This one is for my old Interior Design peeps...seriously not as easy as you think.

Just start typing colors into the box given. If you've spelled them correctly according to their database, the word will be accepted automatically and you can just type the next one. Pretty neat test of our Crayola knowledge...

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Created by OnePlusYou - Online Dating Service

How Many Five Year Olds Could You Take in a Fight?

Fun little study break quiz.

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Created by OnePlusYou - Online Dating

Soccer and Shots.

The soccer game was super fun, and we had a nice little turnout of Ross students supporting the Caribbean teams.

Blue = Barbados, Green and White = Virgin Islands

Um, guys....goin' the wrong way....

The soccer game was super fun, and we had a nice little turnout of Ross students supporting the Caribbean teams.

Mark was the instigator of our sojourn...I think he misses sports in the States.

He also got a little enthusiastic about the $4 EC beers...

Stephanie, Sierra, Myself, and Jen enjoying the game!

No one seems to be able to handle my camera but me.

After soccer we took off to.....wait for it.....waaaiit.....ZIGGY'S! Of course, where else?

Jen pointing and laughing....hmmm....must be at Mark.

Mark, Jen and I. This would be the fifth shot taken...our collective powers seem to interfere with the camera's ability to function.

The guy in the foreground is another of the Peace Corps volunteers on our rock. His name is Jim, and he was the instigator of these Tequila shots.

Apparently, Jen is not a huge fan of Tequila. Tried to tell her.

The Gang...Mark, me, Jen, Steph, Sierra, and Jim (PC vol adopted by Rossies)

Friday = Free.

I have made it to Friday of Hell Week, and as a gift to myself I will be attending the Digicel Caribbean Cup football (= soccer) games tonight. Tonight's game is between the British Virgin Islands and Barbados. Sunday night is St. Kitts vs. Barbados...but that's the night before my Anat Lecture exam so I may not make that.

This will be my first completely local St. Kitts event, not tied to the school in any way. I'm super excited! See the news article below:

http://www.digicelfootball.com/en/news.php?id=269

Also in the news, the new SEVEN theatre movie plaza has officially opened! I have yet to experience a movie there, but plan on visiting sometime next week. Follow the link below for a few shots of the "before" theatre (which was in town, nestled among the other buildings) and the "after" theatre (which is a free-standing building located just down the road from campus/my apartment). Rather than reinvent the wheel (or 'blog'?), I just figured I'd have you check out Julia's blog about the theatre...

http://lifeonstkitts.blogspot.com/2008/09/new-movie-theater-on-st-kitts.html

As a side note, ran into the new 'gang' of Peace Corps volunteers Tuesday at the coffee shop. They are in their 3rd/4th week of training, and seem to be fitting in well (i.e. they haven't gotten back on the plane yet, a good sign). From what I understand, they will be living with a host family for the training period (about 6 weeks) and then moving into apartments for the duration of the 2 years. All of them seem to be teachers of some kind; one girl is in Special Education which I think is fantastic.

From what they've seen, the education system here is terrible. One of our professors was telling us that she attended a meeting with the British Head Minister (?) and one of the topics of discussion was education. It seems literacy is a very serious issue here (sadly as it is everywhere). A local woman who was on the panel approached our professor after the meeting and explained that it will be very hard to change the local view of literacy. Seems they are told from a very young age that when they read/learn, they take up room in their brain that can't ever be used again. They are encouraged to 'save' that space for more important parts of life. I haven't really confirmed this story, but it is very sad to consider. Guess it is a method of control over the population; discourage reading/learning and you discourage free-thinking people.

As to the P.C. vols, I passed along my contact numbers for the better taxi drivers, filled them in on the cheap/yummy food areas, and gave them my contact info in case they ever need anything. I hope they have as wonderful of an experience as I have had. This island never ceases to amaze me.

Breaking news....

My neighbor's place across the street was broken into last night. While this is a common occurance in St. Kitts - especially where students are concerned as we are all assumed to be related to Bill Gates - this was fairly close to home.

Our bedroom doors are equipped with keyed deadbolts so we can lock ourselves in when we go to sleep at night. Last night, my neighbors (who are in my semester) locked up the outside locks, and while one roomie locked his bedroom door the other passed out for a nap that lastest into the night. He woke up in the wee hours of the morning to find a guy in his room. Creepy! The guy drilled through their front door's deadbolt, then helped himself to my neighbor's laptop, wallet, and phones before being caught and chased out of the house.

What a way to start the day....

All the way to Hell Week...and not quite back yet.

It's Hell Week folks, that fun second semester hazing ritual in which we all sit around stunned and wonder when the upperclassmen and professors are planning to jump out from behind things and yell "Surprise! You're on Candid Camera!"

