Before I set foot in Vienna, I had no extreme predilections
of what I would think and feel about this city in contrast to the other places that
I’ve been to in Europe. I didn’t know
what to expect at all and what I found was extraordinary. Upon our arrival to
Vienna from Munich, I was exhausted from a week of acclimating to the rhythm of
this program and I feared that I might not be prepared to fully appreciate it’s
beauty and history. Fortunately, after a good night’s sleep at the
Deutchmeister , a delicious breakfast, and a spontaneous mélange and sacher
torte at Café Demel, I knew that Vienna was going to be one of my favorite
corners of the world. I have had a keen
interest in the history of medicine since high school and I had a wonderful
teacher who instilled in me how instrumental and fulfilling it is to be
educated on this section of history. I couldn’t help but think of her as Dr.
Wasser guided us through the city, stopping to talk about various “fathers” of
bacteriology, toxicology, physiology, and more. As a young person who grew up
in such a modernized time, it’s mind boggling and awe inspiring to me when I
hear about the people who first inquired, experimented, and spent their lives
making progress and discoveries in medicine. I feel so grateful for their
works, and challenged to not let myself become stagnant and simply accept
everything I learn as concrete knowledge, because who knows what is left to be
discovered in medicine? This city that is rooted so deep in the history of
Europe, endured the Plague and two world wars still exists as a paradigm of
music, medicine, philosophy, and culture, and history, which to me makes Vienna
an absolute privilege to experience. I loved visiting the medical school there
and hearing the striking differences between the medical education offered
there, and the one that I’m pursuing in the states. While I envy their
opportunity to streamline into medicine after high school graduation with only
an entrance exam, I have to criticize the system in that it doesn’t view a
student in a holistic way as American schools do. They’re certainly onto
something since they’re matriculation rates are high and they only accept the
highest scoring students. Nonetheless, I’m content to continue jumping through
flaming hoops to build up my strength as an applicant and work towards my goal
of attending medical school and becoming a physician. Walking through the old
insane asylum that now holds the wax models was hands down one of the coolest
things I’ve ever done. It awakened my curiosity about so many diseases and
conditions that have never sparked my interest before, mostly because I haven’t
seen many bad diseases right in front of me like that. The models at the
Josephinum were equally as fascinating, particularly the obstetric models. I’m floored by the age of these models and
how much detail was known or suspected about the body over 200 years ago. The
Freud museum surprised me, mainly because I didn’t know much more about Freud
than his stranger theories which puzzle me quite a bit. I was interested to
learn about his struggle with his mouth once it became diseased from years of
continuous cigar smoking. The fact that he lived with such an invasive
prosthesis and continued his work surprised me and made me more curious about
him as a person. Learning Vienna’s
history as a civilization, alongside its history in the scope of medicine,
accompanied by a daily mélange is what I’d like to call a great week, and I
would love to return to Vienna and do it all over again!
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