Holidays, SSC and Portfolio

Hi to all!!

I am finally in Manchester after a long trip in Spain for about a week. It is extremely tiring and I promised to myself not to do such a long trip ever again. You guys might have already knew that I was on a trip to Italy for about a week as well. Came back to Manchester for about 3 days to re-pack my stuff and then continue with my journey in Spain. Sounds crazy, huh? I think no one has ever matched a two weeks trip as I am. What a 'good' way to spend your three-weeks of Easter Holiday. And not to mention the money in my account as well.

In the garden of Al-Hambra, Spain

A lot of academic works was waiting to be completed by me. These works was supposed to be done during the Easter. But, as a 'normal and average student', I did what a 'normal and average student' does - procrastinate my work. Which ends up leaving me with a heavy burden to finish up all my work in a short period of time.

SSC is one of the tedious homework that I need to do. Luckily, this is a group work, so the tasks are divided among us and I only have to make sure that my part is done. I really hope that my group will do well in creating the poster and also during the presentation day.

Then, there's the portfolio. As a medical student in the UK, we are obliged to have a portfolio not only during our studies, but it will be continued until we are in the real settings of the medical field. Portfolio is a written record of what we have learned so far, any skills that we have performed and any memorable experience in the medical career. It actually helps us to assess our development from day one of medical school until we are retired. The problem is, I'm not the kind of person who likes to write and record any experiences that I had. Therefore, I had to write up all the things that I have learned the whole year in just 2 days!!

PBL can be set aside for a while. I haven't even open my PBL book after I got back from holiday. I think the other medical students, apart from the ones who are really nerd, are in the same situation as me. Everyone is focusing more on SSC because we need to submit it on 5th May.

In all, I made a promise to myself to not have a long two weeks of holiday in Europe again. One week is still OK, but two weeks is just too much. And never ever procrastinate my work again (Hmm..heard that sentence before).

Gelato Or Ice Cream?

Some of you guys might have already knew that I was on a trip to Italy for the past 8 days with one of my course mates and two new-found friends. How was the trip? it was a blast! We went to all of the interesting cities and places that Italy could offer. However, exciting details of the trip will be written in the next entry as I am extremely tired right now due to the long-hours of walking during the trip and I really need a good rest now, badly.

But, in this auspicious time of the day, I decided to spend some time to write on one particular detail that we really loved in Italy - Gelato! OK, I know most of you guys out there do not know what Gelato is. And maybe some of you never even heard of that word before. Now, let me explain it here.

Gelato is actually Italy's own version of ice cream. And yes, therefore it is only available in Italy and any other versions of Gelatos outside Italy will not taste the same. It's not the same as the ice cream that you guys had in Moonlight or Treats. The difference between Gelato and normal ice cream that we can find in supermarkets is that they are very silky in terms of texture, much softer and smoother and it comes in a wide variety of flavours, even the ones that you never imagined!

The most common flavours that I can find in Italy are chocolate, fruits salad, caramel, milk, yoghurt, vanilla, strawberry, coffee, and mint. There's even some shops that has after eight-flavoured gelato! I know my housemates would love to get a taste on one of those.

Everytime we went into a Gelato shop or kiosk, we would buy different flavours from one another and then we would compared it among us. I tried all of the flavours and they were some that I like the most. One of my favourites is the fruits salad gelato. It is made by mixing all types of fruit to get that exquisite sour and fresh taste. Shahira likes to try all sorts of flavours and I think she really likes the caramel and mint ones. And she would always be the last one to finish her Gelato because she loves to savour it thoroughly and slowly. Mayura's favourite Gelato in Italy was the yoghurt-flavoured gelato. People who knew Mayura really well would know why she loved that flavour. :p And Fiqah's favourite Gelato was the Amanera (cherry-flavoured).

The price of Gelato varies between places. The cheapest one that we had were in Venice which only costs about 1.30 Euros. And the most expensive one that we could find was in Rome which is 3 Euros for only one scoop! It was really disappointing for us as well because it was difficult for us to find a Gelato shop in Rome, considering that it is the main attractive place in Italy.

If I counted it correctly, I think I had about 7 Gelatos in total during my whole stay in Italy. But it's still could not match the Gelato-fanatic like Mayura who had 9 Gelatos in 8 days!

Shahira and I with our last Gelato that we had at the airport

Mayura and Fiqah at the airport

I really missed all of the Gelatos that we had in Italy. It was well-worth the money and I hope that someday I could make my own Gelato and savour it till the last bit!