My First Day As An MS1

I am officially a medical student! Today was only a half day of orientation, but we received our books, IDs, and most importantly, our white coats! My friends and I went early to establish our "assigned" seats for the semester (all our classes are held in the same lecture hall). It was very exciting to be welcomed as DOCTORS!

The class size is a whopping 160! 15 of the students are from India, while some are from Iran, Belize, Taiwan and even Egypt. There are also students representing 33 of the US states with the highest number from Texas, Michigan, Florida and New York. 73 of the students are women and 87 are men. There is only 1 other girl in my class that has blond hair!

Anyways, the day was quite informative. They had the chief of police come and tell us a few of the laws of the island. Here is an excerpt from the pamphlet we received:
How can you legally defend yourself?
"Self defense is a tricky issue. First and foremost, the possession of mace sprays or pepper spray, or worse, firearms, are prohibited. So, even when used in self defense the user is liable for prosecution. Bear in mind that the possession of an illegal gun leads to pre-trial detention and a sentence of one year imprisonment! In terms of self defense, the defense must be proportional. If someone simply mad mouths another person, that person cannot stab that man and plead self defense. If someone picks a fight and starts beating, the person under attack can of course hit back, to stop the attack. But it has to stop here. If the attacker flees, you are not allowed to go after him and hit him some more, just to get even!"

I was really surpised by the prohibition of mace especially since I brought some down. I actually had it in my backpack while this speech was going on. What it comes down to is this: if someone is trying to hurt me rest assured that I am going to whip out my mace and squirt them. End of story. Honestly, is the man trying to break into my house going to go to the police station and report me for having mace? And if he does so and gets away with it then the police here are corrupt afterall!

well tomorrow is the first day of class. I will post again tomorrow to let eveyone know how it went. Don't worry mom, Allison's mom took pictures of us today before heading off to school. We were even standing in front of the bright yellow school jeep!