It’s not language barrier but its skills that matters.

Becoming medical students, some of my friends usually end up asking me not to forget them, always saying that I was way better than them, I’m so lucky and all that (because, back in Malaysia, somehow people still regards medic students as the ‘clever’ one. To some extent, it makes me a bit fed up. Obviously, all of them didn’t know me better. To all that matters, I usually said back to them, doesn’t matter what subject you are in, it bears some significance in life. All those subjects are there for reasons and it certainly not as dump as you may think it is. If you trace the sources of one’s knowledge and capability, I’m sure you will find that at the root of it, it will always be someone or something that has been a good teacher to them. If everyone starts rooting for so called professional job, who will feed us our food? (In this sense, the farmer, since we-the-Malaysian obviously eat rice as our main food on the table).

I’m in my last cycle for this winter’s semester like everyone else studying here in Moscow. This cycle covers Gynecology, Reanimation and Surgery. It’s my surgery’s teacher that finally makes me realize it’s not language barrier that’s plague us the most here, it’s the teaching skills that matters (he’s teaching in Russian language. He can speak English of course but slower version compared to the mother tongue). There are a few of my teacher-doctor here that I really look up too, because in my eyes, they are so dedicated to their work as a doctor and at the same time, they really took the efforts to makes you understand what’s behind all the thing-disease-lifestyle that you learn here.

And at the top of the list is my 5^th year surgery teacher Бохарев (pronounce as bokharev). If you let me talk about him, I can go on for hours. He teaches us the concept behind all the disease that we learn (we can even formulate a diagnosis and the basic investigation even without really knowing what the disease is.. it really is a miracle since medic is all about reading and memorizing most of the time), he write his own questions from a diverse cases spontaneously (to force and makes us think like a surgeon) and ask us in class every single time he got chances (he’s a really busy surgeon. All the 3 phones in our small room keep on ringing every time but he doesn’t bother to take it at all since his attention at that time are exclusively OURS.. well, maybe a small portion of it is given to his 3 MO who keep on coming time from time and some of his suddenly critical patients of course). And the best part is the question is strictly personal for you only. No helps from anyone at all. And he don’t get mad at you if you answered wrongly. He got mad when we arrive at class at 8:58 when the class should started at 9am because he usually gives us one patient per person to check for at 8:55am.. you will starts thinking that he got mad because you disrupt his already hectic timetable when all that he thinks off is that you just loose the chance to get more patient for yourself. It’s the practice that makes you perfect. (he did said that to us at that time). Sometimes, he even tell us his experience as a fresh doctor.. so full with question, make mistakes but he said he’s lucky because his senior doctor teach him and help him step by step all the way.

We even got the chance to join the grand ward round here with the HOD (head of department)!! How cool was that? Even when the 2^nd surgeon on line after the HOD scolds him for talking with us (he’s explaining and teaching to us during the round), he doesn’t care! (For Russians, IT IS A BIG DEAL TO RESPECT THE LEADERS. They treat the HOD-kind of persons like some really honored man..) so when he still talking to us, it MEAN A LOT to us. He even help saving some of the newbie’s doctor when they got scolded by the 2^nd in line guy.. he’s so totally different from the HOD. Not only the HOD looks like Michael Douglas-Russian’s version, he’s so nice, smiling and talking nicely. The HOD really makes the place calm and peaceful. (where actually some of the patient are rather severe in Reanimation floor and surgical ward is one of the most-I’m-so-dead [for newbie’s doctor and patient] kind of atmosphere even back in Malaysia).

Saturday class is the best. We usually walks around the hospital (mind you. It really is a big hospital. They even have a place for helicopter to land for in front of the building we studied in – корпус 5). Having the first seat to see all this kind of medical cases is so damn awesome. There was this one time, while we were walking behind our teacher, me and my friend felt like we were the doctors in House Md series.. (^_^ hehe, just some wishful thinking). He still teaches like normal even if he comes straight from on-call..with that tired look on his face and big black eye bag, you really cant help but studying a lot more since that’s all you can do to repay the deeds of a-dedicated-senior-surgeon-teacher.

I’m not saying all this because I like him or worshipping him or anything, it’s the kind of attitude that I like so much. Here in Russia, you can have a very-not-teaching-and-lousy-doctor as a teacher and they sometimes don’t even care if you come to class or not.. and its so scary to have that kind of teacher. It really is a blessing to have a good doctor and a good teacher at the same time. And so, since I’m actually considering myself as a specialist/lecturer in maybe some 10 or more years (insyaAllah), I’m gonna take a bit from all my-favorites-teachers-style and adapt it as my own..

What’s good in having an awesome experience and great knowledge if you don’t pass it on??

>>>> here I put one of my inspiring short stories collection : A SPECIAL TEACHER.

Years ago a John Hopkin’s professor gave a group of graduate students this assignment: Go to the slums. Take 200 boys, between the ages of 12 and 16, and investigate their background and environment. Then predict their chances for the future.

The students, after consulting social statistics, talking to the boys, and compiling much data, concluded that 90 percent of the boys would spend some time in jail.

Twenty-five years later another group of graduate students was given the job of testing the prediction. They went back to the same area. Some of the boys - by then men - were still there, a few had died, some had moved away, but they got in touch with 180 of the original 200. They found that only four of the group had ever been sent to jail.

Why was it that these men, who had lived in a breeding place of crime, had such a surprisingly good record? The researchers were continually told: “Well, there was a teacher…”

They pressed further, and found that in 75 percent of the cases it was the same woman. The researchers went to this teacher, now living in a home for retired teachers. How had she exerted this remarkable influence over that group of children? Could she give them any reason why these boys should have remembered her?

“No,” she said, “no I really couldn’t.” And then, thinking back over the years, she said amusingly, more to herself than to her questioners: “I loved those boys….”

>>>> surah al-qasas [28:77]

‘dan carilah negeri akhirat dengan apa yang telah dianugerahkan kepadamu, tetapi janganlah kamu lupakan bahagianmu di dunia dan berbuat baiklah (kepada orang lain) sebagaimana Allah telah berbuat baik kepadamu, dan janganlah kamu berbuat kerosakan di bumi. Sungguh, Allah tidak menyukai orang yang berbuat kerosakan’