Let's spin in this whirlwind!

We've just completed a whole week of microbiology lectures given by a certain female lecturer who is a doctor-hater. She's pretty freaky, yelling at us not to ignore a fever, and imitating a poor gal who had a bad throat by coughing into the mic.

This comimg week is Immunology week. My favourite topic! At least it was, until I reached the 'Different structures of antibodies' in my prereading. Felt like being whacked across the head while reading that bit.

Living with a Death Sentence

Despite how The Australian has been lambasting Monash's new medical course over the last 2 weeks, there r still aspects of the course which others can't match up to. Once such facet is our fortnightly stakeholder tutorials, where a member(s) of the public come in to give us a talk about something, be it asbestos-induced lung cancer, recounting a gang rape, discussing abortions, and most recently, HIV.

In our stakeholder tutorial today, 3 HIV positive people came in to talk to us about living with the disease, how they were infected, and the treatment they are currently undergoing. 2 of them were gay men while the third was a heterosexual lady who had been infected by her ex-boyfriend.

The whole talk was so poignant, that it radically changed my view of HIV positive people. I admit that previously, in some shadowed region of my consciousness, I discriminated against such people, albeit not outwardly. Something in me always went 'Bleah...I'd never get it, why should I care?' I've since learnt that this is the acme of complacency. That lady who spoke to us NEVER went out to get HIV, nor did she ever dream of getting it. Life bit her in the butt somehow.

Its not fair.

Oh yea, I miss Singapore

I miss watching the sunset over dinner at East Coast Park.

The end of poverty

Been reading this book the past week...not nearly done yet. Its the brainchild of a renowned economist, Jeffery Sachs, who is adviser to a certain Mr Kofi Annan of the UN. Its interesting the way he presents himself as an unconventional doctor; one who heals diseased economies. Its even more heartwarming to know that there's a solution to eradicate poverty in this world.

Everytime I go shopping at Clayton town and see the loaves upon loaves of bread, piled from floor to ceiling, which are about to expire in 24 hrs, I feel like a stinking bourgeois shitbag; an accomplice in a genocide perpetuated by our the developed world's indifference. As Bono put it:

"Fifteen thousand people dying needlessly every day from AIDS, TB, and malaria...This is Africa's crisis. That it's not on on the nightly news, that we do not treat this as an emergency -that's our crisis."

Perhaps some may extinguish their guilt by telling themselves that it is by no fault of theirs that a whole continent is in flames; they did nothing to light the fire. This may make them feel better, if their moral framework decrees that an act is different from an omission. On night I forget to leave the heater on when I retire, I wake up with cold blood coursing through my veins and I feel the same. Indeed, it makes me feel better, and I'm free to spend my day worrying about what to wear to uni, what to have for lunch, that my hair is being messed up by the strong wind etc. Tucker Max once said that he hoped they served beer in hell. Well, I hope they serve bubble tea in hell. I, and you, yes you, may well be heading there by virtue of our callous omission.