(From Tammy Chin)
Our stay in Vietnam this weekend was eye-opening. Before we went, my supervisor was telling me about his stay in Ho Chih Minh for a conference. He told me how busy the streets were and how crossing the road takes audacity. When we got there, I could see exactly what he meant. Scooters occupied places where cars couldn't and stop lights were rarely seen. The cyclists had face masks to keep from breathing in the very polluted air. People buzzed by about five inches from the taxis, and the best way to cross roads, we learned, was to walk steadily and confidently, not stopping or running so that the vehicles could see us passing by. We couldn't believe that Ho Chih Minh was one of the more developed and modernized cities of Vietnam because its living conditions were not the best. The streets were more crowded, less clean, and construction went on in the middle of the roads. The place was definitely more local and had fewer tourists. I saw many cripples hobbling on the streets and the housing looked more cramped. It seemed that health care there needed to be greatly improved on. The people also frequently stared at us, not used to seeing tourists around, and when we went to the Cu Chi Tunnels where the Vietnamese troops hid during the Vietnamese War, we saw a very prejudiced video about "cruel" Americans. We definitely felt out of place. Mary and I did touristy things and visited historic buildings/tunnels. We also ate delectable Vietnamese food, of course: pho, Vietnamese pancakes, spring rolls, salad, sugar cane juice, etc. I definitely enjoyed my time there. Seeing the rural countryside on Sunday, the rice plantations, and the farmers with conical hats during the two-hour drive back to the airport really provoked a peace of mind, and it was a great end to our venture to Vietnam.
I am about to finish my work in the lab. My last day will be Tuesday. All the work that I've done will be presented to my colleagues and supervisors Monday morning during our biweekly lab meeting. I have slowly but surely learned much about researching in an infectious disease lab, and I have grasped the methods of basic lab procedures. Hopefully by Tuesday we will have two samples sequenced. This week, we were having trouble seeing the PCR products for all five fragments of the Dengue virus genome on the gels, but things are looking good now. A recently graduated Duke alumni, Joseph, came on Monday to replace me in the lab. He will be spending a year here before going to medical school. I am busy teaching/supervising Joseph and writing a protocol and template for all the work that I've done so that Joseph will have no problem sequencing the rest of the Dengue 2 viruses.
Outside of work, this week I tried stingray for the first time. It tastes a lot like fish. I also tried a uniquely Singaporean dish called Bak Kut Teh, a peppery soup with pork ribs, pig trotters, and a tropical fruit here called Rambutan. When you've finished your bowl of Bak Kut Teh, the waiters come by and pour you more, which I think is an amazing service. The look of rambutan is very strange. It's small, red, and has lots of spikes, but it tastes pretty good. It's very similar to lychee. Singapore's independence day is in the beginning of August, but people apparently begin preparing very early. Singaporean flags are draped all over the condos and tjavascript:void(0)he streets have been decorated with lights. It's very pretty here at night. Walking through another dorm on the way to/from work every day, I see students building these very elaborate wooden floats, and it's been fun seeing the progress done on them. Tomorrow, some Duke friends and I will be going up to the north of the island to wakeboard. It will be my first time wakeboarding! Later on, there will be a dinner for incoming and current Duke students that I'm attending. Hopefully I can make the incoming Dukees more excited to come in the fall!
Friday, July 11, 2008
Thursday, July 10, 2008
A Vietnam Trip
(from Mary Bohan)
We found a very reasonable flight to Vietnam last week, so we went for a short trip overnight over the weekend. It was really interesting, it definitely made me realize a lot of the things I take for granted in Singapore but the people were all very friendly and happy. I definitely stuck out a lot more there, strangers would come up and say hello or just stare at me all the way down the road, little children would come up and wave, and I even saw the tour guide of a vietnamese tour guide speaking Vietnamese to the group and pointing to me, and they were all giggling, we still have no idea what was going on. We went to some caves that were from the Vietnam War, but what we didn't realize was that they were where the Americans had massacred a village, and the presentation was a bit biased, talking about the "brutal Americans" who murdered their innocent mothers and children, and bragging about the booby traps that killed the soldiers, it was definitely interesting to hear from their perspective. In terms of healthcare, it was clear that they didn't have the same level of care as in Singapore, there were no major modern hospitals that we saw, and even within an hour of the city everything got very rural.
This week I've been working on a powerpoint of all of the different strains of Dengue and Yellow Fever, looking into what enzymes can be used to cut the sequences to study the desired regions, which has been very tedious. My supervisor Azlinda is going to use this next week when she begins to clone the cells and the actual experiments start. Apparently I came at a bad time in terms of actual work in the wet lab, within the next month they will be running real experiments, but I definitely learned a lot from the work that I've been doing, and I've found that I'm much better at analyzing things and researching than I am at performing actual work in the lab.
In terms of my work in Singapore I'm done as of today, I'll be stopping by for a few hours tomorrow before my flight and then hopefully the Friday or Saturday when I return as well, just to say goodbye to everyone, I'm actually sad I'm leaving, everyone has been so great here! In India I'm hoping to work in Shishu Bhavan, which is an orphanage run by the MC, or Prem Dan, a convalescent facility, both of which were recommended by a friend from Duke as well as some family friends who had gone before. I was told to also try to spend a day in each of the facilities, just to get a taste of each, so I'll try to do that if I can. Apparently at the orientation on 3pm on Friday they explain everything to you and you can pretty much work wherever you want, but sometimes they will try to lead you towards working at a certain place that is understaffed that week so we'll see.
We found a very reasonable flight to Vietnam last week, so we went for a short trip overnight over the weekend. It was really interesting, it definitely made me realize a lot of the things I take for granted in Singapore but the people were all very friendly and happy. I definitely stuck out a lot more there, strangers would come up and say hello or just stare at me all the way down the road, little children would come up and wave, and I even saw the tour guide of a vietnamese tour guide speaking Vietnamese to the group and pointing to me, and they were all giggling, we still have no idea what was going on. We went to some caves that were from the Vietnam War, but what we didn't realize was that they were where the Americans had massacred a village, and the presentation was a bit biased, talking about the "brutal Americans" who murdered their innocent mothers and children, and bragging about the booby traps that killed the soldiers, it was definitely interesting to hear from their perspective. In terms of healthcare, it was clear that they didn't have the same level of care as in Singapore, there were no major modern hospitals that we saw, and even within an hour of the city everything got very rural.
This week I've been working on a powerpoint of all of the different strains of Dengue and Yellow Fever, looking into what enzymes can be used to cut the sequences to study the desired regions, which has been very tedious. My supervisor Azlinda is going to use this next week when she begins to clone the cells and the actual experiments start. Apparently I came at a bad time in terms of actual work in the wet lab, within the next month they will be running real experiments, but I definitely learned a lot from the work that I've been doing, and I've found that I'm much better at analyzing things and researching than I am at performing actual work in the lab.
In terms of my work in Singapore I'm done as of today, I'll be stopping by for a few hours tomorrow before my flight and then hopefully the Friday or Saturday when I return as well, just to say goodbye to everyone, I'm actually sad I'm leaving, everyone has been so great here! In India I'm hoping to work in Shishu Bhavan, which is an orphanage run by the MC, or Prem Dan, a convalescent facility, both of which were recommended by a friend from Duke as well as some family friends who had gone before. I was told to also try to spend a day in each of the facilities, just to get a taste of each, so I'll try to do that if I can. Apparently at the orientation on 3pm on Friday they explain everything to you and you can pretty much work wherever you want, but sometimes they will try to lead you towards working at a certain place that is understaffed that week so we'll see.
Thursday, July 3, 2008
Responsibility, Simplicity, and Construction
(From Tammy Chin)
In the lab, I’ve been trying to find the right conditions for thermal cycling of the PCR reactions for the fifth fragment of the Dengue DNA. I had a meeting with my supervisor, Eng Eong, another principal investigator of our lab, Subhash, and some colleagues at the Genome Institute of Singapore Wednesday afternoon. They gave me more efficient primers and enzymes to work with and through their supplies, today I finally successfully amplified all the fragments (there are five total) of the Dengue genomes. With only about two weeks left, I will not be able to finish sequencing all the 50+ DENV 2 isolates but will certainly have a methods report done and some isolates sequenced. This entails doing as many DNA amplifications, gel electrophoreses, DNA extractions, and sequencing forms as possible before I go, all while wrapping up my work in a report that Eng Eong will guide me with next week.
Over the weekend, we went to Pulau Ubin, a nice little island to the north of Singapore. Cycling through the terrain was something I missed from childhood. Biking downhill with the wind in my hair and just letting the wind guide me, was such a relaxing feeling, and it reminded me of how places stripped of urbanity and technology are just as refreshing as bustling cities and how simplicity is still such a welcome concept. Our three hour long trek through the dirt trails and granite roads of the Singapore that used to be, of the last few “kampongs,” or villages that originally populated Singapore, was breathtaking. It was a nice piece of lived history, with its rubber plantations, durians along the road that people picked and placed in their baskets, wells for water, and noisy electrical generators. Many elderly people sat in stands alongside the road, offering “refreshing cold drinks” to us exhausted bikers. I admire these people who have lived on this seemingly deprived island and live without material luxuries that people only a 10 minute bumboat ferry ride away probably would never imagine being able to survive without. The people on the island are friendly and cater to you, whether in selling their food or their bikes or in providing you with a basket when they see you with purses (which I definitely thought was a nice gesture).
