...this time...i bought a big brand new larg-ish suitcase, so large i named him igor, especially since after i packed my winter clothes, suits, clinical gear, some warm weather clothes for my trip to LA after this, he weighed 65 lbs. yowswers. damn those new charges for extra weight on airlines!!
i flew to seattle, and finally got a chance to breathe on the flight. it's always a little hectic before trips. i get to seattle and just as we're about to board at 10:45 pm, we find out our airplane is broken. oh well. they find us another airplane immediately, i get on the plance...and it's packed. thank God i'm full-fare. you know people always talk about getting stuck in the seat next to either 1) the fat guy who's flanks and sausage arms spill into your seat or 2) the irritating passenger who wants to talk story...i'm adding one more to the list. i got stuck next to the adolescent hippie/skater boy (he was somewhere between the ages of 16 and 22, i couldn't tell), who smells of old sweat, with big hair, so big i had to lean away from him, with a nasty double cheeseburger all wrapped up in a ball, that he retrieves occasionally though the flight to munch on, who falls asleep and breathes dragon stinky breath with his mouth open...who at one point actually sneezed on me, i could feel the spray of his infectious droplets on my arm. yup. i had the window and plastered myself to the window, i wish i was paper thin just so i can get as far away from him. anyway...only 4 hours of this, and i'm grateful it wasn't a flight to asia or something.
i'm excited to get to newark and anticipate my arrival in NYC. i expect it to be freezing! it's surprisingly sunny and 50 degress. Not bad, huh? i expect it to be crazy outside of the airport, with gypsy cabs hounding me to jump into their rip-off of a ride. surprisingly there's a huge official taxi sign with official taxis and official taxi drivers.
i see the skyline in the distance and get excited. we make it through the city, no traffic-it's sunday- and arrive to my apartment right on central park, on the museum mile of 5th ave. there's a doorman, and the building is comfortably older and cozy. my apartment is bare...it's wooden floors, with a kitchen, a huge living room, two rooms , one labeled 10D-1 and my room, 10D-2 (with the view of central park!), and my own bathroom. it's literally a bed and dressers. no sheets, no towels, no toilet paper even...but i like it already and can fill in the details later.
i spent the day walking around the upper east side, picked up a pillow, cheap sheets and a light flannel blanket, toilet paper, some snacks. the upper east side is really really nice with expensive stores and restaurants. i read in my guidebook to walk with confidence to appear like a native. it must have worked because 2 people on 2 different occasions asked me for help or directions. haha. i almost laughed but responded with 'i'm sorry, i wish i could help you'. i lug my stuff back to my apartment and can finally take a shower because i have a towel now. i call wendy and we make plans to meet up at 5 pm...it'll be my first experience on the new york subway....alone! i'm nervous but it's okay. it's only because it's new. we're going to meet at union square, halfway between her place and mine. she lives in brooklyn. ...i take a quick nap, and now am at starbucks, confirming where i have to be tomorrow. tomorrow i take a shuttle to new jersey to englewood hospital, then go straight from there to JFK airport, hop on a flt to D.C., take a shuttle to cactus cantina, get to a hotel, sleep while i can, wake up early the next morning for my interview at georgetown university hospital from 7 am to 3 pm, go straight to the airport to catch a flight back to JFK and back here. phew! i just got here and i'm leaving already...it's crazy now but i'm rolling with it....
anyway, i realized i forgot to bring a leather bound notebook. apparently it looks professional on an interview. i will go on a quick mission to find one before i meet wendy!!
adventures!
here it is! round two of my away rotations for my 4th year of medical school. except this time, add in a new city, cold weather, 5 or 6 more cities for interviews, interviews themselves, and a board exam. it's like my last experience on crack. so i'm gonna blog about it.
first thing though: my place doesn't have internet! so i'll try to blog on microsoft word and post them when i make it to coffee shops. there's a starbucks with free wi-fi on 96th and madison, which is 5 blocks from where i'm staying. i hate to come to starbucks given the selection of cute coffee shops around here, but it'll do for the wi-fi.
