Thursday, September 25, 2008

Endorphins

I admit it; I’ve gotten out of shape. So much so that I had forgotten that rush that comes with a steady flow of endorphins – until today. 20 minutes into cardio and I can’t stop smiling. Come to mamma you beautiful molecules….”Oops, I did it again……” (don’t judge people, you know you love it too)…..”I’m not that innocent.....”

Meanwhile, I’m learning a great deal about the ups and downs of the business world. My poor mother is practically being hacked to death by the big guns in the dairy business. I suspect someone sees her as quite a potential threat to their livelihood. Eat or be eaten people. Sorry, any more details and I’d have to offer you up as chum.

I finally finished the online eye health training course for Unite For Sight. Damn interesting stuff. For example – River Blindness, aka onchocerciasis is a form of blindness caused by a worm that enters your body through a black fly. Yup, I’m not kidding. Here’s how it works….a black simulian fly carrying worm larvae in its saliva bites you, transferring the larvae into your skin. In this palatial atmosphere, they mature into adult worms that appear like nodules underneath your skin. The adults then breed with each other – as adults tend to do – and their babies travel through your beautiful body occasionally reaching your eyes. The spread of the worms causes intense itching. If it so happens that one of these worms should die, which naturally they must at some point, the result is inflammation. Under the circumstance that the location of death was your eyeball, the inflammation causes blindness. Yup. Oh, and they can grow to be up to half a meter in length. Hope you’re not about to have a meal if you are squeamish.

This does lead me to think that I am going to LOVE parasitology. Damn fascinating. On a less gruesome note, I don’t think I mentioned that I reached my fund raising goal !! $1,560 – not too shabby.

Thank you so much to all of you that have made donations! Seriously, someone will be able to see because of you. That’s pretty incredible.

The molecules are flowing....

Friday, September 12, 2008

The Bug & The Windshield

I know what you are thinking. I couldn't hack it. I'm one of them. Before I was in this position, I thought the same thing. I could go on for pages about how I ended up heading for St. George's Medical School on a lonely caribbean island called Grenada in January, but I hope that's not all you want to know about me. On the other hand, if you are in the same position, I ask you...

Do you remember that first moment when you realized the ultimate fear of almost every pre-med had just come true for you? The Lochness monster of the medical school application process (you were hearing the Jaws theme playing in the background)? That’s right – the Caribbean. Your leg just got chewed off by Jaws and you're hemorrhaging.

However it came to be that you found yourself in this seemingly awful unthinkable situation (for me, it was the MCAT), I say cheers to making the best of it. So, I’m off to St. George’s (aka SGU) on the lovely spice island called Grenada. Let’s see: Great weather, clear blue water, lovely fresh fishies swimming by waiting for the honor of making an appearance later on my dinner plate, cheap diving certification, rum, sailing, snorkeling, close to South America (one must carnivale, no? ), oh and umm, it’s a pretty good medical school too. Did I say rum already? Mojitos anyone?

So For now, I'm in one of those life transition phases. The kind that makes you think "deep" thoughts. I've never been a fan of these phases. When left alone with too much thought I tend to not be able to turn it off, hence the bags under my eyes and current state of snappiness (apologies if you have been a recent victim).

So, how to kill the time between now and January and manage to not only maintain sanity, but get my beauty sleep - you know how I cherish it. A girl my brother used to date dubbed me the "sleeping champion". I wear the title proudly while I still can. But I digress...

Killing time. Yes, going to Chennai, India for the month of November to volunteer for Unite For Sight. I must confess that I'm a bit unsure if this is the right thing to do with the time that I have. On the other hand, I imagine it will give me that feel good feeling as I think my "deep" thoughts about stuff. And if you are in the mood for that "feel good feeling" too, then by all means, let me assist you in achieving a small sampling : ) : http://www.uniteforsight.org/intl_volunteer/pages/?name=Simrun%20Kalra

More on those details later.

Right now, I am back to packing up my lovely condo in Oakland to move back to southern california (whoever made the OC "cool" is not someone I ever want to know).