will you be the same as when i saw you last, tell me how much time has passed
I think congratulations are in order, because I have just survived what must have been the worst 4 days of my LIFE. Well, to be fair, the first day was relatively alright, but the subsequent 2 days were hell.. and the last day was just hellish because I got a grand total of 1.5 hours of sleep. No one should sleep so little! NO ONE!
And of course, those 4 days were the days preceding my Veterinary Anatomy and Physiology exam. Never mind that the entire VAP syllabus is probably about the same as A level bio and A level chemistry put together. Or maybe just slightly under. The first day I basically slacked around thinking there was time, and when day 2 rolled to a close and I'd barely gotten halfway to finishing... that was when PANIC started to set in and oh my god, it was not pretty =(
So to cut a long, painful story short, I basically freaked out more than your average person would. On a freak out scale of 1 to 10, I say I hit at least 15 because it was to the extent where I would just sit there and nothing would go in and all I could think about was how dead I was for my exam, and how there was no way I was gonna finish and how everyone else is super duper extra fast and I hadn't even completed revision proper... and to top it off I was damn jumpy and couldn't sit still and couldn't concentrate in the silghtest, felt headachey and couldn't even get to sleep because my mind was running so fast...
And oh gosh. I know I sound complain-y but those were literally the worst couple of days of my life here in Sydney. maybe even my life in total because it felt so awful to feel so totally out of control of the situation and so helpless... maybe it's 'only an exam' but I guess it really means a lot to me to do well because I'm doing something I love (well not the studying part. no one loves studying.) and I want to do it as best as I can? All I wanted to do was just fly back home and hug my parents and my doggy and it'd all be fine, but obviously that wasn't gonna be an option.
So yes, after Nervous Breakdown night, during which I pretty much bawled my eyes out, talked to my mom and bawled somemore, tried to watch an episode of How I met your mother so that I could calm down (It didnt work - plus halfway during the episode Marshall went to see a doctor and the doctor told him that he'd pulled his iliopsoas muscle (if that even exists) which only further reminded me of my plight coz i hadnt studied my muscles for the prac exam yet), tried to sleep and failed...
I pretty much got it together the next day and just studied, and thank god all those nervous jumpy emotions and sensations disappeared and I managed to push all that crap out of my head. So even though I slept at 5.30 am, and pretty much screwed up my prac exam because I hadn't studied properly for it (stupid muscles!!!!!) - the written turned out to be not so bad - not easy, but do-able. And it's 50%, which is a lot more as compared to the silly prac exam.
So THANK GOD I don't THINK I'm going to fail... I hope :/ But yeah anyway I always thought I was pretty strong but I guess when you're stuck in somewhere out of your comfort zone, 7 hours away from your comfort zone by plane, in fact, with no way of getting back (until a week later) - everything's very different. I mean I didn't know how much comfort being around my family and in my own home and with my best friends just a text message away would mean in times like these - all along I haven't been feeling very homesick but these few days changed that. Having family near your means SO MUCH and part of why I was feeling so awful was because i couldn't just go find my family and have them comfort me and make things better, like even simple things like cooking meals and my mom making me drink essence of chicken (eurgh) before exam papers... never realised how much I missed that, but now I do.
But hey, I chose this course and I'm still a hundred percent sure it's exactly what I want to be doing. Its insanely tough, even for students who are used to the singapore education system, but well like a lot of my friends here say - P's get degrees. Not that thats a good option or anything, but at the end of the day as long as you know your stuff.. you're pretty much set. Anyway I'm sure by next year I'll forget all about the stuff endocrine glands are made of but that's okay - the life of a practising vet is all one big open book test anyway, ahaha.
So yes, longgggg post - now it's time to get back to studying Cell Bio, my LAST paper on thursday! I can barely wait, because after that I'll be flying home! I don't think I've ever been this excited for the holidays, EVER! Never mind that the weather sucks and it's hot and humid and aunties will shove their way past me on trains; when the pilot announces over the PA that we're descending into Singapore, haha maybe I'll start tearing with joy :D Just 5 more days. I love Sydney, I really do... but home is where the heart is :)