WEEK 2:

MONDAY: First day in hospital was, as always, easier but longer than expected. I barely did anything useful, but nevertheless, I was the first to bail out on rounds when I left at 8pm! I wondered as I fell asleep if they are still there working. In July, I will never have that luxury of excusing myself again.

I am going to see a fair bit of "tropical medicine" here, it appears. First days cases included a couple cases of meliodosis, a crocodile bite (from the zoo), ameobic liver abcesses, etc. No malaria or TB or AIDS... the true scourges of the tropics. Problem with getting out at 8pm is that there is nothing around that's open for dinner. I had to order KFC delivery, which sucks because I just ordered Pizza Hut delivery 2 nights ago... sick diet I'm having. I'll probably have some sort of chemical nightmare because of it.
No pictures from the hospital, sorry. It's too bad. There were some very cool things I'd like to shoot.

TUESDAY: Actually sort of saw two follow-up patients here, but didn't write the notes because I don't really get how they write notes here. It's much shorter and seems less structured to me. A SOAP note would seem really out-of-place in the chart. They write something more like a surgery note.
By the way, the "#" key on the phone is called the "Hex" key here. I like that. When in doubt you can always press the hex key to hex your callers. Convenient value added services abound. In other semantic differences, women are called Madam here a lot. We call patients "Madam So-and-So."

WEDNESDAY: Saw ONE patient. Tough life. But, actually that's sort of harder than being busy because I have no where to go when I'm not working. So, I just sort of loiter around feeling pretty weird all day. I guess it's just that my resident isn't much into giving out work or teaching or anything. He's really nice though. He keeps telling me I should ask one of the nurses out so that she could show me around town and stuff. But, all the nurses look really young (cute, but too young) to me. I found out why today. It's because they can start nursing school at age 16, so they can be nurses by the time they are 18 or so, I guess. Still some of them look like they are still 16! Also, even though there are signs in the subway trying to recruit nurses and everyone says there's a nursing shortage, it seems to me that the hospital is just overrun with nurses. Like there's one per patient or so. Whenever we stop to talk about a patient, the nurse always trots over and just stands with us by the bedside in case we need anything (and to eavesdrop, because of course as in the US, the communication to the nursing staff isn't great).
For the third night in a row, I will just stay on campus tonight. I thought about going to the Boat Quay or something, but I think I'd feel at a loss for how to have fun there by myself. Tomorrow night I get to have dinner with Tracy and friends again, so that's something at least. And, I like to go running on campus at night, too... although it's sort of an intense flirtation with heat stroke each time I do.

Great! After coming home, when I grabbed my hand towel to wipe the sweat off my face, something suddenly scurried off from underneath. It's a gecko in my room. Of course, we all know that that is good luck. Very good luck. Things are taking a turn for the better, I can see. Sure enough, I get a call a few moments later from Tracy. She has found a cellular phone that I can use. Now, I can be a real person not some weird-o that doesn't even have voicemail or a pager. Then, I get an invitation by email. It's from a pharmacist at the hospital. Uh, well, it's an invitation to go to church on Friday night and meet a bunch of people. I like the meeting people part, but church??? that's tough. Still, I call that good luck, because someone actually emailed me! In a final stroke of almost good luck, my ugly big toenail came off at long last... almost. It won't come detached at the very corner despite my gritting my teeth and pulling hard. I put the whole thing back in place, and I'm going out running now. Maybe once I'm pepped up on endorphins my feet are all tenderized it'll come right off. I'll put a picture of that on here soon. Along with a picture of my gecko friend, if he comes out from behind the frig. I'm sure it's a full-on bug buffet back there, so he might be a while.

Ow! Okay, that gecko must have slipped out of my room while I was out running. Yeah, the endorphins did the trick, I had the brain numbed enough that I was able to make a valiant effort yanking at my toenail... until I noticed all this blood on my hands and felt a burst of that sort of visceral pain that is your body telling you "Hey, you know that thing your trying to get rid of, uh, well, we actually need that part." Or, that sort of pain that you get when you twist a screw through your femur, you know.... Anyway, the toenail won. It stays on for now.

THURSDAY: Good luck back again, 'cause went out for real tasty Indian food and to a wine bar tonight with Tracy and her friends. I can't believe how nice they are to take me out all the time. I think I must be pretty boring to have around since I can barely tell what they are saying most of the time... so I just kind of sit there quietly. The Singlish is surprisingly hard for me to follow. Worse than Hawaiian pidgin probably, because even the straightforward English words sometimes slip by me because of the British accent. Still, it's cool for me to go out and see places with everyone.

OH MY GOD! I saw the most amazing mole today. It was just your average plus size mole on the side of an old guys face, but... wow, you should have seen the hairs on that thing. There were like 8-10 thick crooked hairs, each pointing a different direction, each at least 3-4 inches long. They were so perfectly splayed out that it was clear they were styled that way, maybe even moussed. Anyway, it wasn't the type of thing you could just ignore while looking in the mirror, so you know they man likes his mole and it's fancy patch of cat whiskers. You really have to respect that kind of dignity. I so wish I could bring a camera and tripod with me to take a portrait of him and others. So much personality.

