Day 1 Galveston (Brackenridge Summer Internship)
Sunday
Today we traveled to Galveston for week 3 of our Brackenridge UTMB summer internship. Our flight was at 11:10am this morning, so we met at Austin Bergstrom at 9:30am. Flying out on this flight is me, Jing Jing, Clair, Rebecca, Kim, Michael A, Travis, and Meena. Michael flew out later and Chanel is driving.
Sunday
Today we traveled to Galveston for week 3 of our Brackenridge UTMB summer internship. Our flight was at 11:10am this morning, so we met at Austin Bergstrom at 9:30am. Flying out on this flight is me, Jing Jing, Clair, Rebecca, Kim, Michael A, Travis, and Meena. Michael flew out later and Chanel is driving.
We made our flight in time, it took about 45 minutes and landed around noon. The Galveston Limousine Service is supposed to be picking us up at 1:30pm so we had a while to kill before they got there. We are pretty much on our own, and this process was a little shady although I am not at all complaining. We have no idea where to find the limousine service, but we are BME’s and we figured it out. A limousine didn’t actually pick us up, it was actually a bus. We shared it with a bunch of people headed out on cruises. The ride took little over an hour and the pier reminded me of when I went on a cruise to the Caribbean. Anyways so then we checked into our hotel right on the pier.
The Harbor House. Checking in was also an interesting experience. We had no idea who the reservation was under. So we just started listing people’s names. Is it under Cindy Zimmerman? David Weigel? Ehhhh. James Shaw, Michael Achilleos, Mike Yim, Clair Hollingsworth…. Nope. Eventually we found out it was under UTMB for 10 people.
The rooms… wow. Amazing. Right on the harbor. We were all blown away.
Okay time to address funding. I have no idea where all the funds that pay for the program and this trip are coming from. Maybe from tuition? But it really doesn’t add up. So far we’ve been given a Brackenridge hospital gift card for $300 dollars, the flight out to Houston, the limousine service ride to Galveston, the Harbor House stay for 5 nights, breakfast and lunch included at UTMB, and visa gift cards totaling $150, ride back to Houston and flight back to Austin. Tuition costs around $1600 dollars. There’s no way tuition is enough to cover the costs of everything. So I’m thinking maybe the UT BME department or UTMB perhaps? Someone from our group said that overall, this program cost $5,000 per person. That’s $50,000 for all 10 of us. I know that’s simple math, but I just wanted to reiterate. Wow. I just want to say on behalf of myself and everyone else, thank you so much. We all feel so fortunate and lucky to be part of this program. I really lucked out getting selected from all the applicants. This is a big deal because someone is investing a whole bunch of time and money in me. Anyways, thanks.So then after we checked in and got settled, we decided to get some lunch. Our mode of transportation: feet.
Harbor house
Seeing how it was already 4:00pm, we made it as far as the Eat at Joe’s Crab Shack right across the parking lot.. 200 feet away. 
The food was so good. 1. Because we were all starving. 2. Because we used the Visa gift cards and free food always tastes the best. It feels so nice to finally have money as opposed to Europe when I had to eat freaking baguettes and Paninis all day long whenever we would go out.
Seeing how it was already 4:00pm, we made it as far as the Eat at Joe’s Crab Shack right across the parking lot.. 200 feet away. The food was so good. 1. Because we were all starving. 2. Because we used the Visa gift cards and free food always tastes the best. It feels so nice to finally have money as opposed to Europe when I had to eat freaking baguettes and Paninis all day long whenever we would go out. Ordering food.
After lunch, we all kind of wanted to go to check out the beach scene. Seeing how we had no car, we walked it out. It was probably about a mile and a half away from us. The walk wasn’t that pleasant. For one it was so humid and hot. Two the mosquitoes. Seriously, are you kidding me? These mosquitoes are ridiculously vicious. Way more than Austin. I was getting bit through my shirt all over. I pulled out my umbrella to shield myself from the sun, Asian woman style. Hey don’t knock it; it works pretty well.
