‘Sup With Pete

These are pics of me and some medics at the masquerade ball, the clifton suspension bridge on my journey and my beautiful mask that I wore.

Monday, January 30, 2006

Hello!

It’s been a busy little while and it’s just taken me a bit of time to update this site. Also, my camera is being a jerk and not working – so I’ve only got pictures from friends and from my phone (the one’s from my phone aren’t as nice, but they’ll have to do!)

So, what’s up with pete? Let’s start at last Saturday. I woke up late after a nice long sleep in (lie-in in England). I went to brunch and was invited out to play some football (soccer) in the orchard – the field behind my room – that afternoon. This was just with 6 other guys from my floor here at Wills. It was a nice sunny day and a little cold, but warm enough to wear some shorts outside. England winter feels like Fall(Autumn) in Canada. We mostly just kicked the ball around and played a little game at the end, but man, is it ever muddy! You can’t really tell from the pic, but the backs of my arms are completely black and the whole shower was splashed in mud for the next three days! It was great to play some soccer; I always wonder how I played it so little last term – being in England of all places. After my shower, it was about 4pm. So I went for a walk into Clifton (the beautiful area of Bristol, near where I live). We walked down to the suspension bridge (see photo). It’s a nice walk and at the lookout there’s the oldest suspension bridge in Britain and there’s some caves you can go walk around in. It’s really beautiful. Upon heading into Clifton we noticed some children that were sliding down a rock face. We sorta thought – what the? Upon closer inspection we realized that down a small groove there is a polished surface on the rock face. We took off our coats and sat on them and slid down the rock face, like going down a metal slide. There’s a pic here of the girls I was with all sliding down like going on a toboggan. I’m not sure if it’s a geological anomaly or if it been from years of people sliding down the rocks. So if you come to Bristol come rock slidin’ with me! A buddy of my took a video of me going down on my back, it’s pretty sweet! Afterwards we headed into Clifton centre to the Chocolate Bar. It’s one of those entirely chocolate places (girls seem to go nuts over this thing). I had an intensely rich chocolate cake slice and hot chocolate made from cocoa. It was amazing, but I didn’t feel the greatest after eating all that chocolate! We then headed for a post-dessert pub supper. I had a panini and chips (fries). What else? Just headed back for the night and played some poker with some of the guys in my building.

Sunday, got up and played a small hockey game. The pitch was half frozen, so we played a game of 6 on 6 on half the pitch. Normally it’s 10 a side on a full pitch (not incl. goalies). We were down 0-4 at half, but finished the game with a spectacular 4-4 draw! Didn’t do much the rest of the day, just got some food and hung around the hall. Monday, we had the afternoon off as a treat (we were supposed to be working on our reports due today). I went out with a medic friend to a shopping area in Bristol called Cribbs Causeway -> my first time there, but it’s like a box store area with a big mall. I got a big elastic band for my mask, and some needed items such as an alarm clock, a bag for my rugby boots, you know, boring stuff. But it was nice to get out there once. We came back in time for tea (dinner, in England), and then got some good old homework in as I had a brief presentation the next day.

Tuesday was a full day of lectures and tutorials. I played some poker that evening and relaxed. On Wednesday I didn’t go to Rugby practice, as I had to get work done on my project for today. It was an epidemiology report called a Data Interpretation Exercise, comically given the acronym DIE! It was basically a series of questions about an epidemiological study that we had to answer and we had to design our own study at the end. I worked on it mostly Thursday, Friday and Saturday and it was done before Saturday night. Wednesday, the work wasn’t going so hot, so at about 4pm I went out and played some football (soccer, and threw around an American football) for about an hr. Thursday was my first day at my GP placement! I’m in a group of 8 students under the direction of 2 GPs. Last day was an intro session. So, we met the GPs and we had a tour of the facility. It’s an amazing new practice, with a pharmacy, 6 GPs, a dentist, a physiotherapist, some alternative medicines, a travel clinic, and more! I think it’s going to be great. This week I should be doing a home visit or else attending the practice. It’s also way out in East Bristol. I never really realized how big Bristol really is, but it’s about 500 000 people. So we were about a 35 minute bus ride across town. (Don’t worry; we get reimbursed for travel expenses!) It was nice to see a bit of the city and get out of the University bubble.

Friday was a full day of lectures and anatomy lab. Our quiz was on the arm, and brachial plexus (nerves in the arm) and after my presentation on the arm last year, I got a perfect on my quiz! That night was my first ever Burns night at formal. Both my grandmothers have strong Scottish backgrounds, so it was neat to see something of Scottish heritage. For those of you who don’t know Robert (Rabbie) Burns was a Scottish poet, song writer, and much more. He is celebrated each year – it was Wednesday, but we celebrated Friday. The dinner involves a reading from him and eating Haggis! Yes Haggis the food composed of a forcemeat of the heart, liver and lungs of a sheep mixed with oatmeal, well seasoned and put into bags made from the paunch of the sheep. Believe or not, it tasted pretty good, as long as you didn’t think about it. The haggis was ushered in by 2 bagpipers and we all toasted the haggis with a good ol’ pint of Scottish whisky! It was a great night. I just stayed in afterwards and worked on my DIE though.

Saturday evening was the masquerade ball for the medical students. It’s a big dinner and dance formal. It’s usually themed, as this year was masquerade. I took tons of nice photos, but my memory card malfunctioned during the night and I can’t get the photos off it, so you’ll have to enjoy the ones I got from friends. I met before hand with the 9 other people I was sharing a table with and we had champagne before heading to the reception before the meal. The meal (not the greatest), was roast potatoes, veggies and chicken preceded by a salad and finished with some cake. There was a string quartet, bands and loads of wine (maybe a bit too much in my case). It was a great banquet and a fun night.

Also, by the way, I was invited to play for the U of Bristol hockey team as their goalie on Saturday morning. To be honest, it was the 3rd string team, but none the less, they were desperate for a goalie and contacted my captain to see if I could play. I didn’t end up playing though because the game was cancelled (frozen pitch); people in England just aren’t used to a little ice here and there I guess. It was pretty neat to be asked though. Sunday afternoon I did play 3 hockey games though. Two for the medics and one for Wills Hall. In all 3 games I didn’t let in a single goal! We didn’t win the Wills match, left at a 0-0 draw. I spent the night editing my report, and finishing a set of biochem questions due for today. I also enjoyed some great English fish and chips for dinner.

Today we got the results for our exams. I passed! Which is great news, I found the exam quite hard, but I know I can do better on the next ones. I was a little worried about these, even though they’re progress exams (like midterms in Canada).

Hope everyone is well, and wondering what Canada’s thinking of their new Tory minority government. Will it work, will it last, and do people care? I’ve also got my contract for camp this summer. So I won’t really be back to Canada till August 12th, but it’ll be a nice break and I know the job – I did really miss it last summer.

Thanks for reading if you’ve made it this far!

- Pete

These are pics of my after playing football, the girls sliding down the rock face, me and Katie at the choclate bar, and another one of me at the ball.