I’ve noticed that there is an enormous sense of community here in Singapore. People graciously give their seats to the elderly and to the stressed out moms with their tiny children on the MRTs and buses. From the posters of statistics plastered around construction sites, I know that the workers also believe in safety first and pride themselves on the minimal number of accidents and lost hours at the sites. MRT stations also repeatedly show clips that remind Singaporeans to keep Singapore safe by doing their part in watching out for suspicious activity on the trains. With adages such as “Low crime doesn’t mean no crime” on the walls of the MRT stations, Singapore knows that unity is essential for a prosperous country. People are actively helping make Singapore better. A sense of responsibility is well-established here, from the “act responsibly signs” on the tracks of the MRTs, the daunting ads that illustrate what could happen (a world of darkness) if we consumed all the energy/natural resources of the earth, of course the infamous fine signs for littering, chewing gum, spitting, smoking, and the list goes on. Souvenirs with the tagline, “Singapore: a fine city” and the red “no” symbols, crowd the shelves of every tourist location here.
A few nights ago, Mary and I ventured off into the city after working in the lab. We went to Lau Pa Sat, “the largest remaining Victorian filigree cast-iron structure in Southeast Asia” with stalls galore, selling from stingray to stinky tofu, all at affordable prices. Right next to it was Satay Street where meat kabobs were sold with cucumbers and onions and a peanut dipping sauce. The signature satay was delicious. We also went to see the famous Merlion, but unfortunately it was covered in green due to construction. It seems like Singapore is constantly being remodeled. Everywhere you look, you see cranes and workers in hats and boots with pedestrian walkway signs pointing to the allocated pathways. Every day, we walk past a construction site where a new MRT station will be built. It is located right next to wear we live (and we sigh at the government for not constructing it sooner). Here a new MRT station, there a new shopping mall. Here a new casino, there a new Universal Studios. It seems the country is trying hard to revamp its older buildings and attract tourists.
In other news, Mary and I will be soaking up more of the Southeast Asian culture. We're getting up before the sun rises Saturday to visit Ho Chi Minh. Exciting! I'm sure there will be many experiences/cultural similarities & differences to share.
In the lab, I’ve been trying to find the right conditions for thermal cycling of the PCR reactions for the fifth fragment of the Dengue DNA. I had a meeting with my supervisor, Eng Eong, another principal investigator of our lab, Subhash, and some colleagues at the Genome Institute of Singapore Wednesday afternoon. They gave me more efficient primers and enzymes to work with and through their supplies, today I finally successfully amplified all the fragments (there are five total) of the Dengue genomes. With only about two weeks left, I will not be able to finish sequencing all the 50+ DENV 2 isolates but will certainly have a methods report done and some isolates sequenced. This entails doing as many DNA amplifications, gel electrophoreses, DNA extractions, and sequencing forms as possible before I go, all while wrapping up my work in a report that Eng Eong will guide me with next week.
Over the weekend, we went to Pulau Ubin, a nice little island to the north of Singapore. Cycling through the terrain was something I missed from childhood. Biking downhill with the wind in my hair and just letting the wind guide me, was such a relaxing feeling, and it reminded me of how places stripped of urbanity and technology are just as refreshing as bustling cities and how simplicity is still such a welcome concept. Our three hour long trek through the dirt trails and granite roads of the Singapore that used to be, of the last few “kampongs,” or villages that originally populated Singapore, was breathtaking. It was a nice piece of lived history, with its rubber plantations, durians along the road that people picked and placed in their baskets, wells for water, and noisy electrical generators. Many elderly people sat in stands alongside the road, offering “refreshing cold drinks” to us exhausted bikers. I admire these people who have lived on this seemingly deprived island and live without material luxuries that people only a 10 minute bumboat ferry ride away probably would never imagine being able to survive without. The people on the island are friendly and cater to you, whether in selling their food or their bikes or in providing you with a basket when they see you with purses (which I definitely thought was a nice gesture).
I’ve noticed that there is an enormous sense of community here in Singapore. People graciously give their seats to the elderly and to the stressed out moms with their tiny children on the MRTs and buses. From the posters of statistics plastered around construction sites, I know that the workers also believe in safety first and pride themselves on the minimal number of accidents and lost hours at the sites. MRT stations also repeatedly show clips that remind Singaporeans to keep Singapore safe by doing their part in watching out for suspicious activity on the trains. With adages such as “Low crime doesn’t mean no crime” on the walls of the MRT stations, Singapore knows that unity is essential for a prosperous country. People are actively helping make Singapore better. A sense of responsibility is well-established here, from the “act responsibly signs” on the tracks of the MRTs, the daunting ads that illustrate what could happen (a world of darkness) if we consumed all the energy/natural resources of the earth, of course the infamous fine signs for littering, chewing gum, spitting, smoking, and the list goes on. Souvenirs with the tagline, “Singapore: a fine city” and the red “no” symbols, crowd the shelves of every tourist location here.
A few nights ago, Mary and I ventured off into the city after working in the lab. We went to Lau Pa Sat, “the largest remaining Victorian filigree cast-iron structure in Southeast Asia” with stalls galore, selling from stingray to stinky tofu, all at affordable prices. Right next to it was Satay Street where meat kabobs were sold with cucumbers and onions and a peanut dipping sauce. The signature satay was delicious. We also went to see the famous Merlion, but unfortunately it was covered in green due to construction. It seems like Singapore is constantly being remodeled. Everywhere you look, you see cranes and workers in hats and boots with pedestrian walkway signs pointing to the allocated pathways. Every day, we walk past a construction site where a new MRT station will be built. It is located right next to wear we live (and we sigh at the government for not constructing it sooner). Here a new MRT station, there a new shopping mall. Here a new casino, there a new Universal Studios. It seems the country is trying hard to revamp its older buildings and attract tourists.
In other news, Mary and I will be soaking up more of the Southeast Asian culture. We're getting up before the sun rises Saturday to visit Ho Chi Minh. Exciting! I'm sure there will be many experiences/cultural similarities & differences to share.
Tuesday, July 1, 2008
The Queue and Vectors
(from Mary Bohan)
In going to quite a few doctors to try to get my malaria pills and TB test, I definitely found some differences between the Singaporean healthcare system and ours in the US. In Singapore, they have "queues" everywhere, when you walk into the clinic you get a number from an automated machine, and then wait in a waiting room until your number pops up on an electronic screen so that you can even speak with the receptionist. Then you "register" with the clinic, tell them what you need or who you need to see, and then are given another ticket with another number, and wait for that number to be called. Then you have your "consult" for under ten minutes, and then you're given another number to wait for your test or your prescription. Finally, you wait in line again to pay for the services, in cash, which turned into a problem when I didn't have over $150 cash to get my malaria pills yesterday, hopefully I'll get them today. In the clinic for the TB Test, I waited for three hours to see the doctor for about 5 minutes, and then to have an injection which took about 3 minutes. I asked the receptionist a few times whether my number had been lost or forgotten, but she insured me that it would come up, I just had to keep waiting. Everyone else seemed pretty calm about the situation, I guess that's what it's like everywhere. Since most of their services are paid for by the government, they're willing to wait in line for a few hours to get them. The two physicians that I saw were on par with doctors at home, although the one at the TB clinic admitted she knew nothing about malaria pills after I explained my situation to her, and tried to convince me to go to the emergency room, but after returning to work my boss reassured me I'd be fine.
This week I've been preparing for cloning of the Dengue and Yellow Fever samples, using the pGEM-T Easy Vector and the PBluescript II SK(+) Vector. I've been researching the places where the enzymes bind to the samples, as well as the enzymes that bind to both vectors, so that we can choose the appropriate enzymes to use in the cloning of specific regions. I've never studied anything about the subject, except for a day or two in AP Biology nearly four years ago, so I've been pretty much learning as I go along. I'm continuing to maintain and grow my cells in the wet lab, changing the media and checking the cells under the microscope to ensure that they are healthy and haven't become "contaminated," a word I've been fearing for the past few weeks, as not only my work but everyone else's would have to be thrown out.
Next week is my last week at work, except for the friday afternoon and saturday when I return from India, when I'm going to try to make it into work to say goodbye to everyone. I'm continuing to work in the wet lab on my cells, so that they can be used after I leave when the actual wet experiments start. I'm also finishing my work on determining which enzymes to use for the cloning, information that can also be used after I leave. I'm going to have to teach all of what I've been doing to Yinglin, a Singaporean girl who started working in the lab a few weeks ago and who will be taking over my work once I go and using in the next stages of the research, so just showing her where everything is, how it's organized, how I found it, and how to use it will take quite a bit of time.
