Four years of knowledge packed into a year of courses, crammed into your brain in two weeks, and then your fate decided in four hours. What can I say? It's finally over and done with, for now. Now, is an equally treacherous two weeks of waiting to see if you make the cut. If so, then round two begins. If not, then it's back to square one.
The catch...results will be released while I'm at work...where it matters. So, either I prove myself in front of everyone, or cut my chances of landing that full-time job.
Judging from the environment today, I would estimate that there were somewhere around ten thousand people writing this exam around the province. From what I've heard, that means I need to beat at least two thousand of them to pass. Did I do that? I really don't know.
The exam was not what we expected. The parts that we thought would be difficult seemed easier. But that might mean we missed the tricks. The parts that we thought would be easy were more complex than expected. Overall, that messed up everyone's timing. Myself included. As with most people, I guessed on some of the more difficult questions to save time for the ones I should be able to get right. I guess that's not so bad, since it seemed to be a problem for everyone.
It's been a while since I've had to study so hard for an exam. And it's been a while since I've worried so much about an exam. Even when I wrote the MCAT or GMAT back then, it was nowhere close to being this stressful. I guess there wasn't much at stake those two times. But this time, there's a lot of things at risk.
To be honest, I don't care much for the credentials. It's just a stepping stone. What I need is the job. Because everything else in my life depends on it.
Anyhow, it's done.
Apart from the exam itself, there were some more "human" things I noticed today. One good. One bad.
The bad is that I was a little disappointed that I didn't get a single word of encouragement from my family before I left this morning. I really don't think they actually know how difficult this exam is or how nervous I was about this. But I guess that's also partly because they have a very high confidence level in me.
The good is the bonding between people in our program. Everyone seems to be pretty supportive of each other, although in some cases it may be a little superficial. Although scattered throughout the examination hall, everyone in our program went around to encourage, shake hands, or hug each other. That was nice to see. And it was nice to see familiar faces around you during the exam.
Thank you to all the people that shared their study materials with me, and thank you to everyone in my study group.
Thank you to all the people that kept me sane while I was studying, and thank you to all the people who sent their encouragement and best wishes.
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