NoGAPS 2010

It has been weeks since NoGAPS 2010 and I still haven’t write anything about that memorable event, so I think I should start soon before I forgot sweet juicy details of the programme…

NoGAPS is the “national gathering of pharmacy students”, the largest gathering and most important event involving Malaysian pharmacy students from all pharmacy schools all over Malaysia… The activities were mostly having fun with a little bit of serious pharmacy-related time…

This biannual (but already turned into annual event) was hosted by different pharmacy schools each year and this year it was AIMST University (Sungai Petani) turn (yes, this is the first time an IPTS hosted the event)…

 I went there with Apip and Shamel, taking a ride the legendary Avanza… We arrived at Sungai Petani (Semeling to be precise) late in the evening and headed straight for registration… There were already many participants there… I was grouped into group 4: GREEN…

The accommodation in AIMST was superb… It was like living in an apartment with 11 housemates (divided into 3 rooms)… There was even a common room with sofa… Each apartment unit has 4 bathrooms (with hot shower) and 4 toilets, amazingly comfortable… The bedrooms were ok, all the furniture (bed, desk, chair, huge locker) were brand new… The only downside to this was that there is no privacy between the 4 roommates living in the same room (there is no partition or etc)… Overall I would rate the accommodation as 9 out of 10…

Later that night, the program started with ice-breaking and briefing… As usual, there were games to be played in ice-breaking, it was fun… One particular game that I remembered vividly was finding people who match the description in our paper… Everyone goes around searching and asking for autograph just write name actually… One of the things I signed for was “drive a Honda”, which actually I referred to my Honda Wave… Hahaha

Then, there was opening ceremony which we were presented with performance from the committee… They sang songs from glee… It was like the Malaysian version of glee… It was enjoyable… Dr Syed Azhar was there too (the only other dean from outside of aimst who attended)…

Pharmrace (sort of like explorace with bits of pharmacy in it) was fun…. We ran around Sungai Petani town to solve questions and get to the next checkpoint… The “images” from this race still make me laugh until today (only those who went will understand this).

Community service was done as Rumah Amal Kulim (>1 journey from AIMST). This is a daycare/ school for special children (down syndrome etc)… Here, we did senam aerobic, dancing, sukaneka, teaching children to make lovely cards and watch performances by the children and the participants…

 Patient Counseling Event in which I entered representing IIUM… I made it into the finals, so I guess I’m not as bad as I think I am… It was fun and I really learn a lot…

Symposium with the title “Pharmacy leading the wave of change” was truly inspiring… John Chang even dished out some things which are in the planning for the pharmacy profession… Things like not being restricted to just one premises (thus enabling locum), pharmacist specializing in every medical sub-field etc…

The grand dinner (also closing ceremony) was on the last night of the event. It was colourful as everybody was wearing traditional clothing. Most of the participants wore their own traditional attire but some do other ethnic’s attire… We were assigned to sit at different tables, and my table was the farthest from both entertainment and food (buffet)… There were many cultural performances by the committees, all entertaining… We also got to see Prof Naeem that night (kinda miss him though), he still remembered us (most of us anyway)… huhu

I hoped that the new friendship that was cultivated during this NoGAPS would remain for many more years since we can meet online and in facebook… Some of my new friends are apparently active facebook users which make it a little bit interesting now to be online… I think I’ll try to go to the next NoGAPS in UM next year since this year’s NoGAPS is so much fun…