Letter to my Friend.

Dear J

Hi, how have you been? I am sorry that I have not been writing to you in a long while. I kinda lost your contacts so I am writing to you in the most bizziare way I can think of. (No one visits here anyway...)

Anyway, I have been alright. If you read down, you'll see that I had been at camp last weekend. It was good. After my friend left, my other friends came on the next boat. Somehow to me, they are the sunrays that were seeping through that cloudy morning. I am really grateful as they were the few who helped me pass my exams last year. Unlike you, who conveniently disappeared to some European state. Sheesh.

Haha. Anyway, that day turned out pretty good considering that it was such a gloomy morning. I keep using that word... I cannot think of a better one. Dark. Dementoric. Apocalyptic. Anyway, I took part in the tug-of-war later that day, which to this day made me ache all over. It is probably my punishment for not keeping fit as I should have. Remember that annoying belly that you always talked about and like to make fun of? Well, I have it now...

That night we played cards, and then head to the pub. The music was nice. Very dancable, very relaxing. Oh, and it was on an astroturf. I took off my sandals and danced barefooted. It is a feeling that I have not felt in a very long time and it made me remenisce about my days back in Singapore... I remembered bringing you there, so you should know what I mean.

It was pretty much the same from then on. Got home all tired and broken...

And this week is assignment week. All of it is due this Friday. Even so, I don't know why I found the time to have dinner and coffee with a few friends last night. We talked about life in general, starting from the Big Bang... Evolution vs creationism... our younger days and upbringing... growing up with taxes and morgages... to eventually death. At the end of it, I do not know why, but I felt that I wouldn't mind dying tomorrow. I mean, not only do I escape the fear of handing up assignments on Friday, but not to suffer all the pains and despair of the world. I doubt that anyone would mourn for me, nor do I want them to.

Which also brings me to what a friend told me. Live life with no regrets. I would certainly regret not saying how I feel to this particular girl. I do, feel like I want to spend every giving minute with her as though I were to die the next. I wish I can muster that courage to do that. I wish I had more fear of not knowing, than the fear of being rejected. I wish, I wish...

Anyway, enough from me. I do wish you read this and reply me soon. Do take care.

Ken Rhee

Random stuff

I don't know what to blog about, so this is just a list of things that happened:

Again, people celebrated my birthday. Good thing was no cake. Other thing was I got Frosty for my present. Though I don't want it, but it happened and I am glad that it did. Why can't people not celebrate my birthday?

Watched countless of movies and shows. Finally getting back into Anime. I just hope there will be a batch to watch when I go to rural GP.

I organsed a BBQ for IMU-UWA student/doctors. Arrived late, left some chicken in the fridge, didn't get to talk much to the juniors, forgot my camera. Other than that, it went well... or so they say. I hope they had fun.

Finally started Uni again. And finally I can say I am a 6TH YEAR STUDENT. I was so used to saying 5th year, it takes a while getting used to. Like still writing '2008' in 2009.

Was very happy on Monday.

Curse of the Photographer

I can't sleep. It's 1am in the morning on a Tuesday.

Anyway, I decided to blog. This is what happened last Sunday.



I can't really tell you much. By random chance, I was bestowed the opportunity to organize a gathering for the IMU student/doctors that were currently in Perth. It took little planning. I kept thinking that it was easy to organise a BBQ. Get sausages, book a pit, cook, eat, leave.

I started the invites earlier in the week, giving them notice to book their calendars. Then I started thinking of what my menu should be. This was what I started out with:
Sausages
Salad
Pizza

Easy stuff. Buy sausages, buy salad + dressings, order Dominoes on that day.

Then I decided that I crave for sushi. I didn't want to order those and decided to make it instead. I still think it's not a bad idea, but the people involved would tell you it isn't. Well... I'LL DO IT AGAIN! So, the ingredients for sushi? seaweed, japanese rice, vinegar, salt, cucumber, zucchini, egg, sugar, tuna, tartar sauce, japanese mayonese. Time taken... 2hours.

As I worry that we would not have enough food, the sausages became 3 types of sausages to a total of about 50 pieces, 20 slices of bacon/ham and 20 pieces of premarinated chicken wings.

As for salads, it became coleslaw which I made, fruit salad which I made, and potato salad which Wei Kuei made. All of which had so many left over, it was my breakfast lunch and dinner for a few days.

Luckily I didn't order the pizzas.

Also, I had Evelyn make eggtarts for me. The eggtarts, though, ended up to be eggtarts and fruit tarts. Effectively, the amount of food doubled or tripled the amount I set out for at the beginning. I had so to take home all the leftovers, it's not even funny. Not to mention the bottles of coke, fruit juice, marshmallows, gummybears and Doritoes that were left unopened.

So, the bill...

Meat stuff (sausages, bacon, chicken wings)
$39.56

Sushi stuff
$17.43

Salads
$13.98

Eggtarts
$21.60

Unopened food
$25.13

Sauces/Dip
$9.80

The look of everyone's faces and the joy of having organising a BBQ?
Priceless
$127.50

Oh yeah, the title.. basically means that as a phtographer, you will never get good shots of yourself.

Perth, Week 1 & 2

It's been slightly over two weeks that I have been in Perth. The place is just BEAUTIFUL. I love UWA. It is a park. It is a PARK with lovely trees and many birds. There are resident peacocks there and ducks... I just enjoy it here. It is just so calming. To tell how beautiful it is, people can actually have their weddings here in UWA. It is an open campus, where public can enjoy themselves to the many sceneries here. UWA is also situated beside the Swan River, with a small little beach and sand. The river is so wide, that it almost seem like the sea.



The first time I went to the river bank, it was with some other Malaysians studying medic in UWA. some came when they were wee small, and some only after SPM. I made new friends that day, of course not forgetting my old ones. They were a bunch of friendly people. We watch the Australia Day fireworks from the river bank. It was about 15 minutes long, with lots of beautiful colourful sparkles. After some games of Mafia and Bluff, and after the fireworks, we went to a Vietnamese restaurant for dinner and just to hang out. Before we knew it, we were the last customers in the store and we had to leave...

The second outing was at one of their house. His name is Francis. He cooks. He is sporty. He is an artist. He does well in exams. He's single. He's perfect.

Back in classes, we did a range of stuff, from things that we IMU people already knew, stuff that we were taught, but not thoroughly. So basically, we did the same things, but in greater depth. We drew blood from friends, we insert catheters into models' arms and penis, we performed CPR and defib SimMan.

I am in the middle of my Nursing attachment, and I had to bathe patients, take vital stats, gave a subcutaneous injection to a patient and make beds. It was the closest exposure I ever had. And in this point in time, I felt more confident than I was in IMU, in KKB or Seremban. There was motivation. I had something pushing me, yet it was the same clinical situation.

Next week, I get to examine women's breasts. Something I think we will never do in IMU. But maybe I am just lucky to have the right Doctor.

In short, I am enjoying myself.