Schedule of events:

Monday 9/22...........Physiology 2, Exam 1
Tuesday 9/23..........."Day of Recuperation" (AKA Day of Panic)
Wednesday 9/24......Parasitology, Exam 1
Thursday 9/25.........Gross Anatomy 2 LAB, Exam 1
Friday 9/26..............Gross Anatomy 2 PALPATION, Exam 1
Monday 9/29...........Gross Anatomy 2 LECTURE, Exam 1
Tuesday 10/07.........Immunology, Exam 1

I realize the last two aren't technically this week, but really folks. Cut me a little slack on the technicalities and look at the Big Picture.

I have been seriously fighting the urge to crawl into my closet, curl into a little ball, put on my headphones, and let the week pass me by.

The sailors say Brandi was a fine girl.....

What better way to celebrate St. Kitts' 25th Anniversary of Independence from the British than to inundate the island with lots of drunk, horny British sailors?

The Royal British Navy landed a ship here yesterday morning, and the sailors wasted no time finding Ziggy's and getting properly hammered.

A few of Britain's finest decided to join in the volleyball fun.

This was my friend who was particularly 'friendly'. I got offered a tour of the ship but chose studying instead. They'll be back next year....

The previous weekend we celebrated the beginning of the semester with a proper get together at Reggae Beach on the peninsula. Sponsored by the scuba club, this event was all-you-can-drink for $20 EC. Which is, of course, the best way to attract a crowd.

Dr. Danny is our Gross Anatomy course director/professor. He came out to judge some contests and quiz people on their anatomy. I believe there was a wet T-shirt contest that got a bit out of the hand with the anatomy. Notice the scapula in my hand. Pictured: Nicole, myself, Dr. Danny, and Cora.

Nicole and Mark showing their Rock Star-ish-ness. Nicole has it down, Mark is still in training.

Dr. Danny giving us the peace out. Before the wet T-shirt contest, I'm sure. Note Sexy Steph just behind Dr. Danny.

Cora, Nicole, and myself enjoying some all-you-can-drinks.

Update on the sickness: the cold has officially left my head and has since taken up residence in my lungs. I have been entertaining (and I use that term very loosely) my classmates with drawn out hacking coughs that are never-ending. People cringe and slowly back away from me muttering things about mandatory TB tests and parasitic lung worms. I have finished a bottle and a half of Robitussin DM in the last two days. Don't even need the little dosing cap anymore, just sort of guesstimate.

And I leave you, once again, with a picture of beautiful St. Kitts. This one was taken from my back porch just before sunset.

Pretty gorgeous, huh? I love it here.

Have a great week everyone....check back in a week or so to see if I made it through with all of my marbles intact. Toodles!

Lemongrass Goodness.

My minor head cold has progressed into a full-blown obnoxious case of alternative sneezing and coughing with a little runny nose thrown in for laughs.

I went to the Shak Shak today for some tea, forgoeing my normal order of iced coffee. The lovely ladies at the Shak Shak noticed my sniffling frog-in-the-throat voice and did not even offer the tea box for selection - they had something special for me.

I watched as they grabbed a handful of what looked like long blades of grass, rinsed them off, stuffed them into a cup, poured a nice helping of honey on top, and then added hot water. Without even asking what medicine man concoction they had handed me, I was off to class with my theraputic mug of yummy goodness.

Upon reaching class and opening the lid, I was immediately overwhelmed with the scent of fresh lemons. I have since had two helpings of this elixor of the gods, and am feeling better than I did drugging myself with Tylenol Cold meds earlier in the day. Still sneezing up a storm, but no more abnoxious coughing or stuffy head.

Move over Teavana!!



Love my hand-made sippy-cup.



I think I want to start a little garden of lemongrass at home! I highly recommend it!

Saskia is fascinated that C1q->C1qr2s2->C4bC2->C4b2b->C4b2b3b->C4b2b3b5b67->C5b6789n leads to lysis of a bacterial cell.

So simple it's almost retarded.

As scared as I was at the beginning of the semester, I am very much in love with immunology. This semester is really telling me that my future could very well lie with infectious diseases, public health, etc. Stay tuned.


As to the above heading, that is the classical complement system that works in conjunction with your antibodies to head off invasion of pathogens. It's really quite neat, in a totally "micromanager" kind of way. Here is a fun little video that shows the process with neat little 3D models:





You can really give yourself a major headache if you stop to think about how minute of an action it really is for these silly little plasma proteins to swim around in our blood and chance running into each other to build these slightly larger complexes that can then find their way (again by chance) to some nefarious microbe that they will bind themselves to and proceed to burrow a fun little hole into it's side. But not just one hole, oh no. These nasty microbes can deal with one eensy weensy little hole. No, these complement proteins have a system for making many many holes all in a relatively short period of time. Once their main protein complex is built, they can just continue to make the same "tail" portion over and over, which breaks off and re-attaches to the microbe's cell wall to build the little hole. The official term for the hole-building portion is the Membrane Attack Complex. Don't know why I love that. The Membrane Attack Complex (MAC) inserts Over and Over and Over until the cell essentially fills with extracellular fluid and lyses (breaks open and dies)!

