Wan-Goh-Wah

My Cantonese is about to improve immensely over the next few months - at least the verbal comprehension part of it - as I live with an older Chinese couple. They can understand my English but sometimes they just speak Cantonese to me and I pretend that I understand what they're saying. I would rate my Cantonese speech and language development at a 3 year old level. In situations like these I'm glad I have my charades skills to fall back on. Wikipedia states that 52% of people here in Wan-Goh-Wah are ESL which puts me in a minority group for language.

The second leg of my flight was unremarkable. I sat next to an old guy who slept most of the flight and snored loudly. At least he didn't have that "old person" smell. Combined with the rattling of the plane (I thought the wing was going to break off mid-flight with the amount of noise that was coming from it) and the two very unhappy babies that happened to be in my section, it was a pretty noisy 11 hrs. Lucky for me I can sleep through a hurricane if I'm tired enough. I watched Shutter Island and only managed to get through 60% of Invictus before passing out. Probably the most disappointing part of the flight was when the flight attendant gave me the Asian breakfast despite me saying, "I'll have the omelette please" in my perfect Canadian English. I still ate it but I would much rather have had the eggs/hash brown/muffin over the watery congee/pork-floss/salty 'n spicy-cabbage-salad-thing/hard boiled salty egg.

I must have looked real suss in the airport because I was approached on 3 separate occasions by the customs/police officers. It's probably because I was traveling alone and hauling 50+ kg of stuff into the country. None of them knew what abalone was.

I've pretty much unpacked and settled in. Met up with "Ocho" Ang for lunch that included sweet potato fries. I think I might go with him and visit the Evangelical Chinese Bible Church in Burnaby tomorrow morning. I had a look at their 'Statement of Doctrine' and it appears to be okay. I'll probably hitch a ride tomorrow. Not sure how easy it is to get to by bus so that may influence my decision of whether to continue attending.

Hoping things warm up here because it's a lot colder than Brisbane despite it being close to summer here... I'm really starting to love Brisbane's year-round-shorts weather.

The More Random the Better

So I've got 2 hrs to kill in the Taipei Int'l airport and I thought I'd share the latest story of randomness...

I'm usually a pretty keep-to-myself traveler. I don't go chatting up random strangers on the plane or in the airport. I'm either reading a book, listening to music, watching the in-flight movies, or sleeping. Anyway, before this flight I was thinking about how often I waste so many opportunities to share the gospel with people around me and how a plane ride is an awesome chance to do just that.

So I'm sitting in my aisle seat and there's a Chinese lady sitting in the window seat next to me. I'm reading my book and as the plane takes off and gets under way I decide to say hello to her and tell her that I plan to snooze off and on during the flight and not to hesitate to wake me up if she needed to get out (my last flight I'm pretty sure the girl was afraid to wake me up so everytime I woke up she asked to get past me and looked like she was busting...). I wasn't sure how good her English was going to be and it turned out to be pretty good. We made some small talk and found out a little bit about each other.

A bit later, I excused myself to use the toilet and while I was gone I just felt a huge burden to share the gospel with her. It's just the two of us sitting together, she speaks English on a flight where most of the people don't look like their English is great, she's friendly, we've already broken the ice...what am I waiting for? Deep down I knew if I didn't say anything the whole flight I would have ignored the Holy Spirit's voice.

When I got back to my seat I decided to talk about church to try to lead into a discussion about God. When I mentioned church, she lit up and said, "Are you a Christian?!?! Praise God!" It turns out that she is a disciple of Christ as well and just an amazing woman of God and the whole plane ride she had been praying for courage and good enough English to be able to share the gospel with me!

We shared about what God was doing in our lives, we prayed together and we just enjoyed a really good time of fellowship on the flight - something that I never would have expected! I told her about my unknown future and she prayed for me and reminded me how God never fails and how He always has a plan for us. She told me about the visions she's had from the Lord and how God has just answered her prayers in so many miraculous ways over the years. God definitely answered my prayer and I can't wait for more opportunities to encourage/be encouraged by other Christians as well as to share the gospel over the next couple months

Even more random - it turns out that she might be the godmother of this guy I met just yesterday for the first time. Small world.

Mishandled

Hopefully I'll have better luck this time...

Home

The last few days in Sisley were a bit depressing. With most of our furniture moved/sold, it looked vaguely similar to the home we first moved into almost 2 years ago...

Sleeping on the floor isn't much fun =(

I’m really thankful to be back home in Calgary. My trips to and from Australia in 2009 have been rife with delays, missed flights and unexpected overnight stays in a hotel, a friend’s couch and the airport. Still haven’t experienced lost luggage, a plane crash or a DVT so I can be grateful for small mercies. I feel extremely lucky for the opportunity to fly home for Christmas each year to be with family and that’s something to keep in mind – delays or no delays.

