Ambition is a double edged sword

Ambition is wonderful. Ambition is tiring. When you hear people talk about other people's accomplishments, people they admire, people who have a vision etc., ambition is attributed to them. Ambition is the mother of accomplishments. Accomplishments beget praise and admiration. People like to admire things.
In general, I like the fact that I'm ambitious. It gives me something to do, and it pays off. It feels good to accomplish something. It's also very tiring at times. Ambition is like a fire - it's a useful tool, but if you lose control of it, you're in trouble. As you get comfortable with your new accomplishments and endeavors, your fiery ambition starts to burn more - you want to push yourself some more. However, eventually it takes control of you, and you feel overwhelmed. I think I've reached this point. I want to do so much in life. Life is short.
Being class president probably consumes at least 25 hours a month of my time. As an exec on the pediatric interest group, more hours are consumed. (thankfully not too many because I have amazing co-execs). The annual Tachycardia theatrical play is consuming a lot of my time (I'm in the play, and I'm dancing in it too). Countless emails to reply to. Countless profs and doctors who are asking me to write a reference letter for an award they were nominated for. Furthermore, I decided I want to learn how to play the guitar, and so that consumes more of my time (although it's unbelievably fun!!). My commitment to going to the gym or at least trying to exercise at home consumes at least 1 hour/day. Trying to plan, organize and book things for my summer travel to Europe consumes time. Ethics project consumes time. Then there are the little things that really add up a lot - cooking, shopping, catching a moment of silence, listening to friends, friends' birthdays, helping friends, and catching up with the parents.

I'm not sure what I'll do when I look back at this and realize that in the end, things work out. Will I learn my lesson once the fire's under control? or will I be tempted to play with something much bigger?

Happy Easter!

When I begin writing an article for this blog, I like to find an appropriate image to accompany it. Google image search does the job every time (remember kids to put safesearch on). So this time I google imaged 'Easter'(yes, very creative of me) and right away I found a suitable image. I also found something very interesting. There were more pictures of bunnies and eggs than pictures of crosses or of Jesus. How bizarre is that? I won't get too religious in this article, but Easter is about Jesus and His resurrection on the third day. It is about a celebration of hope, forgiveness, and being reborn for millions of Christians. Unfortunately, in a capitalistic society, EVERYTHING becomes marketed. Does this justify it at all? Absolutely not. Suppose we took a well known and deceased figure, say Gandhi, Albert Einstein etc., and instead of commemorating their work, we decided to market some Klondike Bar (Ice Cream sandwiches for those who aren't brainwashed with TV commercials). That's right kids, every Klondike Bar now has an atomic explosion's worth of ice cream taste! mmmm yum! How about twisting Gandhi's quote "As long as you derive inner help and comfort from anything, keep it." and then the marketers can show him deriving comfort from a Klondike Bar! mmm yum again! How ridiculous would this marketing campaign be? In essence, this would be insulting. Putting religion aside, the least anyone can do is respect a good man who gave a message of hope, who did nothing bad towards anyone, and in the process died for something he believed in.
The other interesting thing is that almost anyone can get away with making fun of Jesus, or using the word Jesus in nonreligious contexts (i.e. Jesus f***ing Christ). However, when other religions feel any sign of blasphemy, it looks like a war is about to erupt! For example, the Danish cartoonist who drew a picture of Islam's prophet Mohamed as a terrorist resulted in several deaths, numerous death threats and riots all over the world. When Scientology was attacked (still is) by a group of bored nerds named Anonymous (see video below for example), well Scientologists found ways of getting back at them. So why does Christianity 'tolerate' this? Is it because Christianity (all denominations: 2.1 billion) is the biggest religion will naturally get attacked/scrutinized more? Other big religions (i.e. Islam: 1.5 billion) fight back whenever their religion or prophet is attacked though. I think part of the issue is that Christians are taught to be chronic forgivers, nice etc..to the extent that if something wrong happens, they'll just sit at home and pray about it and then forgive the attackers. Sometimes you have to stand up on your feet though people! As George Jackson once said "Patience has its limits. Take it too far, and it's cowardice."

So that's my rant for the week. Oh, and Happy Easter!

PS below is one of Anonymous' attack on Scientology..if you look under google news and on youtube, you can find more protests being done in an attempt to shut down Scientology.

I have an addiction...

