Mantoux Test

Mantoux test is a test for tuberculosis. The test involves injecting a small amount of tuberculin (an extract of the causative bacteria) into the forearm skin, and the skin reaction measured 72 hours later.

This is the staff nurse who administered my tuberculin injection.

The nurse said the injection itself is quite painful, and claimed that she was quite nervous administrating Mantoux test for a "doctor".

It's an intradermal injection, meaning the stuff is injected right under the skin.

The injection site is left untouched for 3 days; no soap around the injection site during shower. The site is inspected and interpreted by an experienced medical personnel after 72 hours.

The skin reaction on my forearm, 72 hours after injected with the tuberculin.

Simply put, the induration (the reddish hardening) on the skin is measured to arrive to the diagnosis of tuberculosis. An induration of 10mm or more in people with no BCG scar indicates a positive reading for tuberculosis. In most people who are vaccinated against TB and hence, a BCG scar is present, a reading of 15mm or more is needed to indicate a TB infection.

8mm!

My skin induration measured 8mm (and yes, I do have a BCG scar)! That means I don't have TB! Fuhhh... On why I did this test, that's a story for another day!

What Happened Last Month?

The past August was the exam month, that was what happened. It screwed the life out of many of us. I still couldn't find the momentum to blog as a result of "Bitter August 2007", that's how screwed I am.

Of course, the pressure started long before August. Didn't really celebrated my birthday this year (which was in July). But I get dinner treats (quite a few of them) at...

San Francisco Steakhouse @ Mid Valley

TGIF @ Section 14

Steamboat dinner @ Taman Putra, Ampang

Choy Kee's Crabs

Dim sum breakfast at Seremban's Min Kok restaurant

And some presents too! Rachel got me Adidas running apparels, and my sis bought me a bluetooth headset. Seen quite a number of people using this, but too bad my sis got conned. She paid over RM190 for it!

Bluetooth headset from iTech.

I also get a 1GB of RAM upgrade for my laptop, from a previously meagre 256Mb. The improvement in processing speed is totally unbelievable!

Kingston's 1GB of RAM power!

So far so good yeah? Here's where all the good, superficial fun ends. Superficial coz I couldn't get rid of exam stress out of my skull despite being showered with gifts and good food. Here come's the depressing part.

Most of my time were spent nesting in my room, studying. Reading through notes, textbooks, talking to myself, rehearsing stuffs, touching my own bodily parts as though I was examining female patients... and when the stress climaxed, I got creative! I turned the air-cond to the lowest temperature with maximal fan speed, and put on thick winter clothing. And pretend I was studying in the winter...

Stuffed myself with tidbits and cookies and more cookies when burning midnite oil!

I tried changing my hairstyle... and ended up looking like a bloody clown:

I tried growing a goatee, ended up being called a perverted-goat:

I fell sick, and made new friends with Panadol Actifast and Strepsils Extra Strong:

Tried to study in bed numerous times but would konk-out within 5 minutes, without fail...Aaah I miss my king-size bed in Seremban!!!

It didn't help being pestered by your own uni for making the next semester tuition fees in the middle of a major exam! Wait one week later also can die like dat!

Having the company of a few close friends clowning together throughout the study break was what sustained me. Without these monkeys, I'd definitely gone bonkers.

So here's to you guys! Cheers, yum seng, gan bei, whatever! May we all pass through this final hurdle to our MBBS.

p/s: Why such a depressing post ended up being so gay? (gay as in cheerful merry gay, ok!)

New Toy!

I'd got myself a new toy yesterday! It's a very sleek, black, flip-phone from Motorola! It's very much sleeker than the reputable Motorola V3i! It's horrendously stylish, too!

Why another phone? Reason is, my mistress gave me a new SIM card which is under her supplemental plan. Which means calling each other is much more cheaper than the previous arrangement.

Why this phone? Need I say more? Read first paragraph!

Most importantly, acquiring this phone didn't burn a huge crater in my wallet! It's dirt cheap when you compare the "style-to-ringgit" factor. This is an original set with a 1-year warranty from the authorised distributor. I'm gonna refrain myself from divulging it's feature-packed functions. A brand new V3i now retails for RM599. Can you guess how much this black-devil cost me?

This brings my total handsets to a whopping THREE! Why I need so many mobile phones, hor? Kay, let me explain (see pic below). The old Nokia is for SMS, I dunno why but with minimal credit top-up, I get 200 free SMS-es for that number. Not that I SMS much also!

The new black-devil, as previously mentioned, is to call my mistress. Not that we have very much to talk to each other, also! And the Sony Ericsson W880i is to house my primary mobile number. Thank God for Call Divert function, I don't need to carry all three of them when I go marketing! LOL!

Running Apparels

Got these running apparels as birthday gifts (which was 2 months ago). Didn't blog about it then coz were having exams. So before the "someone" who bought me these presents gets frustrated at me for not wearing them, I shall display it on my blog. Heheh!

adiStar running vest - RM125.91

Adidas RSP running singlet (RM44.01) and shorts (RM62.91)

They are bought from the Adidas Factory Outlet in Jaya Shopping Centre, Section 14, P.J. Everything here are priced 40% lower from other Adidas outlets. I've seen the same adiStar vest selling for Rm199.90 in Mid Valley! With these running apparels, I can easily add 1km/h to my top running speed! Wind tunnel proven!

Sick!

Fell sick last week, on the second day in Batu Pahat - headache, fever, grossly enlarged and tender cervical lymph nodes, nothing serious but headache was decapacitating. That came after starting my running schedule, after some 2 months of hiatus. Thought all was well till today, when I started training in gym. Again, same sh*t different day. Headache, fever, humongous lymph nodes. No thanks to tonight's IMU BBQ nite! Had to cut short my on-call justnow. Sigh... must be some nasty viruses!

