I've been getting very lazy and reluctant to do things lately. All i'm hoping for now is that my offer letter comes immediately. I really don't understand why UQ is taking this long to process everything.

Yesterday, i did scaling and polishing on a new patient. This is not just any scaling and polishing. He requires deep subgingival scaling as his teeth are full of stains and calculus. We changed the saliva ejector tip twice as it was stucked with pieces of calculus. The patient kept gagging as according to him, he got chocked by his own calculus. I really don't know how did that happen. I'm seriously immune to seeing blood already. The scaler tip was deep into his gingival pocket that his gum was bleeding profusely. Besides that, he has full set of 32 teeth including all his wisdom tooth. I took 2 hours just for scaling and polishing.

I havent been eating a lot and sleeping enough lately. I hope that i didnt lose weight. Time to find something to do again.

7 years ago...

Front View

Back View (Date: 30/9/03)

Exactly 7 years ago, my girlfriend hand made and gave a bookmark to me. We were sort of in a special relationship but things turned sour for us at that time as we couldn't meet the terms of the relationship. We were only 14, I was really quite serious about it but she wasn't ready and could not believe we will go on further.

It says 'Forever' on the front. I guess nobody would ever be so dumb to believe that love would be forever for a puppy love couple at the age of 14 but I believe. When she gave that bookmark to me, I asked her about what does that 'Forever' mean? She said it could be Friends Forever or Forever Love. She did not want to make a promise that we will be together forever. Be it friends or lovers, the Forever word has casted its spell on us. We are now already in our 41th month anniversary and it will last till when death do us apart. Stories on what happened in between are too long to be told here.

I'm glad that things turned out well for us and very fortunate to have her.

Anyway, I'm currently around 57.5 kg. Gaining weight now is getting even tougher. My body frame is small, building muscles on a small bone frame is a tough challenge. I guess i'm almost reaching my genetic limit but i will never give up till i'm at 60 kg. 2 to 3 more kgs to go till end of december. Oh, btw, my BMI is already in the normal weight range. I have never been normal weight in my whole life. HAHA. I'm so happy now.

Time to cook lunch and get ready. Clinic session in the afternoon.

BJ

Don't get the title wrong. BJ is beijing. Just came back from Beijing few days ago. I would say the trip was good but it is not a city that i would want to live in. The traffic was bad and the drivers there are like crazy and skillful. The vehicles are practically glue to each other with the gap of maybe 1 to 2 inches left. One thing that i dont understand is that how their law permits drivers to U turn and turn left or right when the traffic light is bloody RED. Besides the traffic, the air pollution there is bad. My face which is usually smooth got few pimples popping out during the trip.

First of all, Beijing has a lot of historical buildings to see. I had been to countless buildings which i can't even remember all the names. The designs of each buildings are practically the same. It was more for people who would like to know a little bit more about their history and the reasons for building those ancient looking structures. Their stories are little intriguing and I was amazed by how they built those magnificient buildings at their time. Besides visiting buildings, there are like tonnes of factories to visit. I think i went to Pearl, Jade, Crystal, Silk, Pharmaceutical factories and even Tibet medical centre. I would say the Chinese are seriously damn good in making business. From buy 6 free 2 to free 3 to free 4... and they will drag you along to see other products if you had already bought some. Their special offers are continuously increasing.

The food in beijing is... as usual oily and salty. You will get hypertension and high cholesterol if you live there long enough. Their peking roast duck isnt really that great. I still prefer malaysian cuisine. Oh and i tried silk worm for the first time. The texture is seriously aweful but there isnt much taste, it is similar to prawn paste. The shopping complex is really nuts. Although they have branded stuff there but it is so expensive. Thus, we were brought to those shopping complexes with fake stuff without price tag. The tour guide told us to get atleast 60% bargain from the starting price. From 280 a shirt to 100 RMB. I was lucky that i am not a guai lou. They usually love to suck all the money from them. Additionally, they would scold the guai lous if they dont buy from them after bargaining for such a long time.

Overall, the trip was good. I probably would visit it again maybe after few decades. Haha.

Time to get back to workouts. I'm still at 57kg. ah. need to gain more.

Almost reaching the top at 888 metres.

Great Wall of China, freaking steep.

Panda playing sniffing erm?...

Sex shop? It says Adult Health in mandarin.

Saw a kid peeing on the roadside

Water Cube Aquatics Centre

Bird Nest Olympic Stadium

Temple of Heaven

Forbidden City

FFK-ed.