When we finally got to the beach, we got right in.
You can wade pretty far out. The sand goes for at least 100 yards out. 
But the beach is less than glamorous. The beach is very narrow, the sand is kinda hard, and the water is brown. No one really wanted to get in past their knees. 
So we chilled here for a while, got some drinks, and made a human pyramid. 
Eventually I ended up diving in. At the time it was a great idea. But afterwards I immediately regretted the decision. I felt disgusting.
Dinner time. Time to walk again. In the distance we could see the storm clouds rolling in and they looked bad. Luckily Travis called his friend who was staying in Galveston at the time and he came with his pickup truck. It was perfect timing too because the storm was literally behind us as we were driving.
We piled in and we to a restaurant called ‘The spot.’ It’s basically Fuddruckers combined with Pappadeaux. Seafood dinner. Very good. 
Travis’ friend Nick was telling us about how his friend got ringworm from getting in the water. EHHHHHHHHHHHh.
From there, Chanel came an joined us and we went back to the hotel. We took a side detour so that Travis’ friend Nick could show us the most haunted place in all of Galveston. I was skeptical at first, but oh my God. It was so scary. I couldn’t get a good picture of it, but it looked like a scary insane asylum. There were these staircases that ran along the outside of the building. We just looked from the outside but you could see the lightning in the background which made it even creepier. I offered my Visa gift card to anyone who would spend the night there, but everyone passed.
Then we went back to our hotel and pretty much just crashed. Tomorrow we have to be down in the lobby at 7:45 am. We have orientation, some problem base learning sessions, lunch, and the patient simulator. It should all be fun. Later
-James
PS the mosquito problem is out of control. I have like 8 bites on me. That is all.
After lunch, we all kind of wanted to go to check out the beach scene. Seeing how we had no car, we walked it out. It was probably about a mile and a half away from us. The walk wasn’t that pleasant. For one it was so humid and hot. Two the mosquitoes. Seriously, are you kidding me? These mosquitoes are ridiculously vicious. Way more than Austin. I was getting bit through my shirt all over. I pulled out my umbrella to shield myself from the sun, Asian woman style. Hey don’t knock it; it works pretty well.
When we finally got to the beach, we got right in.
You can wade pretty far out. The sand goes for at least 100 yards out. But the beach is less than glamorous. The beach is very narrow, the sand is kinda hard, and the water is brown. No one really wanted to get in past their knees. So we chilled here for a while, got some drinks, and made a human pyramid. Eventually I ended up diving in. At the time it was a great idea. But afterwards I immediately regretted the decision. I felt disgusting.Dinner time. Time to walk again. In the distance we could see the storm clouds rolling in and they looked bad. Luckily Travis called his friend who was staying in Galveston at the time and he came with his pickup truck. It was perfect timing too because the storm was literally behind us as we were driving.
We piled in and we to a restaurant called ‘The spot.’ It’s basically Fuddruckers combined with Pappadeaux. Seafood dinner. Very good. Travis’ friend Nick was telling us about how his friend got ringworm from getting in the water. EHHHHHHHHHHHh.
From there, Chanel came an joined us and we went back to the hotel. We took a side detour so that Travis’ friend Nick could show us the most haunted place in all of Galveston. I was skeptical at first, but oh my God. It was so scary. I couldn’t get a good picture of it, but it looked like a scary insane asylum. There were these staircases that ran along the outside of the building. We just looked from the outside but you could see the lightning in the background which made it even creepier. I offered my Visa gift card to anyone who would spend the night there, but everyone passed.
Then we went back to our hotel and pretty much just crashed. Tomorrow we have to be down in the lobby at 7:45 am. We have orientation, some problem base learning sessions, lunch, and the patient simulator. It should all be fun. Later
-James
PS the mosquito problem is out of control. I have like 8 bites on me. That is all.
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