Just to keep track

People I should get souvenirs from Malaysia for:
Eliza,
Tim Johnson,
Ann,
Aisling,
Jac,
Mihir.

People I should get stuff for, back in Asia:
:)

I'm usually a little reserved but I'll try to write to express this time. I'm giving myself half an hour. A little drunk on melancholy and a feeling of helplessness. Possibly the exam season moodiness, possibly the culmination of a lot of small things. I know that I shy away, I hide, I express things that have hidden edges. I understand. But it doesn't make the doubt go away, and it doesn't hurt any less, that distance. I know I said I wanted to write about happy little things. But I need this out now, so sorry. I need to put it into writing so it doesn't remain nameless.

There are many things bothering me now. The most pressing being the exams. I don't often put so much effort into exams. It feels like there is so much riding on this one, though. My parents' money, my dad's trust, people I got to know, life in Hobart? So much is going to change if I fail. I don't know if I could get up again after that, for a long time. I know I've slacked off for most of the year, and I haven't done all I can on assignments, getting advice from seniors on how I should do them and stuff. As a result I haven't gotten very good marks on them. I also haven't studied as hard as I could, procrastinating for the most part. It's mostly my fault. The responsibility seems to weigh so much now, now that so much hangs in the balance. The blame.

It doesn't help that I'm not playing as well as I could in ultimate, nowadays. I've injured my shoulder a little, and I keep doing it again and again. Nothing serious, but combined with that change in grip and throwing methods, everything is a mess. The only thing that remains is my catching, but then I'm not sure about that in the wind either, when my fingers are numb and stiff and move like they're holding an invisible stress ball when I want to catch the disc. I guess the shoulder injury and the grip change, and the resultant performance are a good analogy for things that I'm trying to do now, have been trying to do this year.

Especially socially, I tried first to do things the way an outgoing, outspoken person would. This just made me crash. I'd fail to talk to some people, or talk to some people and not be able to go beyond 3 exchanges in a conversation. I'd talk for a long time and still be dodging their eyes. It was just really scary. Till now I don't understand why this is the case. I'm fine now, I can look into most people's eyes and smile most of the time. But some days, that fear and anxiety and self-consciousness comes back and I don't know why. I fail to provide hugs or comfort when they're needed. I manage to piss off the people close to me, and I haven't talked to Claudia for most of the year now. I handled the electricity bill split badly, and didn't manage to stop a huge argument between my housemates. I think when it happened, I sort of gave up on trying to get to know people, and I just fell into myself. Which actually worked better than expected, falling landed me in places where I was most comfortable. Even so, even now, my lack of ability socially and academically still manages to annoy people, or distance them. Sometimes I think that if I get close enough to someone, all that's going to happen is that they're going to see that there's not much I can do, not much I can help with, not much I can be when I'm with them. I'm a dead end. Even the kindest people. So I distance myself. I don't know. This is a horrible cycle and this is a much more straight post than I expected.

Half an hour is up. I guess now that that's been written, I can leave it to mull. I guess all I can do is stick around.

Talking about Christ and College residents(Part 1)

So I joined the Wednesday afternoon Bible study session by Calvin, this week. Chris was going, Rachel was going, and damn quite a decent number attended! There was Emma, Corinne, Nish, Tiffany, Shi Hui, Brian Liew, Daniel, and Jan. Wow. So many dedicated Christians. I was a bit unsure of what I was supposed to do. In fact I was kind of intimidated and might not have stepped into the CBL room if Jan hadn't beckoned me.

Calvin started by talking about a jealous god and how it compared to a boyfriend being protective of his girlfriend. I can't remember what was the next topic but I remember the Triune god and good and evil pretty clearly. I also remember that there was something to do with Isaac, his habit of asking girls to make sandwiches, and the importance of being a loving authority(Quote Isaac later: "As a loving authority, I command you to make me a sandwich!)...Loving authority? Hahahah I guess it depends on your point of view. I wonder what Tiff would say in reply though.

I was a bit taken aback by Calvin's stance on women having to follow their men, though it wasn't a chauvinistic one. I guess it makes sense since it was a biblical idea that he was following through. I'll probably follow up with him on this one though. The idea of anyone having to follow anyone in this day and age just seems a little foreign to me. Reading up on this online got me tons of quotes from the bible that collectively don't point me in any clear direction. At this point, though, I'm more interested in what Calvin's opinion is.

But yeah, back to the session. It was nice seeing Calvin lead the session. He was pretty passionate about it, and he had prepared quite a bit of material. Too bad we weren't singing at the session though, hahah. Since Calvin sings pretty well. Through most of the discussions Calvin prompted, though, it was mostly Jan and Emily(?)(Not sure if that's her name) voicing their opinions. I think Brian would probably pose quite a few questions to Calvin later, and difficult ones at that, since he wanted to ask later.

