Here's some of the more revolting masses.
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I had been born and grown up in a Wiltshire village, but my father had taken an early retirement package that gave him the same pension as if he had worked to 65. He wanted to move to a smallholding in the remotest part of west Wales, and did so as soon as I finished my A-levels in late June 1976. The next day after my parents left, I got on my BSA and spent a week riding around Dorset near Weymouth with a couple of motorcycling friends. My budget was sadly lacking, and we could not afford official campsites, and I got moved on by rather kind policemen at 6am on a few mornings. After a brief but intense affair with a delightful girl from Wyke Regis, the money ran out and I set out for Wales and turned up unannounced as my parents were building the turkey house - as we called it, but at the time it housed an electric water boiler and it was a bath house until the actual farmhouse had been renovated. At the time, only a pair of owls lived in the house, and the humans made do with an old caravan. So I settled in to a summer of farm work and building, with early mornings and evenings dedicated to scourging the local rabbit and pigeon population with either an air rifle or my 12-bore shotgun (I had a license). There came a time when the results arrived, and while I had a grade A for biology and physics, the examination board sent me an incorrect result for chemistry - saying I'd failed. That was pretty bad, and my father amusingly consoled me by giving me a large home made knife - not sure what he intended me to do with it. Further enquiries said there was a mistake, and I had a grade A, and following that I had my first hangover as he fed me far too much Teachers whisky.
So when the day came, I got on a train in Carmarthen, changed at Swansea, and went on to Paddington. Tube to Camden Town, and a long walk up the Camden Road to Ifor Evans hall of residence, room 376. It was the thing then to have a trunk, which turned up a day later, rather surprisingly, with clothes, a tape deck, my cassettes - well, all my worldly goods in it. Dragged it up to the room, emptied it, and then placed it in storage. I remember that was a Sunday, and there was no evening meal available in the refectory. I celebrated independence with a walk around Regent's Park whilst smoking my pipe full of god awful Clan tobacco.
Somehow I had word to go to the Marlborough Arms on the evening of 2nd September to meet my tutor - Samuel Zeki (equally famous for his work on the neuroanatomy of vision and his ultra-left wing politics), so I went and I recall nothing much about it. The next day, classes began with an introductory lecture from the dean, Prof. James, who happily told us we had done the difficult part by getting in, and we would not fail to qualify if we paid just a little attention. This was good news, as we were under the impression we were in for a hard time.
In those days, medical qualification was arranged as first MB, second MB and third MB. The first MB was passing A-levels in physics, chemistry and biology (or, briefly, mathematics instead of biology, which made no sense and was soon dropped). The second MB was taken at the end of two pre-clinical years, and was a formidable exam of anatomy, physiology, biochemistry, embryology, pharmacology, statistics, and sociology. Just for example, the anatomy exam could ask about any part of the body, any structure, and all its 'relations' - which meant what was above, below, to the right and left of it at any point along its course. There were many rude mnemonics* to help the memory. The third MB was finals, taken after three years of clinical studies that came after the two years of pre-clinical.
So year one was dedicated to anatomy, biochemistry and physiology. The part you will enjoy was anatomy, which took up every morning in the dissection room in the Anatomy Basement. Six students, one body, no gloves. Just some barrier cream. AIDS had not been invented, and other risks were part of the job. Every morning we took out our scalpels and got dug in, as it were. Twenty bodies all in a room supervised by a moustachioed sergeant-major, who was quite entertaining when sober, and even better under normal circumstances, when he was very far from sobriety. We all bought half-skeletons from second year students, and I recognised the pencilled writing on mine as being my brother's handwriting (he had gone through seven years before), so I have kept 'Napoleon' (Bone Apart - geddit?) ever since. We cut, sliced, and threw the bits in a bin bag. On the next table, there was a student from Gibraltar, and at some point we must have locked eyes.
Talking of which, I made a couple of attempts to abandon my virginity, and both went nowhere. But on November 17th, the MedSoc held a disco, and I arranged to be there to meet a biology room mate of one of my fellows. I got there early, and found only one other attendee, the girl from Gibraltar. Poor biology student (who was very good at dirty limericks) never got a look-in. Gib-girl and I hit it off. A week after that she spent a night in Camden Road. She hated her accommodation, and in the second term she moved into the Max Rayne residence next to Ifor Evans, but lived in the latter. 44 years later, we are still stuck with each other.
Anatomy also involved a few lectures, and surface anatomy vivas, which I learned to avoid, as a male student would be selected to strip off and be the model for all the poking and touching. Biochemistry was utterly deadly, with no way that the best lecturer could make it interesting. The practicals involved taking white rats, killing them, and homogenising their livers for various silly gas chromatography experiments. Waste of rats. The physiology prof was wonderfully entertaining - Olof Lippold, who discovered essential tremor. Quite enjoyed vivisecting rabbits in the Haldane room under his supervision.
At the end of the year, the exams were pretty wretched, with wheelbarrows full of textbooks that had to be memorised. I think there were about 110 of us, and 60% female for the first time. Maybe a couple dropped out during the year, and perhaps a couple more failed the exam. But Prof. James was right, if you got in, you would pass with just a little attention. I don't think I ever had to do more than an hour of work outside lectures and practical classes each day; it was not hard at all. Managing my grant money was important, as buying textbooks took up most of it, and getting home on the train at the end of each term used up most of the rest. I think I finished the year with £25 left.
In order to earn a few quid, I got the job of helping the Sergeant-Major for a week at the end of the year. This got me access into the sub-basement where the bodies were embalmed and stored. We took the bits from the bin bags and placed them in chip-board coffins held together with staples. They had gold-coloured plastic handles, and a good deal of his cigarette ash went into each, but no matter as all were heading for the purifying flames anyway. In the sub-basement were large tanks made of slate and full of formalin and body parts. Absolutely wonderful experience.
And so we went home for the summer, to kill rabbits, dream of each other (I don't recall, but I suspect Gib-girl came to Wales to meet the sheep etc. She wasn't really from Gibraltar, but her Royal Navy father was in charge of the naval base there.) The big question on our minds (apart from where we could next get together to use our anatomical prowess) was where we might live for the second year, as university accommodation was limited to one year only.
*for example, where the lingual nerve takes an unusual course alongside the musculature under the tongue and twists around a salivary gland duct:
The lingual nerve took a swerve
Beside the hyoglossus
Said Wharton's Duct
I'll be fucked
The bugger's double-crossed us
and so on. There are more, all sanctified by generations of surgical fellowship candidates who need such aide memoires more than anyone else.