Sunday Morning

This is my third Sunday morning spent here in India, and this Sunday is the busiest so far, cz I’m MOVING!!! Moving into a brand new AC single room, for FREE, thanx very much to JPA!!! JPA are very well aware of all our conditions here, they called us to ask our situation, emailed us, and most importantly, they personally asked the admins to provide the best possible “services”!!! And last Fri, they came out with the best ever verdict – All Malaysians will be provided AC room, and JPA is paying for all the extra fees, hurray!!! Thank God!!! Me, and another 5 chinese guys from KTT, moved to Sturrack Road, a more peaceful and clean place compared to my old hostels… Not many ppl stay here, cz it’s expensive – 123,000 rupees per year(bout RM 10,00o).. Well, there’s new bed, new mattress, new chair, new cupboard, new book rack, new table, and nice toilet, just like a hotel!!!! Wow, everything seems so comfortable now in the room – alone, cooling, internet, new loud speakers…. Ahhhh…. But some cons is that it’s actually quite lonely in the room, and we missed all the Malays and locals too, who’re staying in the old hostel (only seniors and rich people stay here in Sturrack)

Last Sunday I went to church- New Life Fellowship, together with Yuan Hwen, Adriana n Rhema (these are the four non-catholic Christian in this Malaysian group). The church is only bout 5 mins auto ride from my hostel, and the church is not a big church anyway- bout 150 members, n quite expectedly, there’s no AC, but is equipped with a electric guitar, a drum set, a PA system, and loud speakers(not bad though for a church in India, I thought)… The worship is quite spirit-filled, and though the number is small, the outcome of the singing is really loud; they sang with much passion and high spirit, I’m quite impressed!! The songs they sang are very familiar to me – Every Move I Make, Shout to the North, etc... The preaching is not bad too, the pastor talk “normal” English, n his way of giving the message is quite interesting and brought revelation to me.. He was talking that we’re Adam (adam means ‘the man’), and we’re special and unique n made in God’s image n we’re given the authority to RULE; a Ruler is above the situation, not under it; he takes control and empower the situation, not ruled by it; and oso we’re ought to take pride of who we are, as we are, in Christ, sitting at the right side of God, and have the privilege of being called the son of God…As a Christian, we must NOT be a simple and humble follower of Christ, but instead stand up and do great things for the glory of God…A verse struck me suddenly, “be strong and courageous, do not be terrified, do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you are” Joshua 1:9… Also, people kept on reminding me that God must have a wonderful plan ahead, and I knew that too, but so far I had not seen the big picture yet, not even a clue, but I decided to stay strong and persevere through the hardship here; I’ll want to empower this current situation, but not surrender to it; I would like to rise up from my depression, and soar like an eagle; I pray oso that He’ll reveal His plan to me soon… Five n half years is a very very long time, and hopefully, I can get through it; I’ll try to walk by faith all the time, and shine for Jesus, and successfully become a doctor…

There’re so much to study in Medicine, so much to catch up for us who just joined, and the 1st sessional exam is only a month ahead, hopefully I can get through…I’ll go back M’sia on 12th Dec, there’s a 3-week vacation, and I can’t wait for the day to come…I miss my family, ‘doggy’, kuantan frens, INTEC frens, church mates, my bed, char kuey tiao, Hokkien mee, home cooked rice, Bak kut teh, football, Megamall…

Here, I would like to convey a heart of gratitude to those who cared for me n encouraged me and prayed for me--mostly to Mum n dad n my bros; then JPA; my church, CA members like Zhang zhi, Lynn Xuan, Wei sian, Michelle, Ee Ling, Linda, Choon Wei, Brandon, Chaw Kuin, Rebecca; other INTEC frens like Chew Ying, Chuan Teng, Jong, Roy; Kuantan mates like Lip Kuan, Choon Jye, Jocelyne, Wei Ping n many others…Beg me pardon if I’d missed out someone.. Thanx for encouraging me n praying hard for me… Thanx a lot…

"I See Dead People"