This time around, I arrived at the airport at around 9:45am alongside my friend Jamesy. We decided to grab brekkie and, since I had a bit of time ‘til my 12:05pm departure, we decided to do so at the airport. We got to the check-in counter and discovered that my flight was going to be 12 hrs delayed. The 747-400 for my flight had just left Los Angeles on route to Brisbane and would not arrive for another 14 hrs or so. Apparently they had some sort of mechanical problems that needed to be fixed. I printed off my itinerary that morning but I didn’t check the flight status online (I think some passengers did check and it wasn’t updated).

It turned out okay though. I stuck with James, got to see a few guys in the arvo, and then made my way back to the airport in the evening. Finally left Brisbane at around 0035 on Dec 10th and arrived in Los Angeles at around 1930, Dec 10th after an uneventful flight. I watched the ‘Time Traveler’s Wife’ and some really terrible war-related movie called ‘Hurt Box’. The rest of the time I slept. I had the aisle seat in a row of three and a girl named Devon (sp?) occupied the window seat. Luckily, the middle seat remained empty and we took advantage of the extra space. I made a bit of small talk with her, found out she was studying at JCU in Townsville on exchange from Northern Arizona University for a semester. She had managed to hit up New Zealand and even Indonesia/Bali and planned to return to Australia to see everything else in the future. I did not envy her travel situation as she had spent the last 60 hrs going from Indonesia to Sydney; then up to Townsville to grab the rest of her things; then down to Brisbane for the delayed flight to Los Angeles; and she still needed to grab a flight home to Phoenix. In hindsight, I should have told her not to hesitate to wake me up if she needed to get up at any point during the flight. I would wake up for meals, watch a movie and then fall right back to sleep. Each time I woke up she appeared to be busting to get to the toilet.

Thankfully, Qantas put many of us up at the Hilton for the evening which included meal vouchers. I was able to enjoy a nice sleep in a massive queen/king sized bed that sure beat sleeping on the floor during our last night at Sisley St.


I've caught up on HEAPS of sleep. I think that's what I've been doing mostly. Had a chance to play some floor hockey on Sunday which was awesome! I have a feeling this break is going to fly by really fast...

My dad in front of the Real Canadian Superstore. You can see my mom running off in the distance trying to get inside because it's -25ºC and she didn't want to stand there for a photo.

Regular Kraft Dinner that's not the microwavable kind...

Dad and bub getting ready to head out for an evening walk so that mom can get a bit of sleep

Emily is 3 weeks old.

Dad says that he misses sleep but they've decided that she's a keeper =)

Who's that strange looking fellow?!?

This is what driving on the right side of the road looks like for all those Aussies. So far, no incidents of driving on the wrong side...

Road Trip?

3,874 km from my home in Calgary to the Philips Arena in Atlanta, Georgia where the Passion 2010 conference is being held in January. Google maps estimates it to be a 38 hour drive.

David Crowder, Matt Redman, Chris Tomlin, Louis Giglio, John Piper, Charlie Hall, Hillsong United, Andy Stanley, Francis Chan and many others will be there this year.


I know a road trip from Calgary to Juarez, Mexico is possible. That was about a 3,081 km drive in a 15 seat passenger van with 11 other people and 3 drivers rotating around. I do remember us staying overnight somewhere in New Mexico though so we didn't drive the entire way in one go (but came pretty close).


Hmm...road trip anyone?

PS - I have DCB's newest album Church Music in my car CD player and I think I've gone through the album about 10 times. I really enjoy listening to it. Not sure how many songs would be suited for congregational use but I know my favorite is definitely "How He Loves".

How He Loves - David Crowder Band


PPS - Okay, I just realized that it is originally written by John Mark McMillan and is covered by DCB. I seem to like a lot of DCB covers...

Paul Washer and Surgical Banter

So I'm still on the bible study group mailing list with South Gate Alliance, my church back in Canada. There was this e-mail that caught my eye about a few sermons by a guy named Paul Washer. I hadn't heard of Paul Washer before so I looked him up and downloaded some of his stuff off the HeartCry Missionary Society. I've only had a chance to listen to a couple of his sermons on courtship and I'm still digesting some of things he said. But so far, I'm really finding myself quite challenged by his preaching.

Finally finished the USMLE Step 1. The day actually went by pretty quickly. Although I didn't run out of time in any of the blocks, my brain started to shut down by about the 6th and 7th set of questions. I started writing my exam at around 0945 (they had some issues connecting to Prometric) and by 1700 I was ready for it to all be over. For the most part, it felt like I was just making educated guesses and there were quite a few questions that I had no idea how to answer. But, I gave it my best and there's nothing more I can do.

Aside from watching some really crap TV in my hotel (Entourage, Monday Night Football/Rugby, some cop chase show, and lawn bowls...they actually show professional lawn bowls on TV and try to make it look like the World Series of Poker), I haven't really had a break. Yesterday was a pretty busy day. Checked out of my hotel in Sydney at 0730, left Sydney by 0900, landed in Townsville at 1130, drove back to Ayr by 1300, and then was helping out with an appendectomy by 1500. We were part-way through the procedure and I had just been drilled with all sorts of anatomy questions as we sliced through his abdominal wall...

