This last month has gone by really fast. For Halloween, the North American Medical Students Association hosted a really great party (as usual)! Janice, Amy, Brooke, Mark and I decided to dress as the Incredibles, which I think turned out really well (and was surprisingly easy)!
It never seems to take much convincing to get the Australians to dress in costumes so there ended up being a really great turn out and heaps of funny costumes. I think my favourite was the 5 biggest guys in our class (they call themselves the tall man study group) dressed as the spice girls. 
They had hilarious outfits, wigs and even choreographed dances. Heather and Mark went as Brittney Spears and K-Fed which was also pretty funny.
A couple weekends after Halloween, the girls (Janice, Heather, Amy and Brooke) threw me a surprise bachelorette party- which was SOOO nice of them. I’ve never had a surprise party thrown for me before and I was truly VERY surprised! There may have even been some tears. :( Anyway, it was a great night. They made us all matching T-shirts with a photo collage on the back, since they know how I love my photos!
They made a cake, some amazing salads and lots of my favourite fruity drinks (including home-made daiquiris).
In the evening we headed down to Darling Harbour for some amazing kangaroo steaks, red wine, and beer tasters! We also played some foosball, pool and Buck Hunter after dinner (very girly, I know…). :)
As for the wedding… the plans are coming along- slowly but surely! It is a much bigger job than I imagined, but has been a good distraction from studying. Last week the girls came down to Brides of Sydney with me for my final fitting and to pick up my dress. :)
Norma, Linda and Joan are meeting up this weekend to bake us our amazing cake and Brent has now sent off most of the invitations. The bridesmaids dresses are in and Brent and I have officially booked our honeymoon in Algonquin Park. Still lots more to do though!Brent is having a little break from all the planning and is spending the week up north at Manitoulin Island hunting deer! He (unfortunately) got one on his first day out… and she’s apparently the biggest one yet.
Also, I think most of you will have seen this already- but there was a pretty funny article in the Globe and Mail last week about Brent and Mom’s court case against Flight Centre: 
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20081112.woz12/BNStory/National/home . CFRB also got in touch with us (via facebook!) and we were interviewed on the Bill Carroll Morning Show and news talk radio. It was pretty embarassing, but luckily I don’t think anyone I know heard it! :)
Mom is in New Zealand right now and will be in Australia in a week. We plan to spend a day or two in Sydney (mostly packing and moving) and then head down to Tasmania for 4 days. I’m really looking forward to it. We stop in Sydney for one night on our way back to Canada and I’ve managed to get us some tickets to see Tim Freedman (lead singer of the Whitlams) at a small bar in Newtown that evening. Should be great!Anyway, guess I should get going on some studying (and packing!). I probably won’t write again till I am HOME in December! Yay. I can’t believe the end of the year is finally here.
Miss you! and see you all soon! xox ... and thanks for the flowers, B.
My life really hasn’t been particularly interesting for the last few months since I spent almost all my time studying for my four “Barrier” exams that were on October 13 and 14th. Luckily they went well and I’m in the clear- at least until my OSCE (practical/hospital) exams at the end of November. It is a big relief to be done the barrier and I’ve definitely been enjoying and appreciating my free time A LOT lately!
The day after the barrier about 70 of my classmates and I headed up the coast to a small town about 3 hours north, called Port Stephens. I stayed in a million dollar house with a bunch of my friends for less than $20/night (for 4 nights). It was just amazing!!!
Janice, Amy, Heather, Brooke, Mark (x2), Gordon and I were all in the house together and had a great time. We were also right next door to another full house of classmates which was fun.
There were all kinds of activities up there and we tried to squeeze in as many as possible. I probably got less sleep while I was there than I have all year, but it was well worth it. We spent a lot of time at the beach, we went snorkeling (and got caught in a CRAZY rip tide), we went for a sunset sea kayak to a sand island, saw some dolphins, ate some meat pies, and went deep water soloing (rock climbing).
We also had lots of ‘family’dinners and lots of wine. It was a GREAT little holiday and I feel like I’m finally starting to be able to appreciate going to school in Australia…I just still can’t wait for Brent to get here. I’m really starting to think that apart for the immigration office, Australia was the perfect choice!
These are a few pictures from our deep water soloing trip- which is rock climbing with no ropes over (hopefully deep) water!
I obviously didn’t participate, but was there watching. Gordon (who is in the pictures) is an Australian classmate of mine from my hospital and is apparently the 6th best rock climber in Australia.
