Working for royalty

The bigger hospitals here are mostly named after royalty, so let's just say I'll be spending my next three months at the Prince's.

That sounded sleazy.

After attempting to explain my working hours to my sister and friends, I am once again reminded of how inhumane the system is. Essentially, my life in the next three months will run in cycles of three to four days:

Day 1: 8am-6pm
Day 2: 8am-6pm-8am
Day 3: 8am- 6pm
(Day 4: 8am-6pm)

Whoever's decision it was to make house officers thirty-three hours shifts every few days is an absolute moron. Besides, taking into account my current unfamiliarity with my job, my days should start slightly after six every morning if I want to do a round on my patients before my medical officer does. I should start looking for a better eye cream.

You may say, hard work pays. Unfortunately, only minimally.

10 hours x 5 week days = 50 hours
4 on Saturdays = 4 hours
14 hours x 2 overnight shifts = 28 hours
Allowing an extra 8 hours overtime per week to accommodate the ridiculous number of patients in our overloaded public system
      = 90 hours x 4 weeks = 360 hours

Divided by our measly wages after subtracting costs of things like mpf and insurance, we receive less than seventy bucks an hour, i.e. just a little over a dollar per minute. In other words, it seems like a better deal for us to work at one of those 每六秒一蚊 sex story hotlines. The job nature is similar - 候召 - but with a better label.  

Despite all the ranting, I'm actually pretty excited to start finally contributing to humanity as a small potato at the bottom of the food pyramid (how apt). T-minus three and counting.