Doc: "So why have I drawn an X here?" (as he points to a black X drawn on the boy's abdomen)
Me: "Uhm, is that where we're going to cut?"
Doc: "Yes, but why here?"
Me: "Uhm, well, this is an appendectomy right? Is that McBurney's point?"
Doc: "Wrong. It's a trick question. This is the point where the patient claims the pain is worst. You find out where the pain is worst and that's where you go in."

So we made an incision maybe 4 cm long all the way into his peritoneal cavity and he starts pulling out the kid's small intestine through the small opening.

Doc: "So where's the appendix?"
Me: "Uh, at the cecum?"
Doc: "Yes, so how do we find the cecum?"
Me: "At the end of his small intestine."
Doc: Holding out some of the small intestine "So which way to do we go to find the cecum?"
Me: "Uhm...I don't know."
Doc: "You can't know. You can either follow along the 6 m of bowel until you hit it or you just have to feel around and find the long, hard stringy thing that will be his inflamed appendix."

So for the next 10 minutes he stuffs his fingers into the boy's abdominal cavity and begins to feel around for the appendix. During this time, we share some jokes. One of the nurses told one about how the animals on the Ark couldn't play cards because Noah was standing on the deck. Then they got talking about the Shroud of Turin. And then the doc in charge went on some rant about how Christianity is a load of crap and that the shroud is a fake because Jesus Christ never actually died on the cross. How come he died so quickly while most other people who were crucified took days to die? His conclusion was that Jesus Christ never raised from the dead because he never died in the first place - there is no evidence that he was dead, no death certificate, and that they just assumed he was dead. And even if it all did happen, his friends probably took him off the cross while he was still alive and then nursed him back to health afterward claiming he had risen from the dead.

In the meantime, we had cut off the appendix and were sewing the boy back up. My mind was racing, should I say anything? I felt that if I remained silent it would mean that I agreed with him - which I didn't at all. One of the nurses said, "Why are we talking about this anyway?" and we realized it was a tangent from someone's comment on the Shroud of Turin. I'll give him credit, he knew exactly how to discredit Christianity - refuting the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. But how should I respond? If I challenged his views, would he kick me out of surgery? Would he lose all respect for me or would he have more respect because I had the balls to speak up?

I didn't say anything. I'm pretty sure everyone in the room had an opinion but felt that it wasn't appropriate to comment. Yes, I know religion and politics are largely taboo subjects in the workplace. But a part of me felt ashamed to not say something because I was either not confident/comfortable to go into the reliability and validity of scriptures in order to prove Christ's death and resurrection to be true and/or because I was afraid of the negative impression I'd make..."Oh that med student is an idiot because he believes in that fairytales and Jewish sect rubbish." It's a hard decision to make in the heat of the moment and I have a feeling there will be many more similar situations in the future. Hoping for some God-given wisdom to deal with them as they come.

Asian Food Store!

One week down, five to go. Things have been going pretty well here in Ayr. I feel like I've finally settled into a bit of a rhythm and I'm excited to see what will happen next. It doesn't feel like a "home" though...I carry my towel, soap and shampoo to the showers every morning; I have to close my door and take keys whenever I need to pee; I have to wear shoes whenever I leave my room; and my butt is killing me cuz all they've got here are these plastic chairs. But, all in all I can't complain because I have running water, electricity and a bed to sleep in at night. It could definitely be a lot worse.

I snapped a few quick photos of the hospital. It's much bigger than what I expected, which was essentially a beefed up general practice. It has 30 beds in a general ward with 24 hr nursing staff, an emergency ward with four beds, four outpatient consultation rooms, a couple minor procedure rooms, and some other consultation rooms used for visiting specialist clinics (eg. pediatricians, psychiatrists). There's a devoted mental health ward located just below our nursing staff quarters where they run clinics Mon-Fri from 8-5pm.

Also, to my surprise, they have a surgical ward with two operating theatres and everything to support them. On Tuesday we were able to observe and assist in a few procedures including a few excisional biopsies, a breast biopsy, surgical decompression for carpel tunnel and a vasectomy. One of the doctors here has diplomas in Obs/Gyne and Anesthesiology and that allows them to perform procedures requiring general anesthetics. They often have visiting surgeons come in to do scopes and other procedures the other days of the week. So far, I'm liking the feel of rural medicine. It's a mixed bag of medicine, surgery and general practice topped with a bit of trauma and emergency medicine. Our preceptor is a certified ultrasonographer so does heaps of stuff by himself. He'll perform all of the antenatal scans himself, do echocardiograms, and will even take people from emergency presenting with abdominal pain for scans to rule out anything sinister. I'm really quite impressed with how versatile they are.

