First Hospital Week

Oh my gosh, I wrote a chunk of text the other day for this blog post but for some stupid reason it was completely deleted. Oh well, another day, another dawn it is. 

So I was saying that I've been in Vietnam for a whole week by now. Before I left, I had absolutely no time to be any kind of excited because I was swamped with work: three exams in the last week and cleaning my flat to move out, packing my belongings into boxes so that my parents could transport it all to Leipzig. Even after landing in Noi Bai Airport, I was void of real excitement (but that could also be because I was seriously lacking sleep). 

But well, if I've realized something, then it is that you don't always need a grand opening to have a good time. I've certainly enjoyed my first week in Hanoi very much. :)

Aside from spending time with family, the first couple days of mine revolved around my internship at Viet Duc hospital, the biggest surgical hospital of Vietnam. I'm stationed in the department of Pediatric Surgery together with two med students form Luxembourg, who coincidentally also study medicine in Germany. We get along really well and I couldn't be happier to have met them. 

Two years ago, I have already absolved an internship in a Vietnamese hospital, so I'm not as easily shocked with all the differences from Germany as the first time. Still, I was quite uncomfortable when I was in the ambulance on the very first day, and the surgeon on duty examined patient after patient without wearing gloves or disinfect his hands once. He touched the penis of one child, moved on to press on the belly of another, and then fumbled with the scrotum of the next one. Without. Cleaning. His. Hands. Once. 

Well, yeah. One positive thing that I can confirm is that the competence level of the doctors here are comparable, if not even better than German doctors. The theoretical knowledge of the docs I've spoken to definitely tops that of several doctors I know in Germany, and the surgical skills of Vietnamese doctors are also impeccable in my eyes. It's just that I'm really not that much interested in surgery. The second hypospadia surgery to me was already really boring, even though I was the assisting surgeon. The only thing I found impressive so far is the retroperitoneal dissection of a neuroblastoma. That frigging tumor bled out 800ml blood of a poor 11-year-old girl... 

Other than that, I feel like I have only seen penises in Peds. It feels like Peds is 5% tumor stuff, 5% abdominal surgery, and 90% penis issues. Phemosis, hypospadia, buried penis - you name it. I've never seen so many penises in one day in my life, and I'm not in frigging Urology! 

Anyway, it's cool. lol

I want to move to Neurosurgery after two weeks. I'm pretty sure I can see the majority of surgeries at least once within those two weeks, and that is more than enough for a non-surgeon like me. 

Here's a picture of the view we've got from the surgery tract - the 10th floor of the new hospital building. (Hanoi is so gray these days, it has been raining everyday...)

And this is a picture of three super smart super cool doctors of tomorrow ;)

At least until this point, it should be noticed that I haven't mentioned food at all. Well, I have to save those adventures for another day, for another extra post. :)

I Hate my Ego

There's this thing I've noticed the last couple of months. I might be clinging too much on my ego. Whenever this stupid ego of mine is hurt, I tend to need a huge amount of time to process or cope with it.

I don't know, I mean, it's pretty normal for someone to want other people's respect and to not be so happy if that respect isn't given to them in an amount they're used to. But I wish I could just shut this 'hurt' off, because this kind of ego hurting can ignite negative feelings towards other people and I just freaking hate having negative feelings towards anybody, no matter if they deserve it or not. What's so fun about hating someone, be mad at someone, or be jealous of someone? If only I could steer my ego in a way that it would only boost my motivation to become even better, to shove it in other people's faces that I do frigging deserve more respect. 

I've tried talking about this, but it didn't help much. Last time, I had to sleep over the problem and weirdly enough all my pent up feelings were gone the next day. That of course was very reassuring to me; I mean, I guess my ego isn't controlling me that much after all. But really, I wish I could just shut it all off, because damn, who the hell needs an ego? The happiest people are the people who do not care about other opinions on themselves and just stay true to who they are. 

Is there a way to train that? I need it, badly. 

*ETA: I don't know if it's an ego thing, but I also realized I just really hate being average. It does not have anything to do with other people's opinion on me, it's rather that I plainly do not want to be averagely 'good'. I can't always be on top, but average is definitely not satisfying. 

Quick Birthday post

So, guess what.

Today is my birthday, and I'm feeling good. lol

The last couple of days (or weeks) were so tiring. I decided I need to give myself a nice treat on this supposedly special day. (In the end it's just an excuse but hey, if that's what birthdays are for, I'm all for it.)