In going to quite a few doctors to try to get my malaria pills and TB test, I definitely found some differences between the Singaporean healthcare system and ours in the US. In Singapore, they have "queues" everywhere, when you walk into the clinic you get a number from an automated machine, and then wait in a waiting room until your number pops up on an electronic screen so that you can even speak with the receptionist. Then you "register" with the clinic, tell them what you need or who you need to see, and then are given another ticket with another number, and wait for that number to be called. Then you have your "consult" for under ten minutes, and then you're given another number to wait for your test or your prescription. Finally, you wait in line again to pay for the services, in cash, which turned into a problem when I didn't have over $150 cash to get my malaria pills yesterday, hopefully I'll get them today. In the clinic for the TB Test, I waited for three hours to see the doctor for about 5 minutes, and then to have an injection which took about 3 minutes. I asked the receptionist a few times whether my number had been lost or forgotten, but she insured me that it would come up, I just had to keep waiting. Everyone else seemed pretty calm about the situation, I guess that's what it's like everywhere. Since most of their services are paid for by the government, they're willing to wait in line for a few hours to get them. The two physicians that I saw were on par with doctors at home, although the one at the TB clinic admitted she knew nothing about malaria pills after I explained my situation to her, and tried to convince me to go to the emergency room, but after returning to work my boss reassured me I'd be fine.
This week I've been preparing for cloning of the Dengue and Yellow Fever samples, using the pGEM-T Easy Vector and the PBluescript II SK(+) Vector. I've been researching the places where the enzymes bind to the samples, as well as the enzymes that bind to both vectors, so that we can choose the appropriate enzymes to use in the cloning of specific regions. I've never studied anything about the subject, except for a day or two in AP Biology nearly four years ago, so I've been pretty much learning as I go along. I'm continuing to maintain and grow my cells in the wet lab, changing the media and checking the cells under the microscope to ensure that they are healthy and haven't become "contaminated," a word I've been fearing for the past few weeks, as not only my work but everyone else's would have to be thrown out.
Next week is my last week at work, except for the friday afternoon and saturday when I return from India, when I'm going to try to make it into work to say goodbye to everyone. I'm continuing to work in the wet lab on my cells, so that they can be used after I leave when the actual wet experiments start. I'm also finishing my work on determining which enzymes to use for the cloning, information that can also be used after I leave. I'm going to have to teach all of what I've been doing to Yinglin, a Singaporean girl who started working in the lab a few weeks ago and who will be taking over my work once I go and using in the next stages of the research, so just showing her where everything is, how it's organized, how I found it, and how to use it will take quite a bit of time.
Monday, June 30, 2008
Gift of Love and Palau Ubin
(From Mary Bohan)
"Peace begins with a smile" - Mother Theresa
Every day on my way to and from work at the fifth floor lab of the Brenner Center, I read this quote on a small poster in the elevator. It wakes me up me as I walk in early in the morning and relaxes me after a stressful day at work. But, surprisingly, it also led me on a trip to Calcutta, India.
Upon coming to Singapore, I had booked my flight home three weeks after my work was done, planning to travel and explore the area before returning to America. Speaking with one of the girls on my hall, a native of Calcutta, or Kolkata as it is now called, I learned how easy it is to fly to India from Singapore, and she encouraged me to plan a trip to India. But one day, on the way to work, I saw the poster in the elevator in a completely different light, and everything clicked. I immediatly emailed my parents, hoping to convince them to let me go to Calcutta to volunteer. Having grown up in a Catholic family and attending the Convent of the Sacred Heart for 13 years, I had always thought it would be amazing to work for the Missionaries of Charity, the organization by Mother Theresa. It would tie in perfectly with the work that I was doing in Singapore, bringing a more personal and real life experience to the medical research that I was doing in the lab. This was my chance.
At first my family was skeptical, as I would be traveling alone as a young American girl to the chaotic country of India. But the more they heard about it, the more they liked the idea. A few weeks later, I now have a flight, a visa, six shots in my arm, and I'm just as excited as I am terrified. Before I left Singapore, my parents insisted that I meet with Sister Luke, the colleague of a friend of my parents who is a member of the order, and was a personal friend of Mother Theresa's in Calcutta, who is now working in Singapore.
On Saturday afternoon, I headed off to the church associated with the order, for a service called a Novena that is held hourly from 1 until 7 weekly. It was an amazing experience, an open air church with a thousand people coming each hour to participate in the service. There were people of every race and ethnicity, some whom were wearing traditional Indian clothing, others in Chinese dress, and I was the only American or European individual. After the service was over, I asked the receptionist for Sister Luke, but she responded with a blank stare, and after we searched the directory for a few minutes, I learned there was a convent down the road where she might be.
I started walking, and two hours and a two liter bottle of water later, I came across a small faded sign that read "Gift of Love, Missionaries of Charity." I walked past the empty security booth of the gated compound, and came across three buildings, a home for the blind, a health center, and the "Gift of Love." I was surprised to be greeted by a middle aged overweight Asian man wearing only a towel, who confirmed that this was in fact the home of the Missionaries of Charity, but that Sister Luke was in Cambodia for the month. He brought me to another nun to speak to, a Filipino woman who knew both Sister Luke and our family friend very well, and was very excited about my trip to Calcutta. I later learned that the Gift of Love is a center for individuals who had been neglected by their children and had no where else to go. The center is staffed by volunteers, who take the residents to services of their respective religions, and cook, clean, and bathe them while the nuns visit others in their homes and the hospital. The home had a wonderful sense of calm about it, everything seemed very peaceful despite the apparant illness and poverty of the residents. My visit to the Gift of Love made me even more excited for India, I can't wait to go!
On Sunday, Tammy and I were a bit adventurous and ventured out to Palau Ubin, a remote island ten minutes off the shore of Singapore. We took a bumboat ferry across the water, and upon reaching the other side it seemed like we had gone back forty years in time. There are very few cars on the island, the principle mode of transportation is by bicycle. We set off to explore the island, and ended up biking for nearly three hours straight, on roads, sandy paths, and dirt roads. The island had many coconut and rubber plantations, mangrove swamps, and enormous granite quarries. Unlike mainland Singapore, in which nearly all agriculture and manufacturing is exported to Malaysia, this island was very rustic and natural. But Tammy and I were surprised to find that one of the isolated beaches was covered with litter above the water line, a strange sight given the fact that we have probably seen a grand total of three pieces of litter since arriving, given the severe fines for breaking the law. Somehow every piece of litter in Singapore had managed to wash up on this beach. We continued to bike around until we the sound of thunder and the threat of rain led us to head for the mainland. We were completely exhausted, and couldn't even speak a word the entire trip home. We definitely got our exercise for the week!
"Peace begins with a smile" - Mother Theresa
Every day on my way to and from work at the fifth floor lab of the Brenner Center, I read this quote on a small poster in the elevator. It wakes me up me as I walk in early in the morning and relaxes me after a stressful day at work. But, surprisingly, it also led me on a trip to Calcutta, India.
Upon coming to Singapore, I had booked my flight home three weeks after my work was done, planning to travel and explore the area before returning to America. Speaking with one of the girls on my hall, a native of Calcutta, or Kolkata as it is now called, I learned how easy it is to fly to India from Singapore, and she encouraged me to plan a trip to India. But one day, on the way to work, I saw the poster in the elevator in a completely different light, and everything clicked. I immediatly emailed my parents, hoping to convince them to let me go to Calcutta to volunteer. Having grown up in a Catholic family and attending the Convent of the Sacred Heart for 13 years, I had always thought it would be amazing to work for the Missionaries of Charity, the organization by Mother Theresa. It would tie in perfectly with the work that I was doing in Singapore, bringing a more personal and real life experience to the medical research that I was doing in the lab. This was my chance.
At first my family was skeptical, as I would be traveling alone as a young American girl to the chaotic country of India. But the more they heard about it, the more they liked the idea. A few weeks later, I now have a flight, a visa, six shots in my arm, and I'm just as excited as I am terrified. Before I left Singapore, my parents insisted that I meet with Sister Luke, the colleague of a friend of my parents who is a member of the order, and was a personal friend of Mother Theresa's in Calcutta, who is now working in Singapore.
On Saturday afternoon, I headed off to the church associated with the order, for a service called a Novena that is held hourly from 1 until 7 weekly. It was an amazing experience, an open air church with a thousand people coming each hour to participate in the service. There were people of every race and ethnicity, some whom were wearing traditional Indian clothing, others in Chinese dress, and I was the only American or European individual. After the service was over, I asked the receptionist for Sister Luke, but she responded with a blank stare, and after we searched the directory for a few minutes, I learned there was a convent down the road where she might be.
I started walking, and two hours and a two liter bottle of water later, I came across a small faded sign that read "Gift of Love, Missionaries of Charity." I walked past the empty security booth of the gated compound, and came across three buildings, a home for the blind, a health center, and the "Gift of Love." I was surprised to be greeted by a middle aged overweight Asian man wearing only a towel, who confirmed that this was in fact the home of the Missionaries of Charity, but that Sister Luke was in Cambodia for the month. He brought me to another nun to speak to, a Filipino woman who knew both Sister Luke and our family friend very well, and was very excited about my trip to Calcutta. I later learned that the Gift of Love is a center for individuals who had been neglected by their children and had no where else to go. The center is staffed by volunteers, who take the residents to services of their respective religions, and cook, clean, and bathe them while the nuns visit others in their homes and the hospital. The home had a wonderful sense of calm about it, everything seemed very peaceful despite the apparant illness and poverty of the residents. My visit to the Gift of Love made me even more excited for India, I can't wait to go!