anyway! some background on the last 6 wks since my trauma surgery rotation in davis ended: i spent two weeks doing plastic surgery, two weeks off, and two weeks during orthopedic surgery. essentially 6 weeks of play, receiving interview offers, anticipating and preparing for this trip....but mostly alcohol, surf, exercise, sleep, friends. and oh yeah, throw in that i started to really like a guy...who as for now, turns out to be just another one of those 'oh well, at least i'm learning how to do this intimacy /communicating feelings thing'. but that's another story. it's all good.
last time, i could get away with packing a small-ish suitcase because sacramento was 90 degrees. and i didn't have to bring a suit...this time...i bought a big brand new larg-ish suitcase, so large i named him igor, especially since after i packed my winter clothes, suits, clinical gear, some warm weather clothes for my trip to LA after this, he weighed 65 lbs. yowswers. damn those new charges for extra weight on airlines!!
i flew to seattle, and finally got a chance to breathe on the flight. it's always a little hectic before trips. i get to seattle and just as we're about to board at 10:45 pm, we find out our airplane is broken. oh well. they find us another airplane immediately, i get on the plance...and it's packed. thank God i'm full-fare. you know people always talk about getting stuck in the seat next to either 1) the fat guy who's flanks and sausage arms spill into your seat or 2) the irritating passenger who wants to talk story...i'm adding one more to the list. i got stuck next to the adolescent hippie/skater boy (he was somewhere between the ages of 16 and 22, i couldn't tell), who smells of old sweat, with big hair, so big i had to lean away from him, with a nasty double cheeseburger all wrapped up in a ball, that he retrieves occasionally though the flight to munch on, who falls asleep and breathes dragon stinky breath with his mouth open...who at one point actually sneezed on me, i could feel the spray of his infectious droplets on my arm. yup. i had the window and plastered myself to the window, i wish i was paper thin just so i can get as far away from him. anyway...only 4 hours of this, and i'm grateful it wasn't a flight to asia or something.
i'm excited to get to newark and anticipate my arrival in NYC. i expect it to be freezing! it's surprisingly sunny and 50 degress. Not bad, huh? i expect it to be crazy outside of the airport, with gypsy cabs hounding me to jump into their rip-off of a ride. surprisingly there's a huge official taxi sign with official taxis and official taxi drivers.
i see the skyline in the distance and get excited. we make it through the city, no traffic-it's sunday- and arrive to my apartment right on central park, on the museum mile of 5th ave. there's a doorman, and the building is comfortably older and cozy. my apartment is bare...it's wooden floors, with a kitchen, a huge living room, two rooms , one labeled 10D-1 and my room, 10D-2 (with the view of central park!), and my own bathroom. it's literally a bed and dressers. no sheets, no towels, no toilet paper even...but i like it already and can fill in the details later.
i spent the day walking around the upper east side, picked up a pillow, cheap sheets and a light flannel blanket, toilet paper, some snacks. the upper east side is really really nice with expensive stores and restaurants. i read in my guidebook to walk with confidence to appear like a native. it must have worked because 2 people on 2 different occasions asked me for help or directions. haha. i almost laughed but responded with 'i'm sorry, i wish i could help you'. i lug my stuff back to my apartment and can finally take a shower because i have a towel now. i call wendy and we make plans to meet up at 5 pm...it'll be my first experience on the new york subway....alone! i'm nervous but it's okay. it's only because it's new. we're going to meet at union square, halfway between her place and mine. she lives in brooklyn. ...i take a quick nap, and now am at starbucks, confirming where i have to be tomorrow. tomorrow i take a shuttle to new jersey to englewood hospital, then go straight from there to JFK airport, hop on a flt to D.C., take a shuttle to cactus cantina, get to a hotel, sleep while i can, wake up early the next morning for my interview at georgetown university hospital from 7 am to 3 pm, go straight to the airport to catch a flight back to JFK and back here. phew! i just got here and i'm leaving already...it's crazy now but i'm rolling with it....
anyway, i realized i forgot to bring a leather bound notebook. apparently it looks professional on an interview. i will go on a quick mission to find one before i meet wendy!!
adventures!
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