We just went to grab a few groceries from Coles before it closed (not much is open on Sundays here) and we spotted this tiny Asian food store. We had asked a bunch of asians we bumped into at Coles if there was an asian food store in town and they said we'd have to go to Townsville. So when we saw this place, I was thinking "they lied to us!" We went in and found out that it had just opened up 3 days ago. In fact, it was so new that they didn't even have everything priced. It was great though, we picked up some curry paste and chili paste to spice up our food and grabbed a box of instant noodles. Finding the only asian food store in town was the highlight of my day lol.

We usually use this korean brand chili paste in a red tub but this will have to do for the next 5 weeks. =)

Woop Woop

"Woop Woop" (Australian slang)
Def'n: a collective description for any destination outside your local area (eg. a small town out in the middle of nowhere)

Alright, time to revive this blog with a long-ish post about what's been going down =)

Finally wrapped up my first week of my rural rotation. The days seemed to go by agonizingly slow as we pretty much sat through lectures and pracs from 0800-1700 each day - a painful reminder of what learning was like in the previous two years. Not all of it was bad. I feel a lot more comfortable with my cannulation and suturing technique after a skills workshop. We had a really great lecturer from Cairns come in to talk to us about bush bugs and a do a review of ECGs. We had a local snake expert come in and talk to us about, you guessed it, snakes. He gave us this guide if you get bitten by a snake:

Before you get to the hospital...

1. Do not wipe the wound
- many snakes are non-poisonous and the ones that are often won't inject venom for every single bite (unless you really piss the snake off)
- BUT, just in case, leave the wound as is so you don't facilitate the spread of the venom

2. Mark the bite location with a pen
- Depending on the snake, there may be two inconspicuous puncture markings or there may be a huge bruise the size of an orange (I think he said pythons are known to have very large bite marks because they latch on and chew on you...but the ones here in Australia are non-poisonous).

3. Do not try to catch/kill the snake
- Most bites occur when the snake is startled and feels it has nowhere to run
- With the exception of adders, most snakes will try to run away first. Adders will freeze like a deer in headlights thinking that if it doesn't move we can't see them. They'll only bite you if you aggravate them or corner them so that they have nowhere to go.
- Taipans are super fast and can bite you 4-5 times as they speed past your leg.
- Brown snakes are the leading cause of snake bite deaths in Australia
- Sea snake venom is the most potent but they will rarely attack unless you make them really angry. Apparently you can swim along with them and they will ignore you (but I wouldn't encourage it)
- Having said that, you'd have to get pretty close to identify the snake so probably best to just avoid.

After you get to a hospital...

4. Apply compression and immobilize the bite site
- most bites are about 1 cm deep (shallow envenomation) and venom will move through the lymphatic system. Therefore, compress and limit muscular contraction to limit the lymphatic spread.

5. Investigate with venom detection kits, urinalysis, and bloods (especially INR since the venom often contain pro-coagulation factors)
- I think here in Australia they have venom detection kits for every single type of venomous snake out there.

6. Treatment includes IV anti-venoms
- Because of available anti-venom agents for all the poisonous snakes in Australia, the mortality rate from snake bites is very low for those who are treated promptly.

**For more detail on how to manage snake envenomation, read here.

We also watched an interesting video on a remote Indigenous community in the Northern Territory. Seeing condition of the community made me think about some of the Native American communities in Canada and just how they are often neglected by the government and the rest of the country. Here people were living in 3rd world conditions and had life expectancies of 45 yrs. It just reminded me that you don't have to travel very far to find people in need - they're living right in your city - and you probably don't have to even leave your province or state to find people trying to survive without the basic necessities like clean water/food/shelter. I find I often talk about how it would be nice to travel to Africa on a medical mission but is it necessary to fly around the world? Instead of flying 12 hrs across the globe I could drive 12 hrs and probably find people in an equally unfavorable condition and in need of aid (at a fraction of the cost). I suspect that the same holds true for spreading the gospel of Jesus Christ...


Speaking of the gospel, I was so happy to have the privilege of serving in RICE Brisbane 2009 with heaps of others in an inter-church, non-denominational teen outreach movement. In only it's second year since inception (inspired by a similar movement in Sydney), I was very impressed with the unified efforts of so many who have a passion for serving, a passion for teenagers and most of all a passion for Jesus Christ. The theme was "A Tale of Two Kingdoms" and everyone was challenged to live in a way that reflects God's eternal kingdom right here, right now. During the event, I spent a lot of time backstage with the rest of the music team so I can't wait to watch the video of the entire evening. The games were awesome and I could hear everyone having a great time with them. The skit team did an amazing job, especially with the hand mime to Casting Crown's "Who Am I?" In fact, there were so many people working/meeting behind the scenes for many months prior and also during the evening to make it all possible. They deserve a lot of credit for going through all the planning and overseeing everything. The tech team was unbelievably slick throughout the evening and Eugene Hor delivered a powerful message that I know has helped changed at least 17 lives forever. Soli deo gloria!

I grabbed a few photos of the music team off Facebook (which might be copyright infringement) 'cuz I wasn't able to take any during the evening. If I'm not allowed to do this someone let me know and I'll pull them off.

