Today, the fate of about 20,000 medical graduates will be decided in what could be best described as a complex interplay of luck and computing. I’m more concerned with the fate of some 8,000 foreign medical graduates (of which I am a subset of) – for we have it the hardest. The culmination of years of patience and practice finally dripping down to this state where your chances of being matched are directly related to:
- The probability that the program remembers you through an interview you probably gave 3-4 months ago
- The probability that the program actually ranks you on their list
I’m fighting for 63 positions for which, probably, about 600-700 people would have applied. I don’t know what will happen 2 hours from now when the results come out but I needed an outlet for my frustration/anxiety/panic attacks/you-name-any-emotion-here
Some questions that were tormenting my mind were:
- Will I match?
- Where will I match?
- What visa will I get?
- When should I start booking tickets for India? What should I be shopping for parents/friends/girl friend?
- What if I don’t match? Another year stuck here?
- If I don’t match, I’ve got a mid-term exam tomorrow – will have to push my mental balls for that one
- If I match, do I need to finish off my current graduate studies?
- If I don’t match, how will I finance my graduate studies for another year?
and the list goes on… I’ve spent the better part of the last 24 hours cerebrating about these and more, leading to what can be best described as – “stress related diarrhea” (Had to make the post funny). Actually, could not sleep till 4 AM last night just because I was too excited about the results.
I’ll be recording my reaction to the match result email and post it here in another 2-3 hours. Look out for it and wish me luck.
Tags: Medical
In the times of recession saving every bit of money you can counts. Consider something that we are forced to do every month and bleed through the wallet to pay for it – Hair grooming. Yes, that little chore that I used to do every month in India for about 50 cents a month. Now I pay about $19 for each trim (including tip – yeah apparently in USA the only profession that does not get a tip is Doctors.. hehe)
Its not like I have other choices – There’s a chop shop on campus and around the street which offer cuts for about $10 (tip is optional) but I don’t trust their quality and I’ve got to walk or take a bus to reach there. The saloon that I go to is right in my apt’s basement and gives a good cut – for a hefty price though. Well what do you do? The internet comes to the rescue. A quick Google / youtube search for “how to trim hair at home” shows a myriad of videos – a majority of them are for women only. How’s that for equality of sexes? A quick link for stranded people like me would be at expert village. They’ve got some good hair grooming tips and videos to get you started.
Well anyway, in about 20 minutes after I write this post, I’m heading to walmart to get a Wahl Deluxe Chrome Pro hair grooming kit for about $40. I figure that if I do things right, it’s going to pay for itself after 2 trims. My biggest peeve right now is to trust Nazneen to trim my hair. More pictures and video’s will follow in about 3-4 hours – depending on how things go 
Here’s a quick post from the archives regarding one of my previous experiences with hair grooming.
