When summer students joined me to learn medicine, we'd have lunch together and work like a team. And as much as I wanted to, I knew I couldn't skip the conversation topic of burnout, that to sweep this burnout issue under the carpet was to behave like an ostrich. It's a hot topic among our colleagues. And there is also the nettlesome question of whether our medical interns are getting less enthusiastic near the end of the term (translation: June) - that's an

My friend tied the knot in Singapore, and I stayed in the diamond-shaped island over this weekend.

Travelling to Singapore is nothing but a three-hour nonstop flight. Before departure, I'd been reading a book on decision making but I decided not to bring the unfinished book with me this time. The idea is for something less serious; it's joyful time to go with the newlyweds and witness a couple saying "I do." Of course, "I do" is a big decision

Not so long ago, really - four days ago when I was leaving for Japan - I read the book The Art of Thinking Clearly at the airport bookstore and learned about planning fantasy. In brief, it's the illusion of grandiosity when we make plans. How often do we allow this idea of grandiosity to go rampage at the buffet dinner? If there's an Olympics for that kind of fantasy, I should have been awarded a thousand world-class gold medals.

Now imagine your teacher gives you an

In many ways, going to academic conference is a good way to learn: the program usually runs the gamut from basic science (like zebrafish) to patient care (that we do now and then). The downside is that some lectures aren't attractive and there's a day's worth of activity outside the conference venue.

This week, I'm attending a conference in Tokyo. Thinking of all the Tokyo's top sights mentioned in Lonely Planet , I knew pretty well the reason of some

Call myself professional on one hand, and I teach my students to learn from waitresses on the other.

It does make sense.

After my recent lesson from the waitress, I went on to read more on the waitresses' strategic mimicry, and how mimicry increases the odds to build rapport and move others. To me, the answer that the waitress also doesn't want her customer to wait is trying to attune, to enhance liking, to get inside the head of the customer, to draw the map showing we

Sometimes the line between the professional and unskilled job is blurry.

Tonight I went to order takeaway dinner. Quite a number of people were waiting outside the cafeteria. Most of us, it turns out, were there because domestic maids don't usually work on Sunday. Getting a table is tricky and may not be easy on Sunday evening. And yet it's practical. It's visceral. I wasn't surprised when the customers grumbled about the long wait.

"Heck, it's quite a

What happened when a hundred-year-old man climbed out of the window (in his slippers) and disappeared? Go read Jonas Jonasson's novel and you will find out the man set off in his pee-slippers (so called because men of his age rarely pee further than their shoes) and unravelled one story after another.

But what if a four-year-old climbed out of the bed and disappeared?

Ah, a mystery.

That four-year-old turned out to be Jasmine'

Let's pretend that you're the mummy. You have two little girls. One of them breaks fifteen cups as she is coming into the dining room, the other breaks one cup as she is trying to get some jam while you are not there. Which of them would you punish more severely?

I didn't make up this story myself. That's the way the Swiss psychologist Jean Piaget explored the child's understanding of morality. This story comes from my recent reading Teaching Right from Wrong