I probably should have split up this post into multiple smaller posts. Oh well...
We arrived in Ayr at around 1620 on Friday and, with the help of Ping's GPS (thanks Ping!), made it to the hospital without any dramas. We met some of the nursing staff there and they seemed really nice! They showed us to our rooms in the nursing staff quarters right behind the hospital where we will be staying for the next 6 weeks. I'm so glad I'm not traveling alone 'cuz this place is FREAKY. As we were hauling some groceries back in the dark, it was like a scene straight out of a horror flick. Dark, narrow hallways with a few flickering lights (most of them don't work). None of the clocks are working and the whole place smells like nobody has lived here in ages. My room door shuts really tightly (you pretty much have to slam it to get it closed) and is so hard to pull open that a few times I've started to panic thinking I was trapped in my room (I should NOT have watched "Room 1408"). There were birds outside making strange, crying noises throughout the night. There's also some random old nurse named Philip living in one of the rooms next to us who we met last night. It was after 11pm and we were getting ready to sleep. We were standing in the dark hallway outside our rooms talking about what we should do the following day when we saw this guy emerge from the stairs at the end of the hall and start walking to us. I probably would have crapped myself if I was alone. I locked my door overnight and considered leaving my lights on. I'm going to have to fluid restrict myself after 8pm 'cuz there's no way I'm waking up in the middle of the night to use the bathroom.

Luckily, I'm not in room 13 (Albert is). The well-lit room interior is actually not too bad. It was nice to finally unpack my stuff from my suitcase. I have a lot of ironing to do this weekend >_<

More stories from the crypts of the Ayr nursing quarters to follow...

Ayr

Just found out that I will be heading to Ayr from Aug 3 to Sept 25 for my rural rotation. It think it's pronounced "air" but who knows? The Aussies call Cairns "Cans", Mackay "Macai", and Melbourne "Melbin". Last year in my preference form I had put down a town called Mossman that is located even further north up by Cairns. The plan was to visit Cairns and the surrounding area on the weekends. My flatmate and I both landed the same rural placement so we'll most definitely still be doing some sight-seeing from Ayr. We're both pretty happy about being somewhere north and also being in a town that's near the coast. I definitely do not envy whoever has to go to Mt. Isa or some other town in the middle of the continent.

We'll have to decide how we're going to get there. I believe there will be a week of orientation in Rockhampton prior to the start of our rotation. I was thinking of maybe making a road trip? Would take a lot longer (only about a 16 hr drive from Brisbane) but I could probably bring more stuff with me.

A is for Ayr!

The Joys of Traveling

95. That's how many hours it took me to get from my home in Calgary to my home in Brisbane...

I'm sitting down at this "Traditional Taiwanis Snack & Drink Bar" in the Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport. I just ate a bowl of spicy beef noodle soup that was good until I found a hair in it. I still finished it off because I doubt it will cause me any physical harm and even if I complained they probably wouldn't understand me.

My journey began on 20-Jan-09 at around 1815 local time in Calgary. My family gave me a ride to the airport and we chatted just outside Tim Horton's until around 1945 when I proceeded to head through to wait at my gate for my flight to Vancouver with Air Canada. It was supposed to leave at 2030 and arrive in Vancouver at 2103. I picked this flight because originally my international flight with China Airlines was scheduled to leave at 0135 in the middle of the night and I figured 4.5 hrs was plenty of buffer. They had since then bumped up that flight to 0005 but I wasn't too concerned because that still left me 3 hrs to make the connection. How much delay could there be between Calgary and Vancouver?

Well, after I got to my gate in Calgary I saw that my flight was delayed for some unknown reason (I found out later that there were mechanical issues and switching planes for our flight was the reason for the delay). I watched as the time was pushed to 2100, then 2140, and eventually 2240. I found someone from Air Canada and voiced my concern about missing my connecting flight in Vancouver. If we left at 2240 and arrived at 2300, that would only give me 1 hr to collect my bags and then check-in for my China Airlines flight. Not much time at all. The lady dismissed my concerns and told me everything would be fine (I think she thought that my connection was all on one ticket).

On the plane, it was after 2300 when we finally took off. The pilot apologized for the delays and said that they would try to get us there in 1 hr instead of the 1.5 hrs normally (if the plane can fly that fast, why isn't the flight always done in an hr?). One of the flight attendants announced that there were 10 passengers who were needing to catch a connecting Air Canada flight to Sydney at 2345. He kindly asked everyone else to please stay seated and allow these passengers to exit the plane first. I spoke to the flight attendant and explained my situation to him.

Me: "I'm concerned that I'm going to miss my connecting flight in Vancouver. It's scheduled to leave at 0005 and I need to collect my bags and everything. Is there anything I can do to get them to wait for me? Is there a way I can notify them that I'm on my way but will be late?"
Air Canada person: "Is your connection with the Star Alliance?"
Me: "No"
Air Canada person: "Then no."
Me: "What do you mean no?"
Air Canada person: "There's nothing we can do"
Me: "You can't contact someone in Vancouver on my behalf?"
Air Canada person: "Nope"

Later I saw that they had arranged for a cart to shuttle the 10 passengers to the their connecting flight. So clearly, they must have been in contact with Vancouver to notify them of the latecoming passengers. What a jerk. "No" shouldn't even be in his vocabulary.