On Sunday, Tammy and I were a bit adventurous and ventured out to Palau Ubin, a remote island ten minutes off the shore of Singapore. We took a bumboat ferry across the water, and upon reaching the other side it seemed like we had gone back forty years in time. There are very few cars on the island, the principle mode of transportation is by bicycle. We set off to explore the island, and ended up biking for nearly three hours straight, on roads, sandy paths, and dirt roads. The island had many coconut and rubber plantations, mangrove swamps, and enormous granite quarries. Unlike mainland Singapore, in which nearly all agriculture and manufacturing is exported to Malaysia, this island was very rustic and natural. But Tammy and I were surprised to find that one of the isolated beaches was covered with litter above the water line, a strange sight given the fact that we have probably seen a grand total of three pieces of litter since arriving, given the severe fines for breaking the law. Somehow every piece of litter in Singapore had managed to wash up on this beach. We continued to bike around until we the sound of thunder and the threat of rain led us to head for the mainland. We were completely exhausted, and couldn't even speak a word the entire trip home. We definitely got our exercise for the week!
Thursday, June 26, 2008
Singapore: The Lab, The Culture, and the (Quasi) Natural Wonders
(From Tammy Chin)
I've still been very busy in the lab from 9-6 every weekday. My goal, as part of a collaborative effort between all the fifth floor Duke-NUS GMS lab members of the Brenner Centre for Molecular Medicine, has generally been to advance the knowledge of Dengue in this area where Dengue is so prevalent. From the start, my head supervisor has been Dr. Eng Eong, an epidemiologist who spends most of his time about 10 minutes away at the DSO National Laboratories. The focus of my research studies changed from what I was told at the beginning, which was to investigate how IP-10, a chemokine that potentially promotes viral replication, interacts with dengue virus. It turns out that Eng Eong and his colleagues were so eager to find out more about it, that they had already started the project before I came to Singapore. Duane Gubler, the head of the Duke-NUS GMS effort to further Dengue research, had brought back many virus isolates from Puerto Rico and Indonesia, and Eng Eong, after discussing with fellow teammates, decided to let me sequence the complete genome of these virus strains and see if, we can see a correlation between human response of Dengue and the sequencing. So, that has been my target since day one here (actually day two since adjusting to the Singapore heat and catching up on sleep took away a day). Presently, I've been working on extracting DNA out of the gels that I made and finding all the measurements of the extracted DNA. I will be sending out some DNA samples and primer sets for sequencing tomorrow. It's exciting news, but there's still a long way to go. I've only done PCR/gel extraction of two strains of the Puerto Rican Dengue 2 Virus. There are still plenty more strains to finish sequencing.
During my work in the lab, I have developed a copious amount of respect for my supervisors and colleagues. Being a scientist involves having much patience, the ability to work under pressure, and being able to keenly handle all possible scenarios while also mixing in good teamwork and communication skills. The person who supervises my work in the lab every day was talking about how tired she was today. Her daughter was sick yesterday, and she had to leave work early to get her. She also told me how she hasn't slept in the last few days because she has been under so much pressure to finish her paper and have it published. Extracting DNA out of the gels, making PCR master mixes, and isolating RNA from the viral supernatants takes a lot more time and concentration than most people will think, I have realized and experienced. Take for instance, our progress was delayed because it took us days to figure out the best cycling conditions for the PCR mixes since the melting temperatures for the primer sets of the complementary DNA were so different. Thank goodness we found the temperature gradient on the thermal cycler machine, and I've been keeping track of all of my progress in a notebook in the lab. My supervisors tell me how important jotting down every detail of every activity is in the scientific research world.
Aside from the every day labwork, I have had time to enjoy Singapore's incredible goodness. On Saturday, my friend from India and I went to the MacRitchie Reservoir to get away from the hustle and bustle of typical Singapore life. We hiked about 10 kilometers through beautiful greenery and the peacefulness of nature and ended up at The TreeTop Walk, a suspended bridge connecting the two highest points of the nature reserve. The view was amazing. Tall trees and monkeys, fresh air and a cool breeze replaced the concrete buildings and construction sites, pollution and heat that I was so accustomed to. It's worthy to note that we saw quite a few people running up and down the trail. We couldn't believe how fit these people were, especially at the ages they were at, while we were barely surviving our slow paced walk up. We only wish we will be as fit as they are when we grow old. After living here for a good amount of time now, I know how much Singaporeans value good health and fitness. It's rare to see obese people here, and the fresh fruit/fruit juice stands are always crowded with people. The food is always made fresh, and I notice many healthy options at the eateries here, like vegetables and healthy booster juices. Milo, a popular nutritional drink, is sold everywhere, and I am a huge fan of it, as Mary can testify.
While we we trekked up the trail, we passed a country club, and my friend said that only the richest of rich can afford to be a member of the country club, and that it was the desire of every person here. She said every Singaporean wishes for the 5 C's: country club, car, condo, credit card, and cash, and that really resonated in me. Golf courses and country clubs are very rare amenities here in Singapore because of the lack of land. A car is also incredibly expensive (evident from the fact that Singaporeans have to bid on a Certificate of Entitlement which ends up costing more than $15,000 separate from the car costs). A person is lucky to find a condo in such a small country where every inch of space is a fortune. Even though it's distinctly part of the "Singlish" lexicon, these are things that almost every person living in the world wants. It's interesting, after spending these past five weeks focusing on a virus that takes so many lives here, that these material things seem trivial compared to good health and care of the body. Later that night, we relaxed from our day of hiking by going to Sentosa, a man made beach nearby. The artificiality of the place was clear after we stepped onto the rocky sand, but the place was still great for an evening of tranquility.
Since my friend was going back to India soon, we decided to take advantage of what Singapore had to offer and bought a $40 park hopper for the Jurong BirdPark, the Singapore Zoo, and the Night Safari. The Birdpark is a great place to go during the day. They have the largest man made waterfall there, and the Night Safari is the first of its kind. I saw animals that I had never known existed, and there's nothing like being driven around the safari in the cool evening and listening to fascinating facts about creatures from all parts of the world. We also enjoyed the closing ceremony of the Singapore Arts Festival at a lake over the weekend. It was a spectacular and eccentric show done by Europeans on the water, with fireworks and amazing props (like the HUGE creature made out of water bottles). I can already tell that I will miss this place greatly when I go back home in a couple of weeks.
I've still been very busy in the lab from 9-6 every weekday. My goal, as part of a collaborative effort between all the fifth floor Duke-NUS GMS lab members of the Brenner Centre for Molecular Medicine, has generally been to advance the knowledge of Dengue in this area where Dengue is so prevalent. From the start, my head supervisor has been Dr. Eng Eong, an epidemiologist who spends most of his time about 10 minutes away at the DSO National Laboratories. The focus of my research studies changed from what I was told at the beginning, which was to investigate how IP-10, a chemokine that potentially promotes viral replication, interacts with dengue virus. It turns out that Eng Eong and his colleagues were so eager to find out more about it, that they had already started the project before I came to Singapore. Duane Gubler, the head of the Duke-NUS GMS effort to further Dengue research, had brought back many virus isolates from Puerto Rico and Indonesia, and Eng Eong, after discussing with fellow teammates, decided to let me sequence the complete genome of these virus strains and see if, we can see a correlation between human response of Dengue and the sequencing. So, that has been my target since day one here (actually day two since adjusting to the Singapore heat and catching up on sleep took away a day). Presently, I've been working on extracting DNA out of the gels that I made and finding all the measurements of the extracted DNA. I will be sending out some DNA samples and primer sets for sequencing tomorrow. It's exciting news, but there's still a long way to go. I've only done PCR/gel extraction of two strains of the Puerto Rican Dengue 2 Virus. There are still plenty more strains to finish sequencing.
During my work in the lab, I have developed a copious amount of respect for my supervisors and colleagues. Being a scientist involves having much patience, the ability to work under pressure, and being able to keenly handle all possible scenarios while also mixing in good teamwork and communication skills. The person who supervises my work in the lab every day was talking about how tired she was today. Her daughter was sick yesterday, and she had to leave work early to get her. She also told me how she hasn't slept in the last few days because she has been under so much pressure to finish her paper and have it published. Extracting DNA out of the gels, making PCR master mixes, and isolating RNA from the viral supernatants takes a lot more time and concentration than most people will think, I have realized and experienced. Take for instance, our progress was delayed because it took us days to figure out the best cycling conditions for the PCR mixes since the melting temperatures for the primer sets of the complementary DNA were so different. Thank goodness we found the temperature gradient on the thermal cycler machine, and I've been keeping track of all of my progress in a notebook in the lab. My supervisors tell me how important jotting down every detail of every activity is in the scientific research world.