It's true, you read the title right. I have an addiction. An addiction to hugs. From the moment that I was born, I preferred sleeping on my parents' chest than eating. I wasn't a noisy baby nor did I cry much. I slept and hugged them. That's all I seemed to need from them to feel peaceful. My mom would often recount the effort she had to put in feeding me. Food didn't seem as high of a priority on my list as sleeping or being held by my parents.
As I look at how I am now, I must say, these habits still remain true (minus needing diapers thankfully). I eat when I feel hungry or when I realize I haven't bothered eating much that day. When it comes to hugs though, I'm a glutton. It's my desert. What's amusing is that the other hug-lovers in the class (pretty much all girls - woot woot) come to me. Apparently the years of 'practice' have paid off. Everyday, it seems like there's a lineup of ladies waiting for their turn to get a hug. I do get teased about the attention I get, but any teasing's worth that warm, innocent, comforting, peaceful feeling of holding someone you care about. Despite getting a lot of hugs daily, every single one feels like a new wonderful experience to me.
This stirred up some thoughts and discussions among my colleagues (yes this is what your future doctors talk about). Apparently hugs cause your brain to release endorphins which makes you feel good (basically acts as a reward mechanism). So I started thinking - can you overdose on a hug? Can you become so used to a hug, like an addict, that your usual dose no longer feels as good?
The other thing about hugs is, some people just suck at giving hugs. I assume they didn't practice like I did when they were young, so now they're not olympians of hugging. A bad hug is one in which they stand about half an arm lenght's away,and instead of coming closer, they lean forward, as if there's a fence between us, and then pat ya on the back. Honestly what is that!? There's no fence or bubble of space in hugging! When I meet a good hugger, I let them know of how amazing of a hugger they are, which often takes them by surprise, because I suppose not too many people point out their appreciation of hugs. So now I jokingly refer huggers to other good huggers, thereby creating a network of awesome huggers.
So how important are hugs? well they seem important enough that people are investing valuable time and technology to create clothes that hug you! Basically, if you are away from a good hugger, well then you can both buy this special shirt - the hug shirt - and when activated, you'll receive the same feeling and warmth of a hug from them! check it out: http://www.cutecircuit.com/projects/wearables/thehugshirt/

Well that's all for now folks. *hugs*.

I say hello, you say goodbye

I lean onto the train window, staring at the snow draped farm lands, naked trees, deserted muddy roads, and a distantly shy sun. Vast open land, cold and seemingly lonely territory being interrupted by the rhythmic rickety sound of the train. Roughly 2 hours ago, my brother and I stared out of the same window, waving our hands to our parents as they mirrored us from their car window. The lady in front of me waved to what seemed like her husband. They tried to communicate with a makeshift sign language. He pointed to his eye, drew a warm heart through the cold air, and then pointed to her. She tried to lean closer to him, but her window would not give, it was stubborn. The lady across of her waved to her husband (unless that big rock on her wedding finger was accessory jewelry), he waved back and walked away. As she watched him walk away, her lower eyelid was shaking under the weight of that tear drop, a drop that said I miss you already.

Train stations trigger a lot of emotions and thoughts. People come, people go. Some have no one to wave to but await smiles at their destination. Others wave to their loved ones, and hopefully have smiles at their destination too. Then there are people who seem to have nothing. I sit here staring out of my window and wonder about the day I won’t have my parents to wave to. Which category would I fit in when that day happens? And does it matter which category I’m in? I feel grounded in who I am, what I can do, and proud of what I have accomplished so far, but I realize that deep down I’m like most people. You are unique, like everyone else. Deep down, like any normal human being, we all have a fear of being alone. However, I don’t believe that everyone is aware of that fact. Humans are social creatures, and without that characteristic, we would have been long extinct. This characteristic manifests itself in different areas of people’s lives. If you open your eyes, you’ll see this longing to connect with others through normal day to day interactions, facebook (how many friends do you have and why do you keep going back to see what others are doing?), myspace, msn, blogs, personal relationships (note how many people try to quickly replace their ex b.f./g.f. for the sake of not being alone) etc. Like strands in a fabric of a society, we try to connect with one another whether we realize it or not. Sometimes I wonder if more people realize the cores and pillars of what makes us human, what makes us behave the way we do, then if the world would have less conflicts.

I’ve reached my destination, and a world awaits me.

And when will you be back home?