The other mind-blowing portion to all of this is the simple (or not so) ability of the complement system to recognize pathogenic cells. Could you imagine if your body couldn't recognize what cells were it's own versus invaders?! (I smell an autoimmune disease in our midst!) Your body would essentially attack it's own cells and you would die. Crazyass stuff.

Alright, that's all I've got for you tonight. I'm busy fighting off an infectious agent of my own...a nice doozy of a head cold. Nothing that a little NyQuil can't fix. Sometimes you just can't wait for your body to get into gear.

Note to self: Do not get sick enough to be "admitted" to island hospital.

As an avid reader about infectious diseases in third world countries, I am familiar with the concept of sub-par medical facilities. My experience last night made a concept into reality.

A very close friend called me last night, asking for a ride to the hospital because he had been feeling ill for the last couple of days and had recently begun vomiting blood. I rushed over to pick him up and thus began our 5 hour tour of the St. Kitts hospital system (and I use the term "system" rather loosely).

Upon arriving at the hospital, we were greeted by...nothing. No reception area, no signage, just a door to the left marked emergency. Inside there was the remnant of a reception desk that I am sure at one time was used as such, but not for some time. People filled all of the chairs in the large reception room, perhaps about 40 people total. No AC, no open windows for ventilation, no air exchange whatsoever. I tried my best to limit touching anything - including people - to a minimum.

After waiting around 45 minutes - asking for help twice - our other friends finally arrived who took it upon themselves to turn the hospital upside down for a doctor. By this time our school nurse, previously unavailable for "personal reasons", had contacted the hospital and made sure to inform the doctor that we were there and needed to be seen ASAP. A nurse ushered my friend into a back room, whereupon the entire waiting room erupted into a riot about the stupid white kid getting helped before them. Never mind the fact that I had already mentally triaged them all, and I promise you he was the worst of the bunch. But we were white, and therefore devils. It was a rather tense hour.

My friend had a 103 fever, and was admitted to the hospital for tests and fluids. What can I say about his quality of care? Let's just say, I won't be running to the hospital any time soon. And sterile does not seem to be in their vocabulary. And nasal gastric tubes don't require any anesthetic agent to insert. Wow.

Long story short, my friend recovered after two nights of fun on the St. Kitts hospital's private ward. The nurses were quite amused at the sheer number of students that came to visit him. He was released Saturday, and is doing very well now.

For those of you who are curious about what caused the hematemesis? The best answer we could get is irritation/erosion of the lining of the esophagus or stomach. I was shooting for Dengue fever, especially after he broke out in a rash while waiting for his IV to be put in...but alas it is merely GI upset. Guess we'll just have to keep waiting to see who breaks first with a tropical disease!

The Unveiling.

All it took was a night at home alone and 4 Caribs....but the room is clean, neat, and tidy. Well, except for the bathroom. What?! I can't reinvent the wheel overnight.

Here are some pics for those of you sitting at home dying to see where I now live. The sheets are a St. Kitts specialty, since my bed is conveniently a queen size and I was expecting a double. A nice surprise despite the need to spend terrible amounts of money on very low thread-count sheets. With flowers on them. Almost too chipper for my mornings.

The bed of a 12 year old girl.

Door to the bathroom and to the right of it is the closet.

Desk/chair at left, typical St. Kitts dresser on right. And by typical, I mean made with such quality that the two bottom drawers fall straight off their glides if I open them farther than 4 inches.

Bathroom ceiling, super fun. I tell you it's everywhere!

Tried to get a good shot of my shower. It's not very easy in such a tight space. Essentially, I could fit my entire lab group in there....should I be so inclined. Ha ha.

Walk-in closet.

Shelving on the other side of the closet, lots and lots of storage space!

Week 2 and still alive.

So I've already broken my promise and went three days over my proposed blog-writing schedule. Sorry.

A few updates...


The White Coat Ceremony was held the first day of school, and my precious little vet preppers from last semester were officially inducted into The Welcome-to-the-Rest-of-Your-Life-HA! Club. Little do they know what is in store for them....

Kristen (#3), Chris, and Nicole. Triple Dose of Trouble.