Aside from the every day labwork, I have had time to enjoy Singapore's incredible goodness. On Saturday, my friend from India and I went to the MacRitchie Reservoir to get away from the hustle and bustle of typical Singapore life. We hiked about 10 kilometers through beautiful greenery and the peacefulness of nature and ended up at The TreeTop Walk, a suspended bridge connecting the two highest points of the nature reserve. The view was amazing. Tall trees and monkeys, fresh air and a cool breeze replaced the concrete buildings and construction sites, pollution and heat that I was so accustomed to. It's worthy to note that we saw quite a few people running up and down the trail. We couldn't believe how fit these people were, especially at the ages they were at, while we were barely surviving our slow paced walk up. We only wish we will be as fit as they are when we grow old. After living here for a good amount of time now, I know how much Singaporeans value good health and fitness. It's rare to see obese people here, and the fresh fruit/fruit juice stands are always crowded with people. The food is always made fresh, and I notice many healthy options at the eateries here, like vegetables and healthy booster juices. Milo, a popular nutritional drink, is sold everywhere, and I am a huge fan of it, as Mary can testify.
While we we trekked up the trail, we passed a country club, and my friend said that only the richest of rich can afford to be a member of the country club, and that it was the desire of every person here. She said every Singaporean wishes for the 5 C's: country club, car, condo, credit card, and cash, and that really resonated in me. Golf courses and country clubs are very rare amenities here in Singapore because of the lack of land. A car is also incredibly expensive (evident from the fact that Singaporeans have to bid on a Certificate of Entitlement which ends up costing more than $15,000 separate from the car costs). A person is lucky to find a condo in such a small country where every inch of space is a fortune. Even though it's distinctly part of the "Singlish" lexicon, these are things that almost every person living in the world wants. It's interesting, after spending these past five weeks focusing on a virus that takes so many lives here, that these material things seem trivial compared to good health and care of the body. Later that night, we relaxed from our day of hiking by going to Sentosa, a man made beach nearby. The artificiality of the place was clear after we stepped onto the rocky sand, but the place was still great for an evening of tranquility.
Since my friend was going back to India soon, we decided to take advantage of what Singapore had to offer and bought a $40 park hopper for the Jurong BirdPark, the Singapore Zoo, and the Night Safari. The Birdpark is a great place to go during the day. They have the largest man made waterfall there, and the Night Safari is the first of its kind. I saw animals that I had never known existed, and there's nothing like being driven around the safari in the cool evening and listening to fascinating facts about creatures from all parts of the world. We also enjoyed the closing ceremony of the Singapore Arts Festival at a lake over the weekend. It was a spectacular and eccentric show done by Europeans on the water, with fireworks and amazing props (like the HUGE creature made out of water bottles). I can already tell that I will miss this place greatly when I go back home in a couple of weeks.
Sunday, June 22, 2008
The 9 to 6
(From Mary Bohan)
Work has kept me quite busy the past few weeks, as I spend every day in the Brenner Center for Molecular Medicine, working on the computer or in the lab. For the first half of my stay in Singapore, I was unable to start my work in the wet lab, due to the fact that I had not received my work permit. It worked out perfectly though, as I completed an analysis of the bioinformatics of Dengue.
I first read up about the disease, attended a seminar given by a prospective member of the Duke-GMS Medical School staff, and was given an overview of my work by my supervisor, Azlinda. Then I set to work on the computer, finding RNA complete genome sequences and aligning them using quite complicated software to visualize the differences between different strains of the virus. I eventually found enough data to be able to look at changes based on geographic location, as the virus is located in the Americas, Africa, and Asia, serotype, as there are four not mutually exclusive serotypes, namely Dengue 1, 2, 3, and 4, and severity, as there are two types of Dengue that can be diagnosed, the typical Dengue Fever, and the severe Dengue Hemorrhagic Fever. My eyes would ache every day after staring at the multicolored sequence analyses. I eventually completed my task, and I even taught the other members of the lab how to use all of the programs as well as what I had found, so my work was definitely quite useful.
Last week I finally received my green card from the Ministry of Manpower, along with a stamp in my passport, and began my work in the wet lab. Another girl joined our lab, Yinglin, a recent graduate from Singapore, who had previously been conducting research on developing more nutritious genetically engineered forms of rice. Once Yinglin arrived, Azlinda matched the two of us together, and for the first two days I watched as she worked in the lab, but after that I was on my own. To be honest I don’t fully understand what I’m doing, changing media and performing cell cultures. I just do what I’m told and hope for the best, as if I do something incorrectly, my cells will become contaminated, which means the work of everyone else in the lab will have to be thrown out. It’s been quite stressful, and I’ve reminded my lab supervisor that perhaps this isn’t such a good idea, as they’re gambling the entire success of the lab on my beginner skills, but she’s convinced it’s a good idea, so I trust her. So far I’ve been lucky, but my immediate supervisor, Daniel, had to go to mandatory army training for the week, so without him to watch over me I’m a bit worried.
The basic idea of the work is to prepare cells for the use of the lab in the next few weeks, in experiments to look at the genetic makeup of the Dengue virus. The lab is comparing the genetic makeup of the Dengue virus to the similar Yellow Fever, Japanese Encephalitis, and Hepatitis C viruses. By comparing the responses of certain proteins, they are hoping to find out more about the virus, information that can hopefully help in finding a vaccine. It’s very interesting work, but at times it’s hard to see where my immediate cell culture work will play a part. In terms of the most interesting things to learn so far, I would say its been fascinating to see how changes in the structure of the sequences of these viruses can be correlated to different types of disease, geographic locations, severity, etc. I find it much easier to identify with things that pertain to real life and health, so I think it's really interesting to see the huge effects that one small change in a sequence can have.This experience has definitely taught me to understand how much time and effort goes into one experiment, one paper.
Work has kept me quite busy the past few weeks, as I spend every day in the Brenner Center for Molecular Medicine, working on the computer or in the lab. For the first half of my stay in Singapore, I was unable to start my work in the wet lab, due to the fact that I had not received my work permit. It worked out perfectly though, as I completed an analysis of the bioinformatics of Dengue.
I first read up about the disease, attended a seminar given by a prospective member of the Duke-GMS Medical School staff, and was given an overview of my work by my supervisor, Azlinda. Then I set to work on the computer, finding RNA complete genome sequences and aligning them using quite complicated software to visualize the differences between different strains of the virus. I eventually found enough data to be able to look at changes based on geographic location, as the virus is located in the Americas, Africa, and Asia, serotype, as there are four not mutually exclusive serotypes, namely Dengue 1, 2, 3, and 4, and severity, as there are two types of Dengue that can be diagnosed, the typical Dengue Fever, and the severe Dengue Hemorrhagic Fever. My eyes would ache every day after staring at the multicolored sequence analyses. I eventually completed my task, and I even taught the other members of the lab how to use all of the programs as well as what I had found, so my work was definitely quite useful.
Last week I finally received my green card from the Ministry of Manpower, along with a stamp in my passport, and began my work in the wet lab. Another girl joined our lab, Yinglin, a recent graduate from Singapore, who had previously been conducting research on developing more nutritious genetically engineered forms of rice. Once Yinglin arrived, Azlinda matched the two of us together, and for the first two days I watched as she worked in the lab, but after that I was on my own. To be honest I don’t fully understand what I’m doing, changing media and performing cell cultures. I just do what I’m told and hope for the best, as if I do something incorrectly, my cells will become contaminated, which means the work of everyone else in the lab will have to be thrown out. It’s been quite stressful, and I’ve reminded my lab supervisor that perhaps this isn’t such a good idea, as they’re gambling the entire success of the lab on my beginner skills, but she’s convinced it’s a good idea, so I trust her. So far I’ve been lucky, but my immediate supervisor, Daniel, had to go to mandatory army training for the week, so without him to watch over me I’m a bit worried.
The basic idea of the work is to prepare cells for the use of the lab in the next few weeks, in experiments to look at the genetic makeup of the Dengue virus. The lab is comparing the genetic makeup of the Dengue virus to the similar Yellow Fever, Japanese Encephalitis, and Hepatitis C viruses. By comparing the responses of certain proteins, they are hoping to find out more about the virus, information that can hopefully help in finding a vaccine. It’s very interesting work, but at times it’s hard to see where my immediate cell culture work will play a part. In terms of the most interesting things to learn so far, I would say its been fascinating to see how changes in the structure of the sequences of these viruses can be correlated to different types of disease, geographic locations, severity, etc. I find it much easier to identify with things that pertain to real life and health, so I think it's really interesting to see the huge effects that one small change in a sequence can have.This experience has definitely taught me to understand how much time and effort goes into one experiment, one paper.
Disparities in Singapore
(From Mary Bohan)
Its been five weeks since I’ve been in Singapore, and one thing that has become more and more apparent since arriving in this small island nation is the discrepancy that exists between the rich and the poor. Singapore has gained status as one of the wealthiest nations in the world in the past few years, and by 2010 it will have more millionaires than Hong Kong. Walking along Orchard road past boutiques of all of the top fashion houses, with Ferraris driving down the road, you could easily believe it. A friend of my family is living in Singapore as an expat due to her husband’s job, and through my few encounters with her I’ve seen the lifestyle of the machine gun guarded American Club and luxurious homes. It’s easy to assume that everyone here has it easy.
