The Very Random End Of Year Two Post

Note: I’ve only just clicked on the Nike Ad below this post. I know, quite stupid right. Put ad on my own blog also never layan myself..:P But i’ve just clicked on it and I quite like the comic strips! Very nicely drawn. 🙂 Reminds me of the big boys who used to play football in the playground when I was a kid sitting on the swings back in the 90s. So proud of Nuffnang.. they’ve reached all the big boys. My eyeballs nearly popped out when I received notification that a FireFly ad was coming up on my blog. What big players will they have on board next? 🙂

I should have written this post on the day of the last class of Year 2. It was no different from all the other days I spent in lectures, early in the morning with a bag of Nescafe ais bungkus in hand, dozing off as the lecturers start to speak. Waking up just in time to scribble some more notes. But don’t worry, I absorb best when I’m studying in my own time. No uncontrollable comatose moments when I’m in my own room in study mode. I’m more of a work-at-home type of person. 😛

Year 2 just whizzed by like that. It was only yesterday that I remember starting year 2, coming back into the course all grateful and happy that once again, I’m blessed with the opportunity to resume my studies. I was so worried about having to repeat year1 because I failed my biochemistry paper.. but that was settled when I passed the resit paper.

Once again my finals are looming. No it’s not even looming, it’s sitting on top of me, oily backside and everything, smothering me. It’s only in like ..slightly more than 10 days’ time. I know, I’m screwed. But definitely not as screwed as my sleeping hours.

I thought things were bad when I only went to bed at 5/6am.

Yesterday was an all time record. I was still studying at 8am. Only went to bed right after that and trying to sleep amidst the sounds of children laughing in school buses, birds chirping and gurgling(the pigeons ya) by my window, mothers washing the pots and pans… so bising. I woke up at 3.30pm though. Haha. I really wanted to skip lunch since it was so near dinner time.
I know this might sound a little strange. Is it weird to like the sound of the morning muslim prayers? The one that they play at 5.45am? Maybe it makes me nostalgic, reminiscing about national service.(I don’t miss the batons hitting on my metal bed frame at 5.30am to “BANGUN, BANGUN!!” though. Just miss those early morning baths and the squatting down at the assembly area where I would sleep for a few more minutes..). It’s just so soothing.. the distant sound of a man’s voice echoing throughout the neighbourhood, bouncing between the walls of corner houses. A loud lone and hollow voice in the morning darkness. It makes me realize that only in Malaysia, that all these races can just live together and have the morning prayers of another faith to be part of our everyday life.

That’s one of the things I look forward to just before my bed time. 🙂 Sun rise, and I’m down.

As I’m typing this, a sudden chorus of happy birthday floats through my window into my room. I think it was a surprise party somewhere down the road. There were no party noises just before this. When the song ended, the group of people cheered and ended with a crescendo.

Yet you accept it. Birthday noises and azan prayers floating through the still of the night. Please read Cecilia Ahern’s latest book A Place Called Here. She ends up in a place where all missing things goes. Not just items, but sounds and scents too. 🙂 That’s how those noises seemed to me. So normal, just floating in.

I wanted to do a little recap about year 2 but the only thing I can properly recall is the many times that we would lament while stopping at the traffic lights back from lunch and wondering why year 2 was going by so fast. We barely had time to breathe. It was exams after exams. Wham, wham, wham. Oh how we slogged.

I wouldn’t rave about how happy I’ve been in year two because it’s not exactly a whole lot of fun. But the feeling of seeing all these dental related things for the first time, the excitement I got when I touched the hand piece for the first time, the ability to discuss about art and science together in one breath….it all happened this year.

If year two can happen this fast… *eyes cast down with bashful smile*, I just can’t wait for the next three years to fly by.

And of course, here are so many photos that I never got to post up in the past few weeks of painful revision:-

For partial dentures, we had to bend wires to make the clasps.

I must say, I was pretty okay with it. Although most of us ended with many wire imprints on our thumbs. Very painful too.

Lie Yuen in full concentration mode.

And that’s where your clasp goes. It would be attached to the base later on!

Sometimes being a dental student is great too. You can even ask the dental technologist lecturer to help you fix your earring.

Here we are, learning how to take impressions from a stone model.

There shouldn’t be a void though!

That’s alginate powder!

And the instruments that you will be using with it.

It’s very kancheong to mix the alginate and the water together because it sets so fast and ends up so solid that you can’t even use it to take an impression anymore.

Just three scoops.

Upon adding 40ml, stir the mixture in a figure of eight motion. We have to do it really fast and must be careful that we do not trap anymore air bubbles into it.

Me and my tak jadi impression. It’s so embarrassing that I didn’t even take a photo of the end product. Horrid torn thing.

Like melted sugus. Mmmm.

This is how Andy tries to stop our car when he wants to tell us something.

One of the last few simulation practicals, we had to try to rebuild an entire cusp. Say for instance in the case of a fractured cusps. As in the whole thing chips off due to an accident.

Smoothing out the surface.

We had to make a hole to insert a pin. This is technique is called amalgam pin retention.

And here’s the pin.. Tough little thing to bend.

My very ugly under filled effort in rebuilding a cusp. There are some lame attempts to carve out some fissures too. :\ Very upsetting.

Next up, a class IV cavity. Like when your kid falls down at the playground, that kind of accident.

