Slovenia..? Scandinavia..?

People seem to have trouble remembering where in the world I am going to study! No one I have spoken to seems to know much about Slovakia, and indeed neither did I before I started researching the vet school there! With the help of Wikipedia and Google I have started to learn about the country and city where I will be living for the majority of the next four years. From what I've found it looks like a lovely place to live, which is good because I won't get a chance to visit before I move out there. 

Slovakia is a small country, even smaller than the UK, with a population size of about 5.4 million. Kosice is the second largest city after the capital Bratislava, but still only has a population of about 240,000. The country is landlocked and bordered by Hungary, Poland, Ukraine, Austria and Czech Republic (with which it used to make up Czechoslovakia. It's a part of the world I've never really visited before so I plan to use this opportunity to travel a bit more.

The landscape of Slovakia seems to be full of mountains, caves and castles. I'll leave it to the Slovakia tourism website to provide you with pictures because I obviously don't have any myself yet.

The climate looks pretty good too, with proper summers but also proper snowy winters. Maybe I can take some tips back to the UK for coping with snowy weather! I'm pretty sure the Slovaks don't drop everything at the first flake.

Regarding travel, there are currently no flights directly from the UK to Kosice. The options are flying to Bratislava and getting the train to Kosice, or flying to Budapest, Hungary and getting a taxi. The Budapest option seems to take slightly less time but it's also slightly more expensive. I have read rumours of a flight route opening up between Luton and Kosice which would be ideal, but I'm not getting my hopes up because there have been no confirmations yet.

On another note, I had my last day volunteering at the zoo today :( I will miss it but I'm going to be working more hours in the retail department of the zoo from next week and I need my days off for planning the big move to Slovakia. I will still be volunteering for Tiggywinkles as it's not such a big commitment, so I should still get my animal work fix occasionally!

Bye for now!

Lucy

It's been a long time...

...but I decided to revive my blog!

A lot has happened since I last posted (well it has been over a year!) so I don't quite know where to start.
After my RVC interview last year I was rejected at the end of March, so I applied again in October, had an interview this year in January and was rejected AGAIN in March. The RVC obviously don't want me, so I moved on to my back up plan; studying abroad.

I applied to the University of Veterinary Medicine in Košice, Slovakia, shortly after receiving my second rejection and... I have a place! So I'll be starting there this September. The main reason I'm restarting this blog is to help out anyone who is thinking of studying there. The course seems to be getting more popular but there's still not much information out there for potential applicants so hopefully I'll be able to rectify that a bit once I get started on the course.

In other news, I've been working in the retail department of a local zoo since March last year, and also volunteering on the Africa department which has been a lot of fun! Especially getting to hang out with newborns like this little guy.

The giraffes are probably my favourite. I think it's because I look a little bit like one!

That's all for now. I'll try to keep the updates regular from now on! Hopefully I'll post some pictures of the things I've been knitting over the past year in the next few days. I have vague plans to sell some of them off to raise funds for my studies but we'll see how it goes.

Bye!

Lucy

Progress!

Since I last wrote, I have sent off my university application and managed to find a job, yay! 

I am working in the gift shop Past Times which sells some cool stuff (or I think so anyway). It has gone pretty well so far, but I don’t get paid until the end of November which is a pain :(

 

College is going ok, and it has been half term this week which is weird because it feels like we only just started! What is the point of half term, really? It has given me more time to work in the shop and earn monies anyway which is good.

I have done a few more training sessions at St Tiggywinkles and moved on to larger animals now. The foxes and badgers are fine (although the ones I have been practising on so far have been pretty flat) but I was having trouble with the deer. I have decided that the bigger deer are too heavy for me to lift on my own (about 30kg, and kicking) so I will just pin them to the floor and get someone else to help me lift them :D 

I went to see Contagion the other day which I thought looked pretty good. I went with my mum (cause I’m cool like that) cause plague/disease-y type films are our favourite. I quite liked it and it seemed really realistic compared to something like The Stand where everyone except a few particularly interesting characters die off. One thing that annoyed me though was the overuse of technical jargon one minute and the patronising explanation of simple concepts the next. People who work in disease research are not going to explain lock and key mechanisms to their equally knowledgeable colleagues! Anyway, I think it was worth seeing but maybe not at the cinema (although we went on a cheap night so that was ok :) ). 