Independence is a forbidden fruit. Once you taste it, it's very hard to go back to your former broccoli of a life (although I do like broccoli). Part of the joy of growing up (and hopefully maturing) is leaving your cozy nest (aka the parents' home), and learning to take care of yourself. Initially it's not easy to be away from your mom's amazing cooking, the daily hugs (I love hugs more than food), the quality time with the parents, and of course access to a car. However, you soon appreciate the advantages of doing whatever you want to do, whenever you want to, an not having to explain your priorities to your parents. This does not mean that I'm going to let myself go loose like an unrestrained child in a candy store (although some students end up doing that...they end up with diabetes and cavities). Independence is what you make of it, and in my case, it was about learning what my limits are and what I am capable of on my own. Although, I suppose if I stayed at home, I would grow up even more (assuming I took initiative). At home you'd have to learn to take an active role in experiencing the same thing as your peers away from home while making your parents grow up and accept the fact that you're no longer a little kid. It's like two challenges at the same time! (Bravo to those handling the double challenge!)

In any case, I took the easy route of being away from home. However, I'll have to face the second challenge next year when I go back to my hometown to do my hospital rotations. Whenever I go back home for a long weekend/holiday, I feel like a little kid again. This is mainly because my parents will remind me to eat (apparently I don't eat much while I'm at school, but this is probably compared to Mediterranean meal standards), I'll be asked why I'm not studying madly (after all, this is all that med students should do), I'll be asked why I'm not dressed warm enough for the cold weather, and of course, my two favorite question - when are you coming back home and who are you going with? These two last questions define childhood and parenting. I appreciate the fact that my parents love me and have a concern about my safety - and believe me, I have come to terms with those two questions - but I don't know at what point of my adulthood when they'll accept that I hang out with trustworthy people, and that I don't really plan the time that I'll be coming back home. Next year will be especially amusing because I'll be spending the majority of the time at the hospital. I can vividly imagine my parents asking me where I'm going, who I'm with, and what time I'm coming back home - "Mom, I'll be at the hospital again, I'll be hanging out with patient R, Patient X, Patient Y, and Patient A, and I'll be on call, so I won't be home tonight." - "Ok, make sure you eat, and study!".

All I know, is that one day I'll miss my parents and their attempt to provide a protective bubble (Lifetime warranty!), and I'll keep that memory alive by passing on the bubble to my future kids. Ah, now that's love.

The Culture Train

One of the most noticeable thing between the North American culture and my Mediterranean culture is the distance people keep from one another. Mediterraneans speak in an exaggerated cartoon like way. We talk louder, move our hands as if juggling invisible balls, and stand a lot closer than our North American counterparts. In North America, it seems like everyone keeps distant from everyone else. On the bus, train, etc. people sit at least 1 seat away from each other and then avoid eye contact. People also seem less touchy than in the Mediterranean culture. If a Mediterranean person is having a conversation, chances are they'll touch your shoulder or arm when making a point or gesturing at something. While this is just a normal and automatic part of the way we act, it's definitely not as common in Canada. Last year, I remember walking towards a door at the same time as a classmate. The door was narrow, so naturally I let the girl go ahead first. To gesture this, I stuck one hand out (as if pointing to the doorway) and the other on her shoulder very briefly and said "go ahead first". She gave me a talk about how I seem very touchy and how that makes people uncomfortable. That little lecturing she gave me threw me off. It felt as if a doctor told you that you had a disease you never knew you had. It hits you hard, makes your heart stop as you try to collect your thoughts, and you don't know what you're supposed to do next. I ignored it. I kept a mental note to keep an exaggerated distance away from her. Other than that, I'm not changing. I may sound stubborn, but this is how I grew up, and I know my way is better. I'm right. In fact, the two Mediterranean doctors I did electives with this summer act EXACTLY the same way with their patients, and they love it. I have never seen any of the Caucasian doctors get this many hugs, kisses, and patients teasingly slapping their shoulder for their witty/teasing remarks. I love it. I embrace it.
A couple of days ago I took the train to visit my parents for the weekend. Naturally, everyone boarding looked for an empty seat. People like their oversized North American bubble of space. I avoided the empty seat, and sat beside a stranger. It confuses them. It's amusing. I then begin to chat with them about their life, their travels, family, relationships. It's amazing to see a person who once segregated themselves away from other passengers suddenly open up when they find someone to listen to and be fascinated by their life. The first passenger I talked to was a young lady (about my age) in criminology, but is aspiring to be a lawyer. She told me how her career goals get in the way of wanting to have a family and lots of kids [a common theme with some of the girls in our med class]. She taught me about the importance of unions, women's rights in the workplace, and her travels across the world. She was once on a plane that had to make an emergency landing because it was about to catch on fire! That day I also learned that there are blond Italians (every Italian I have met is short and has dark dark hair).
The second passenger I met was a 24 year old girl who worked in health care management. She initially confused me. She was opening all these templates in a microsoft program and closing them...for an hour. So I asked what she was working on and then I teased her that I thought she was going crazy with her work. This opened up the conversation, where I got to learn about her work, why she thought I should be a nephrologist, and then we chatted about relationships. I then asked her how she met her boyfriend [it's always amusing to hear these stories & the things guys go through to ask a girl out!]. Her boyfriend story wasn't very climatic though - she met him through a mutual friend. But whoever he is, he's one lucky guy, she was smart, beautiful, and was fun to talk to.
The train arrived to its destination. Like everyone else, we all went our separate ways. Unlike everyone else, we went away with a unique memory instead of what could have been a boring 2 hour train ride otherwise.