Unfortunately, Gordon made it look so easy that 2 other guys in my class decided to ‘give it a go’ and literally almost drowned. The tide was up and a big set of waves came in and pulled the other 2 guys off the wall into the white wash.
I was tempted to jump in, but decided it would have probably made things worse since the cliffs were 15m high and I would have had no way of getting back up the cliffs afterwards! Luckily, the boys eventually made it back onto some rocks- and were mostly fine but for some cuts, bruises and a bit of vomiting. If we ever do that again I’m definitely bringing some rope and a ring buoy. 
Anyway, we all made it back to the city ok, but it’s been hard to get back into school. I’m pretty much done with my classes on the Sydney Uni campus for good, so all my days are spent at the hospital now. This block we are learning about Oncology and Palliative Care. It’s really interesting, but also really scary. We’ve only had a week of it so far so I’m still not sure what I think of it. Last week we spent a day at a Palliative care ward, which was very sad. 96% of the people there were dying of cancer and of those, 50% were dying of lung cancer. While we were there we learned about all kinds of things including symptom control, the morgue, the team of people involved with each patient, the logistics after someone dies, and how eyes are harvested.
On Friday, Brooke took me climbing for my first time. I had a great time, but can NOT believe how sore my forearms are. I’ll hopefully go again next week after my arms have recovered. After climbing Brooke and I met up with Amy, Janice and Heather and we headed downtown to what was supposed to be my final wedding dress fitting. Unfortunately, the dress was too big this time…And I have to get it taken in another 2 inches before I get to take it home. Not good news for the wallet! :(
The rest of the weekend was pretty relaxing and I had the chance to catch up with a few more friends. Tonight I’m going to a BBQ in Glebe. Spring/Summer is here and I’ve definitely been enjoying the long days and the BBQ/beach weather!
Miss you!
The end of the summer/winter has gone by really fast. Aunt Chris was in Sydney in early August and we managed to meet up for a really nice breakfast in Newtown one morning. Brent and Jules kept busy with their surf lifesaving competitions in Toronto which happened to be held at the Woodbine beaches this year. They both competed at the Provincials and Nationals and did really well!
I spent a lot of time (when I first got back from Canada) working on our wedding website with Brent- and I think it turned out pretty well. :) Brent has also been busy making the invitations and organizing the flowers and, in his spare time, he’s taking a course at Ryerson on the Canadian Healthcare System (to help him get back into school mode before he starts his masters in Australia next July).
Also, I’m sure most of you heard that Jamie is back in school now too! So instead of calling him at his office to say hello- I’m able to chat with him on msn while he is in class! :)
I’ve been keeping busy for the last month by going to see a lot of great speakers that have come to talk at the University. A few weeks ago I went to see Glenn Singleman speak at the Wilderness Medicine Society at the school. He is a University of Sydney Medicine alumnus, a doctor at the Sydney Adventist Hospital ED, a BASE jumper, and adventurer. He is also the world record holder for BASE jumping and BASE jumping in a wing suit (jumped off a 6672 metre Himalayan mountain in 2006). He’s also been on expeditions to Antartica, jumped of Mount Minto and Mount Meru and been a part of James Cameron’s deep sea Titanic expeditions. It was a really neat presentation, but can’t say that I’m any more inclined to get into BASE jumping after hearing him talk. A wing suit on the other hand… 
Speaking of nice dinners, my friend Jad (who I worked with at the beach) recently moved to Sydney to be with his Australian girlfriend. Coincidently, they ended up moving into a place about 20 minutes (walk) away from me and had me over for an amazing dinner last week (fresh salmon from the fish market!).
Although, I think I might also miss the weather. Our 3-month ‘winter’ is pretty much over already and we are back to beautiful, sunny, mid-20 days already (actually 31 tomorrow!). I was back in the pool swimming outside today—something I’ll never get sick of!
Well I better get back to my studying. We are learning about HRT, BPH, STIs and IVF these days. It’s pretty interesting since they are all very common issues. A LOT of our professors have been very passionate about their topics and several of them have told the women in the class (since most of us are now past the ‘ideal’ child bearing age of 24), on numerous occasions now, that we “shouldn’t be attending the lectures and instead we should be out getting pregnant”! Easy for them to say. We also learned some other interesting stats: apparently studies are now showing that babies of fathers who smoke are up to 10 times more likely to develop brain tumors in their lifetime. Eeek. Also, they say that couples who have twins are 5 times more likely to get divorced than the average couple. A bit of a sad stat- but I still think I’m super lucky to have my twin!
