red sky

so i had one of those moments where i took a late afternoon nap after work and woke up around dusk to this. i totally freaked out 1) cause i couldn't tell if it was morning or night, and 2) i thought i was in the middle of a tornado after watching storm chases or some shit on discovery recently at the gym. i remember we had a sunset like this in new york towards the end of june on the same night that we happened to go to that open bar housestaff welcoming party at, oddly enough, red sky. also oddly that night, minhee cried. anyway, all was well as no tornado hit downtown madison (although one did somewhere in the surrounding counties) and i'm perfectly fine. well, not exactly perfectly fine, but that's other shit i have to deal with.

dairyland

for the most part, all is well in america's dairyland. been hit on by two old gay men. still have the occasional teary-spell when i look at old pictures and think of where i should be. but overall, madison's not a bad alternative. heart's still a little broken, so that clip-art is staying on the background of my shitty lg flip phone for a while. i'm kinda like that girl from dance party usa who was so obsessed with prince that she wore a fake tear on her cheek until the day she actually met him in person (or some other stupid shit like that. i actually think her name was 'princess' but, yeah, not gonna go there.)on the other hand, had an awesome squash curry with chicken from what's touted as the best laotian food in the city, lao laan-xang, at the atwood summerfest street fair. did not disappoint. was a little weirded out by the near-east madison hippies, but didn't take any videos of them dancing cause i thought that might have been a little exploitative.

had my first shift of paid work at the madison va hospital last friday. surprised no one asked what i was. well, i guess someone did ask where i was from, but i kinda eschewed the racial undertones of the situation and just said 'new york.' otherwise, not much different than my experiences in the manhattan va, now with the bonus of an awesome view (lake mendota. the awesomeness of the view is kinda compromised by the overcast day, but i'll replace it once i get a better pic).

there are, however, definitely ways in which madison is different from new york:
- went drinking for some dude's birthday at the mall
- no filipino nurses in the hospital
- less body dysmorphic disorder
- polite homeless people
- college football

i'm sure i'll add more to this list throughout the year. wish me luck.

memento

since i want to recap some of my move, the first couple entries might be a bit memento-like with flashbacks interspersed with present day shit. will definitely not be as cool or interesting as the movie though. so as my flight on midwest airlines (i know, i hadn't heard of it before either) was approaching milwaukee, this is what greeted us.

ominous, no? still managed to take this picture. what's eerie is that the previous night i had a dream that my flight had crash landed and exploded because of a novice pilot. wtf? anyway, the plane landed fine with no hullabaloo. after the 3 hour layover and the short 20 minute shuttle, i ended up safely in madison, just blocks away from this:

pretty, right? that's a shot of the memorial union, the only student union in the country that serves alcohol. not exactly a good sign for my detox plans, but whatever. when in rome.

hello wisconsin!

four years since my last post and my how things have changed. for one, i not only completed my intern year (at beth israel, new york), but also an entire ophthalmology residency (at nyu/meeth). i'm sadly no longer living in new york and have instead relocated to beautiful madison, wisconsin, where i'm now in fellowship. four years. a whole new world.

life here is not so bad. the lakes are beautiful. watersports are abundant (haha). people are nice. i have a lot more free time on my hands (evidenced by my facebook status updates and regression to this blog). and the food is good. recent discovery...

squeaky fresh cheese curds. suffice it to say people are a little larger here than they were in new york. more to love, i guess. anyway, i could wallow in my sadness and ramble on and on about how i miss new york. but that wouldn't be very mature now, would it? instead, i'll just try and move on. i'm not good at hiding emotions, so my degree of apathy should directly correlate to the amount of messages i post. let's see where this goes.