edit note (March 13, 2008) : I don't think I'd hug a patient unless they initiate it. Although we are not swamped with lawsuits like in America, who knows what the situation will be like by the time I graduate. I remember reading the newspaper this week about a man who was sued for hugging someone..apparently it was considered as an assault. Maybe the man misunderstood what a bear hug was supposed to be...what a world!

Interpret this!

I like to be entertained. Life is full of routines. Those ideas often clash together, especially with most of life revolving around school, faculty meetings and various presidential duties. As much as I love being in med school, this year feels too routine. Start a block, slack the first couple of weeks, work on an assignment, cram for the exam, do well on the midterm, and repeat with another block. However, I finally had the chance to do something a bit unusual with the GI block's assignment. Each group chose a GI related topic and was asked to create a presentation to show during a symposium for students, professors, and drug rep.
Once we had our topic chosen, we brainstormed for ideas, and then I jokingly mentioned we should do an interpretive dance of our topic - Meckel's Diverticulum (for info about this, see our website).
Soon it was the big symposium day. It was very hectic. Students, profs, drug reps walking around everywhere, visiting every station. We didn't know when we could break out into our surprise presentation. We were pumped. I was ready to make a fool of myself. We got everyone's attention, we told them to sit down for an interpretive dance of this disease. It was funny to see people's reaction at our statement. Some laughed, dismissing it as a joke, some looked at each other, thinking "are they serious?", others just followed our request and sat down.
Then the dance began. I'm not really sure what the class' reaction was because I was trying to focus as hard as I could to not laugh at how silly this presentation was. But by judging the laughter in the video (see below) it was obvious everyone enjoyed it.
Then last week, one of the professors who was present at the symposium came up to me and said "thank you for that presentation. Every year I teach, I see how routine things are and I wonder what's wrong with people, but you broke out from it, you put a creative touch and made us laugh. I've never laughed this hard in a long time, and I had to tell my wife about it when I got home!" I guess, I'm not the only one constantly looking for an escape from the daily mundane routines.

It's In You To Give

"It's In You To Give" is the quote of the Canadian Blood Services [the Canadian Red Cross no longer collects blood]. I learned this motto today when I went to donate blood for the first time! I was excited for a while to do this, I just never got around to do it. I put it off for years by telling myself that I'll do it later repeatedly. But I finally did it! Now my blood will save 3 patients somewhere in Canada, and all I had to go through was a little questionnaire [about risky behavior and travel destinations] and a needle!
Next time I go again (56 more days!), I hope that it's as exciting as it was this time. It's truly gratifying to know that you're saving someone's life. The other thing I have to keep in in mind is to not squeeze my fist so hard, no matter what the nurse says. As she prepared my arm for the needle, she said squeeze hard [so she can find my vein], so I figured I'd be helpful and squeeze as hard as I would while weight lifting. That vein popped out as if it was begging to be popped by that needle. I then proceeded to go back chatting with this girl donating blood...until my peripheral vision caught something in the air..and then the nurse saying "UH Oh". So apparently you can squeeze your fist too hard and end up having blood squirting all over you when she puts the needle in! Of course Murphy's Law would dictate that the day you get a messy shirt, is the day that you happen to be in your nice dress shirt [that I wore at the clinic that morning]. So that day I proudly walked away, knowing I did something good, with a blood drop shaped sticker on one side of my shirt that said "First Time Donor", and with a blood stain on my other side of my shirt. Quite the walking advertisement I must say!

V - is for vagrant

A couple days ago I had a chat with the upper year class president about something we're both experiencing. It's a feeling that I like to describe as class president vagrantism. What in the world does that mean? Well my friend, it means that being class president often means that you get along with everyone, you don't really have enemies, and you spread out your time & love for the class. This seems wonderful at first because you get to know everyone, and everyone knows you. However, there's a price to pay for this - vagrantism. I really don't belong to anyone; I'm a vagrant, a floater, a wanderer. I'm not part of the keeners, I'm not part of the brown town/brown crew, the jocks, the not so socials, etc. I suppose that it can be argued that I partially belong to all of them? One of the vagrant phenomena is that any invitation to a social crews' events feels welcoming, yet like you don't fully belong. The crew is happy to see you, but at the same time you know that you don't know them as well as you would like.