I really liked the look of my composite restoration from the back.

The front part is so so, just not that smooth. I LOVE USING THE MYLAR STRIP to smoothen the surface down though while activating with the light cure unit! Mmmmm…. I want to do it again and again and again… *deranged look on face*

That’s a mylar strip around a premolar with a mesial occlusal distal cavity.
The coloured wooden wedge is to adapt the mylar strip to the tooth so that your restoration turns out like how it should.

And here’s the base for the elastomer. Also for impression taking purposes.

The catalyst. Not gonna bother explaining how it works. (actually because haven’t finish studying this chapter..hohoho)

I so need one for my toothpastes. This is another kind of impression material.

You gotta love the colours. Reminds me of my childhood.

Not a booger.

The point is to get a homogeneous mixture.

And then when it’s all nice and teal, get it onto a stock metal impression tray.

It becomes rubbery.

Here you go!

Oh, that’s my finished partial dentures. Well, it’s still in the wax stage. Since we’ve done the whole flasking and packing thing with complete dentures before, we didn’t need to waste anymore time by doing it again for partial dentures.

It’s okay… so-so.

The back of it.

And here are some photos of my new campus!

Beautiful scenic road heading up to the foothills of Gunung Jerai. Which is also where the new campus is located.

Beautiful clouds, swwweeeet architecture.

We’re lovin’ it!

That’s the administration building and the park in the middle. I foresee many Hari Kantin and Hari Keluargas…well at least the university equivalent of it..which can be held at the park. Great big pavements for many many stalls!

See what i’m saying?

Hello, it’s the sun that’s why I’m smiling so weirdly. Also because stressing for exams, long time never practice smiling.

The medical faculty. The side of it.

The inside of the library. Yes, three full floors of library.

Lie Yuen reading a notice outside the big glass doors leading into the main library floor.

A well lit vast space!

They’ve yet to transfer all the books over from the old campus though.

Me, mock shock.

Imagine, studying there with all your books and beautiful surroundings right in front of you with a floor to ceiling window.

Looking down, not believing it.

Again, mock shocking about the existence of a lift in the LIBRARY. We were in the lift by the way!

Looking hopefully at part of the new campus in the distance.

THAT’S RIGHT! WE’VE GOT OUR OWN PLACE TOO!!

Mmmm. I do wish there’ll be a lift inside.

And this is part of the cafeteria.

It’s bigger than it looks.

See, the canteen staff are really hygienic too.

We then drove around to check out the staff’s residential area. These houses would be allocated to senior lecturers.

And the hostels for the rest of the staff!

On Thursday(last week), we had CPR classes in the new campus.

Fuwah, look at how their lab coats flap in the wind.

That’s our juniors waving from a distant. Since they are still doing medicine subjects, they have their classes in the new campus where all the other first year courses facilities are located.

Lie Yuen checking out the big interior.

And this is one of the lecture halls. Apparently there’s a great big auditorium in the administration building. I can’t wait to see that one.

Jamie and Ee Chia waiting for instructions from the lecturer.

That’s Jamie looking for any signs of breathing.

After I finished my turn, I went around snapping photos from the windows. Those are the hostels!

Lie Yuen blows!

Poh Yee pumps.

Sett checks for a pulse, while the Chwan Hong and Jimmy looks on. Can really feel a pulse one okay. These dummies cost RM1.5million because they can even cough, breath, have different heart palpitations…and the list goes on!

Camwhoring while the others in the background finished their turns.

The dummies’ eyes can be dilated if you shine a torch into it.

Jamie and I feeling each other’s pulse.

The dummies are really huge though.

You can even change the setting of the ‘conditions’ of the dummies.

Codes for different conditions.

We even got to have a bit of fun with the stethoscope. Sorry lorh, we’re just mere dental beings.

And yes, it works.

L-r: Jamie, Poh Yee, Tired looking me, Magesh.

My turn. No, I don’t like the looks of myself as a doctor. I look so..pompous and serious.

The back of the building.

The front view from the building, overlooking the hostels and the student centre and cafeteria.

Yes, very shy that I’m photographed with my water bottle.

Lie Yuen and I.

We were walking to the other wing to see some realllly old friends.

More of the landscape.

Yeap, long time no see, old friends.

We didn’t get to see the cadavers though. But apparently there are no cadaver noobies.. still the same ol gang stacked a top each other in the big formalin tanks.

Many many lockers!

And a big and bright anatomy dissection hall!

Here we are on our last day of class! We are always the earliest in class.

Stretching up against a wall at 4am. Studying can do such things to you.

I never seem to realize that pathology AND digestive biscuits don’t go hand in hand. It’s always so disgusting to see all those diseased organs and chomping on something at the same time. Ughh.

This exam is different from my other exams. I procrastinate A LOT less. So, here’s to turning over a new leaf.

Turning..

over…

.. a new leaf!
T______T I really hope I can enjoy a nice holiday before year 3 starts. Which means no having to study my ass off for another bloody resit. Please please please pllllleeeasseee…. *clamps palms together* And also, please let me go to year3!! I DON’T WANT TO REPEAT YEAR 2!!

Alright, that’s all from me for now. For maybe a few days? See lah what happens to me. 🙂

p/s: this is for my own record. Period came today. That’s why I love my blog. It’s like my organizer and diary all rolled into one!