I am annoyed at the lack of horror movies in cinemas now we are so close to Halloween. They are my favourite part of the holiday! Except maybe the sweets. 

I know I said in my last entry that I’d try to have something interesting to write about this time but that has failed :( Have a picture of a kitty instead.

(I’ll try again next time)

Lucy

A few things...

Been up to a few things since I wrote the last entry! I started at college where I’m retaking A level chemistry. I was a bit worried I was going to be the oldest in a class of 16/17 year olds but there are a few people doing the same as me so that’s good! It’s not as awful as I remember chemistry being so hopefully I can get a better grade this time.

I’m still looking for a job, which is a pain. The office temp job I mentioned last time lasted a week. I very nearly died of boredom. I’m definitely not made for office work.

The deadline for vet med UCAS applications is coming up fast so I’ve been busy with that. I think I may actually have finished my personal statement finally. It’s not perfect but I don’t think it’s too bad so hopefully it can get me at least an interview. I’ve also been revising for the BMAT exam which I need to take at the beginning of November. It’s so difficult! I just hope I do ok in the actual exam.

Other than that, I had my first training session at Tiggywinkle’s a couple of weeks ago. Had another little look around the shelter and got to stroke a fox called Casper. He’s really tame and behaves just like a dog. It was very strange! He is lovely, but not very white any more.

So far I’ve only had training in handling small mammals and birds. The birds were a bit of a challenge, they flap all over the place! Next time I’ll have training in catching large mammals like foxes, badgers and deer. The badgers sound quite scary; apparently they can bite and charge at you. Not as cuddly as they look!

Ooh, I made a purchase today. I tried to resist buying anything but failed miserably. I spotted a copy of the illustrated version of the Life of Pi for £3. £3!! So I bought it. The story is amazing and the pictures in the illustrated version are lovely. Apparently there’s a film coming out next year but I think I may avoid it. I don’t think it will come across that well on film. However, Jean-Pierre Jeunet was on board to direct a few years ago and I think maybe I would have given his version a watch.

That’s about it. Next time I will try to have something more exciting to write about. Maybe some pictures would make this more interesting... hmmm.

Bye for now!

Lucy

St Tiggywinkles Ambulance Driver

I had an interview the other day to be an 'ambulance driver' for St Tiggywinkles the wildlife hospital. It involved driving out to collect injured animals to take them to the hospital. I'll be getting training in handling all sorts of animals which sounds really exciting. They gave me a massive list of equipment I'll need to fit into my car as well. Deer crates and gauntlets and nets and all sorts.
I also had a quick tour of the hospital which was really interesting. I'd love to work somewhere like that but I imagine jobs are pretty scarce! I saw a badger coming round from surgery which I was pretty excited about. I've never seen a badger in real life before! I also had a look in the nursery where there are lots and lots of baby hedgehogs at the moment. There was also a species I hadn't encountered before called a Glis glis which is a type of dormouse. They were very cute!
I didn't realise before how busy the hospital was. Apparently in summer they can get over 1000 cases per day :| My work as an ambulance driver will be pretty sporadic because they will only call me out for cases in my area, but it should still be really interesting.

Other than that, I finished my kennel work experience last week and then on Thursday I started at a temporary office job. I'm covering for a PA and I pretty much have no idea what I'm doing. I mostly just have to answer the phone and emails and make calls. It's very very boring. Makes me work harder at all my animal-y stuff so I don't get stuck in an office job forever.

On the vet front, I finished a draft of my personal statement today. It's over the character limit so I'll have to cut it down but I don't know which bits to cut and which to leave! It also seems really really cliche... I just hope I can get it so it will do the job. Only a month and a half till the deadline now!

That's all for now,

Lucy