Sublimation

As Freud has pointed out, there exists some mechanisms of defense. Among these mechanisms, sublimation is probably the best one for the development of mankind and society. It converts the socially unacceptable attitude into a praised behavior. The most interesting (and probably most worrying) example would be it changes a sadist to a dentist. People will pay you to be inhumane.

Living in a field so strange, I can at least tell a few examples of people doing great things because of the mechanism. But it is better not to do it for the reason that Batman has suggested in The Dark Knight. "Sometimes truth is not good enough. Sometimes people deserve more. Sometimes people deserve their faith rewarded." They should imagine that all of my colleagues and seniors are born to be something good, free of insane ideas, and ready to save their lives for the sake of humanity.

Speaking of Batman movies(again), do you notice that the motive of Bruce Wayne is at first for an ungraceful revenge? In the world of Christianity, it is actually not quite a moral attitude, but then, he has sublimated to become a fearful one to the bent cops and the mobs. He might not realize himself, but he is perhaps one of the few who can turn the anger to the correct targets. If he ever should fall and get into a slightly deviated track he would immediately become someone like Bane, or Joker.

Harvey Dent was a failed example. He might at first sublimated his inhumanity to become a White Knight. However, pushed by the Joker, he put his guns towards the wrong targets. "Madness is like gravity, all you need is a little push." The Joker expressed how hard it is to maintain the sublimation.

The Batman Movies are never a mere superhero film, like Avengers.

10

人生有幾多個十年? The exclamation, or the question has been echoing in my mind after receiving a call from a distant friend in US.

He is Michael. He is the long-awaiting man for me. I have not seen my best friend in my childhood for more than 10 years. Until last year which I could barely find his name from Facebook and added him, I never had a contact with him. In the years of Information Technology, I have to admit that I am a man of poor communication.

Things have become practical. He asked me if there is any job available for him. I then realized that he is a graduated man. At the same time, I am still struggled in the medical school fighting or begging for a mere pass. KY told me the reason that he would not come back, was indeed he found a job in US, which made him stay there.

But then I wish I could tell him how much I miss the old days. Things have really changed. My voice had become so deep, my mind so torn apart by the stressful life here. But then, all I wanted is the blue moon over our head, with us playing freely in the park between our homes. Our lives might be as short as the burning candles in the Mid-autumn festival, our lives are brighter than the fire.

Epistaxis

You are the minority if you never have nosebleed in your lifetime. 90% of people in their life would have epistaxis. Despite a terrible bleeding, it is also the bleeding that usually does not require medical attention. Do you remember you have attended a doctor because of it? I hope you not.

I used to have a lot of nosebleed in primary school time. My mother never got me to the western doctors. Instead, she got the secret formula from her friends to make some soups with strange taste for me. I had not choice but to take all of them. Really I got less and less nosebleed as I grew up.

So as most of my classmates in the primary school. I still remember how exciting it was when someone in the class had nosebleed. Everyone would look at him and gave him tissue paper (if any), asking him to clamp his nose for sometime. The class would halt for some time, and then resumed. It was quite enjoyable, as I did not like class very much. Some chaos were funny to me, and some of my naughty friends in the classroom.

Oh, why do I remember such a minor thing in my life? I should have been focus on the examinations this year and prepare myself, instead of keeping myself in the mood of nostalgia, hanging around for the old memories.

Perhaps there is nothing minor when you were a mere kid.

Noodle

The standard food for a normal university student in Hong Kong is instant noodles. There is no doubt of it. It is fast and it is cheap, so as life as a student.

My roommate and I used to buy instant noodle in bulk, for the reason that it would be very economical. Also, as my consumption rate is terrifying (which I am not sure if I have a good appetite for the instant noodles, or the noodles has too little to offer in each pack), I often need to buy every week.

Everyday I cooked myself for a lunch or a dinner with instant noodles. If you consider that putting a piece of noodles inside a bowl of boiled water and then waiting for 3 minutes is defined as cooking, I have become a master. Moreover, I tried many ways to improve the quality of soup by reducing the amount of the water used. In a way, I know how much favoring to put to make the best soup.