What I’ve found even more interesting is learning about the lives of those who are working every day to make ends meet here. Walking down the street at night past construction sites where the new train station is being built, there will be foreign laborers working past 11 at night, and you can see groups of them driving around, 20 or so on the back of a truck, clearly not the safest of all conditions. A few weeks ago I would up alone in a housing project in Singapore, trying to find a bus ticket to Malaysia, and was surprised by the conditions, with cockroaches at my feet and men calling out to me. It seemed to be an entirely different country than the Singapore I was used to, and opened my eyes to how diverse a country it really is. Even more extreme is the poverty seen in Indonesia and Malaysia, where one taxi driver told me that he had never left the small island that he lived on, and that he could barely support himself driving his taxi 48 hours straight with a 12 hour break every three days. And he has to be one of the more fortunate individuals.
In terms of healthcare, however, I have yet to see so much fragmentation. The lab in which we work is a few minutes away from the National University Hospital, one of the top hospitals in the country. There are no beggars or visibly unhappy individuals around the hospital; everyone seems very calm and satisfied. Apparently the government pays for around 80% of the basic public healthcare services, and has a system of mandatory health savings accounts to ensure that everyone is prepared in case of an emergency. The hospitals are required to publish a price list, in order to facilitate comparative shopping for treatments. I know my dad would love to see something like this in the United States, as he always notes how there is rarely a set price for any procedure at home. The Singaporean government only spends less than 3% of its GDP on healthcare, compared to the 15% that the US government spends. The results are amazing, as Singapore has a lower infant mortality rate and a higher number of years of average healthy life expectancy than the United States.
Its been five weeks since I’ve been in Singapore, and one thing that has become more and more apparent since arriving in this small island nation is the discrepancy that exists between the rich and the poor. Singapore has gained status as one of the wealthiest nations in the world in the past few years, and by 2010 it will have more millionaires than Hong Kong. Walking along Orchard road past boutiques of all of the top fashion houses, with Ferraris driving down the road, you could easily believe it. A friend of my family is living in Singapore as an expat due to her husband’s job, and through my few encounters with her I’ve seen the lifestyle of the machine gun guarded American Club and luxurious homes. It’s easy to assume that everyone here has it easy.
What I’ve found even more interesting is learning about the lives of those who are working every day to make ends meet here. Walking down the street at night past construction sites where the new train station is being built, there will be foreign laborers working past 11 at night, and you can see groups of them driving around, 20 or so on the back of a truck, clearly not the safest of all conditions. A few weeks ago I would up alone in a housing project in Singapore, trying to find a bus ticket to Malaysia, and was surprised by the conditions, with cockroaches at my feet and men calling out to me. It seemed to be an entirely different country than the Singapore I was used to, and opened my eyes to how diverse a country it really is. Even more extreme is the poverty seen in Indonesia and Malaysia, where one taxi driver told me that he had never left the small island that he lived on, and that he could barely support himself driving his taxi 48 hours straight with a 12 hour break every three days. And he has to be one of the more fortunate individuals.
In terms of healthcare, however, I have yet to see so much fragmentation. The lab in which we work is a few minutes away from the National University Hospital, one of the top hospitals in the country. There are no beggars or visibly unhappy individuals around the hospital; everyone seems very calm and satisfied. Apparently the government pays for around 80% of the basic public healthcare services, and has a system of mandatory health savings accounts to ensure that everyone is prepared in case of an emergency. The hospitals are required to publish a price list, in order to facilitate comparative shopping for treatments. I know my dad would love to see something like this in the United States, as he always notes how there is rarely a set price for any procedure at home. The Singaporean government only spends less than 3% of its GDP on healthcare, compared to the 15% that the US government spends. The results are amazing, as Singapore has a lower infant mortality rate and a higher number of years of average healthy life expectancy than the United States.
95 Degrees and 90% Humidity
(From Mary Bohan)
It’s been hot in Singapore, to say the least. After spending the year in a non air-conditioned dorm at Duke, I thought I was prepared for the heat. I wasn’t. I remember exiting the aircraft after our 25 hour flight from the US, and feeling the surge of heat as soon as I stepped onto Singaporean soil. After a two hour adventure on the train and bus we arrived on the campus of NUS, each carrying more than our body weight in bags for our ten week stay in Singapore. We asked everyone we could find where our residence hall was but no one could tell us, and we dragged our belongings in circles around the nearby hospital. I remember the final ascent towards the residence hall a few hours later, taking two steps at a time and thirty seconds to recover each time, just enough time for the black spots to clear my head and for me to regain full consciousness, dripping with sweat and more exhausted than I had ever been in my life. To say the least, the heat is a bit much. Our rooms have no air conditioning, only one ceiling fan, and we have three huge windows to open but no screens, so we have many bugs visiting us daily. Our bodies have somewhat acclimated, in that we are no longer dripping with sweat and drinking six bottles of water a day as we were. I’ve completely given up on doing anything with my very curly hair, as any straightening or blow drying will be destroyed by the humidity within minutes. During the first few days of our stay in Singapore, we were so worn out by the heat that we would take the free shuttle bus in circles around the campus in order to take advantage of the air conditioning. I said to Tammy, half seriously, that I would consider taking a nap on the bus and seeing if anyone noticed. It was that bad. Every day on our way to work, we are faced with a huge hill, probably 20 stories high, which we must ascend and descend in order to reach our office. It’s become a given that we will make a stop to the sixth floor to get a glass of water each morning after our climb. So much for being 1 degree north of the equator!
I can definitely see where the conditions here contribute to the potential for diseases such as Yellow Fever and Dengue. The humid weather, lack of air conditioning, and open windows seem to be asking for mosquitoes to breed and spread disease. In my own room, part of a newly constructed residence hall at the biggest university in the country, I often there are often many different types of bugs coming through the windows and even the walls. The bathroom has a constant stream of ants, as does the refrigerator in the kitchen. I have yet to see anyone use any form of bug spray, or any form of netting to prevent against these insects. In my few weeks here I’ve gotten quite bitten up by bugs, and even joked to Tammy on the ferry from Indonesia that perhaps given my symptoms of a fever, nausea, and many bug bites, perhaps I had contracted one of the diseases we have been researching! So far I’ve been fine! After seeing all of the work that is being done from a virology and vaccine perspective, I wonder why no one is implementing any other preventative techniques against these diseases. It’s definitely something I’m going to look into.
It’s been hot in Singapore, to say the least. After spending the year in a non air-conditioned dorm at Duke, I thought I was prepared for the heat. I wasn’t. I remember exiting the aircraft after our 25 hour flight from the US, and feeling the surge of heat as soon as I stepped onto Singaporean soil. After a two hour adventure on the train and bus we arrived on the campus of NUS, each carrying more than our body weight in bags for our ten week stay in Singapore. We asked everyone we could find where our residence hall was but no one could tell us, and we dragged our belongings in circles around the nearby hospital. I remember the final ascent towards the residence hall a few hours later, taking two steps at a time and thirty seconds to recover each time, just enough time for the black spots to clear my head and for me to regain full consciousness, dripping with sweat and more exhausted than I had ever been in my life. To say the least, the heat is a bit much. Our rooms have no air conditioning, only one ceiling fan, and we have three huge windows to open but no screens, so we have many bugs visiting us daily. Our bodies have somewhat acclimated, in that we are no longer dripping with sweat and drinking six bottles of water a day as we were. I’ve completely given up on doing anything with my very curly hair, as any straightening or blow drying will be destroyed by the humidity within minutes. During the first few days of our stay in Singapore, we were so worn out by the heat that we would take the free shuttle bus in circles around the campus in order to take advantage of the air conditioning. I said to Tammy, half seriously, that I would consider taking a nap on the bus and seeing if anyone noticed. It was that bad. Every day on our way to work, we are faced with a huge hill, probably 20 stories high, which we must ascend and descend in order to reach our office. It’s become a given that we will make a stop to the sixth floor to get a glass of water each morning after our climb. So much for being 1 degree north of the equator!
I can definitely see where the conditions here contribute to the potential for diseases such as Yellow Fever and Dengue. The humid weather, lack of air conditioning, and open windows seem to be asking for mosquitoes to breed and spread disease. In my own room, part of a newly constructed residence hall at the biggest university in the country, I often there are often many different types of bugs coming through the windows and even the walls. The bathroom has a constant stream of ants, as does the refrigerator in the kitchen. I have yet to see anyone use any form of bug spray, or any form of netting to prevent against these insects. In my few weeks here I’ve gotten quite bitten up by bugs, and even joked to Tammy on the ferry from Indonesia that perhaps given my symptoms of a fever, nausea, and many bug bites, perhaps I had contracted one of the diseases we have been researching! So far I’ve been fine! After seeing all of the work that is being done from a virology and vaccine perspective, I wonder why no one is implementing any other preventative techniques against these diseases. It’s definitely something I’m going to look into.
A weekend in Singapore : Dengue, Sentosa, and Church
(From Mary Bohan)
This weekend was the first time I relaxed in Singapore since I've been here. While in Southeast Asia I've been trying to take advantage of all of the amazing places that are nearby, so I've taken buses, ferries and planes to Malaysia and Indonesia each weekend. It's been amazing but I'm exhausted, too many 4 am flights and 8 hour bus rides have been taking a toll on me. I finally decided that enough was enough, and planned to stay here and enjoy the city.
