Month: March 2014

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New Town, Stockbridge Market & secret gardens // Edinburgh walks

Last Sunday we took another walk around Edinburgh. The weather was too good to sit at home. Close to where we live we spotted another little car, just as last week. We walked through New Town, admiring the architecture again. Edinburgh New Town has such an interesting history. You can read more about it on the Internet, for example here. In short: Edinburgh used to be no more than a single street with high rise buildings on both sides which extended along the Royal Mile, with a castle propped on a rock which used to be a volcano. 35 000 of both rich and poor lived in the same tenement buildings and the city suffered from poor sanitation, overcrowding, crime and bad smell, hence it was named The Auld Reekie.  In the second half of the 18th century it was decided that the city needed a new start and a boost of its economy and New Town was commissioned. At the time it was the biggest urban development of this scale in the world, carefully …

Rural Bali see real Bali Munduk what to do in Munduk (25 of 25)

Destination 2014

After thinking about it for what seems like ages, we finally booked tickets this morning. (here’s a little photo quiz.. sorry to be such a tease) We’re going to Bali! It’s going to be our first ever trip outside of Europe and I’m super excitied. Bali seemed like an easy destination to travel to and ticked all of our boxes: sandy beaches, good food, friendly people, completely different culture to Europe, safety…I hope it will leave up to our expectations. We’re flying from Edinburgh to KL and then straight to Bali with Air Asia so I’m hoping we will survive this first long haul flight of our lives. We have to decide whether we want to spend any time in Malaysia as well but since we only have two weeks I think we may want just to go to Bali and then maybe Lombok or Gili islands. We have lots of planning to do so if you’ve been or read any interesting articles/ blogs about travelling to Bali please share in the comments! Here’s what …

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Edinburgh walks // Architecture

On Sunday after a long breakfast we headed off to wander around Edinburgh. We usually just walk in the residential areas, to discover how other Edinburghers live, to take pictures, discover new parts of the city. We started our walk in the West End and headed towards the Gallery of Modern Art (a must if you visit Edinburgh, even if you don’t like modern art, it’s a pretty perfect place to get away from the festival crowds and stop for an impromptu picnic). ^^ We stopped on Dean Bridge to take some pictures. And walked on towards the Modern Art gallery. On the left hand side I spotted this tiny bay window. On the grounds of the Modern Art gallery there were some interesting road signs. After turning right we ended up in the Mews area – the Edinburgh New Town mainly consists of grand tenement buildings and town houses. Mews are small houses built at the back of the grand rows of sandstone buildings. They used to be servants’ quarters in the past, and …

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A Piglet, a woman and a dinosaur

The title of this posts sounds like the 8th part of The Chronicles of Narnia, whereas in fact it’s just about some photos I took when I was learning about photography. When I received my first camera as a gift I was fascinated with macro photography. I would spend hours taking pictures of flowers, insects and frogs. I loved how much detail the pictures revealed: the texture not seen by the naked eye, the light playing in the contours and shapes of the objects I photographed. This fascination has now passed (fortunately, one can only take so many pictures of tulips and flies ). As I was looking through the archives of my analog days, I found those four pictures. One of them is a my friend’s ring, the other two are small plastic figurines, the piglet’s name was China and the dinosaur’s Józef. They remind me of good old high school days. Jozef’s party trick was standing on his head. #nostalgia None of the pictures were edited. They were scanned directly from the film …

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Switzerland in analog

8 years ago I decided to take a photography course in the Palace of Culture and Knowledge in Warsaw. This very unloved building, still a hallmark of Warsaw even though it no longer dominates the capital’s skyline thanks to the newly added sky scrapers, is home to various state- funded education establishments which remember the communist times as well as the janitors and dinner ladies in state schools. My course involved 3h of photography per week, including equipment hire, access to a studio and a dark room (for about £20 per year). My teacher was a nature photographer who travelled the length of Vistula river to create a series of photos of local birds. He had a ponytail and wore a classic fisherman’s sleeveless jacket with 100s of pockets. It was the best course I’ve taken in my life. Jakub and I started taking pictures with handed down Zenits and here is a sample of Jakub’s work from his trip to Switzerland in 2006. As you can see the scanner and Zenit added a bit …

