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This might be my last past for a while. The hurricane is near. Even the locals are freaking out. Took my final exam today. It’s all over now. My landlord is boarding up the windows. They’ve closed all the restaurants and shops. It’s about to hit the fan. See you all on the flipside.
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Dominica is a fun place to be today. The entire campus is in chaos, and the island is preparing for a hurricane. My final exam is taking place in two hours. We were just told that we don’t have to take it, and can instead use the average of our previous three exams as our final grade. Everyone is taking that options it seems. Everyone but me, that is. I’m a massive geek and I just can’t let it go. I’ve studied for this sucker, and I’m going to take it.
In case you didn’t know, a huge hurricane (Dean) is currently headed straight for Dominica. It should likely hit us tomorrow morning. Almost all students (except 4th semesters, who still have an exam next week) are leaving the island. The US Embassy in Barbados actually stepped in and got extra planes to come and evacuate all the US citizens. They’re tearing down the boats at the dock. There is very little canned food and water left on the shelves. People are seriously freaking out.
My plan? I’m taking the final today, and then I’m going to Tomato’s to celebrate with my friends. It will be the last time some of them will ever get to go there as it will be closed tomorrow, and then they are leaving the island.
I plan on getting video footage and pics of before the hurricane, during, and afterwards. This should be pretty interesting.
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One of my bestest friends, Keith, made a very sweet video using all the footage that he’s collected of our group of friends at our number one hangout location, the Tomato Cafe. Unfortunately, he couldn’t get it exported exactly right, so you’ll have to turn your sound up to hear it. Honestly, it almost makes me cry every time I watch it. The peeps in the movie are all my very good friends, and almost all of them are going to be leaving the island in about two weeks to do their fifth semester in Miami. I don’t know what I’m going to do without them. ‘Maters, as we affectionately call it, will never be the same. And neither will Dominica, for that matter. This one goes out to the ‘Maters crew. I love you guys.
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Phone conversation between Micah and Hong Kong (Chinese food) Delivery Man:
Micah: I’d like a vegetable chow mein and an egg roll.
Hong Kong Man: Okay, where should I deliver to?
Micah: Past the green house and the yellow house on the Banana Trail, and it’s the peach house.
Hong Kong Man: You mean the one with the blue lights?
Micah: Yes, the peach house with the blue lights and the two dogs who bark.
Hong Kong Man: Okay, but keep your dogs inside.
Micah: Okay, but please bring extra duck sauce.
Hong Kong Man: Okay.
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I’ve been studying hardcore for the past week or so. Tomorrow is my mini 3 exam, and then my final is on Thursday. After that, I’ll finally be finished with this semester. I really feel like I’m going crazy. I don’t usually stress out about exams, but there is just so much material to cover, and my brain is starting to fry. I miss my friends and family so much, and I promise to come out of my hole after my final. I’m really beginning to burn out and question my committment to sparkle motion (sorry if you don’t get that reference). I miss having a life. I miss enjoying all the little things in life like double espressos and laying in bed all day watching movies. I want to hang out with all my friends, and completely forget about pharmacokinetics and neisseria meningitis. I’m questioning what I’m doing with my life. Why am I doing this again? It just all seems so pointless. My brain is so saturated with med school facts that I don’t have room to think about life. I really miss life. This isn’t life. Because if it is, I would have upgraded to a better version many years ago. I miss the good ole days of roasting marshmallows, laughing at myself and friends, eating salty edamame, jumping into the ocean naked, pretending to be a gangsta, drinking bloody marys on sunday mornings, picking my friends’ noses, taking pictures in piles of leaves, eating a box of girl scout cookies in one sitting, and dancing until every inch of my clothing is drenched with salty goodness.
(Pic is me and Laura krumpin on our camping trip to Seneca Lake years ago. Them was the good ole days.)
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Please check out the post I wrote on Medscape about me dealing with the current turmoil in my life.
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As promised, here is the video that I put together from our hike to Boiling Lake here in Dominica a few weeks ago. I’m still working on the photo album, but should have it up, with captions, shortly. Enjoy!
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I haven’t posted anything here in a while because I wasn’t sure how much I wanted to share about my personal life with the rest of the world, especially given that I haven’t shared too much with my friends or family. The long and short of it? My partner Micah may be returning to the States for a bit. We’ve both decided that it’s the best thing for us right now. That’s all the details I feel like I can share for the time being.
In other news, some things have been improving. My sprained ankle is now almost the same size as my other ankle, and I can walk, but not yet run on it without too much pain. My computer is also now put back together again and working, thanks to Micah. I now only have three more exams to take for this semester: the Behavioral Shelf, Mini 3, and the Final Exam. The final is on August 16, so luckily I still have a bit of time to study.
Also, I managed to get back all the Boiling Lake pics and videos, and I’ve made a sweet movie, which I’ll be posting shortly. I’ll also finish editing the pics (hopefully today), and post a nice pic album.
I think I’ve gone through just about every emotion in the past week, and I honestly feel like my head is going to explode. Med school is tough. And med school + emotional events such as break-ups, deaths, etc., is just about impossible. I don’t know how anyone ever really does it.
Note: The pic again has nothing to do with this post. It’s me and my BFF Laura, who I happen to miss quite terribly right now.
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I’m sure almost everybody out there can relate to the painful events that went down yesterday. Have you ever spent untold hours in an emergency room? Well, I have before, and it totally sucks. I think the longest time that I ever spent in one was around 16 hours. Eventually, I did get seen. Unfortunately, things didn’t go as well yesterday.
Micah and I left for the
I looked at the x-rays, and didn’t see anything broken. Unfortunately, though, I didn’t trust my inexperienced second year med student eyes, so we walked (I crutched) over to the emergency department to find a doctor to take a look at my x-rays.
We signed in with the nurse, and she told us that we would see a doctor soon. Really, all I wanted was to have a doctor confirm my suspicion, and give me an air cast for support. Long story short, we waited for over 6 hours, and never saw a doctor. Many people (with no apparent emergency) came and went through the doors. The nurse never called a single person, including us. The whole thing seemed very suspicious. We asked her several times if they were even calling patients, and she told us that we were in line, and eventually would be seen. Apparently, they only have one ER doctor.
We had already paid our 5 EC “casualty fee,” which covers your ER visit, but by this point, we really didn’t care so much about the money (I know, what a bargain!), so we left the ER and found a restaurant to get some calories into our sick and tired bodies.
When we got home, I had a professor look at my x-ray, and she reaffirmed that nothing was broken. I also showed my x-rays to all my eager med student friends. Yesterday, I decided that I was going to try and walk without the crutches, so I returned them and hobbled around campus.
Today, I woke up and was in excruciating pain. I can barely put any weight on it, and now I don’t have any crutches to get around with. I wish I were in the States, so I could just send Micah to the pharmacy to pick me up an air cast and a set of crutches, but unfortunately, things don’t work like that in Dominica.
So, I guess I’ll just be laying here in bed all day, trying to study, and feeling sorry for myself. What a wonderful life!
My name is Kendra and I am a third-year medical student attending Ross University School of Medicine. I went through my basic science training on the Nature Island of Dominica, hence the name of this blog. However, I am currently living in Brooklyn, New York, where I'm doing my clinical rotations. I am a life enthusiast. I talk to strangers, cut the tags off of my pillows, and I don’t carry an umbrella with me because I prefer to get wet.
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