Long story short, I ended up sprinting to the check-in counter and was told at 2330 that it was too late to get onto the flight (I hadn't even picked up my bags yet). I was given a 1-800 number for China Airlines' customer service and told to call them to see what could be done. I go to call them and I'm told that the office is closed and that business hours are 0600 to 1800. Great.

So I ended up spending the night in the airport trying to figure out all my options. I knew a classmate of mine was flying from LAX to Taipei at 1350 on 21-Jan-09. We were supposed to catch the same flight from Taipei to Brisbane. So I thought maybe I could grab a flight from Vancouver to Los Angeles...thanks to the free internet I was able to look up flight information online and I saw that there were a couple at 0630 and 0715.

I called Air Canada, explained my situation, and asked if they could give me a deal on one of their flights to Los Angeles that morning. I was told no and that any complaints would have to be made to their post-flight complaints department. I entertained the thought of just spending all night at a phone calling 1-888-247-2262 (Air Canada's reservations line) and yelling at them for being such a lousy airline. I would have complained to someone in person if everything wasn't closed at the airport for the night.

I also looked into one-way tickets from Vancouver to Brisbane but most of them were over $2000. I finally got a hold of China Airlines at 0600 and they told me that they could put me on the next flight to Taipei and Brisbane but it wasn't leaving until Friday. Also, the Taipei to Brisbane leg of the journey was currently full so I was waitlisted with the possibility of being stuck in Taipei for another undetermined length of time.

Why am I writing this all out? Well, I've had a lot of time to spare in the last few days hahaha. But also, this whole ordeal turned out to be a bit of a blessing in disguise. I was able to get in touch with a guy i knew from church who had recently moved to Vancouver. He went out of his way, picked me up from the airport, let me stay overnight on Wednesday at his place, and drove me back to the airport the following day. It was a great time to just catchup with him - something that I probably would never have had a chance to do had my flights not been screwed up. For an opportunity to see Richie, I'm almost glad that I missed my flight (almost being the keyword).

It was also a humbling lesson to wait and trust in God. I remember in the midst of anxiety and uncertainty, God gave me peace through my frantic prayers and told me to just wait it out and not to act impulsively. I ended up getting a seat on the next set of flights and was back in Brisbane about 50 hrs later than expected. China Airlines didn't charge me any extra fees even though it was totally my fault and I had no travel insurance.

There's been a lot of changes in the past couple months and I'm really looking forward to a fresh start in 2009. I'm eager for new clinical experiences, re-connecting with old friends, making new friends, trying out my Route 66 with my Blackheart little giant, and opportunities to be salt and light. Ready, steady, GO!

Foo Fighters!

First off, before I say anything about the INCREDIBLE concert that Dave Grohl and his Foo Fighters put on last night, I must thank my EVEN MORE INCREDIBLE flatmates who surprised me with concert tickets. I admit I was genuinely surprised - they presented it to me less than 24 hours before the concert was supposed to start. It helped that my actual birthday is still more than a month away but hey, I'm not complaining ^_^

I came real close to missing the Foo as I ran into problems with transit on my way to the Brisbane Entertainment Centre. I hopped on a train to Shorncliff at Toowong station. Everything was going along alright until the train stopped at Northgate station - 4 stops away from Boondall where the concert was. They told us that the train line ahead was not working, that we had to get off the train, and that they would send buses to take us the rest of the way. This was at around 7pm. There were hundreds of us waiting outside before the first bus came at maybe 7:45pm. I think I was able to get on the 4th bus they sent and by this time it was 8:20pm. The concert had started with the couple of opening bands at 7:30pm and the Foo Fighters were scheduled to take the stage at 8:30pm. Luckily I did make it there maybe 5 minutes before they started...

I was sitting pretty far back and pretty high up so the acoustics weren't the best. Both concerts sold out of standing room tickets last year - that's definitely where you have to be. They lowered a stage from the roof down to the centre of the arena and did an acoustic set from the middle circular stage. The great thing about the Foo Fighters is that they have so many hit songs. Their set included most of the stuff from their latest album "Echoes, Silence, Patience and Grace" as well as songs like Breakout, Learn to Fly (one of my favs), Stacked Actors, Generator, All My Life, Times Like These, Monkeywrench, My Hero, Everlong, Best of You... They threw in a few drums solos and guitar solos between Dave and Chris Shiflett, the lead guitarist. For a few songs they added percussion instruments, keyboards, a cello (for The Pretender) and a violin for some of their acoustic stuff. Snapped a few pics with my crappy phone cam...

During the break before the Foo Fighters take the stage. Made it just in time!

Lowering the stage into the middle...

Dave Grohl kicking off an acoustic set from center stage.