Later on, Rachel was asking Calvin quite a few questions about the material we covered that session. Calvin found her questions good because they gave him quite a few new perspectives, because they were asked very honestly and made for good intellectual stimuli.

I guess I found the session the same way as well. It also let me understand a little bit of what my Christian coursemates idealise, and strive towards. It made me feel good, thinking about this. This reminder that everyone is trying their best. The meeting's material is also good food for thought, no matter how you take it.

So yes, I will be going again, I think.

Of live music and mud(Part 2)

We planned to have breakfast at Seaport but that plan was scrapped pretty quickly. No one could get up at the 8.45am alarm. I woke up about 9am, and just rolled around in the sleeping bag. Rachel, being who she is, had shared her blanket with Leo after waking up to go to the toilet at 5am. I, being blur as usual, had taken the sleeping bag and given Leo the air-mattress thinking it would be more comfortable for him. I was wrong. It deflated and he slept without a blanket, too. Cold and tough on the back. Sorry Leo! Isaac kept sleeping till about 10+. Had a few bananas and some of Rachel's amazing sandwiches for breakfast. This one was a leftover peanut butter and honey one. No one makes sandwiches/wraps like she does :P

Darshan, Rachel, Naz and Awis messaged us at 9+ saying they were headed to Seaport. They had breakfast there, and joined us at Evandale at the Van Diemon brewery at 11.15am. Our wave would start at 11.45am. We were greeted by a bunch of people running across the open, hilly region, completely covered in mud. Intimidating much! There was a light drizzle and the sun was hidden, but the brewery's grounds were well lit. Perfect weather for a mud run, as Isaac would say later.

When we were walking to the registration site, we passed by a guy shouting at the group, briefing them about the mud run like a captain would pep his army up before war. A bunch of people in Dinosaur onesies started running up the hill as we got up to the tent to register. It was pretty exciting, really. Even though I had complained/whined so much about joining an endurance event, I felt a little anticipation building up.

We left our bags at the bag-drop tents, pinned on our numbers and went down just in time for our wave to start. The first bit was an uphill run in over-trudged mud. Every step had us sinking in about half an inch. At the top, we got baptised in mud by rolling through a hole in the fence into a muddy puddle. It got pretty dirty pretty quick! In a few seconds Darsh, Rachel and I fell into a hole in the middle of the path filled with mud. The waist-deep muddiness quickly cleared any qualms I had about getting myself muddy. Rach(Chong)'s knee had been feeling pretty bad but apparently dancing the night before cleared up most of the pain and she was doing pretty well.

Things that I remember pretty well from the run:
1. People randomly laying out into mud.
2. Jumping over huge tyres and rolls of hay.
3. Major exfoliation while commander-crawling through mud.
4. Resting when Rach's knee started to hurt.
5. Freezing water. It did freeze balls.
6. Darshan sliding everywhere. We all slid down hills but Darshan just did it at ANY chance hahah.
7. Rachel(Ng)'s cleats dying.
8. Climb/jumping a hay-fortress.
9. There were different types of mud. Some smelled better than others. I got familiar with the taste of the brown mud. It was actually a little salty...
10. Tribal music played by the organisers.
11. Being covered totally in mud. Apparently my teeth had some too. Enough to look like they were missing.
12. Wishing for more mud when we got out of the water. It was so cold!
13. Spotting the barbecue before the race finished and getting really hungry halfway through.

I actually broke my one-meat-meal rule that day :/ and ate sausages. I also tried the Van Diemon beer and it was really good. So much depth in one drink. Never knew what I was missing till then! The beer. Of course.  But food was after we showered. Which was really difficult. No idea where all the mud was coming from and we were shivering all the way to the showers, mud was still stuck in our hair after the showers.

After the barbecue we left for lunch, at Burger Got Soul because Koreana was closed. We had a little fiasco with Rachel's wallet, which had been left on the chair. It was missing and we thought someone had stolen it but it was really the staff who had kept it- LUCKILY. I had a vege-burger to restart my vegetarian-transformation. It was not bad but pretty expensive- I had Ya Gotta Have Soul if I remember correctly, 12.90. Chips were really good with the Dijon-Mayo though! After that, we left for Hobart. Leo driving the whole way though Rachel was protesting and asking to drive. That girl.. hahah.

So Launnie was good. I need to visit Burnie next, and check out more of Hobart soon.

Of live music and mud(Part 1)

I'm pretty tired right now so bear with me if this post is a bit long-winded/confused.