Today, OHC has the worst record. None of the patients turned up... Yeah. NONE. Apparently, there were supposed to be 4 cubicles open for treatment but 1 pharma student and 1 whole family ffked. This is so time and money wasting. Imagine travelled all the way to IMU for 45 mins, paid 1.60 toll twice, 2 bucks for parking... and few litres of petrol added to air pollution. Sigh. Besides that, we wasted all the plastic wrappers and barrier films which we had already prepared for the cubicles. I just don't understand why can't the patients freaking give a phone call earlier before we leave for uni or least, before we set up the cubicles.

So, few of us went to yum cha at Old Town. We had a chat on certain topics which i would say that they are not easy going and i stoned at a moment because i don't know how to answer. I'm not sure of what i want to do after i graduate, what sort of career i want, what specialty i want to further on, whether coming back to malaysia or stay on in australia and etc... I believe that a lot of us are also unsure and they think that they will decide when the time comes. Hmmm. 3 more years and we are going to graduate. Am i able to make up my mind by that time???

I believe that there is a big flaw in malaysian education system. We are taught only by what is in the textbooks, do as what the teachers say, memorize answers for exams and practise sample questions as many times as possible. To make things worse, kiasu parents force their children to go for tuitionSSSS which make their life so miserable. I guess that they do not understand that all work and no play makes jack a dull boy. Ultimately, even though they managed to achieve flying colours that are as tall as the rainbows in the sky for their UPSR, PMR, SPM or whatever exams, they do not seem to know what they want in their life. They study, study, study and study throughout their childhood and teenage years without exploring other fields of interest. At the end of the day, we produced students who are followers not leaders. As they have been following orders throughout their life, they stumbled when it is time to make decision.

I was almost once like that. Ok, not to say that i have tonnes of tuitions and no play at all. Those days weren't as bad as the kids are going through now in schools. When i was in high school, i almost could not decide what i wanted to do. I just do not know why dentistry popped up in my mind. I know that i'm good at science, interested in helping out, dislike paper work and want a stable career. Besides that, seeing my sister doing so well and going to study medicine influenced me to sort of follow that path. Now, i'm in my 3rd year of dentistry and i still do not know if dentistry is the correct career for me. Dentistry is really quite subjective at times. I'm really interested in the things that we are learning but treating patients is really a tough challenge. It takes more than brains to diagnose a lesion that is so small and treat it. Decision making and quick and precise hand skills are required. If the treatment goes on too long, patient gets tired and it makes your job even harder as mouth opening is limited. There are many other challenges as well.

Parents play a major role in their children's careers. Often, we see parents 'advising' their children to go to a certain field. Of course they are more experienced in the working world and they think that they know what is good for their children. Obedient kids who are unsure of what to do would not want to go against them and ended up choosing the path that their parents wanted. It is pathetic that they are living in the dreams of their parents instead of their own. When i was finishing my SPM, my dad automatically assumed that i would study A level in HELP university just like my sister did. That was the only time i realized that i needed to convince my dad to allow me to study SAM instead as my gf (who was not my gf at that time) is going to taylors to study SAM. Great courage huh? LOL. Of course, i did not give him reason about my dream girl going to taylors.

I'm still trying to think of what goals i would like to achieve in life. For now, I will focus on studying to graduate and hopefully by then, i will be able to make up my mind. I told my younger sister that she does not need to feel pressured as both my elder sis and I are studying medicine and dentistry. I want her to chose a career that she likes but oh well i know is not easy. Having a big dream is better than having no dreams to work on. I strongly believe that people should work hard and be persistent to make their dreams a reality.

Idola Ku

Idola ku? I remember during form 2 my BM teacher gave us a task of writing a karangan with that title. Guess what? I wrote about leehom in more than two full pages if i remember correctly. It wasn't easy at all because i had to translate some of the mandarin and english terms into BM.

Leehom finally produced his 14th album, The 18 Martial Arts after 18 months. This album once again has his "chinked-out" style of music which blends traditional music with modern western music together. I admire his effort for establishing a new genre of music of his own. Even though he received a lot of criticisms when he first started his chinked-out music back in 2004 with his Shangri-La album, he continued to distinguish his style of music from other artists. To be honest, i wasn't quite fond of his "chinked-out" music when he first started. It was a little strange to listen to a blend of tribal music with the hip hop, pop and rock beat. However, i believe his determination and effort have inspired a lot of us to believe in ourselves and not succumb to criticisms from the society.

