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Nathan & Beth's Medical School Adventure

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So what's the latest?

Hello and welcome to the new home for updates on Nathan and Beth Claydon. We currently live on the island of Dominica (DOM-IN-EEK-A), which is located in the West Indies portion of the Caribbean Ocean. We are both first semester medical students at the Ross University School of Medicine in Portsmouth, Commonwealth of Dominica.

We are currently about halfway through the first semester, and have gotten a good idea about what it will take to succeed here. We have met many upper class students who have been encouraging and helpful. We have made it through our first exam, and histology practical. This week is a big anatomy week, as we have an anatomy practical worth half of our grade thus far in the class.

Other than class, we found a church on campus that we go to on Sunday evenings. It is a nice break from studying (if only for an hour) and it reminds us of home. We are hoping to gather some more pictures of the campus, our apartment, and the area for the website soon. We are sorry that the updates are not as frequent as we were hoping we could accomodate. We LOVE reading our guest page messages, so thanks to all of you that gave us a shout-out.

Overall, we are impressed with the school so far. The campus is actually quite beautiful, and it is situated on a spectacular ocean-front piece of the island. We are looking forward to jumping into the material and returning to the student's life after a 3-year hiatus. Our first-semester classes include Biochemistry, Histology, Physiology,Anatomy and Doctor/Patient in society.

We were able to secure an apartment not far from campus (seen in picture #40 below) which is situated next to a river that originates high in the mountains above and empties into the ocean a short distance from us. We have found that life on the island is a relentless pursuit of efficiency due to obvious logistical and infrastructural challenges. We are actually enjoying a simpler, more modest way of life at our new home. See "Life on Dominica" link for more info.