We have 8 hours each week to meet the dead people, or more precisely, the cadavers.. There’s a collection of bout 30 bodies, “swimming” in a formalin pool, and during each dissection anatomy class, groups of bout 30 people will sit next to a specific body, and WATCH( we dun have the qualification to dissect yet, only to touch them) the post graduates carefully and artistically peel off the skin, the fasciae, the fats, the muscles, and the tendons layer by layer, bit by bit for us to observe and study each and every part one by one.. The cadavers are black and quite old (they’re preserved for at least few years), some of their body parts are being ripped off or opened up, and some even have only half of the head, yiiakkeezzz!!! They bear faint formalin smell, and the formalin often makes our eye feel tearful and tired… Unbelievably, none of us vomited, though undoubtedly, the scary and disgusting feeling is there sometimes...

Classes had been continue to be blur for many of us, firstly because we missed some classes, and secondly still, due to language problem; many lecturers (they’re all doctors though) are simply hypnotizing; we can hardly make out what are they describing on the slides sometimes… Exam is only a month away, and we’re still struggling hard in our studies, esp in anatomy - there’s just too much things to memorize. Most of the locals seems to be very well prepared, as they always know how to answer the doctors’ questions.. things we’re studying now are very familiar to them cz they’d studied them in their 10+2 foundation…

On the other hand, I would like to admit dat we, the Malaysians actually brought some ‘havoc’ to the administration of Kasturba Medical College.. The Dean of KMC, especially, is being troubled by non-stop pressures from us the students, the parents, and JPA… There were many discomforting complaints; and the involvement of JPA, or can be so called the Malaysian government, simply ‘stimulated’ the admins to act fast and carefully… Extra classes had been postponed-to-dunno-when before this, the bad conditions of the rooms had not been repaired, and the food had been sux ..Yesterday, the dean personally met us and instantly arranged everything for our comfort, including the possibility of offering AC rooms to every one of us (but of coz if only JPA would pay for us), wow… However, I think we can’t blame everything on them… This is India, and India is about an era behind than that of what Malaysia is now… the conditions here is like the 50-years-ago environment in Malaysia… they wouldn’t know that what they’re having normally is considering very old and bad for we Malaysians… We, as students, as the ‘ambassadors’ of Malaysia, are supposed to be strong in other countries, to adapt and accept, to over come and persevere what is being offered here, not only to complain and expect everything to be like the ideal home sweet home, correct?? (Haha, suddenly I feel that my self being a hypocrite… Yea, I do complained a lot anyway, but now I’d accepted the fact, hehe, I know this sounds ironic)

SOS call from the "Black Paradise" (part2)

Class started, it's really hard to make up wat some of the lecturers are saying, and the lecturer hall in non-AC, hot n stuffy, 200 student in the hall, and electricity always break down (this happens to all part of india, shit) Guys need to wear formal everytime in school, n gals need to wear their 'formal' indian dress, eg Sari, sux rite...We guys need to walk to the school everyday, 15mins walk, passing through the dirt, dust, exhaust smoke, rubbish n cow dunks :( We all are already late for 1 month, and the school's only giving us once extra class per week, rubbish lar, it'll be no use at all cz we're still keeping up with other normal classes, and during these other classes, we're totally blur, esp Anatomy n Physiology (btw, we're taking 3 subjects- Physiology, Anatomy, and Biochemistry) We had seen some corpses yday, definitely will get to disect them in the coming days... We have 6-days class each week, which is killing, and everyday from 9am to 4.30 pm... break from 1.00-2.30pm, of which we need to walk back to our men's hostel again to have lunch, and to-from takes 3- mins, they say we can't join the gals to eat at school, crap lar..