Friday night I met up with a few friends that I had met by chance a few weeks ago, a girl from Australia, her Singaporean friend, and a few Chinese acquantances. We had a great time, and I had the chance to speak with the group regarding my research this summer. I mentioned that I was studying Dengue, its genetic makeup, and trying to make some small steps towards finding a vaccine. One Chinese boy said that many people he knew had been infected with Dengue, and that if I ever wanted to interview a few people he could arrange something, so I'm considering taking him up on his offer. It was quite satisfying to hear someone interested in Dengue, and appreciative of the work that is being done to combat it. His words really brought home the real life implications of the work that is being done in my lab, and renewed my interest in Dengue.
Early Saturday morning I went off with a friend to Sentosa Island, a tropical resort which was created from scratch by an American developer a few years ago. It's an eerie feeling, taking a bus from a busy downtown area similar to New York or Boston, and ten minutes later being greeted on a faux tropical island with Jamaican reggae drifting off towards the sea. After taking a quick tram ride, on which the recorded announcement finished each sentance with "have fun!" we arrived at a tropical scene filled with tons and tons of imported sand, swaying palm trees and sea views of the largest tanker ships I have ever seen in my entire life. Beyond tropical islands connected by bamboo bridges were ships larger than the most cruise liners carrying hundreds of tracter trailer crates full of cargo. The entire project was quite impressive and illustrative of the achievements of the Singaporean people, but at the same time eerie, with a Disneyland feel to it.
On Sunday I had the opportunity to visit a local church with a Singaporean girl a few years older than me named Yinglin who works in my lab. She had warned me that in the entire year only one other Caucasian had visited the church, and four of her friends had to spend the entire mass translating to him. Since coming to Singapore, I had been hoping to make it to a different worship service each work, and so far having only gotten to a Catholic mass and a ceremony in a Hindu temple, I was anxious to try it. I met my friend at the local MRT station, and we walked to the apartment where mass was being held, as the church was having construction. I asked her what type of a church it was and she replied "charismatic." In 13 years of Catholic school and religion class I'd never heard of that denomination! We walked into the apartment, took off our shoes, and behind a large curtain stepped into a makeshift meeting room, about ten rows of ten chairs each separated down the middle. In the front there were two men who looked more like rock stars than ministers, in dress clothes holding guitars and wearing microphones. On the ceiling there were two huge speakers and a man controlling the sound with a high tech computer sat near the front. The men sat on one side of the church and the women on the other, so as to minimize distraction and allow the individuals to be able to dance to the music without feeling self-conscious. The mass was closer to a Southern Baptist service than anything else, and consisted of lots of singing with swaying arms and clapping, a long sermon, and then a gathering with food afterward. It was all in Mandarin with my poor friend trying to translate everything to me, but I got the general idea though. It was quite an experience!
This weekend was the first time I relaxed in Singapore since I've been here. While in Southeast Asia I've been trying to take advantage of all of the amazing places that are nearby, so I've taken buses, ferries and planes to Malaysia and Indonesia each weekend. It's been amazing but I'm exhausted, too many 4 am flights and 8 hour bus rides have been taking a toll on me. I finally decided that enough was enough, and planned to stay here and enjoy the city.
Friday night I met up with a few friends that I had met by chance a few weeks ago, a girl from Australia, her Singaporean friend, and a few Chinese acquantances. We had a great time, and I had the chance to speak with the group regarding my research this summer. I mentioned that I was studying Dengue, its genetic makeup, and trying to make some small steps towards finding a vaccine. One Chinese boy said that many people he knew had been infected with Dengue, and that if I ever wanted to interview a few people he could arrange something, so I'm considering taking him up on his offer. It was quite satisfying to hear someone interested in Dengue, and appreciative of the work that is being done to combat it. His words really brought home the real life implications of the work that is being done in my lab, and renewed my interest in Dengue.
Early Saturday morning I went off with a friend to Sentosa Island, a tropical resort which was created from scratch by an American developer a few years ago. It's an eerie feeling, taking a bus from a busy downtown area similar to New York or Boston, and ten minutes later being greeted on a faux tropical island with Jamaican reggae drifting off towards the sea. After taking a quick tram ride, on which the recorded announcement finished each sentance with "have fun!" we arrived at a tropical scene filled with tons and tons of imported sand, swaying palm trees and sea views of the largest tanker ships I have ever seen in my entire life. Beyond tropical islands connected by bamboo bridges were ships larger than the most cruise liners carrying hundreds of tracter trailer crates full of cargo. The entire project was quite impressive and illustrative of the achievements of the Singaporean people, but at the same time eerie, with a Disneyland feel to it.
On Sunday I had the opportunity to visit a local church with a Singaporean girl a few years older than me named Yinglin who works in my lab. She had warned me that in the entire year only one other Caucasian had visited the church, and four of her friends had to spend the entire mass translating to him. Since coming to Singapore, I had been hoping to make it to a different worship service each work, and so far having only gotten to a Catholic mass and a ceremony in a Hindu temple, I was anxious to try it. I met my friend at the local MRT station, and we walked to the apartment where mass was being held, as the church was having construction. I asked her what type of a church it was and she replied "charismatic." In 13 years of Catholic school and religion class I'd never heard of that denomination! We walked into the apartment, took off our shoes, and behind a large curtain stepped into a makeshift meeting room, about ten rows of ten chairs each separated down the middle. In the front there were two men who looked more like rock stars than ministers, in dress clothes holding guitars and wearing microphones. On the ceiling there were two huge speakers and a man controlling the sound with a high tech computer sat near the front. The men sat on one side of the church and the women on the other, so as to minimize distraction and allow the individuals to be able to dance to the music without feeling self-conscious. The mass was closer to a Southern Baptist service than anything else, and consisted of lots of singing with swaying arms and clapping, a long sermon, and then a gathering with food afterward. It was all in Mandarin with my poor friend trying to translate everything to me, but I got the general idea though. It was quite an experience!
Thursday, June 19, 2008
Dadi's and the East Coast Park
(from Tammy Chin)
This week has been great. My work in the lab is going well. We had some good results today and my supervisor offered to buy me icecream, but of course I refused her gesture. The principal investigator of our lab brought us all Dragonfruit from the Duke-NUS GMS building today. There are plenty of new faces at work. An NUS honors student is spending some time here working on antiviral strategies for Dengue.
This week has been great. My work in the lab is going well. We had some good results today and my supervisor offered to buy me icecream, but of course I refused her gesture. The principal investigator of our lab brought us all Dragonfruit from the Duke-NUS GMS building today. There are plenty of new faces at work. An NUS honors student is spending some time here working on antiviral strategies for Dengue.
Over the weekend I went to East Coast Park with a hall mate from India. East Coast Park is known for its nice scenery and pathways and its delectable seafood. Everywhere you look there are people running, biking, and rollerblading. They even have underpasses with ramps to suit bicycles. The first thing we saw was a cable ski park, which I had never seen until then. We had Singapore's famous chili crab, and although we had a hilarious time trying to pry it open, the food was amazing. On the way back to our residence, we passed many prisons. They are all strategically located on the edge of the island, near the international airport. We saw a sign for a women's prison and talked about how the conditions inside must be unfortunate.
Yesterday, we went to eat at a place serving North Indian Cuisine called Dadi's, located right by a Cheese Prata Shop. The Cheese Prata Shop has been continually trying to shut down Dadi's because of its increasing popularity. Dadi's does not legally have a right to let people sit down and eat, and there are illegal workers inside. An inspector from the government had come that night to take pictures of the place, and the owners were pretty nervous. They made most people take away their food, and many workers were told to hide. The whole situation was confusing for Mary and I, especially at the beginning when we had no idea what was going on. The food was delicious, though, and we hope the place doesn't shut down. We had sweet lassi, mutter paneer, and palak chicken. Yum.
Singapore: A Mix of Cultures and Religions
(from Mary Bohan)
During the past few weeks one thing I have found is that there is a huge mix of people from completely different backgrounds, living very peacefully together. In food stalls there are Indian and Muslim food stalls right next to each other, on the train you'll see Chinese and Japanese people talking to each other, and a mix of European and American expats are always around as well. I even found it very interesting that the people I work with, who have distinctly Chinese and Malaysian names, do not identify with these cultures, but insist that they and their families are Singaporean. I was speaking with a girl from Singapore that I work with yesterday, and she asked if she could ask me a very personal question, so I was a bit hesitant and worried about what it could be, and she asked if there was racism where I came from. I explained to her that most people in our country are not racist at all, but that there had historically been problems in the South of the country, and that for the most part people are trying to move on. She responded "Oh, well if you were racist, you wouldn't have come to Singapore!" which I was quite surprised at, as racism hadn't even crossed my mind the entire time I'd been here.