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Currency of surgical placements / Medic diaries No.3

On Thursday I started my ophthalmology placement. I am based in a rather small district hospital and my placement mostly involves sitting in eye clinics and learning about eye examinations and diseases. I will also have to go to theatre 3 times during the next two weeks to observe eye surgery (which I’m dreading, it gives me chills to even think about someone poking an eye with a knife). Patients are usually awake for this as it’s sufficient to anaesthetise the eye and eye muscles to operate. I’m also going to observe cataract surgery and lacrimal duct surgery (tear duct leading from eye to nose ) for which I need to revise some anatomy. Surgical placements follow a certain pattern. Knowledge is your currency. If you come in to hospital early you have a chance to talk to the patient before the surgeons do. You know the patient’s case and can present on the ward round if your patient is an in-patient, i.e. stays in hospital before the operation. If it’s just a day case …

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Man batters fish // The best fish & chips in Scotland

This is what I googled last Saturday afternoon and that’s how we made a decision to drive up to visit Anstruther Fish Bar in the Kingdom of Fife across the Forth Bridge. Anstruther won the independent fish and chips award in 2008 and 2009 and according to the website this where you will find finest raw ingredients, cooked with skill and expertise to produce the tastiest fish and chips – all served with a smile and a dash of salt and vinegar (no vinegar for me though). Drive across the Firth of Firth. Remember that part of Ann of Green Gables when she says she’s afraid of crossing bridges but she has to look to make sure she doesn’t miss the moment when the bridge collapses? For some reason I have this quote stuck in my head. It was a beautiful drive via the Fife scenic route, about 45 miles from Edinburgh, up and down the hills with a frequent glimpse of the sea (as in pictures above). At first, we got a little lost …

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New York, New York

So, on Monday this happened. I can’t believe my luck.* A llama in Times Square, photograph by Inge Morath in 1956 [source] * the price is a trip to New York for two people, including flights hotel and car hire (not sure about the last one…do people even drive in New York?). The last thing I won in my life was a disposable camera in a contest about alcohol and smoking awareness in primary school…

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Medic diaries // no.2

Yesterday was my last day in ENT theatre. It was one of my favourite placements so far, with lots of surgeries and also some time spent in the clinic. The majority of ENT I saw was concerned with  hearing loss and surgery to treat that. There were operations treating glue ears in young children, eardrum reconstructions, lots of nose surgeries as well, tonsillectomies and some salivary gland tumours (not my favourite but I saw the branches of the facial nerve which was very cool). I find that surgeons and scrub nurses have a much better sense of humour than medical physicians. I’m not sure where it comes from, perhaps it takes a certain personality to become a surgeon or a theatre nurse.In every placement I did so far patients, medical and nursing staff constantly say things that make me smile or even laugh. Some things that patients say make lives of medical students difficult. Other things will make you smile or laugh and you’d be glad that someone has just brightened your 8h day in …

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Wooden desk makeover // Before & After

In 2011 we moved to a new flat (hardly new as our tenement building is from late 19th century but new for us) and  I was on a lookout for a wooden desk. I was studying a lot at a time as I just started med school and wanted a dedicated working space in our living room for my anatomy and physiology books. I looked at IKEA options, but I didn’t want a yet another chipboard piece of furniture that I didn’t love. Then Jakub emailed me a listing from gumtree advertising a solid wooden desk for £30. On a Saturday we drove to Duddingston village in Edinburgh to pick up my new desk and discovered that it was in serious need of some TLC. I’m not sure what kind of wood it was made of, it was stained a dark brown colour so it was clear it needed sanding and a new coat of paint. Here are before pictures (not a great quality). Initially I wanted to paint it white and add colorful drawer …