I do have some very close friends, however, it's definitely not as many as I would have with a dedicated social crew. At times I miss the opportunity of being able to have memories with a consistent social circle. At other times, I realize that I am pretty lucky in that I get to know everyone in my class as well as the upper & lower year classes! There are even some people in my class who don't even know everyone's name in our class because they only stay with their crew! I suppose it's one of those "the grass is greener on the other side" type of thought. But you know, I don't even like grass - when I own a house one day, I'll make sure it has as minimal amount of grass as possible. But that's a rant for another day.

Uncle Leo, why are you so angry!

Remember that Seinfeld episode where Uncle Leo has his eyebrows burnt off accidentally and ends having some eyebrows (badly) drawn on. He ended up looking angry at everyone, which made the episode a classic. While that episode was funny, the reality is...eyebrows do bother me. No no, not in the sense that they should be removed. My pet peeve is seeing so many butchered eyebrows! Honestly, there's a limit to how much you can pluck them! I'm getting the hunch that these people are going for an eyebrow look that falls in between a transvestite and porno star.
So let's start with what I call the McDonald Arch eyebrows. These eyebrows have an unnatural semi-circular shape that makes you look like you're constantly surprised. The picture above is the best I could google at the moment, but I've seen worse..
Next, there's the "I glued on a piece of string" for eyebrows. These ones are literally as thin as a piece of string. I'm not really sure what to make of it because it doesn't look natural at all. I think Pamela Anderson is a good example of that.
The last one on my mind is what I call the "mini chopsticks" - these ones are excessively trimmed, to the point that it just looks like a straight line hovering above your eyes.
Whether you believe it or not, there's a science about how eyebrows are shaped. For example, forensic experts can figure out the width of your lips (when you're not smiling) based on where your eye pupils (the dark spot) are. Similarly, the eyebrow has a science as well. The eyebrow starting positions is roughly where your eye starts (towards your nose that is!). It then slopes up almost in a straight line until it gets to its peak. The arch (peak of the eyebrow) is found by drawing a line from the side of your nose, across the eye pupil and then towards the upslope of your eyebrows. Afterwards, the eyebrow slopes down so that if you draw a line from the side of your nose again, past the outside of your eye, it'll meet up where it should end. Here's an example of what I'm talking about, I drew some lines to make it clearer. Well that's the end of my rant about bad eyebrow jobs.

Where's her face!?

Some people think bigger is better. I just never thought that it would apply to sunglasses to the extent I saw today. As I sat peacefully on the bus this morning, a young lady boarded, and if it wasn't for my common sense, I could have confused her for a gigantic fly. Her sunglasses covered I would say 2/3 or more of her face! I understand that the current fashion is the big sunglasses look (which is recycled, since my grandma has the same glasses), but it seems that this fashion is getting out of hands! The glasses I saw today covered half of her forehead and went down to nearly her mouth. Which brings me to the next point - fashion trends are usually followed to look attractive, but when you can only see someone's chin and some of their forehead, then what are you showing off? Well, we'll see what the next fashion trend will be...sunglasses at night anyone?

Human Nature - Broken

So yesterday I had the privilege of learning that a friend of mine blocked me on msn. I really don't know whether to consider them as a friend any more, simply because our friendship was fragile by this point of time already. It's kind of like those "Jenga" towers, and my friend's final move toppled everything over. Am I bothered because I was blocked? Not fully, I just find it immature. What does bother me though is that one week ago, that person said that they would never do something like that. I trusted those words. Now I have no trust.

Why would I trust someone if the friendship was so fragile? It is because it didn't used to be fragile. That person used to be my closest friend. However, a long time ago, I made a mistake towards this person - I bottled up some issues I had involving this person because I didn't want to risk losing what we had. That bottling up ended up hurting both of us, and despite my best intentions, I ended up losing the person anyways. It was inevitable. I could only delay it for so long. However, all was not lost. There was one last strand of friendship between us. We kept distance, but I thought we still trusted and respected each other. I thought wrong. Now, I move on. The last strand was cut.

Does all of this bother me? A bit; but I can't let things linger within me. Life is too short. But deep down inside, like any human being, I'm looking for reason and understanding of this situation. More importantly, was this situation incidental, or is it reflective of those around me, those that I will meet and human nature as a whole?