This weekend I went to Indonesia which was definitely an interesting experience, it's a completely different way of life than in Singapore. It's odd to think that Singapore is such a modern and westernized country in between two developing countries, there are such huge differences within an hour or two of leaving Singapore. In terms of religion, in Singapore there is a huge mix of religions, I was speaking to a Hindi girl who grew up here, and she was saying that most people take notice of all of the religious holidays, but that no one religion gets more attention than another. The country is 43% Buddhist, 15% Christian, 15% Muslim, and 4% Hindu, while Malaysia is 60% Muslim and Indonesia is 86%. I found this difference to be very clear as all the women dressed a lot more conservatively, the food was clearly defined into that with pork and that without, and there were prayer rooms next to the departure gates at the airport.
During the past few weeks one thing I have found is that there is a huge mix of people from completely different backgrounds, living very peacefully together. In food stalls there are Indian and Muslim food stalls right next to each other, on the train you'll see Chinese and Japanese people talking to each other, and a mix of European and American expats are always around as well. I even found it very interesting that the people I work with, who have distinctly Chinese and Malaysian names, do not identify with these cultures, but insist that they and their families are Singaporean. I was speaking with a girl from Singapore that I work with yesterday, and she asked if she could ask me a very personal question, so I was a bit hesitant and worried about what it could be, and she asked if there was racism where I came from. I explained to her that most people in our country are not racist at all, but that there had historically been problems in the South of the country, and that for the most part people are trying to move on. She responded "Oh, well if you were racist, you wouldn't have come to Singapore!" which I was quite surprised at, as racism hadn't even crossed my mind the entire time I'd been here.
This weekend I went to Indonesia which was definitely an interesting experience, it's a completely different way of life than in Singapore. It's odd to think that Singapore is such a modern and westernized country in between two developing countries, there are such huge differences within an hour or two of leaving Singapore. In terms of religion, in Singapore there is a huge mix of religions, I was speaking to a Hindi girl who grew up here, and she was saying that most people take notice of all of the religious holidays, but that no one religion gets more attention than another. The country is 43% Buddhist, 15% Christian, 15% Muslim, and 4% Hindu, while Malaysia is 60% Muslim and Indonesia is 86%. I found this difference to be very clear as all the women dressed a lot more conservatively, the food was clearly defined into that with pork and that without, and there were prayer rooms next to the departure gates at the airport.
Thursday, June 12, 2008
Prevention Policy & Lab Progress
(from Tammy Chin)
My stay so far in Singapore has been very enjoyable. I had the chance to do lab work without supervision, isolating the RNA from the culture supernatant. At first I thought the precision and careful pipeting would overwhelm me, but I got used to it in no time and had 50 extractions of RNA done. We have found the optical density of all the RNA samples, and there seems to be an ample amount of RNA in all the samples, which is very good to hear. We did reverse transcription on the RNA collected, and tomorrow I will start the polymerase chain reaction. It seems like I will be quite occupied in the lab until the end of my stay here.
My stay so far in Singapore has been very enjoyable. I had the chance to do lab work without supervision, isolating the RNA from the culture supernatant. At first I thought the precision and careful pipeting would overwhelm me, but I got used to it in no time and had 50 extractions of RNA done. We have found the optical density of all the RNA samples, and there seems to be an ample amount of RNA in all the samples, which is very good to hear. We did reverse transcription on the RNA collected, and tomorrow I will start the polymerase chain reaction. It seems like I will be quite occupied in the lab until the end of my stay here.
People here are very conscious of Dengue and its dangers. There are posters plastered on the MRT trains and signs all along the streets that warn people not to leave water stagnant and to protect themselves. Hand, Foot and Mouth Disease has also been brought to attention in Singapore, as I have noticed. The Ministry of Health recently gave a press release about its prevalence here. It seems though, from the cleanliness of most of the bathrooms and just from my own observations that the people here are actively trying to take good care of themselves and believe that good personal hygiene is a must.
As for other experiences, Mary and I had some good Mexican food yesterday night in Holland Village, a nice little place with fine eateries and shops, and tonight we ate the best naan I have ever tasted, in a canteen on campus. There is such a wide array of food here, and I am enjoying every bit of it.
As for other experiences, Mary and I had some good Mexican food yesterday night in Holland Village, a nice little place with fine eateries and shops, and tonight we ate the best naan I have ever tasted, in a canteen on campus. There is such a wide array of food here, and I am enjoying every bit of it.
Kuala Lumpur
(from Mary Bohan)
I went to meet a friend from Duke in Kuala Lumpur over the weekend, and found that to be a very interesting experience. I found it to be very similar to Singapore in terms of the attractions to the city, but overall it was less developed, had more poverty, and not as clean. I was only there for 24 hours so it was very quick but I did make it to one site that was very interesting, it was called the Batu Caves, which is a sacred place for Hindus in Malaysia, and you climb 272 nearly vertical stairs to reach a cave with lots of statues and temples. There were many people who seemed to be sick climbing the stairs, some had their heads shaved and some yellow or orange cream on their heads, we're still not very sure what it was for. I also had to go to the hospital to get information regarding getting vaccines for India and found it to be very efficient, a woman was able to see me right away with no appointment and tell me all of the information I needed, and the payment system seemed very straightforward and fair, unlike lots of the confusion with insurance and everything in the US. Apparently all of the children here are vaccinated from just after birth and every few weeks, so in some ways they're even more advanced than the US.
I went to meet a friend from Duke in Kuala Lumpur over the weekend, and found that to be a very interesting experience. I found it to be very similar to Singapore in terms of the attractions to the city, but overall it was less developed, had more poverty, and not as clean. I was only there for 24 hours so it was very quick but I did make it to one site that was very interesting, it was called the Batu Caves, which is a sacred place for Hindus in Malaysia, and you climb 272 nearly vertical stairs to reach a cave with lots of statues and temples. There were many people who seemed to be sick climbing the stairs, some had their heads shaved and some yellow or orange cream on their heads, we're still not very sure what it was for. I also had to go to the hospital to get information regarding getting vaccines for India and found it to be very efficient, a woman was able to see me right away with no appointment and tell me all of the information I needed, and the payment system seemed very straightforward and fair, unlike lots of the confusion with insurance and everything in the US. Apparently all of the children here are vaccinated from just after birth and every few weeks, so in some ways they're even more advanced than the US.
Tuesday, June 3, 2008
Lab Work, Dengue Publicity, and Indonesia
(from Mary Bohan)
Things are going well in Singapore, I'm in the middle of the first half of my project, and just starting to actually analyze the RNA sequences I've collected. I'm doing a small presentation next Tuesday for the people in my lab on what I've learned, and what I have to do to complete the analysis.
We haven't been able to get into any hospitals or clinics to see what's going on, but I've picked up on a few things outside on my own. One big thing is the huge advertising and PR campaign that they have going on about Dengue, we'll be on the bus and see a poster stained with blood saying "they breed, you bleed," as well as quite graphic images of spiders on the MRT telling people to clear out their standing water, use protection against mosquitoes, and seek medical care as soon as possible. We walk by the hospital every day on the way to work, and for the most part people seem to be very satisfied, and the whole system seems very efficient.
We did make it to Indonesia last weekend to the beach and got to relax for two days which was great after all of our work in the lab. It was very beautiful and the people were so friendly, it really worked out well. We're still managing with food and everything, although I have to admit I did make a few stops to McDonalds last week, something I rarely do at home, but I just needed some American food.
Things are going well in Singapore, I'm in the middle of the first half of my project, and just starting to actually analyze the RNA sequences I've collected. I'm doing a small presentation next Tuesday for the people in my lab on what I've learned, and what I have to do to complete the analysis.
We haven't been able to get into any hospitals or clinics to see what's going on, but I've picked up on a few things outside on my own. One big thing is the huge advertising and PR campaign that they have going on about Dengue, we'll be on the bus and see a poster stained with blood saying "they breed, you bleed," as well as quite graphic images of spiders on the MRT telling people to clear out their standing water, use protection against mosquitoes, and seek medical care as soon as possible. We walk by the hospital every day on the way to work, and for the most part people seem to be very satisfied, and the whole system seems very efficient.
We did make it to Indonesia last weekend to the beach and got to relax for two days which was great after all of our work in the lab. It was very beautiful and the people were so friendly, it really worked out well. We're still managing with food and everything, although I have to admit I did make a few stops to McDonalds last week, something I rarely do at home, but I just needed some American food.
June 3 Reflection
(from Tammy Chin)
Week two has been great! Mary and I have explored the NUS campus and found great places to eat. We've also traveled all around Singapore and been to places like the Raffles Hotel, the Ancient Civilizations Museum, and have done some shopping at many local shopping centers.
Week two has been great! Mary and I have explored the NUS campus and found great places to eat. We've also traveled all around Singapore and been to places like the Raffles Hotel, the Ancient Civilizations Museum, and have done some shopping at many local shopping centers.
Monday, June 2, 2008
May 26 Reflection:
(From Tammy Chin)
Singapore has been treating me really well (except for its sunny and humid weather, but I'm getting used to it). There are a lot of great places to go, and Mary and I have been going to many of them (Little India and Chinatown) after work and on the weekends. The people here are very nice, and it's very easy to communicate with them since they understand English (and Mandarin). It's also easy to commute and find where we're going. The MRT is a great way to travel. I love the variety of food here, the Indian food, Chinese food, uniquely Singaporean food, etc.
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