IMU's Babi-Q Nite @ Batu Pahat

On the other hand, the past weekend was very very very very very unproductive! Spent the whole Saturday and Sunday watching a Hong Kong drama series. All 35 episodes in two days!

It's called Dicey Business, starring veterans Bobby Au Yeung and Michael Miu. Have two more HK drama series in my hard drive - don't think gonna start watching either anytime soon. The "chase" is very addictive. Making me feel like a yellow-faced housewife. Haha!

Cameron Highlands

My one week's break is officially over at the stroke of the midnite! How depressing! So let me recapitulate how I spent three days of my precious semester break... if the title hadn't gave it away, I was in Cameron Highlands. Driving up Cameron was easy-peasy provided you don't follow the Malaysian roadsign.

The conventional way is to exit at Tapah and endure the vomit-inducing winding trunk road up Cameron. Being the smarty-pants I am, I did a little googling and found out the Simpang Pulai exit is a better alternative albeit farther. The journey took us about 4 hours, including a 30-minute break at Tapah R&R.

Rachel booked a room in Equatorial Hotel for two days. Since it's weekdays, the room was priced at RM250++ with RM88 credit per night for hotel food, of which RM44 is deductable from the hotel rate if none of the RM88 is used. Since it was so bloody confusing, we went ahead and used up all the RM176 worth of credit. More on that later.

Equatorial Cameron Highlands - viewed from Kea Farm.

The room.

Panoramic view from the balcony - click to enlarge.

Hotel gym and swimming pool.

The room was okay; my only gripe is that the bathtub outlet is half blocked, resulting in flash flood whenever one takes a shower. We headed to Brinchang town for lunch after checking-in. It was a cut-throat lunch.

Omelette.

King's Pork-ribs (pai quat wong).

Flied lice.

Three simple, inexpensive dishes totalling RM41! Bloody hell. If any of you guys decides to go to this Chinese restaurant called Silverstar or something (which also serves steamboat), better go elsewhere.

Later that night, we went back to the same place at Brinchang, but a few restaurants down the road. Restaurant You Hoo was packed with customers, so we headed straight into it.

Restaurant You Hoo.

Tao miu - not sure what it is called in Enggerish. This dish no pork!

Sweet and sour pork.

Guinness pork ribs (hak beh quat).

Steamed tofu with minced pork.

Our dinner here totalled RM40, inclusive of two glasses of herbal tea. Now you say Silverstar Restaurant cut-throat anot? Cut leh... told ya! We walked around the area after dinner, and bought 1kg of dukong langsat and mangosteen each. Both are priced at RM3 per kg. Cheap cheap!

Fruit stall at Brinchang.

Although hotel regulations state that no mangosteens (and durian, jack fruits, and pets) are allowed into the room, we didn't care. We were on holiday! Heheh...

But we did take extra precautions so that the bed sheets are not stained with mangosteen juice, else the hotel staff might think of something naughty. The mangosteens were fantastic! They are 100% sweet, all 1kg of them. I downed the whole 1kg worth of mangosteens into helpless empty pericaps within the same night!

The rest of the night was spent watching TV and snacking.

Here's our personal mini-bar!

Equatorial is situated just next to Kea Farm, which sells fresh vegetables, fruits, flowers, food, plants, etc etc. It's like a pasar malam (night market), just that it opens only in the day.

Strawberry plantsCactuses

We also visited the Time Tunnel, which is essentially a mini-museum.

Here's a video of koi fishes taken in the Time Tunnel. The swimming pattern of koi fishes is simply majestic:

Rachel insisted we visit the tea plantation, so we took a 20 minutes drive to the Bharat Tea Plantation at Tanah Rata.

Bharat Tea Plantation.

Lunch at Bharat - Lemon tea and scones. Two glasses of lemon tea cost RM6.

Scones - RM12 for two.

On the way back from Bharat Tea Plantation, I noticed a sign board that says Hospital Cameron Highland. Decided to have a peek, who knows there might be a job oppurtunity! Haha!


We had lunch at T Cafe, located above Marrybrown at Tanah Rata. This place is easy to miss as you drive pass the busy road.

Mushroom soup.

Sirloin steak for me.

Chicken chop for her.

On our way back, we dropped by Strawberry Park Resort, and snapped loads of photos. Some are rated XX and thus are not published here. Hehe...


We decided it was enough for the day until we discovered our hotel is also next to the Butterfly Park. The bed just had to wait... one more destination to go!

The first creatures that greet you at the Butterfly Park are not a butterflies or moths, they are these:

Clockwise: Scorpion, centipede, gecko, milipede.

Clockwise: Tortoises, leaf-like insect, stick-like insect, three-horned beetle.

A variety of frogs and toads. But the one that caught my attention was the one at bottom right. Can you make out the larger brown-coloured frog? It's labelled as the Malayan Hored Frog (or is it Malayan Horned-Frog)?

Iguanas! Jurassic creatures! Still no signs of butterflies...

A variety of slimy snakes.

And then, come the butterflies...

And more flowers...

This is called the bird of paradise. Exotic eh?!

We had hotel food for dinner; at the main restaurant called the Coffee Shop.

Beef bacon salad with shredded eggs.

Rib-eye steak for me.

Nasi Bumbu Hijau for her - very tasty.

And another helping of Chicken Kebab for us! I feel fat!

The next morning's breakfast was also at the Coffee Shop - buffet style. Actually hor, the buffet breakfast here cannot make it lah, but since we have remaining hotel credits, we gasak only la.

Nasi Lemak with beef rendang.

We checked-out after breakfast, visited the Kea Farm again and bought loads and loads of fresh veggies, and 2kgs of dukong and mangosteen each! I'm fully recharged for Batu Pahat already! Hahaha... who am I kidding?!