FRIDAY!

Hello all,

So it's finally the end of our first week, and I think I speak for all of us when I say I am absolutely exhausted. We are not used to being on our feet all day, nor are we used to being on our feet all day in the heat. This is definitely a good taste of what rotations will be like in our third and fourth year of med school, and it makes me grateful that we still have one more year of classroom-style learning (I'll probably want to take that statement back once second year starts....).

I am blogging on my lunch break...I was on OB/GYN all morning (again). Today is my last day of SCHEDULED OB/GYN, but I have a feeling I will go back everyday I am here for at least a couple of hours every afternoon. I have learned SO much already about life in labor and delivery, and I don't want to leave my friends there! I have become close with a couple of the interns as well as one of the attendings, Dr. Kruipa. She is 26 but already at the top of the food chain! This is because they do not go to undergrad and get a bachelors degree, students just go immediately into medical school which lasts 5.5 years, with the last year being their "intern" year. For us, our intern year comes AFTER we get our M.D., so it's slightly different. The interns here, however, do EVERYTHING - they deliver most of the babies and stitch up all of the episiotomies and just take care of checking on all the patients. The attendings oversee everything, but they don't have to get their hands too dirty unless there is an emergency. Speaking of getting your hands dirty, let me just say I have never seen so much blood in all my life...after the delivery, women lose SO much blood! And it keeps coming well after the delivery. I can't remember the exact amount, but I know pregnant women have a very large blood volume, I just had no clue it was THAT much additional blood to the point where they lose over a liter during childbirth and are still fine after! Sorry if that's TMI....

This weekend we are opting to stick around Vellore and see what there is to do in this area. We are planning to watch Twilight (1 AND 2) tonight because they said last night on TV that they would be showing them back to back tonight...we are also planning on ordering in ice cream from room service....HOW EXCITING! It's really funny because whenever an American show is on we get super excited. Yinan and Rasika have become faithful Dexter watchers every night at 10 p.m., and Sarah, Shivani and Caitlyn have been loving watching American movies on HBO. Jen and I only recently plugged in our TV, and we prefer watching Indian MTV - Indian music videos are, in a word, hilarious. We just lay there and crack up the entire song, none of which we can understand, but their costumes and dances are definitely very different from American-style music videos. Tomorrow, some of our Singapore friends are going to what is called a "hill station" - it is basically an area higher up in the mountains where it is cooler, and super pretty! I am going to email one of the girls about it, but we may also choose to do something a little bit closer (they are going to a hill station two hours away). I would love to find a hiking trail and go up in the mountains, so I am going to ask around today aobut that. And on Sunday, as Jen said, we are going to try and see the new Pirates movie....should be interesting to see what movie theaters are like in India!

Time to get back to my babies! Hope the weather is nice back home....

Alexis