Even though I have a pile of work to take up on, I started the day sleeping in, which felt really, really good. Good news arrived as a first thing in the morning, too, when I received an email from my ERASMUS coordinator, telling me that it is possible for me to come a few days later to Prague and therefore extend my travel time in Vietnam. I'm so excited, really. I can extend my plans a bit, not only travelling in Vietnam but also visit one of my besties in Singapore, maybe take a quick peek at Malaysia or Thailand or something, or just spend more time with my family in Vietnam. So. Excited.

At this very moment, I'm sitting in a cafe with (an empty) cup of coffee and drowning myself in writing. Is there anything in this world that can make me feel better than this? I don't think so. Later I will meet up with some friends for lunch and dinner; guess that'll do me some good, too.

I don't know, maybe I will come back later to this post and report what else happens on this day. Right now, I'm going to write some fiction, coz I feel so inspired, hehe.

Do what you love on your birthday. That really should be my motto from now on. (Though that would probably mean I will never throw any party, ever, anymore. :P)

I Think I'm Going to Implode

1. I'm feeling not so good these days. I can't really pinpoint the exact reason, though I have my suspicions, but yeah, bottom line is: I am stressed, like all the time.

2. I think everyone should have it written on their foreheads whether they're taken, they're single and not looking, or single and currently looking. It makes the world much easier.

3. Aligning with that, I'm wondering what could go wrong if people just be bold and direct and ask for each other's numbers when there's interest. It doesn't even have to mean love interest. You may find someone attractive, or just cool, just nice, and you just want to hang, so what's wrong with asking for their number? Argh, I hate society's preprogrammed perception of certain actions and I hate even more that I fcking care what society thinks!

4. One thought keeps popping up in my mind these days: rather be the jerk who dumps someone, than be the one who gets dumped. If thinking rationally, I'm convinced I'm such an ass for just having that thought.

5. I have no time for shit. I want to have me time, but then again, I don't want to be alone. Most of the time, I'm surrounded by people but I feel lonely as fck.

6. I love my family, but my family needs to stop throwing problems at me. At this very moment, I already have enough to struggle with.

7. I love medicine.

8. I love internistic medicine. I think I might just have dropped the desire to follow Neonatology. Sorry to say but my profs in Peds kinda ruined all the love I had for this specialization before...

9. I want to focus on work and shove away all the negative feelings again. But I can't fcking concentrate on work, because I keep scheduling myself to meet up with people. Usually I feel good, nowadays I just feel fcking lonely in the company of my best friends. What the fck, really?!

10. I need a break from life. Shit.

11. Problem-solving approach: Take off. Me-time for a whole day. Up until now, I think I was too afraid of feeling lonely and empty when alone. But maybe, quality me-time is exactly what I need.

12. Need to figure out what my actual problem is. Thereby, me-time. Go back to 11.

Thank heavens that I have this place to vent out all my incoherent thoughts. I'm about to implode, really. Is this what fcking burnout feels like, yeah? I just want to sleep for two days and shut out the whole world....

Bla bla bla

So... I haven't written anything for a really long time.

I'm not quite sure why because when I look back, it doesn't feel like I've been that tied up. For the past few months, I literally just stuck to the lab. I don't remember doing anything outside the lab. That's probably the reason why it gives me the impression I wasn't too busy. But well, I was probably really that busy, because damn, the amount of data I produced within the last three months makes more than a half of my entire data set. Now, there are a few experiments left, meaning three or four more weeks in the lab, and I can finally call it quits. Yay for that. :)

Today was the first day I got back to uni. Truth to be told, I was frigging excited for more than a week about it. And First Day indeed didn't disappoint. Even though I had to attend a lecture at eight o'clock, it was awesome, and guess what, I didn't fall asleep. Teehee.

I'm a bit worried that I might be too motivated to study and try out new stuff at the moment, caused by the caged feeling nine months in the lab gave me. I freaking signed up for a Japanese course this semester, lol! When in October, I'll go to Prague for exchange and should be taking up Czech classes instead... We'll see how it goes. I just remember two or three semesters ago, I was overmotivated at the beginning of the semester, too. Look how that turned out. I was squeezed dry by the latter half of the sem, haha. Oh well.

I'm thinking about people and relationships and life these days, again. Gosh, it's not even fall, why am I getting into a semi-depression phase like this? I blame it on my life which is currently throwing people problems and relationship problems at me. The only good thing about it is that it's the reason I'm sitting here to write right now. Sadly, I can't jot down the things that really bother me. Got no time for that...

Well, I guess I have to end it here. It was nice while it lasted, my dear blog. T_T

I hope I can come back to you soon.

P.S: Dear t.y, if you read this: I'm sorry I haven't been very attentive these days. But why did you lock your blog and didn't tell me? :'( Please let me in again! Miss you, and I want to read your posts!~