Shopping, Czech style!

Well. You probably all know that I'm a typical nordic person. Blond hair, blue eyes, fair skin. And every summer I do the same mistake. I never learn! I really wanted to have my time in the sun today. And I got burned. I'm look like a new-boiled lobster. Pink, someone?

So, what to do? A good idea is to buy some sunscreen. And aftersun. So I went shopping! And you know what? The drugstore had both aftersun and sunscreen left! SPF 16 on the sunscreen, perfect! The seller showed the bottle to me, and asked if this was the one I desired. Yes, thanks, I'll take that! How much does it cost? It's the last one. It's not for sale!

This is typically czech. A year ago, two of my schoolmates went to buy dresses for the big faculty ball. They found the perfect dresses. Krasny, krasny, the seller said. Good, we'll take those! Not for sale!

The people of Czech Republic doesn't understand capitalism...

And by the way, I failed my histo final today. I'll make it on the retake. I hope.

Essays, credittests and reports.

It had to come. We are now proceeding the end of the academic year, and things are getting tougher. This is the two months who will decide if I'm good enough to be enrolled to the second year. I have to work harder. Read more. Read even more than that! I have plans to reread everything I've read in the subjects we are gonna have exams in this spring. If I got time!

For histology I have to finish the embryology. Luckily I passed the embryology I credit test (most of my class actually failed it..), and there is one more. Then I just have to pass my minitests and the last slide-test; because I don't have to take the credit test then. And I can decide myself when to take the exam (with a few limitations).

For anatomy I have to hand in my essay in special dissection on monday. It's nearly finished. I just have to make some adjustments and make a simple scheme which have to follow the essay. My essay is about the obturator nerve, by the way. Then I have to make my minitests (again) and the CNS-credit. The exam is HUGE, and the material I have to read is some thousand pages.

Latin is an another story (you did read my Latin-post earlier?). I probably failed the credit last week (I focused on the embryotest instead..) But give me a couple of weeks, and I'll be able to decline corpus alienum in all 5 cases in both singular and plural.. And all the terminology and rules for comparative adjectives... If I can make the credit, I can make the exam.

Then I have to do a couple of credits; biology (I have to have my lab-booklet controlled and accepted, and pass a test which will be held in the end of this month) I also had to hand in a lab-report last week.

The other credit is czech language, I feel I somehow got control on it; I have to take the reading part, the medical vocabulary credit and MAYBE the grammar credit. Time will show!

And then, suddently, we are in the exam period. The period of reading, overdose of coffee, nervous breakedowns and failed trials on the exams. And if lucky; passing an exam from time to other..

The only thing I actually is finished with, is the first aid. Hurray!!

Glands and apartements.

Busy, busy, busy!

Yesterday I moved allmost all my stuff over to Ayan's place. It's time consuming to move around. Finding a place, pack all your stuff, drive it over to the new place, carry it to the new flat (which is, of course, in 4th floor, in a building without elevator), trying to find a free space on the floor.. Go for a new box. At the same time, two persons are moving out from the same flat. That means; their stuff is packed in boxes stacked all over the place, making it even more difficult and messy.

So this is what I spent my entire day (after school) on, yesterday. And I'm going to spend even more time on it today.. But there was a problem. I had to prepeare for slide-test in histology too.. The test has just been finished. I went to the lab without proper preparation, wondering if this was the day I would fail big time.. I didn't care to read to much during the class eihter (while waiting for my turn to be tested). I just went up and grabbed my slide, hoped it was from the gastrointestinal trakt or liver, and started microscoping it.

I couldn't recognice the slide. Or.. it looked like a gland. Pinkish lump of cells. I had to try to find out which glands it couldn't be. I found out that it wasn't pituitary gland, because there wasn't two distinguable lobes. Pancreas got Islet of Langerhans, the preparate didn't. Thyroid gland got big ponds of colloid surrounded by the glandular cells, there was no colloid. And adrenal gland got cortex with 3 distinct layers, and a medulla resembling early nervous tissue. The cells looked quite evenly distributed through the slide, so I decided it had to be a parathyroid gland, producing parathormone. Then my preparation time was up, and I had to start tellin my professor about the slide. Just in the same second I looked on the slide in the other microscope (the one used during the actual test), I recogniced two distinct layers. It was cortex and medulla of adrenal gland.. I wasn't prepared to answer questions about it.

Anyway. I somehow made to answer the questions of my professor in a way that made her quite satisfied.. I got a 1 minus (exellent minus). Sometimes it's just pure luck!

Histo credit test

I made it! I got my very first credit in histology. The question was thymus in involution, not the easiest slide. I got the mark "2-very good". Happy!!

The test is like this: we are all gathered in the histolab. We have all our books, notes and microscopes and slideboxes aviable. Then one by one get up to the front, where the teacher give you a single slide, a paper for notes and a microscope. You are not allowed to bring anyting but a pencil. Then you look at the slide macroscopically, and in the microscope.

The task is to identify this nice, pinkstained piece of tissue, and tell as much as possible about it. Then the professor ask a lot of questions. Then you answer, hopefully a bit more than what he/she asked for. And then you get your mark.

Just for your information. Thymus is sitting in your anterior/superior mediastinum. It's a place where t-lymphocytes matures (or get killed by apoptosis after negative and positive selection). There is a lot of adipose tissue in the thymus in involution. And there is someting called Hassal's corpuscles in the cortex.

And if you don't understand it at all, it's ok. I hardly understand it myself.. It's just this way it is!

First trial

Hey guys!

I do have a blog on my homepage, but I can't write in it.. So I decided to make a brand new one. Girls and techincal skills, you know.. =)

My plan was to create this blog (or use the old one) from the day I started to study medicine. But the first 6 months have been busy...
...very busy. But it's a new year, and new possibilities, so I start now!

As you can see, I'm supposed to work with my microscope today. Histo slide test tomorrow! That's the second reason for making this blog just today! ;-)

Due to my international class, this blog is written in english and maybe some czech from time to time.

I'll upload some photos and write down some stories from my everyday life.. Enjoy!

Sorrow