Bout food here, 1 word- sux!!! Dining hall always serve exctly the same food -Chapati, white rice, and curry vege... dat's all!!! for extra order, of which u need to pay more, is only either a fish- chicken, and an egg, plus fruit juice... Every meal, every day, not even a diff roti!!! Food at dining hall is a must-pay for all hostel students, even if u do not eat , u still pay, shit!! And ya, the voltage here is only 220v, compared to M'sian's 240v, so, i can't even boil water in my room cz it'll over load, n power will break down, shit, can't cook myself oso, gonna get a power stabilizer... and oso, the electricity in India always break down, can up to 10 times a day, and this really hurts the lap top.. some of my fren cant charge their lap top, and 1 of them the lap top spoilt, shitty rite..

i'm now trying to get wireless phone for my room,n eventually will have internet access hopefully...i had a new local mobile number (+919886215008), feel free to msg or call :) i miss malaysia, truly!!! Life here SUX to MAX, hopefully i'll get used to it, but currently i'm still can't accept the fact that i'm gonna be here for 5.5 yrs (trying hard to accept that)... Thanx for the comments oso, wonder why suddenly so many ppl put there read me and support me, i'm really thankful for that...

SOS call from the "Black Paradise"

I stepped foot at Bangalore International Airport at bout 11.45pm (india time; 2 hours later than that of M'sia), and the 1st thing which shocked me was a stray dog lingering around the air port, and the air port is old n dusty( 1st impression n the starting of dissapointment).. However, i really thank God that my whole hourney was very fluent, thanx for all the prayers (some of my frens' luggage delayed and they can only get them few days later)..We stayed a night at a 4-star hotel (a major boost instead), and the next morning flew to Mangalore, and there's where nightmare started!!!!

Let me 1st lead you for some visual imagination of India:
COLOR - brown (every corner of the streets, the walls of buildings, and the air, are yellowish, damn!!!!
SIZE - small (the taxis, buses, local cars, roads,shops, and houses are very compact, and of course, very uncomfortable!!!
SCENT - "indian-plus-dust-smell" (it's very uncomfortable for me, from the clean and clear air of M'sia, sux man!!!
SKIN - black, thoroughly, even the campus has less than 1% international student, oh my God!!!
SOUND - "honk, honk!!!" - every single driver horn like crazy, the frequency is bout 5 horns per min each driver, crazy!!!

Ok, let me start to describe my personal experiences... The main office of the college, foremostly, is situated at the centre of the hustle-bustle town, n wat i mean husle here is really really noisy with horns, and dusty... the whole campus is seperated around the town, and the main office( the only 1 building i'd been since) is extremely small; super old; all local student; and not even a sport facility!! The campus bus is the size of 'BAS-MINI' in M'sia - open-windowed, no AC; i wonder how dirty will our shirts get for each trip..those 4 seaters buses like the UiTM bus is very rare, and 3 seaters VIP bus is out-of-the-world here..
Now to the hostel... For the 1st year student's, it is situated half way inside a jungle, have to pass by those 'kampung-like-boulevard' and it's damn damn damn old, like those flats of the 80's...The furniture is ancient (but thank God mine are all well conditioned), and the whole block has only locals, exept us..There's no Internet point at all in our hostel...But the weather in Mangalore is not as hot, heard that this is the coolest place in the whole of south india, the climate are similar to M'sia.. When we reached the hostel, everyone was looking at us from above, eyeing our lap-tops and stuffs, damn scary!!! We have a dining room which serve only indian food, which is so much diff from M'sian, every single thing is red and orange in color...And oso, this is the 1st time we, m'sian, experienced the feeling of being stared at, like aliens, but they are very friendly to us, though there's always a very very hard problem in communicating, their indian accent is too strong, so as our M'sian slang...Luckily there's a tv room which serves bout 40 channels including ESPN, HBO, CARTOON NETWORK, National Geographic, AXN...The shops here closes at 9pm, and there's no night life here..Everything is cheap here, except electronic stuffs and papers, (Harry Potter is only RM80)...The girls' hostel is even worse, there're many corpse lying just there around the stair-case, super scary...I dunno how about Manipal, but from wat i heard, township wise, we win; facility wise, them (they even have Starbucks in the campus!!!, and we have nothing)

I feel like crying in the first night here, and i really feel like flying back to the heaven-like Malaysia immediately, where there everything seems just so fine... Prayers are much needed...I'm now staying with another crisitan from Sereman, which is very good...This is my 1st post from india, at the college library, and i'll definitely update constantly bout my current situation... :(