The weekend was spent in Launceston. Good company provided good fun. Ultimate in the morning-afternoon. I was pretty out of form though, so I mostly chilled at the sidelines or worked as a role player on the field. Definitely need to work on consistency there! We layout drills after the games since the grass was so soft. I'll always think of layout drills as bringing out the inner seal now thanks to Dahlia! Hahah.

Me, Isaac, Leo, and Rachel had decided to stay the night and join the Tassie Mud Run the next day. Pat and Angus stayed as well though they didn't join the Mud Run. We stayed over at Huddy's. Huddy is an intern at Launceston from Queensland. Me and Isaac played with him in Regionals this year. We saw an unexpected side of him this visit- he's planning to leave for the USA if he gets through the USMLE, because of a girl! Hmmm.

We had dinner at Three Steps on George. It was a really chill place- a barbecue at the bottom of a long flight of steps, in a small garden, secluded from the streets and the lights outside. Made it feel like we were in someone's private garden, but it was close enough to the city to keep a feeling of possibility alive.. close enough for the night to feel young :P. Interestingly enough, I enjoyed the cider there. The alcohol was light enough, so it didn't make me nauseous. Then we headed to Irish Murphy's.

Live music was on the menu at Irish Murphy's(which we got into because people can't recognise Asian faces and names, I'd forgotten my ID and used Leo's Singapore one instead. He used his Tassie one.). The music was so loud that I felt my left ear was still a little deaf by the end of the night, and the bass so strong that I could feel the vibrations throughout my body. I guess that does help dancing in a way, or maybe I got more used to the music these few months. While I'm usually pretty stiff/awkward at dancing, I was a little better that night. Maybe it's progress!

I was supposed to go to Darshan's place and try his sambal+ maggi goreng but we finished the session at 2am so I just stayed over at Huddy's. We stayed for about 2 whole sets and were only done about 1.15am! The band's selection of songs was pretty good, and their playing was pretty neat, too. Took me a while to understand the allure of live music but here in Aussie, the performers seem pretty enthusiastic and into their songs, even in a small town like Launceston. Buskers in Tassie are also pretty good, and get quite a bit of donation. We took a picture with the drummer of the band afterwards since the singer had already headed into their private room for some rest.

I guess it has to do with how passionate the people are about their community. They're really into supporting their own. It's easy to support causes/organisations that you believe in, and the people working for those causes are very active in working to improve the community's quality of life. There're programs where you can learn to make a bike from spare parts donated by people and keep it afterwards, the supermarkets help collect donations for local schools and other other local organisations, there're really cool activities like the Mud Run. While local Malaysian organisations do organise some cool stuff, I don't think it's as common or widespread as it is here in Tasmania, nor does it impact the local's lives as much. I might be wrong here, do correct me if that's the case.

I'll probably try looking out for good live music in Malaysia when I get back. I suspect it'll be a little difficult, though. What do you guys think?

Talking about small stuff.

Perspectives gained in medical school:

1. The little stuff matters.

2. Even in all this structure, it's still necessary to gamble. Maybe even more so.

3. Priorities, priorities.

4. How serious and passionate people can be.

5. And otherwise.

6. Cliques.

So starting with 1.

The little stuff matters:
This, my uncle told me like years ago when I was young. I never really listened to him, sadly. Academic material at med school seems so intuitive when you can imagine it. Like when they're talking about the femur and all the muscles that attach to it. Everything makes sense when I can imagine the movements of the muscles, when I connect it with something I know well in reality. Then when it comes to veins, nerves, and even identifying the muscles in different slides of imaging, it gets so difficult. Intuition has its gaps.

Days can pass in a blur when you repeat them. When there's a schedule and you follow it. Then in those times, the little things seem to bring it all together, give the repeats a meaningful pattern. It's the little kind gestures, free wraps and awesome potluck parties, the little talks, the throwing sessions, cooking for each other.. Thank you, Tassie people. Rae. Isaac. Leo. Claudia. Rachel. Terence. All of you guys. You bring the syncopation in that steady march through the year and I love you for that. (You know right? Even if I am weird and awkward sometimes)(And I go through periods of overthinking that make it hard to talk to me).

When I present in CBL and I run out of words to say, I feel how inarticulate I am. I feel like I don't know anything, when I am wielding words and ideas that I am unused to using. I find that my usual form of thinking is inadequate in expressing myself intelligently. Noticing the little stuff matters, but defining the little stuff matters as well.

I cried once in Tassie. I almost cried one more time. I almost cried, in Melbourne. Actually I did. And then the more I live here on my own, the more I realise how much how much stuff really matters to me. And how important it is to go out and bump the small stuff. I like to specialise. But then the small stuff is important.

So important. Hopefully I can start filling this blog with small stuff, especially happy small stuff, soon.