Of exams and results

Couple of months back, wifey had actually registered for some exams related to her work. There were 3 papers that she had to take in one go, with individual pass mark of 45 and overall pass mark of 50. Her colleagues and friends who had taken those exams prior had warned her of the difficulty level and extent of preparation needed, alongside mentioning about the pass percentage of people who clear the exam in the first attempt. Just like justice, the more delayed more denied, information related exams also, should be relegated under same category. If not provided timely they only serve the purpose of putting the fear of god in people, making them doubt if they would be able to clear the exams. Had those trivia about those exams been told to her much earlier, chances of her not taking them would’ve been bit high. But having already registered, that too with just a month to go, she had no choice but to give it an honest try and honest try it was!! In between we had a temple run long delayed due to covid which further reduced the study window. She was watching you tube videos on classes conducted for those papers during travel and once we were back, she took those sessions head on. Every single waking minute was spent with you tube and notes taking wouldn’t be an exaggeration!! The one person who was happy about her long study hours was junior, for he could stay late and delay his sleeping hours, playing with me. He was a pakka gentleman in this respect, not disturbing her at all and often would use that pretext (read blackmail) to play more and stay awake. When she cleared the first exam, the stress level increased a bit as despite spending most of the effort on that paper, the marks were not satisfactory (for her!!) and she feared if the rest of the papers, with even lesser time to prepare took a score hit, this number wouldn’t help in shoring up the overall percent. With more vigor she took up the second exam and for that entire week, earphone-mobile-youtube videos accompanied her everywhere except while taking bath. Had there been a waterproof option guess that would’ve been put to use as well!!! The highlight about this study exercise being, she never excused herself from any of her daily chore or routine. (ivlo vakkanaiya post podriye nee edachum help pannia kekaravangaluku…tholla pannathathu was my biggest contribution endru perumaiyaaga…grrr!!) The results were much better than the first exam and with a 2 week breather for the final one, she finally relaxed a bit for a whole one day. Panic soon set in knowing that the final one was the toughest of the lot and the earphone-mobile-youtube routine started with vigor. The venue for the final one was different and on the other extreme of the city. She had a tough travel and we were literally in the mindset that even if it doesn’t come through the next attempt will give her more time, as she has already cleared two of them. Not so surprisingly, the final paper got her the maximum marks and maximum envy from her colleagues majority of whom had never cleared all the papers in first attempt!! Junior was super happy and awarded her with a “trophy” and became progressively sad when the bed timings got restored.

Aaacha. 

Seeing her study as if preparing for board exams, made me all shades of green with envy and I wanted to clear some course on immediate basis. Luckily(!) there came a professional certification that is majorly recognized and I enrolled for the same. It was a 3 day virtual session, coupled with only one material of 163 page, alongside a practice test, coupled with the test being flexible enough to be taken from the luxuries of home(anywhere). Ithana flexibilities apart, the only thing needed from my side was the effort to study and appear for the exam, which as the trainer proudly proclaimed none has ever failed (that he warned us from breaking that record was a different story). I had a month’s time to prepare and spent most of the time wondering how to postpone the exam than preparing. The virtual sessions were so boring that I had slept during some of them( and I got to know about it only when I asked my fellow mate why the trainer skipped those sessions!!) The most embarrassing thing of all was that, it was supposed to be on my present role and how I do my daily routines. Idhukum mela compare panni solanumna, idhalam clear panalaina, adha vida periya avamaanam wouldn’t be there. Cake walk was the term commonly used to describe these exams. Adhelam ozhunga padichi prepare panravangaluku. Class edukarapo thoongina!! Slowly the fire of fear started to set in 2 weeks before the exam. When I opened that 163 page material (I remember the number because, I looked at the last page to see how big the book was to console myself) each page was a printout from some presentation slide and only had pointers at high level. But the more you read those lines, each lines turned into a page long material!!! By the end of that week, I had mentally prepared myself to pay for second attempt if at all the postponement didn’t work out. There were 12 people who attended those sessions along with me and everyone where waiting for the other to finish the exam. Slowly a couple of them cleared and by the last week, a false sense of bravado set in. Some one casually had mentioned that all questions came from practice test and it is sufficient if we are clear with that set. 2 days before the exam only the realization stuck in with all ferocity that, each of the attendee got a different set of practice test and as it is there were 600 different questions. The night before the last date to appear for the exam was the longest I had ever spent studying in the last decade!!! I did manage to clear the exam was a different story but compared to the sincere effort took by wife and the callousness with which I prepared, felt that exam taking mindset has long evaporated from my system. Inimaylam padichoma naalu review poatoma nu irukanumnu realized!!! Edhuku intha veera velayaattulaam!!!