Tua Pui, I'm so sorry

Tua pui passed away this morning. A friend of mine asked for my help to babysit his hamsters while he is back to Malaysia for holiday. Since I’ll be alone here settling the registration matters, so I nodded saying yes, I would love to! The 3 hamsters are cute. 2 of them are aggressive I didn’t dare to really play with them. Before he left Medan, he taught me the way to clean the hamsters and taught me how to feed them. Without these hamsters as company these few days, I would be bored to death. I showered for them like the way he taught me. They are all hyperactive hamsters. It feels like they never rest.

Tua pui, the white hamster was so naughty yesterday playing with the water from its water bottle making himself all wet and all the shear woods down there sticks on him. So I cleaned and dried him. He was still running around happily and stupidly as usual. He loves to run a big round, stand and then drop on its back. That’s the cutest part and the people who see that would say ‘you stupid!’ but he brought us joy. This morning when I’m awake, I disturbed all 3 hamsters as usual but realized tua pui didn’t respond much. I thought he was just plain lazy, I even said to him ‘get up you lazy bum’ as if he understands English >.<>

I started to worry. I don’t have my friend’s latest number in Malaysia. I contacted kiddo but he wasn’t replying. I reckoned See Theng might know more since tua pui’s papa is See Theng’s hamster. She told me she’ll bring some antibiotics here after her work. Maybe he is sick, she said. She also told me ‘prognosis not good already. Usually when a hamster is weak like that, few days later they’ll pass away but don’t worry so much. I’ll bring antibiotics later.’ I kept wondering what will happen to tua pui when I was doing my registration in campus. I gave Zkang calls to tell him about it. I felt so sorry I didn’t take good care of his hamsters.

I quickly rush home once I’m done with the registration which was about 5 hours later. I was shocked to see ants are all over him already. He passed away. I don’t know what is wrong with him. I rang Zkang immediately. He must be regretting handing his hamsters to me. I’m not sure if I made any mistake while taking care of him. I wondered why he passed away that sudden. I texted See Theng and told her about it. We both buried him together.

Tua pui, may you rest in peace T.T

photo used for registration

I’m currently busy with all the registration. I just realized, to graduate is not an easy thing to do. We have to get much documentation done. First, get the grade for my thesis and I’m here proudly telling everyone I got an A yay! Most people will get A for their thesis so I don’t think getting A is a big deal LOL. Just that I’m feeling happy so here I am to share =) Then I have to photocopy all my results and also receipts of my tuition fee payments. Not to forget to get ‘surat bebas pustaka’ from the libraries, both from the library in my faculty, also the big library belongs to my university. That is to declare we had returned all the books we borrowed during our academic years.

Then we have to fill in some forms and biodata. They will need our photo in passport size. I’m not sure if it is just for the forms or they will use the photos on our certificate. I wonder why they didn’t want to use the coloured photos. They wanted us to hand in black and white photo. I used to like black and white photo but definitely not this one. It looks like those photos people use for the dead. I shared the photo in MSN with my friend and she laughed nonstop at how I look and said it looks like the body's not mine. She said it looks like I'm putting my head on the body-like board like many tourism place will have. OMG! Are they really going to use the black and white photo? o.O

Manifestasi Gambaran Radiografis Goldenhar Syndrome pada Rongga Mulut

What is Goldenhar syndrome? Goldenhar syndrome is a rare congenital disease with ocular, auricular, and spine anomalies. Incidents had been reported that happened between 1 : 5600 to 1 : 26000 live birth, usually dominant in males and on the right side of the patient. The etiology of Goldenhar syndrome is still unknown.

Clinical manifestations like facial asymmetry, microtia, unilateral coloboma, microphthalmia, epibulbar dermoid, lipodermoid, micrognathia, cleft palate, and cleft lip can be found in new borns. Medical experts and stomatologist can also find images of decline in mandibular ramus height, loss of teeth, cleft palate, cleft lip, supernumerary teeth, and tooth hypoplasia via radiograph.

There are a few treatments that can be done according to the age of the patient. There are essentially two approaches: either an early operation (during growth), or a late treatment (after the active growth period). The prognosis for individuals with Goldenhar syndrome is very good in cases without systemic association. These individuals typically have a normal life span and normal intelligence.

*tadaa* that’s the abstract of my thesis =) Yes, I finally completed and passed my thesis presentation *claps for myself* I’ve printed this and will be distributing these books to the department and library of my university in few hours time. Looking for reference to get this thesis done wasn’t really easy for me since it is a rare disease so at most reference, they are mostly predictions. While looking for references, I found this blog, written by a patient with Goldenhar syndrome. She writes about her life since young with this syndrome. It must be hard for her but she is tough, she made it. Her post tells me to be tough and be optimistic in facing problems in the future. We’re all lucky unlike these patients. So, do appreciate what we have and what is given to us =)

Letter to Santa

Dear Santa,

My friend, Joe, had told me to write a letter to you at least a week before Christmas. You would need a week time to get my Christmas present delivered it seems. Well, I really hope you would do that for me. This year will be the first year celebrating Christmas myself. This year will be the real lonely Christmas for me. I’m not going home due to study matters and so will be staying here in this cold town all by myself, far away from family. I wish for a safe stay alone in this town till my Malaysian friends are back here for their new semester. My family will be having holiday in Singapore this Christmas. How I wished I could join them. Too bad, I got to stay here to settle some matter.

