Sunday... boredom.

Just feeling bored not exactly knowing what to do. Ithought I might just take a look at pictures of foods I've made over the semesters. So I took those foods which I thought stood out most in the folder. So the top four are those in the picture below.



Oh well, meant to do some work but I simply couldn't think and have the urge to force myself forward.

The dates for my clinical exams have been put up on the student board via the internet. Scary? well perhaps some other words could describe better.

So I have to master all the skills especially on manipulation for musculoskeletal assessment, neurological assessments and of course, for vascular assessments. These basically looking at the bones and joint structures, locating their position and knowing their functions, looking at senses and reflexes and looking at the blood circulation and pulses respectively.

What do I need to do those? Of course my brains, my hands, my eyes, and my nose... I guess. But I also need equipment and instruments that are necessary. Which I'm thinking of buying next time. They're bloody expensive.

• The doppler which is more reliable to assess blood circulation. Alternatively I could use electronic stethoscope or normal stethoscope to get Ankle Brachial Pulse Index.
• Tuning fork - to detect vibration sesations
• Neuropen which comes with a neurotip - to assess pressure point whether a patient has protective mechanism on their sole of the feet and differentiate whether it's sharp or blunt and specify where exactly they feel it.
• Patella hammer - to see reflexes in the join as a mean to assess any motor neuron diseases, or any discrepancies in action reaction.

Basically that's it... hehehe

Bye!

The colours of April.

G'day everyone. Let's start with the highlights that took place in April.

1. To start with, I carried my work forward. At this point, work progress was around 10%.
2. Easter holidays began.
3. Cathy arrived in London.
4. Spent 5 days in London.
5. Spent 3 days in Eastbourne, Portsmouth and Brighton.
6. Spent 3 days in Rome, Italy.
7. Spent 3 days in Paris, France.
8. Grand Finale - London.
9. Back to uni and saying hello again to work.
10. Abang's birthday and Mama's birthday.
    
11. Bond/Mel's Birthday at Hyde Park London cum 1st Bruneian outing in the UK.

As of today, I've got few pieces of work out of the way, leaving me around 12, 000 words more to type, a video assessment (almost done), and viva oral to prepare. All and all, will looking forward to Mama's arrival here to the UK and my summer holidays.

London for Easter holidays.

That was my first time going to Heathrow to pick up someone. Cathy's flight was scheduled to arrive at 6.20am. I rushed to the airport in the cold early English spring from East London early at 5.30am. Heathrow was looking no different at all to any other times, it's always pack and full of people. Like a zombie as I was, looking around if RBA flight had landed. The flight was delayed to another 10mins, then 20, then a total of 1 hour. I couldn't hold myself any longer from boredom. Ran to Terminal 3's departure area, walking through obstacles of packed people just to get myself a good cuppa coffee. Thinking starbucks was there to replenish my caramel macchiato deprivation, it was to my disappointment to no avail. It was transformed to that ugly Costa. What choice did I have? Ordered a large cuppa Costa's Mocha. It took me ages to shove that bitter coffee down my throat. But thanks, for keeping my zombied eyes wide opened.

20mins later...

Phone beeped. Cathy knocking for my home address. I know it's necessary to have a contact person and complete details of people in the UK which I presumed Cathy had it inder her belt. That text made me more anxious. Previously, Rafie was detained in Heathrow for 2 hours albeit the comprehensive information he had given to the officers.

At almost 8am, came a stinky awaited friend (cos ia inda mandi)... hahaha. She was looking around for me and I snapped this picture!


She was carrying a full load of mommy's "kiriman" - foods! She was lucky to escape. HHEhehe. Then, she refreshed herself and summoned Rafie and Ms Dessert to meet up at Bayswater.



We were so clueless to what we wanted to do at Bayswater. Then on a crucial moment, a brilliant idea popped up, we headed towards London Eye since the weather was good. There were massive crowds of people at Lon Eye. Had this camel race which I won without knowing!! I won tons of coupons.. ehhe. Had quick snack at McD and we were so obsessed with this winning stickers at McD. We "won" an ipod, but apparently we lost one of the stickers. Rafie and I had to search every single coupon laying on the floor regardless how filthy the floor was. It was a good day outing to start with. Night time, we roam every single aisle of Leicester Square and Soho. Then we ended that night with late Chinese dinner at Bayswater.



The next day, the weather was perfect. It was April 1st. The sun was shining so bright and perfect for a picnic. Had bread breakfast at Waterloo. That was a good fulfilling basket of fresh warm bread. From there we went to St.Jame's park and walked from Trafalgar square up to Buckingham Palace before meeting up with Rafie and Ms D at London Eye. From there we decided to go to Camden Market for a good outing. Camden town was superb. It's so young and so vibrant with loads of stuff to find. From range of varieties of clothings and fashion wear to even drugs!?! That's where I got my cool jazzy hat!!




The following day, we thought of going to Lakeside. It's a huge shopping mall at outer London. It took us about 10mins train ride from Barking tube station to Chaufford Hundred then Lakeside. It's basically a huge superstore with all those typical names you could find in London like Riverisland, GAP, FCUK and such but in bigger scale. We ended up feeding our rumble belly with loads of foods from BBQ, Krispy Kreme and good malay foods too. From there we went to the "nearby" IKEA for a quick look around. Oh well, it was geographically near as the sign was clearly visible. We follow the track, crossing dangerous highways and roundabouts like mad mad people. The 4 of us were running here and there and at many times the cars just went honking their horns! ahah That was fun indeed! The three of them swore they will never ever go back to IKEA in that situation again...

