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| What up y'all - this will be my first post in LA (and apparently my first post in a helluva long time). That's right, I have officially left the bay area to begin my med school odyssey, or something. In case you all are wondering, here's the rundown on everything:
The location - freakin' awesome. I've spent my whole life, including my college career, living in places where everything can only be reached by car. NOW, I have Whole Foods, Long's, BofA, BestBuy, HomeDepot, InNOut, Burger King, Subway, 3 Coffee Beans, 10 bars, several dessert places and a handful of cute cafes and restaurants ALL within walking distance. Some of you may think that's pretty unimpressive, but my sheltered ass is pretty impressed!
I'm living in a two-story, 2 bedroom townhouse just off of the main campus and a little south of the med school. The living room and kitchen are pretty nice and spacious, although the rooms are just big enough for a full size bed and desk. Also, we're right across the street from the cemetary, which will probably freak the parents out. At least it's quiet here.
The school - amazing. (Also in walking distance) The Ronald Reagan hospital is supposed to be a state-of-the art facility catering towards the greater Los Angeles population and is slated to open in '07 - which means our class will be on its maiden voyage, which is pretty cool. Classes here are heavily PBL (problem based learning) - this means me and 7 other students are given a clinical problem to dissect and solve together with little instruction. It sounds pretty constructive and all, but I guess I'll have to see how my first few sessions run. More on that in the future.
The students - bright, diverse, and friendly as hell. I'm beginning to vibe well with everybody here - we're all really excited to meet each other, and I can tell that there are good times ahead. We have a whole week of social events lined up - it's too bad classes start next week, cuz I think we need more playtime before actual work starts.
I can't tell you how relieved I am - I think the whole idea of leaving the bay area was really daunting these past couple weeks, especially since I've been having such a kickass summer. Saying farewell to the Tcrew after Vegas was really tough, and I hated the thought of being separated from all my friends and loved ones. I think I'm taking solace in the fact that I'm in good hands and in good company here - I still miss everybody at home, but I'll be back before I know it, cuz time flies when you're spending 40 hours a week memorizing shit.
Anyway, drop me a line Tcrew cuz I know ur reading this. Big shoutouts to Spifytif, Dr.Ohn, and FrankTsaiMD who are also starting this week. Good luck guys, I know you're gonna be great.
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| Aite, big update here!
First - Charlie's bday was awesome - Suite181 was great, and bottle service never tasted so sweet.
Thanks to everyone who came out - Charlie didnt hook up with the parking meter like last year, but I think he had fun regardless. But if you missed it last year, here's kinda what it looked like:
Anyway, couple weeks later Chuck, Andrew (Butters), John, Johnny and I flew out to Vegas for some troublemakin. Charlie had never been there before, and Drew hasn't been out there sans parents, so we all decided to take a vacation out in sin city.
uh, so, a little background on this pic - it was so friggin dry there, and for some reason the lack of humidity caused my hands to swell like crazy. Hurt like hell. anyway, here's a really happy Andrew:
Vegas was great - I loved Hooters by the way, they have the best wings. Thanks to the guys for makin it an awesome trip. I hope we can get in a couple more weekend trips before I gotta leave the Bay Area for good.
On that note, a lot of you have been asking where I'm gonna be for the next four years. Right now, I'm picking between UCLA and UCSD - both places are incredible and I can see myself happy at either one. Any suggestions? I'm really glad that the whole application process is done - I can't believe I submitted my primary app almost nine months ago. Thank you all for being so supportive - I'm lucky to have good friends and mentors.
Alrite, I hope to update more often. Anyone reading this thing anyway? | | |
| One of the best things about working in the Longaker lab? The awesome software I get to play around with. Photoshop CS2 is pretty darn amazing, although I prolly only know how to use like 1% of all the features on there.
One neat tool I found was an auto-Photomerger, to generate panoramics thru 360 degrees. Here's a shot of nighttime at Berkeley, taken from HoChie's roof this past saturday - I wanted to see how smart Photoshop really is by giving it all that black space to weed through:
It's smart alright - the whole thing was automated, I just had to crop out the edges cuz I couldnt hold my camera still enough while taking the panoramic.
Any of you good photographers? Im thinking of taking a digital photography + Photoshop mastery class come summer - Stanford will pay its employees for "personal training and enrichment" expenses and I wanna utilize that free $$, but need some suggestions for where to look for those kinds of classes.
In any case, God bless the tcrew, you guys rock! Some pics from Saturday:
O yea, who else is gonna be in Vegas on the 23rd-26th?
Per John's request, I've uploaded the only photo I have with Butters from that night. Enjoy!
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