There were too many things that happened this year which taught me a great lesson of life. Even though some are very harsh to me, but I appreciate the way they showed me what life means, what I would face in this cruel world. I turned 21 early this year where I celebrated my birthday with my family and my close family friends. My close friends celebrated with me a night earlier since they need to head back to their universities for classes. It’s the 2^nd year I’m celebrating Chinese New Year with friends in Medan. This year was a little different. I had reunion dinner with Kelvin’s family. I must say Drg. Suwito and Drg. Betty Laut are really nice people. They gave me feelings like I’m celebrating CNY with my family back in Malaysia. They helped me a lot here in Medan. Valentine’s Day fell on the same day as the first day of Chinese New Year. I celebrated my first Valentine’s Day. I couldn’t stop laughing when looking back at the videos recorded on the night my housemates and I had vodka together. Those faces of drunk housemates of mine are funny.

I had a short wonderful holiday later with my friends. I won’t forget my longest ride on a motorcycle in my life just to find the hot spring. It is fun riding on bikes with friends around the place, though tiring, but I enjoyed. I shifted to new house, living with new housemates early April. I followed my Indonesian course mates to Bukit Lawang for some odd jobs. I gained a lot and it was fun with Umaiyal, Navissha, and Banu in the room with a bathroom where we actually can see through and we made fun of each other LOL. I had my semester break later where I visited my brother who is currently studying in Malacca. Trip with family are the best. Of course, I went out with my besties, also attended a small gathering as secondary schoolmates reunion. Most of them looked so different now. 4 years really can change a person.

I attended Junior Clearkship. Students from the faculty of dentistry would need to get themselves present in the hospital for a week on duty. I learned and see a lot of new things. I broke up with my boyfriend by the end of August. I went home during Hari Raya. I’m glad to know there are so many people who actually care and love me. They support me. I told myself not to let these people down. I shall show them I can still lead my life and it will be better than before. Let bygones be bygones. Roger taught me that. I always bear these 4 words in mind. I’m lucky having Drg. Amrin as my lecturer who guides me in getting my thesis to be done well. He is a very helpful, kind and supportive lecturer. Since I’m a little free with my thesis, I helped Desi with her research.

We had a small BBQ birthday party for kiddo (Liang Jie). Too bad it rained that night so we ended up keeping everything back into the house but we had fun in the war of water and flour. Then it is time for Mid-Autumn Festival. I didn’t meet any juniors in campus during orientation week and this Mid-Autumn Festival gathering was the gathering I finally got to know 2 of my juniors, Jun Yang and Jack Loo. Next event of the year was CK’s birthday. We went karaoke and then celebrated in the juniors’ hostel. We almost cooked him up by throwing all sorts of spices on him. I remembered how I sneezed while recording video because of the pepper. I joined the Indians for their Deepavali dinner together in a hotel and found an amazing, breath taking night view. I love Medan the moment I was on the top floor of that building. I attended another odd job organized by Dental Student Committee. I started up my online business with Desi. I never thought this dream can really come true. It is finally the time for final examinations. Tomorrow will be my first day of exam.

This year is a total different year for me with loads of happenings. I’m glad to know more about my friends, about how true they are, how fake they are. I’m glad to know how supportive my friends and family can be. With all these happenings around, I believe I’ve learned and grow up. Christmas is around the corner, Fransisca told me she wants a Canon DSLR as her Christmas present. So, Mr. Santa, after my long summary of what had happened this year, I would say I wanted a machine to help me keep all these precious memories in case I would forget them one day. I didn’t want to forget how each and every one of the people around me gave me the lesson of life. I would like to thank Joe for giving me this idea to write to Santa and thanks a million in advance to Mr. Santa for your attention.

Warmest regards,

Pan Li Ting

Is RELIGION a barrier in relationship?

In a month time, I’ve heard about 3 couples breaking up and the reason is “Our religion’s different.” They promised not to hurt each other, not to force each other to convert into others’ religion, and will respect each other. I guess, like I said in my previous post, when he/she asked for break up, promise is nothing now.

We shall all respect others’ religion, not forcing them to convert their religion. That’s what I think we should do. I don’t understand why some people would promise now saying they would respect but convinced their loved ones to convert their religion in the end. I see many married couples with different religion. They can live together happily but why can’t some others do so too? Don’t you think it is useless for a person who said “Nothing can be done now, let’s break up.” So, now I see breaking up is really as easy as ABC. *sighs* what do you readers think about this? Is religion really a barrier in relationship?