Next day, which we decided to have a picnic since the weather was terrific-ly sunny and warm for the past week. Too bad, it went opposite on the day we wanted to have a picnic at St Jame's park. We ended up having a picnic in the cold cold weather. We even had tremors and shivers just to get a piece of sandwich to our hungry mouths! Then before saying goodbye to both the couple, we had a chill out time at Ms D's crib enjoying bites of K.Kreme.

Just see how ugly the weather was when we had the picnic. We ended up feeding most of the foods to the ducks instead.





WELCOME TO EASTBOURNE

Had a wonderful time in Eastbourne from times at the Pier and of course at the must visit Beachy Head. Magnificent views of Eastbourne from the top of the cliff and walking through the hills of Beachy Head. That took us good whole day of walking.





Portsmouth

Started off walking back to memory lane, places where I stepped foot for my first visit to the UK when Kachu was studying there. We started from Guildhall to Kachu's old halls of residence before walking back to the Spinnaker tower. Had a quick look around, shopping and went up to the Spinnaker tower. Before heading back to the train station, we had a quick stop in town. Following the smell of good aroma of Dinky Donuts, we finally stepped foot at the stall with loads of fresh fried donuts. Bought a bag and finished it in a snap. That was my biggest thing for Portsmouth. It was a craving that I had to endure for 10 years!

Too bad I can't show ny pictures cos my itchy hands managed to delete all the pictures taken. (pix attached were taken on a different occasion)





Rome

Off to Gatwick early midday to catch the 5pm flight to Rome. Arrived Rome safely and we had a personal driver waiting at the airport. Another driver then took us for Rome day tour on the same car. That afternoon, we met Lilac at Trevi fountain. That was my first time meeting Lilac since September where we happened to be on the same flight.

Rome was excellent. Loads of stories to learn and appreciate from the remainings of ancient Roman buildings. The churches and historic places of interests were just amazing to see how sculptures and painting were created into a very perfect minor details. Complemented by Easter, Vatican was just filled by millions of people. Although the weather was quite hot, it was still not as hot as back home. Certainly gonna come back and will spend longer time next time.

Rome, I will certainly miss your inner beauty and historic stories plus the croissants and good coffee. Of course, nothing beats Italian Gelato!




Paris

It's not a trip to Paris if you had not visited Eurodisney and Eiffel Tower. And yes we did. We started off with Notre Dame where we had a good munch of good French Crepes. Watched Eiffel tower from far until sunset. The next day promised us with more joy and excitement, Eurodisney.

Went there minutes before the gate was opened. We had a fast pass ticket where took us inside in just a blitz. Language certainly was a barrier but not a problem at all. Like a Bruneian saying.. "gasak saja tia~~"

Had my first "head upside down" ride on that space mountain ride. It's basically a roller coaster ride that resembles a ride to space. You could actually feel the G-force and as if you were floating in space with the light effects and all. Hard to describe, certainly worth the try. But not for the faint hearted. I almost puke on my way out!!

Bad Paris: I hate the transport system! It took us minutes most of the time to figure if it was the right place and time!





Eastbourne and Brighton

Had a good time spent in Brighton at Churchill Square. Didn't get to explore the inside out of Brighton really. Meant to visit the famous landmarks like The Brighton Dome, The Pavillion etc. Too bad, we were enjoying the sun that so much time was spent at the Pier. Whilst being at the Pier we were just watching people enjoying the day, kids enjoying their mini fun rides whilst I just enjoying the sun and the fresh seafoods!!

Oh by the way, what's unique with the beach at Eastbourne and Brighton (Sussex) is that, they're pebble beaches. heheh






London and Bye to Cathy

That was the time when it was not a good time to be in London! The transport system just went mad. Loads of service closure and signal failure. People were just being silly to add salt to the wound! They dare to pull emergency alarms in several occasions and one of which happened on our train!

To cut story short, Cathy arrived at the airport 30 mins to boarding time!! The check in counter was closed but the RBA rep managed to get the counter open again as our reason(s) were kinda valid. On the way, we had to go through loads of obstacles, casualty, system failure, etc. Imagine the Rat Rate... that was how it was or rather Amazing race for some of you! Oh, that was not the end, another race then had begun. My train back to Eastbourne was really a pain in the arse. It took me 4 hours instead the usual 1.5 hours to Eastbourne from Victoria. Had to take the train to Three bridges, then from there took that awful 2 hour old double decker bus ride to Lewes through a long and winding road, then taking another train to Eastbourne. *sigh*

All and all, it was a good Easter break however.




Bondy's Birthday

Went to London again the following week to meet up some good Bruneian friends for a Hyde Park birthday picnic. I was reluctant to go but the host called me up the night before. I felt obliged then. It turned out to be a good outing. Had a frenly footie match. Gila ganas... macam tangkap ayam! ahahahha those were the saying. Had my body ached all over for few days. Bruised my left eye from Lilac's elbow hitting on my eye bony area. We ended the day with a good plate of Chicken rice at Bayswater!!

Before going home at the train station, we bumped into a lady who was in a state of epileptic shock. The rest of the gang were like.. "go sani..." and I said.. "don't you guys dare to identify me as a nurse!.. I so dont wanna get involved" ahahahaha.... it's all about ethical and legal practices here in the UK. Besides I ain't a registered nurse here plus I ain't practicing. I'm a total "newbie" in a way being student podiatrist now.







Oh on this day as well, there were people outside Harrods demonstrating and shouting "Boycott Harrods". This was carried out by, I presumed Animal rights people expressing their protest against the use of animal furr as fashion clothing which can be found at Harrods.

It was indeed something new whilst enjoying my Banana Muffin and my macchiato from the starbucks across.