Gradually, I am used to having them and I wonder if I have any good meals during school time. Well, if there is any good food, I will not remember them at all. Until one day, I can't endure the Korean brand that I used to and I go to the supermarket to search for other brands. Actually there are quite a lot that I never tried. Thousands of flavors in the world I have not tried. And I just stuck in the world of indulgence.

Back

After the attachment to the most stressful military unit in the army, I went to a unit with truly quality of life.

"Please do two things in these two weeks." The head of the unit said. "Enjoy our unit because it is enjoyable. At the same time, please learn something as well."

Why it is enjoyable? Because we do not really have a lot of stress in this week. Some say you need some stress so you can learn something. Not really true. We are already under immense stress in the previous time with the stressful unit and we don't need more of it. Stepping a bit back, I know that learning is interesting again.

"The unit is about clearing something from many tubes in the head. That's almost everything of it." A tutor told me. It is simplistic and true. You don't have to worry about being bombarded, which caused frequent headache and nightmares.

Stepping a bit back more, I ask myself if a good doctor should have a healthy mind before saying he can help patients.

Bale

Talking about the Christopher Nolan's Batman trilogy, we could never miss Christian Bale. How much do you know about him?

Despite having a American ascent and playing a role of American superhero, he is in fact a man from Wales. But it does not matter, Americans do not mind who will become Batman, as the film stressed, everyone can become Batman. The director Christopher Nolan is also a British, by the way.

Bale did want to play Batman in the series, but he said he will want no more. Therefore, as we can see, The Dark Knight Rises will be the last film that features Bale as the Batman.

Concerning about the the possible appearance of Robin, Bale did voice out that if the helper of Batman should appear in The Dark Knight Rises, he will not play Batman in the film. More interestingly, Robin is the favorite character of Bale, and he did once nearly act as Robin in the Tim Burton's Batman series!

Looking heroic in the film, Bale seems flawless. But again you will be amazed that before Batman series, Bale was famous of being a psychotic billionaire in the film American Psycho. This nearly banned movie featured the very insane, very heartless, and very hopeless Bale.

P.S. In The Dark Knight, Harvey Dent asked Alfred if Rachel did have any psychotic boyfriend in the past that he should be aware of.

Alfred replied "You never know."

Order

Today I nearly made a grave mistake in the calculation for the hostel association. As a treasury, my responsibility would be keep the account safe. I nearly failed the trust from Mr. Hui.

At first I thought I made all the calculation, based on the assumption that the money we had would be similar to the money we had had a year before, which was around ten thousands.

However, I realized that I missed some vital items which could change the balance completely. For example, I did not state the complete money that I had claimed from the University, which was not a small sum of money. Also, I did not state that I had returned the money to the members of the association, which was again, not a small sum of money. At the same time, I nearly missed the point that some generous professors did sponsor our events, which was again a handful of money.

Putting it altogether did I realize there should be something more in the account. The difference could be around ten thousands. I was panicking in my room, feeling so helpless. The order that I thought to exist disappeared, and I understood what the Joker meant in The Dark Knight: 

Nobody panics when things go according to plan, even if the plans are horrifying. If I tell the press that tomorrow a gangbanger will get shot, or a truckload of soldiers will get blown up, nobody panics. But when I say one little old mayor will die, everyone loses their minds!

We built our society and our government to reduce disorders. But with these institutions and authorities, we seemed lost our ability to combat uncertainty. Even worse, we strengthened the authorities so we destroy the opportunity to change.

I suddenly reckoned how Henry Tang said when he was still a High official.

P.S.Sorry to make a lot of reference from the Batman series these days, but as I have said, I would like to devote some space to the masterpiece.

Rebound

The issue (http://kkpoon329.blogspot.hk/2012/07/ethics.html) that I previous mentioned has provoked a wave of problems.

The story began with a statement. It said A --> B is true and asked for our response. We had a few choices, namely Strongly agree, Agree, Neither agree nor disagree, Disagree and Strongly disagree.

While the statement is not valid (instead of contradictory, as suggested by some of our sophists), I did have no choice but disagree with it. But whether I should strongly disagree with it, which I believe will spend most of my life to do it, or just disagree with it by clicking the corresponding button, I choose the later one for the sake of efficiency.

