| Apr. 8th, 2009 @ 11:51 pm A Very Short Summer (Vacation) |
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Current Mood:  chipper
Current Music: "Poker Face", Lady GaGa (get out of my head, darn it)
I'm sorry, my dear LJ, for I've neglected you for so long...I could blame Plurk and Facebook and my strange addiction to the quizzes there and my hectic schedule, but oh, I apologize still. T_T
...LOL. XD Anyway, a lot of stuff has actually happened since I last posted here, but I was either too busy/lazy to post about them, and also post the pictures I have of those events. ^^; But now I finally have the time! :D We're only given a very short break though, as we go back to the hospital (!) on the 16th.
Yes, I am now officially a medical clerk.
*gulp* It's both a scary and exciting prospect at the same time. I don't know how many interns/residents/consultants/nurses will end up shouting at me because of the (inevitable) stupid mistakes I'll be making, and how many patients' lives I'd be ultimately responsible for, but I'll get through this, somehow. I hope.
So, a run down of the significant events that have passed:
Philippine Speculative Fiction Volume IV Launch
This happened last February 28, in the U-View Theater at the Fully Booked High Street branch. I was...terrified, actually, because I always am when faced with the prospect of meeting other people, and before the program started, I was actually hiding out in the Sci-Fi/Fantasy section (well, I was helping my father look for the Second Foundation spin-off series of books too...). ^^;;
But the program was starting soon, so we finally went inside.
( 'I have to speak in front? Really? O__o' )
Actually, I think I like writing genre/speculative fiction mostly because of my parents' own reading preferences: my father was the one who introduced me to science fiction (especially Asimov) and fantasy (Tolkien), and my mother loves horror and crime fiction (...and romance, but forbid me to read her books because she said I was too young :P). They really were a big influence on my own reading tastes, and they never stopped me from writing even when everyone else told me that Medicine would never, ever let me write, so I really do owe a lot to them.
What I did forget to say that day though was that I also owed that particular story to some of the teachers I had both in high school and college...for all their boring lectures, because if they had been so interesting, my mind probably wouldn't have drifted off and thought up all those ideas for that story. LOL.
Anyway, I hope you do buy the book (and you can order through me!), since it would make all the authors (especially me) very happy. :) I haven't finished reading the book yet, but I'll go put up a short review after I do.
Manila Ocean Park Trip
So after that, my life had been pretty much a repetition of exams and reports and medical histories and exams again, until our very last day of school. And then, finally, vacation! My friend Liz and I were planning a grander pre-clerkship outing (overnight/two nights in Baguio), but everyone kept backing out the last minute (and we kept having to change our plans because of them, changing our original plan to a trip to Subic, then Tagaytay, then Bulacan), then in the end only five of us went to Manila Ocean Park on April 4.
But surprisingly enough, we really, really enjoyed ourselves. I'm glad there was a promo that included the Fish Spa (where nibble fish chew on your feet and rid it of dead skin cells; it felt a little bit like...er...kittens were nibbling on my feet ^^;; Weird comparison, I know) and the Glass Bottom Boat ride, because the trip turned out to be quite an experience because of it. ^_^ I knew I'd be happy anyway, actually, since even though I'm terrified of the sea, I love looking at and studying marine species.
The park was a bit smaller than Singapore's Underwater World, but it also had the underwater tunnel, and the fish tanks, but with the local species, which proved to be very interesting. My particular favorite was the lipstick tang, with its (Angelina Jolie-esque?) thick "lips". Hehe.
After touring the park, we went off to Mall of Asia, and watched the sunset over Manila Bay, while just talking to each other, bonding, gossiping--
That sounded like an ending to a movie, haha.
Puerto Galera Trip
Then right after that, ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif?v=92.1) safranin, Jerc, cea_chan and I headed to Puerto Galera, Mindoro, and stayed there for four days and three nights (April 3-6). It was, as Jerc put it, a "very well-paced vacation". It wasn't too hectic, but at the same time, we did get to accomplish quite a lot.
It was fun swimming (despite my fear of the open water and the fact that I kept hitting rocks and sand kept entering my suit), snorkelling (and actually being able to swim with the fish that I only saw in tanks inside Manila Ocean Park), cooking (with Karen as our chef and Rhea and I being sous-chefs and Jerc being our coal-boy ^^;) dancing, and catching up. ^_^
And yes, we did find Nemo.
(The clownfish were really cute! And I love feeding the fishes. There was only one particular kind of fish that did not seem to shy away from humans though, which was a bit disappointing, because I wanted to see the electric blue fish up close. I still don't know what type of fish they are exactly.)
I have a whole new set of corny jokes now (which I should tell this particular friend of mine :P), and a tan, to boot. I also learned how to play Bridge, but I don't think I'll be playing that game again soon. Because I was horrible at it. Just horrible. I also loved how we just stayed at the beach one night and went stargazing, and after cea_chan taught Jerc how to roll, Judo-style, then we went and etched large drawings in the sand (which people kept avoiding walking over and earned us a lot of strange looks)...in short, just plain hanging out.
And that was very nice. ^_^
And now I'm back home, spending time with my family. I really did miss just relaxing and doing, well, next to nothing, but I know this vacation would be a very short one, so I'll be going back to work again soon. And I do have to start writing again.
That's all for now, then, until the more fangirly posts later, hehe.
To close the post again, a meme from ekmisao!
Association Meme: Comment to this post and I will give you 5 subjects/things I associate you with. Then post this in your LJ and elaborate on the subjects given. Also, give me 5 topics you associate me with, to make this more fun, hehe. :D
( 5 topics from ekmisao ) |
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worried
anxious![[personal profile]](http://s.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
![[community profile]](http://s.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
melancholy
sleepy
bouncy