Taipei

So I've made it to Taipei in one piece. The flight was pretty uneventful with a little bit of turbulence here and there. Every single time there was a little turbulence, the captain would turn on the fasten seat belt sign and one of the air hostesses would instruct us to please make our way back to our seats and buckle up for our safety. Now this wouldn't have been so bad if it wasn't for the fact that they pause your movie/game to do this. They must have done this at least 5 times. Oh well, safety first right?

The last few days have been pretty full-on with getting ready to return home for the summer break. Wednesday was pretty much a write off with some post-exam celebrations. Thursday I went into the city to pick up a few things to bring back home and to get some large storage bins. In the end, I had to get six 100L containers to hold all the stuff that I wasn't going to be bringing back home with me and I STILL ran out of room. I can't believe how much stuff I've accumulated over the past 9 months. In the end I ended up forgetting to pack away my pillows. Other tasks of the day included getting my student ID card changed so that my Chinese name read "Cheuk Hung" instead of "CheukHung," getting my passport and foreign currency from my safety deposit box, and having a little left-over dinner party where we helped Susan eat what was left in her fridge.

On Friday, I picked up some spray paint to touch up some paint on the ceiling that I had accidentally peeled off. Also had to sort out some rental stuff and then say goodbye to some people from church. Watched a movie called Facing the Giants, a high school football movie heavily based on Christian themes and values. It was a good reminder that with God, all things are possible. Seeing them play football reminded me of home and how I will soon be able sit in front of the television and enjoy the familiar sports of football and hockey. Later on that evening, we were watching the movie Carrie on TV. Based on a Steven King novel, it was about this high school girl who has telekinetic powers. She goes crazy and ends up killing everyone on prom night.

Saturday was a lot of fun. Rented an SUV for moving and for getting to the airport the following morning. Had an awesome brunch with Albert and some of his housemates and just got some final packing and cleaning in. Had one last Aussie meal of Vietnamese noodles. Definitely not going to miss the food in Brisbane haha.

Still have 4.5 hours to kill in the airport...

Under The Sea

So I finally went and developed the pictures I took with my disposable underwater camera during my sailing trip in June. Some of them turned out alright. We didn't have a ton of sunlight during our snorkeling days and some of the spots had poor visibility. I remember one bay we were in there was so much sand and silt in the water you couldn't see more than a few feet in front of you. Combined with the fact that I'm as blind as a bat without my glasses, it made for some pretty difficult underwater viewing. In fact, I'm surprised any of my pictures turned out at all since I had to get pretty close to the corals and fish to actually make out any details. You can check out my pictures here.

I like Homer's solution to everything: move under the sea where there's all you can eat sushi!

I <3 Vacation

The last month or so has absolutely blazed by at warp speed. It seems like only yesterday I was starting up my mid-year holidays. I had such an awesome time hanging out with old and new friends over the past couple of weeks.


Eric, Meera and I rented a car and drove out to Coolangatta for the weekend. First time driving on the wrong side of the road. It was actually not too bad as long as there was traffic to follow. We caught some beautiful sunrises, saw some dolphins swimming around some early morning surfers, took some surf lessons, and just relaxed on the beach. And to think that this was all done at the start of winter here in Queensland - absolutely mind boggling. I did manage to catch a few of my own waves but I have a long way to go before the Billabong Pro Competition.


Next up was a second visit to the Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary. I had been there one before with my dad way back in January and I must say that the koala's were a lot more feisty this time 'round. We watched a bunch of them playing/fighting each other, got to feed some more kangaroos, and got attacked by parakeets. Albert made his debut as a bird handler with an owl as his sidekick.


Last but definitely not least was the sailing trip to the Whitsunday Islands. Nine days + one catamaran (the Don Gato) + seven mates = one great trip. The sailing part was absolutely awesome and I learned the basics of tacking and jibing the jib. We started off with some pretty wet weather. The day we arrived it was the coldest it had ever been since they started keeping meteorological records about 150 years ago. But it worked out well because we had some great winds for sailing at the start. Near the end of our trip, the sun finally broke through the clouds and it was just gorgeous.


Highlights included snorkeling among the many corals and reefs; watching dolphins swim in Macona inlet; the great food; hiking up Whitsunday Peak; getting a gorgeous view of Whitehaven beach; and walking among sting rays along the beach.

By the Numbers...

One-and-a-half

The pairs of black socks that I have left. I don't know why but I seem to be putting holes in all my black socks. I don't know if it's because I have fewer pairs and thus they get worn more often when I need to wear black socks with black shoes - or maybe my black shoes are wearing them out? Either way, my laundry schedule does not coincide well with the days I need to dress-up. Going to stop into K-mart this weekend to fix this situation...

Three

The number of times I can use a tea bag. I always have coffee first thing in the morning but during my last few weeks of studying, I decided to drink tea in the evenings. Alternating between black and green (my favorite Twinings Earl Grey and a less spectacular Lipton green tea), I found that I could use the same tea bag three times with water in my Starbucks coffee mug. The fourth time was pretty watered down.