But then the teacher did not like it, especially when 83% of the class disagree with him. "Have you chosen the wrong profession?" This is his point of view.

I am not sure. But in case of 83% of our classmates did not agree with him, there are but many solutions. He can arrange a patient-safety tutorial for us, which surely yields disappointingly with our changed learning style. And of course, it is not cost-effective.

Concerning about cost-effectiveness, patient safety in itself is about cost-effectiveness. We spent a lot of time to take care of patient, optimizing, or even maximizing the resources to provide the best care for most of our patients, based on the Utilitarianism. But with the ethics of Kant, we are not doing quite right, as we treat everyone base on this principles.

Oh, we are talking too far from patient safety. But it is perhaps more important than discussing how invalid this statement it is, which I believe is high school students level.

Spinning

While I am so attached to the Batman trilogy, I made use of my limited time in weekend to revisit Inception.


The ending is no longer ambiguous, and I am no longer skeptical. I believe that Coob has arrived again back to the reality, but that is not important. For two reasons from Michael Cane and Christopher Nolan himself.

In September 2010, Michael Caine, explained his interpretation of the ending, "If I'm there it's real, because I'm never in the dream. I'm the guy who invented the dream."


Nolan himself noted that "I choose to believe that Cobb gets back to his kids, because I have young kids. People who have kids definitely read it differently than those who don't". He indicated that the top was not the most crucial element of the ending, saying "I've read plenty of very off-the-wall interpretations... The most important emotional thing about the top spinning at the end is that Cobb is not looking at it. He doesn't care."


What is more important is we don't care about the struggle. We live on our own, be if realities or dreams. When we sleep, we go to one world, and when we awake, we go to another. They might interfere themselves, but it is what we want us to do matters, rather then where we do matters.

I think this is what Christopher Nolan wanted to say.

Castle

Before I entered the castle 5 weeks ago, I thought I could be a Harvey Dent. In the castle we can still find the hope to live and the reason the cheer.

But then, I know I was wrong. "You thought we could be the decent men in an indecent time." In the castle, everyone is bearing immense pressure, for whatever stupid reason. They said, being a soldier is always hard. I don't see the life is that hard in other places. Soldiers are busy in other castles, but they can mange to have their own lives and interests. In here, what else could we be, apart from being a military officer to be ordered to kill, or to be killed?

Oh, I just realized. This is really a castle. Whoever think they can become the best soldiers would try their best to enter this castle, but when they realize that the life in this castle is so tearful and bloody, they have no choice and leave. That's why it is called a castle -- The outsiders is barred to know the truth, so as the insiders, who never know how a soldier should have.

I missed the other place so much.

Greatness

Our SSM group led by KH had the honour to have lunch with two professors from Paediatrics in a very afternoon, to celebrating our publication in HKMJ.

We actually shared a lot of funny past of ourselves, most of them related to education. With education, our young professor SL disclosed his life as medical students in other CU located in UK.

We talked about the trend of elite students being admitted to medical schools. "In my CU, the students aim for a pass, saying that 'Anything more than a pass is a waste.' The school is undoubted overrated with the attitude as such. But then they still managed to get the best students the UK, and the rest of the world!" Our young professor said.

He may be puzzled about the attitude, but the truth is that we never know how much to pass and many people will still try their best to prepare. Of course, failure will be ensured if someone does not prepare enough for the pass.

We talked about the sister school on the other side of harbor. "Of course we are a better medical school because I am involved in the teaching!" He said. "Perhaps they are more systematic in answering clinical questions, it is not what how excellent they do in the examination, but what they do that define." Just a modified quotation from Batman.

We come back to our CU. "Previously we have admitted a young girl with outstanding public exam performance, how is she?" He apparently has not gotten update a lot from the news, as we all know, the phoenix has gone from the fire.

One of us mentioned. "That's actually good for her overall. With the first encountering of failure, she will only learn truly how to fly." Do you remember the quotation from Rocky? "It ain’t about how hard you hit; it’s about how hard you can get hit, and keep moving forward."

Actually there are not a lot to know this.