One-Way Ticket

My last month in St. Maarten.

Benji and Meow-Meow have a one-way plane ticket outta here!

That’s right, I just bought a one-way ticket from St. Maarten to Miami and I just can’t believe it… finally, my last month on the island! There’s still a lot ahead of me right now as I prepare to take the next NBME comp exam next week as well as the Kaplan comp exams towards the end of the semester, along with two more quizzes and a shelf exam for ICM 5 in between. So now is not the time to celebrate just yet nor is it the moment to write a reflection piece about my bittersweet time on the island just yet, but it’s exciting to see the end of Basic Sciences just over the horizon.

In a little over a month, I will be in Miami for the next few months, finally uniting with my dear fiancee Irene. She’s going to be starting her clinicals soon and I will be studying for the USMLE Step I Exam, my one-way ticket towards residency. We’ll both be busy but at least we’ll both be together. Being so far apart for so long, we both deserve it.

Sunset at AUC

I remember first arriving here nearly two years ago with everything I needed packed neatly in one suitcase. My stuff here has grown over the semesters, and now I got lots of stuff I need to sell or throw out, and even more to bring back home. Because of this, I recently managed to convince IreneĀ  to come down to the island… “I need help packing!” I said. In reality, I just wanted to see her. So in two weeks, Irene’s flying down to the island to visit me during her break, just in time for our big Fifth Semester Party, a nice formal party with catered food and dancing at the Westin by the beach that our class is holding to celebrate the end of our journey together on the island, before we part our own ways to start the last half of our medical education. At the same time, it will be me and Irene’s last time on the island together as well. St. Maarten has been the place that separated us thousands of miles apart yet also the place that brought us together as fiance and fiancee. It’s a special place dear to both of us, and it’s good to be together here one last time before starting the new phase in our journey together.

So I’m looking forward to the last stretch of this journey on the island, however stressful or excited it may be.

In the mean time, I’ll be studying hard and enjoying the fascinating stuff I would have never thought I’d learn in class… did you know you can tell the difference between a baby being fed breast milk vs. one who has been fed formula, just by looking at their poop? Yeah, I didn’t know either until my professor pulled up two pictures side by side, showing comparisons on the big screen. That may come in handy during my pediatric rotation…

I won’t know til next semester…