Medicine - study, study and study

I started my first week with enthusiasm and full of expectations. I was to attend multiple welcoming lectures to the subjects I am going to study this year, including anatomy, histology, biophysics, latin and first aid. During this time, I also had the opportunity to meet the rest of my classmates, the group of people with which I will hopefully spend the following 6 years. What shocked me the most was the fact that there is so many Slovak people studying medicine in my “class” as well as the whole faculty.

Moreover, the first two weeks could be characterised by one word, and that is chaos, because at first, nobody was sure where to go, when or what to bring for a lecture. On the other hand, this was a learning experience, as we visited most buildings of the faculty, learning the position of every subject. Upon this and a few “shortcuts”, which lead to a late arrival, I managed to orientate in the complex domain of the faculty.

In regards of the university accommodation, I temporarily chose to live at the dormitories 17. listopadu. Although I was a little skeptical at first, because most of my classmates lived at the Kajetánka dormitories, my choice turned out to be the best possible, as my net travel time to the university is only 20 minutes, which is only a half of what my classmates have to sit through to arrive at the faculty.

Adaptation to the university lifestyle has not been the easiest for me. The greatest challenge has been the fact that in order to get to my morning classes, I have to get up extremely early. I was used to working very late and getting up much later, so I had to significantly alter my daily habits. To my surprise, I was able to get up early without any problems after a month of such university schedule. Another change that occurred was the fact that I had to start cooking for myself, however, I never had an issue with cooking, so it has been again only a small variation in my daily routine.

I expected to have an immense amount of work at this university, so I mentally and physically prepared for sleepless nights, which have by the end of the first week became reality. The covered themes are very broad and one has to spend many hours studying them in order to be able to both understand and memorise them. Despite the academic difficulty, I remain positive and optimistic, because I still believe that medicine is my future, and to achieve it, I will do everything in my power.