OMG!!!! Leehom came to One Utama last sunday! Although i like him so much, i didnt go. I just don't like to go to over crowded place with tonnes of sweaty people shoving around. So my lovely gf went with the album which i bought, along with some her friends. She said it was EPIC! Well, she nearly didnt manage to get his signature because Leehom needed to get on a flight to somewhere else. However, leehom said he will try his best to sign for everyone. After being stopped by security guards, pushed by fanatic fans and almost didnt get his signature, my gf went through tonnes of emotional peaks and broke down after leehom smiled at her and signed on the album. She was indeed mesmerised by his charm. I'm very grateful that she went and got it signed for me. To clarify things, I did not force my gf to go through all that, she wanted the experience of meeting superstar. Well, it was definitely a wonderful experience for her.

I don't know what did he sign...

The 18 Martial Arts. I like the design.

This album has few great songs which i like a lot. Though some of the songs are quite plain though. Oh well, nobody is perfect. He has great talents. He knows how to play 10 musical instruments and speaks 5 languages. Besides that, he is very smart. He got offers from Princeton and Yale but he chose to do music in Williams College and later on Berklee college of music.
Ok. I shall stop praising him after people think i'm gay.

Thanks lovie for getting the album signed!

100% Responsibility

I would like to share something that i have recently read from a book. I usually don’t read books but i have started to pick up the habit of reading. Not story books please but some self guidance books. Story books are NO NO for me as some of them are too dramatic, emotionally intense, imaginative, ... and the list goes on. I can’t picture images of vampires fighting werewolves, wizards flying on broomsticks or bunch of hobbits, elves and humans going gaga over a silly ring in my mind.

A formula which is useful and common in our everyday lives that i would like to share is

E + R = O.

This is a very simple formula to understand and not some Einstein’s theory of E=mc2. E stands for event, R for response and O for outcome. The idea is that for every outcome that we got in life is due to how we responded to events which happened in our lives. Let me provide some simple examples.

Event: Boy A meets girl B in his class. Girl B is very pretty and boy A sort of fell in love with girl B. B doesn’t have a bf but has a lot of boys going after her.

Response: A decided not to go after her or confess his feelings as he thinks he is not as good as other boys or fear he will be rejected.

Outcome: B is together with someone else and A is left alone.

If A had responded by showing his affection for B and determination to win B’s heart, the outcome might have been different. Instead of working for an outcome which is desired, he put the blame on other boys or the fear of being rejected. Have you ever blamed something or given excuses for an undesired outcome? I know i did and a lot of us do. If we are going to be successful in life, we have to take 100% responsibility for the things we do. If we want a favourable outcome, we have to put in extra effort and take risks to achieve it. We have to give up on all the bullsh*t.

Up to till now, we have created everything that had happened or happening to us. We have to be responsible of that and be in charge of creating a future that we want. Change your responses if you don’t like what you are experiencing or creating.

“99% of failures come from people who have a habit of making excuses.” – George Washington Carver

MO

So what does MO mean? For dental students, MO is mesial occlusal. Yes. I did my first amalgam MO on a 47 on a real patient. Nothing big to be proud of but i'm just happy. I set a goal for myself to finish it in less than 2 hours time. However, my handpiece was annoying. With the water and light on and off at times, i had to keep my foot up and down, up and down, up and down, up and down on the peddle to make sure there was water coming out when i was drilling. Even my partner was laughing at it.

I still managed to pack and carve the amalgam within 2 hours. I thought the bite was alright as there wasn't any opposing tooth. It suddenly became high bite when i checked with the articulating paper with the patient grinding as many possible ways as he could. It was the opposing adjacent tooth (16) that put marks on it.

It then dragged on for another 40 minutes as the amalgam was already quite hard and the waiting time for the lecturer was so long. Although I did not finish it in less than 2 hours which i originally planned to, I was happy with the restoration. You could say i did not achieve my goal, but that goal was to push myself to try my best with the FRUSTRATING handpiece, MATRIX BAND (the supervisor wanted a tofflemire instead so i had to change the siqveland band) and the long waiting time. I'm not putting the blame on those things as i did my best with what i had.

I will try harder next time and set a higher goal for myself.

"The greater danger for most of us is not that our aim is too high and we miss it, but that is too low and we reach it" - Michelangelo