You know, last time when matah wore shorts......

You see, as people get older, they like to talk a lot about the past. One of the things that junior trainees get most frightened of is kennah stuck with the lao kok kok professor or senior consultant. 

If you are lucky, you may be listening to his life story for the first time in a nice restaurant over lunch. He will tell you how he struggled through a poor family and had to study with a candle. Nevertheless, he managed to get into medicine and eventually became the godfather of the fraternity. He will tell you how he had wanted to be in another speciality but fate has it that he was rejected and therefore he is in the present one (which explains why he hates a certain speciality so much). At times (if you are really lucky) he will share how he eventually fell out with his long time teacher and mentor or how he used to be best buddies with another prof but he cheated/ framed/ made used of him. Sometimes (if you are really really lucky), he will tell you how he had wished for his son to follow his footsteps but he did just the opposite. All these are really interesting and gives you a perspective into why so and so cannot be seated in the same table during the faculty dinner. This also may just keep you out of trouble by preventing you from offending one prof because you openly praised the other.

If you are unlucky, you may just have been caught by the prof at the corridor and you are standing there listening to the same story for the nth time. You know exactly what the prof is going to tell you next as you have already (by passive diffusion) memorise his whole life story. You are post call, tired but you seem to be nodding as if you are interested. Actually, your tired neck muscles can no longer hold your head in place and you are just falling asleep. At times (if you are really unlucky), you may really need to go pass urine but the prof just does not recognise the urgency (pun intended) in your contorted facial expression. Sometimes (if you are really really unlucky), his unfilial son has stood him up for dinner again and he invites you to continue the conversation at the same damn restaurant (so that he can continue the torture). All these putting up with the prof is necessary as he still yields power in the fraternity. This may also be the only reason you are still surviving as you have managed somehow to offend the other prof and guru in the speciality. But this one likes you as you are the only probably the only one who listens to his story.

If you are a girl, you may be with the (humsup) prof in the Alumni Building... but that is another story for another day... not sure lucky or unlucky... haha...