A Great First Meeting

My parents arrived to Prague this Thursday with 6 of their friends to see me, take a tour in the city, drink beer and eat great Czech food. Me and Kristýna planned to take them all to something more than just city sightseeing and could, with much and appreciated help from her mother, plan a trip to Hrád Karlstejn during the Saturday.
However, first I booked a table for 10 at Ambiente, an amazing Brazilian live restaurant, close to the Old Town Square. I strongly recommend anyone having parents or friends over that want to have a food experience to go there if a restaurant in the more exclusive range is to be preferred.

During Sunday we spent the whole noon walking the Czech nature at Prachovske Skaly with my parents, as the friends already left. It was a nice walk with amazing forests and rock formations not too long outside of Prague.
It felt great to work off the heavy food and beer from Ambiente and other smaller pubs.
However, when we went back to Prague we didn't have much time to rest before we were supposed to meet up with part of Kristýnas family for more food and beer.
This time we went for regular Czech cousin specialities - probably the best I've had so far here.

The weekend was great and it was very nice to see my parents, their friends and to see that they got very well along with Kristýnas family.

I believe that another week of hard work demands this kind of "rest"...

Sunny Daze

My summer was the most amazing summer in a long time, or rather, for all time so far. Since histology was my last exam and my flight back home to Sweden was the very next day I had a lot of pressure on my shoulders to make it and go home to recharge. At least this was my plan and I believe I’d be a little bit devastated if I would not succeed. However, as the previous post reveals I did make it and could fly with a feeling of relief the next morning. Kristýna accompanied me and more than just my dad met us up at the airport - he also brought the best weather possible.

We sure did hit the best weather in a long time.
The risky thing about taking vacation on the Swedish west coast is the weather. If it’s with you you’ll have an amazing time but if it’s not appealing at all then you might as well stay at home. Of course it was a bliss to see my family again and to spend some quality time with them and Kristýna but it’s funny how the weather decides so many things.
   For example, we wouldn’t be traveling with our family boat to the very extent that we did this summer. Swimming and sailing in rain is no fun either. The only thing I’d still do, even if the weather would hit us badly, would be to play around with the jetski. However, I won’t waste time writing pessimistic words about the perfect summer – I’ll let the photos I'll post later speak for themselves.

Kristýna left after three weeks and I stayed another in order to see some friends and just relax. I knew what was coming for me because we’d been planning a trip to Austria and my first visit in real mountains. I’m not much of a hiker nor walker or runner but I do like camping and being in the wild and I must say that Austria totally changed my mind. The nature was ever so beautiful and climbing mountains are really a fun quest to conquer.
   It was a battle not only with the mountain but also with my self – I wanted to reach those damn tops. But, I do have an issue with heights and this put extra rocks in my backpack. However, during the last climb I somewhat overlooked the feeling of dizziness and felt actually pretty damn confident.  I think it takes practice, just as with anything else.
    MedSchool was not really close in my mind at this point and it’d take me another three weeks before I really started to plan in my head for the upcoming second year – and now I’m all of a sudden here,  sitting in the park next to campus having lunch and reading biochemistry.

Time flies by...

Early dive into the cold

I woke up from the neighbour boat playing a fanfare on his horn at 7 o clock, or more accurately ten to seven. I didn't mind since I being here for only a couple of days have brought me back to my early habits and schedule that I used to follow before going to Uni.
   Yesterday's intense jet ski ride with Kristina "at the helm" took the leg power out of me since her only mission seemed to be to try to throw me off - she almost succeeded - and in the evening I fell asleep at the deck with our dog lying at my arms.

I am aware that I drift off far from posting anything that is even remotely related to school, although, in one way it surely is. Getting to rest in between the heavy studies are a key to success, if one is to believe Kristyna. When I packed my anatomy and genetics books with me she look at me with an evil look. The books still ended up in my backpack but I haven't yet opened them.
   I am very happy that I passed the last exam right before leaving, having to leave with it undone or uncompleted would result in feeling obliged to go back to finish it and I would not have the vacation that I now can have. My mind still drifts off towards school, however, they are thoughts of satisfaction and eagerness, to see what the second year will have to offer and what challenges it presents that must be conquered.
   There is a possibility to demonstrate during the first year student's winter dissection and I will do my best to pass the test and hopefully out rule the competition. The interest for the demonstrating slots are changing every year but I believe that more students start to see it as the great way to repeat anatomy, which actually is the core in medicine. However, the test to sort out the non prepared (after all you have to teach it) is different from the test seen in the first year anatomy. The slides one has to label are not taken from painters in atlases or computer graphics, they are rather photographs from the actual dissected body and if the rumors are corresponding to reality it ought to be quite the challenge.
   Another goal of mine is to help with the guidance at the first year's enrollment. I very much appreciated the system where guides from the upper years showed us around the vast campus in town and gave us pretty much all the information we needed in order begin the year with the question marks straightened out to exclamation marks.
   Ever since the military service, where I voluntarily took the position as responsible for the safety and working environmental issues at platoon level, I have began to see that doing something else on the side and to actually get involved in questions that are important to others (may it be the guy next to you in the trench or the colleague next to you in the school bench) is a rather appealing way to satisfy ones need of feeling important with out being egoistic. As you might have understood I enjoy sharing of, not just thoughts, but experiences and information - a personal need of, for me, great importance.
   This brings me to a third route. There is a scandinavian, or purely Swedish (this I do not know for sure since I haven't had time to look into it until now), group of people from all the faculties that engage issues and questions about the return of graduated doctors to their home countries.  Questions like these might be raised later even for me, although I have no idea what the future might bring, and I find issues regarding the Swedish system very interesting. It might seem early, but when they asked for persons to represent the first faculty, which surprisingly seems to be absent, I began thinking about joining in to see what it is actually all about.

I'm now sitting the the cabin of the family boat writing this (surprisingly fast) from my dad's iPad which I, not only hate to admit, but actually find really convenient. I'm not much for fruit and electronic hybrids - even if it seems they actually are resistant to worms...

It seems like the amazing weather will stay so today brings more jet ski, fishing and tomorrow we will travel north to other rocky locations in the West coast archipelago...
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Posted at the deep blue, via iPad