I finally took a few minutes and snapped some shots of the apartment. I have a STOVE!! Yay for baking! So far we've had very few problems (knock on wood)....the plumbing is a bit noisy (I can hear the kitchen water gurgling in my shower) but otherwise all is good. I especially like the ceilings, which are like that throughout the apartment (even in the bathrooms!). I haven't taken any shots of my room yet; as most of you who know me know, I take my time getting sorted in new environments. Translation: my room is a mess.

Not a great environment for anyone on LSD probably, but it works for us!

Living room. Spacious enough for us not to tumble over each other. The TV is just a prop, no cable and we can't get the DVD player to work. The couches all fold down to flat pillow-top beds. And under those horrendous covers they are really quite nice-looking. Maybe we'll bother to take the covers off one of these days.

View of living room/kitchen from the K/Cristin's wing. You can see my room's door just to the right of the kitchen. I have putrid hospital green curtains.

Our fabulous ceiling!

In keeping with my attempt to be more open and get to know more people in life, I have met a number of nice nubes (short for newbies) through Jen. The firsties are an interesting bunch; most are seriously young (fresh out of undergrad) and act like they've never had to work hard a day in their life (in school, that is). They already have one prof ready to fly away (quite literally). Normally this semester is typically the largest due to May/June being when people normally graduate, however this group of firsties is abnormally large at 137 people. They are literally falling over one another. It will be interesting to see how their semester pans out.

Also through Jen I've met another current vet prepper in her class named Mark. Mark's birthday (23, what a young'n) was this past weekend, and we celebrated by attending Mr. RUSVM on Saturday night. Mr. RUSVM is a pageant of sorts held each semester. One male is nominated from each semester of students and they compete pagent-style. The judges are made up of professors from Ross. Things can get quite interesting, and as always in life...sex sells. Mothers, you might want to sheild your children from the following pics.

This is James, our semester's contribution to Mr. RUSVM. Here he is displaying his goods for the Swim Suit competition.

Apperantly he wasn't being entirely honest with his "goods". And yes, he threw that sock into the cheering crowd. Mmmmm.

It's getting hot in there. Gotta grab someone's beer.

This was a 'member' from one of the upper classes. His mother should be proud.

James in the talent portion of the night. He sang Total Eclipse of the Heart with gusto.

One of the upperclassmen, who had to be carried on-stage. He sang Under the Sea.

Evening Wear and final interview. I think the bowtie really spruces up the speedo.

Some final group entertainment.

Sadly, our James did not win (his title was certainly stolen from him). The guy in pink above won (3rd semester, I believe).

Back to Mark's birthday. Since I have a nice gas stove to work with now, I attempted to make Mark as birthday cake. As always, to make things hard on myself, I chose to make something from scratch. And even more difficult, to make Angel Food Cake from scratch. I call it "Ghetto Food Stamps Cake". I had to make a number of substitutions due to living on a rock in the middle of the sea AND choosing to bake a cake on a Sunday afternoon when NOTHING is open.

For those of you who bake (Tanya and Karola especially!), here are a few substitutions I made:

Recipe called for......................My substitution
Cream of Tartar.................................White vinegar
Vanilla Extract....................................Vanilla Rum
Sift dry ingredients with sifter.........Sift dry ingredients with a collander
Bake in a round bundt pan................Bake in a square cake pan with coffee mug in the middle

Initially the cake seemed to be coming around nicely. It didn't rise as high as expected, but the crust on the top seemed promising for success.

Action shot of cake cooking. The cup kept migrating up as the cake expanded. Hope there wasn't any lead paint present.

Post-bake shot of cake with cup.

Dissection of cup successful.

Mark at the ice cream shop with his cake and balloons (the people running the shop gave them to him...I love the color, goes great with his eyes).

Action shot of Mark cutting his cake. It was pretty spongy and resistant to cutting. Not a good sign.

Lateral view of cut piece showing completely NOT cooked well insides of cake. Despite this, these three hungry vet students ate every bite. Mark even had seconds, though I can't be sure that wasn't just an attempt to make me happy.

Myself, Mark, and Jen. Overall a successful birthday.

Just as another example of the twisted island I live on....

"A friend" went to the ATM the other night and got quite the surprise. Having just deposited his financial aid check, he was expecting a nice wad of cash available at his fingertips...somewhere in the ballpark of $15,000 EC. It seems the bank had another number in mind:

Yes, that is ONE MILLION THREE HUNDRED AND SEVENTY NINE THOUSAND THREE HUNDRED AND FIFTY TWO DOLLARS. And twenty cents. Converted to US, that's $510,871.18. Unfortunately for my friend, the next day his account was back to normal. But for that few hours, he was a millionaire!

And with that, I sign off. Hope all of you have a wonderful week! Until next time, I leave you with my view at lunch this afternoon:

Don't hate me. I only get to enjoy this less than one hour a day. If I'm lucky.