Twenty-Four

Forget about Jack Bauer...this is how many days of holidays I have until the grind starts up all over again with Week 19. In fact, it's more like 23.5 since half of today is already gone. I'm pretty excited to have Meera and Eric visit me during the break. A group of seven of us are going on a week-long sailing trip up at the Whitsunday Islands in less than two weeks! We rented a Seawind 1000 sailing catamaran. Here's what the boat looks like:



Thirty-Nine

This is how many flashcards I managed to make in my attempt to memorize all the drugs that we covered this semester that were on our essential drug list. I didn't actually make enough cards for all of them since I sort of ran out of time and I knew drugs were going to be pretty low yield on our exam. But I should have made 40...stupid proximal tubule carbonic anhydrase inhibitors! Nobody even uses those diuretics anyway! This semester I plan to make them for the drugs that we cover each week.

Three hundred sixty three

The number of days until my next birthday. I spent most of my actual birthday studying and trying not to stress out about my exam. I met another girl, Cassy, who shares the same bday and she hosted a nice little party that evening. It was great to take a few hours of a study break to chill with people. Last night a bunch of us went for a steak dinner at this place in Woolloongabba. I thought it was just going to be my roommates and I but a bunch of others turned up as well - a pleasant surprise. The food was good and it was nice to kick back, enjoy a nice meal, and enjoy the company of friends. Would post up a few pics but I'm waiting on the photographers to get back to me hehe.

Matt's New Aussie Vocab: Part Deux

There might be some overlap from part one. This is a lesson in communicating down under.

Understanding an Aussie Bloke:

G'day mate = Pleased to make your acquaintance
He's blotto = Inebriated beyond the capacity to stand up
You little ripper! = Words of praise fail me
Rack off = Your presence is no longer required
Fair dinkum = Of course I'm telling you the truth
Pull ya head in = You may be correct in your assertion but shut up
Wanna rage? = Would you like to drink large amounts of alcohol with me until we both drop?
You dronge = A rather dimwitted person
Your shout = If you value your well being you should buy the next drink
Go on = I'm not entirely convinced you know what you're talking about
Whadayawant? = Might I enquire about your needs?
Have a chunder = The delicate act of regurgitation
You pong = Dear me, we do smell don't we
Bloody oath! = I'm in total agreement with you
Howya going? = May I enquire about your welfare?
Give it a go ya mug! = Are you perhaps incapable of performing this act?

Understanding an Aussie Gal:

Wanna cuppa? = Would you care for some tea?
Go and tart yourself up = Please dress in your best clothes
Wanna come to our piss-up? = You are invited to our party
How ya goin' luv? = I hope you are feeling well
Don't get your knickers in a knot = Don't upset yourself
What's the latest goss? = Any juicy news?
The old man's shot through = My husband's left town
Shut ya gob! = Tell someone who cares
Don't crap on = Aren't you exaggerating?
Could I bot a fag? = May I have one of your cigarettes?
Grouse lippy = What a nice shade of lipstick

Matt's New Aussie Vocabulary: Part One

1. Prac - instead of using "labs" they call them "pracs". It actually took me a few days to realize that my anatomy and microbiology pracs were really just labs.
2. How you going? - This sounded (and still sounds) so strange when I first heard it. I responded with, "huh? I'm not going anywhere." But what I thought was a localized case turned out to be quite widespread. A common greeting that they use along with "G'day". I'm more comfortable with "How are you?" or "How are you doing?"
3. Fly-bys - I got this a few times at the grocery store. Finally figured out that this is their version of Air Miles. For some reason I thought maybe they had to do with drive-bys...
4. EFTPOS - the Aussie version of debit.
5. Crisps - potato chips. I guess chips refer to fries. I wonder what fries refer to?
6. Full-on - hardcore or HC. HC for JC and HC for MD!
7. Barbies - instead of BBQ they simply refer to them as "barbies".

There's probably more but that's all that I remember at the moment. Cheers mate!

Surfers Paradise

Well, it's pretty sweet to be able to drive for less than an hour to reach some of the best waves for surfing in the world. Taking advantage of a long weekend and a very slow start to classes, I went out to the Gold Coast for the day with four of my classmates. The weather was absolutely gorgeous. The beach seemed to extend forever and we took full advantage of it. I had a chance to try out some surfing but I wasn't able to stand on the board for more than a second or two. I don't know how those guys can balance on the board. I was having trouble trying not to slip off the board while paddling around on my stomach. Kneeling on the board didn't prove to be much easier either. After an hour of struggling in the ocean and swallowing some salty sea water in the process, I called it quits. It was actually a pretty tiring cycle of waiting for a decent wave, then paddling like crazy and trying to hop up on the surf board to catch the wave. Maybe next time I'm out there I will take some lessons...

Happy Australia Day 2007

Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary

Visited the Koala Sanctuary in Brisbane and got up close and personal with the bears and 'roos.

My pics...