It's The Great White Tower(Japanese: 白い巨塔), a 2003 Japanese series adapted from a novel. Goro Zaizen and Shuji Satomi are the main characters. They were classmates in Medical school and worked in the same hospital. Zaizen majors in thoracic surgery, while Satomi is an internalist. They two are the most gifted among others. Zaizen's surgery graft is superb, even beyond his tutor, Teizo Azuma, who's the chief of surgery of national authority. And Zaizen's enchanted by it. Surgery for him is like playing the violin. He's energetic, confident, and ambitious. There're many unspoken rules in society, including the holy white tower-- hospital. And everyone inside it is influenced. Zaizen wants to climb to a higher position of the tower, thus making the system better and benefiting more patients. He has to flatter those in power, although he seems overqualified. Finally, he made it to the top as the chief of Japan's newly built, no.1 cancer center. However, he has always wondered if he had lost something, maybe his roots, especially when faced with Satomi, an ideal and honorable physician always sticking to his principles, no matter what it takes him. Sadly, Zaizen was diagnosed with terminal and inoperable lung cancer, which is exactly his field, just before his career was to take off. He died young, leaving the world to think about the essence of medicine and humanity. --------------------------------- PS My English skills are limited, and this series is very complicated and deep.

It's The Great White Tower(Japanese: 白い巨塔), a 2003 Japanese series adapted from a novel. Goro Zaizen and Shuji Satomi are the main characters. They are classmates in Medical school and work in the same hospital. Zaizen majors in thoracic surgery, while Satomi is an internalist (internist ?). They both are the most gifted among others. Zaizen's surgery graft is superb, even beyond his tutor, Teizo Azuma, who's the chief of surgery of national authority. And Zaizen's enchanted by it. Surgery for him is like playing the violin. He's energetic, confident, and ambitious. There're many unspoken rules in society, including the holy white tower-- hospital. And everyone inside it is influenced. Zaizen wants to climb to a higher position of the tower, thus making the system better and benefiting more patients. He has to flatter those in power, although he seems overqualified. Finally, he made it to the top as the chief of Japan's newly built, no.1 cancer center. However, he has always wondered if he had lost something, maybe his roots, especially when faced with Satomi, an ideal and honorable physician always sticking to his principles, no matter what it takes him. Sadly, Zaizen was diagnosed with terminal and inoperable lung cancer, which is exactly his field, just before his career was to take off. He died young, leaving the world to think about the essence of medicine and humanity. --------------------------------- PS My English skills are limited, and this series is very complicated and deep.

And I'm a bit confused when deciding which tense to use. I'm telling a story that has happened so that the past tense may fit. However, sometimes it's merely telling the bare truth. In that case, the present tense？