~JcZw

Carolling at Quality Hotel with the church today. I was the only one from my rather expansive family to take part. Even more ironic was that I'm the one with the closest exam =X Infernal bacteria. And their antibiotics.

Much smaller group than last year, but still quite high nevertheless. A lot of people came to watch and to take pictures. And we sang our lungs out heh (No splitting into sections dealing with your own particular range here). On the whole, a good show, and more importantly a good testimony to what we believe in =)

Group pic at the end of the thing.

But the new thing this year was going to the blocks opposite to sing. They were of the older variety, small flats occupied with a variety of people, but mainly the elderly. I'll long remember singing songs like "you yi jian li wu", talking to them, reaching through the grills of the house to shake hands with them. We sang for near an hour straight until our voices all became quite strained. The image of singers nodules floated unwanted into my head.

God bless these people and keep them healthy, even in their immunocompromised days.

Had a more sobering experience on the MRT ride home. Was on the train from City Hall back to Kembangan when a man shuffled into the carriage looking for a seat. I remember him very clearly - brown sandals, olive green Converse satchel, black cap and clutching a box of Ferraro Roche tightly to him. No doubt a Christmas present to someone he cared for. He found a seat and sat down, not a big deal since the train was pretty empty (Because everyone was at parties, according to Dezhi).

A very ordinary scene at this time of the year.

Except his face and arms were criss-crossed with angry nodules and swellings, across his lips and his ears, twisting his fingers. The people who were near him imperceptibly shrank away. The old man next to him looked him up and down. I would be lying if I didn't admit that the sight made me feel uncomfortable myself. I could only think of mycobacteria or hypertrophic scars as a cause. But there you have it. We study about all these terrible things in the textbooks but nothing quite prepares you for the real thing, as we used to discuss back in SJ.

Just an ordinary guy, with his own programme, his own ideas, and definitely, from what he carried, with his own friends and loved ones much like any of us. But a guy whom some might say got a raw deal with life.

It was a harsh reminder of my reasons for wanting to do medicine, and what the job entails. Ultimately, it's for these people whom the various bugs and pathology indiscrimnately attack that we mug.