FRIDAY: One the one hand, there are some pretty different cases here that I would never see in the U.S., so that's good. But, on the other hand, my clinical experience is somewhat lame. I just kind of shadow everything on rounds and all. I need to hook up more with Dr. Tambyah because he actually likes teaching. Then, even if I'm shadowing I'll probably learn a bit. I feel really bummed out right now though, thinking about how expensive this whole trip is. I really like to throw money away on dubious ventures, don't I. I'm especially down about my room in the residence hall, because I'm letting myself be hella ripped off. It's going to end up being like $1000 for only 25 days here. :( that plus my rent back home! What makes me mad is that on the website for the res hall, it says only $60/week for visiting undergrads. That's probably for the regular dorm room, rather than this room with a private bath, but a regular room is what I wanted. I feel so lame for not being able to negotiate something better or find a real apartment or something for this amount of money. dumb dumb dumb.

Went to Holland Village because I thought there were cafes there where I might sit and read. But, it was all bustling like North Beach on a weekend, with no hope of finding a place where a single person could dine or have coffee alone and not feel weird. So, I just looked around, bought some beer at 7/11 and caught the bus back home. You can't accuse me of not trying to meet people. I've been trampling all over my dignity in an effort to do so. But, it's just hard to do in any sort of reasonable way with this sort of time pressure. I talked to a fellow student on the bus just now. But, first of all, the bus just isn't a great pick-up place. It's not very fair, 'cause people just want to get home, they don't want to have strange men talking to them. Second, I am indeed strange and my conversation, weird under normal circumstances, is especially stilted and dull when directed at a stranger. Third, even if a great conversation ensues, in places other than New York, five to ten minutes of conversation is generally too little to justify swapping numbers and planning to meet again. In New York, people just move that fast, but not in most places. So, I just said nice to meet you and got off the bus this time. I don't really want a date, I just want a friend. But, I have to ask myself, if I were in Berkeley and some random student from France started talking to me and wanted to hang out sometime, how would I feel about that.... hmmm.... actually, I started that sentance thinking that the answer would be simply annoyed, but I'm not so sure. That's never happened to me before... because I'm a guy mostly, I guess. Girls are, i guess, much more used to being talked to randomly like that. If I was annoying, I was probably only one of ten or so annoying guys this week. Does that make it okay? No, I still feel vaguely ill about disturbing people. I think I should have just stayed at home watching TV or blogging or something.

God, I'm hungry! I can't eat 'cause there's nowhere that's set up for a single eater. I never see people eating alone here, practically. Japan is so different, with tons of places (at least in Tokyo) catering to the single eater. You feel so accepted out alone in the city there. Here, I feel like I need to retreat to my room. I don't get a friendly vibe around town at all, despite how nice people are when you actually talk to them. I've already eaten all my raisons, it's time to go look for a snack machine.

Ups & Downs: "how was it?" "Good! Perfect, perfect!" - It's not at all like me to use superlatives in an emphatic voice, but really the pasta I just ate felt like some of the best I'd ever had. I went upstairs in search of a microwave &/or vending machine, only to find the cafeteria was surprisingly open for business. I was so hungry and suddenly there was salmon marinara past in front of me. Moreover, the husband wife duo working the cafeteria were really friendly and asked me about who I am and joked with me, so that I felt like a real person... as big a relief as when I first touched the mobile phone yesterday. Anyway, that pretty much brought my mood way up.

better go to sleep while the going is good.
plan is to play soccer tomorrow, but I haven't a thing to wear. oh dear.

SATURDAY: Soccer was awesome. But, that's pretty much all I did.

SUNDAY: Nice day at the beach at Sentosa with Tracy and family/friends. It was really relaxing and didn't feel touristy at all. In my book, you can't go wrong with trees and water, even if the sand is fake (i.e. imported from some other country!). Managed to only get sunburnt in one small patch on my arm.





Back home, hiding in my basement room makes me depressed again. I go upstairs in search of any sort of human contact, and even though I don't actually talk to anyone, it does make me feel better just to see a few people around. I feel like some sort of Quasimodo or Phantom of the Opera, the pale skinned creature who by night comes up from the basement to buy sodas and then retreats into darkness. As you look down from the balcony to see who is walking there, he looks up at you furtively, hopefully peering into your eyes for a second, like maybe even he has a soul yearning for human connection, wishing for only an ounce of dignity, of simple recognition. But, knowing it cannot be his, he quickly shies away, back to his lair.

No, it's really kind of like that because no one else lives on the ground floor like I do, and to get to the lobby level, i cut underneath all the walkways, along some gravel and storm drains to the interior staircase. And, when I go back it's like I go back underneath the building or something. funny. If only I were a more permanent resident, I could probably build up the mystique to be something good.

Instead, there is no dark sorcery going on down here. It's just me and the TV that is too painful to turn on right now. It's a fuckin' Meg Ryan movie. With apologies to my mother, who someone once said looks like Meg Ryan, I really can't stand any movie she's in. And "Kate and Leopold" looks like it could be a contender for the worst. But, I am unwilling to watch it long enough to see if it wins. After all, I'm not on an airplane. I can get up and leave... or at least blog.