GMAT done..oh! not yet..

I messed up my date with gmat on the d/g-day. Scored in 600's. I failed to finish both quant and verbal in time. (can't get any worse!)
My experience in detail
I brushed up all my flashcards on the day before gmat and completed everything before noon. Watched a movie and in the evening i went for a swim just to cool my nerves. My appointment is in the afternoon. I went to the gmat center armed with chocolates, bananas and fruit juice. I reached there one hour before the scheduled time. The friendly receptionist there asked me for passport and took my finger print. I was given a locker to put my belongings including watch and wallet. There was a seperate room where i can put my eatables. Now she said that i can go ahead and take the exam. I didnt know that i can take the exam before the scheduled time. I even brought reader's digest with me to kill some time in the test center. They even provide a piece of paper to write down the five school names. I don't need this since i know the school names by heart.

Everything in the gmat is exactly similar to what we saw in gmatprep. The good old blue screen. It really relieved me of some tension. Before starting the exam we have to enter all five school names. Soon i started with AWA. I practiced to write only one arguement and issue before the exam. Even then it didnt troubled me. I thought for a while and started typing according to my own template. Finished in 28 minutes. It is the same with issue. Very easy topic. Finished this in 25 minutes. But i didn't click on next. Just waited for the clock to show 29 minutes. I used this time to adjust myself and prepare mentally for the quant.

I opted for 10 minutes break. But i returned after 5 minutes. Math section started with an easy question. I felt the level of difficult is quite equivalent to gmatprep questions. In total i had to guess three questions. i tried to solve them for 3-4 minutes, but couldn't arrive at the answer. I knew that if i spent more time on them i could solve. But i followed the sages advice. clicked some answer which i thought is an intelligent guess and moved on. Among these three questions. One is from probability. I encountered only one question from probability and nothing from permutations and combinations. And the rest two are from geometry. As i spent more time on these i was left with only 4 minutes for the last 4 questions. Fortunately i got all easy questions. May be it is because i committed some error in the previous question. I solved the last question but didn't click on next. I was doing a double-check on my answer in those last seconds. Suddenly time-expired message popped up. Even then, I thought, i did well.

Again opted for 10 minutes break. Had some juice and came back in 6 minutes. We have to give our finger prints while coming and leaving the exam hall. Started verbal with SC. Then CR, then SC and finally my 7th question is an RC. I got 4 RC's. 3 smaller ones and one big one (jumbo). two RC's are easy. The bigger one took lot of time. and the last one which is smaller looks easy when i read the passage but the questions are real tricky. I wanted to spend more time on the first 15 questions and speedup on the last ones. This created some problems to me as i didnt pace the test well. For the last 15 questions i was left with only 15 minutes. I got little panicked. Did some breathing exercise and resumed the final quater hour of the battle. Adding to my woes i got RC. For the last 4 questions i was left with 1 minute. i randomly clicked answers for three questions. So final question and the last 30 seconds. It was SC. Pretty easy one. I clicked on C. but still looking at other options. Out of no where a message popped up saying time-expired. This means i failed to finish Verbal in/on time.

Being an optimist, i patiently gone through all the eight screens answering some of the questions. The moment has arrived for which i am waiting for the last couple of months. When the score came, It was in 600's. Not at all what i expected. I was utterly disappointed at that very moment, nevertheless managed to put a smiling face to the receptionist who gave a printed copy of my scoresheet. I looked at it for few minutes waiting for 6 to become 7. Apparently it didnt happen. I came back to my place and spent some excruciating hopeless moments. I even thought that i should put my mba plans on the back burner and continue with my present job. Such is the pain when we get a score that we didnt desire for. I prepared decently for the exam. Got scores of 700+ in practice tests. But in the final exam i faltered.

Evidently, I can't live with my present score and i need to retake. But for now i will take a break for couple of weeks from gmat preparation.I want to congratulate all those who scored 700+ in their first take for their competence and genius. But i want to salute those who took gmat for the second time and achieved their desired score. It needs guts to accept the reality and move on. It really needs lots of energy and enthusiasm to go through the whole process again.
More thoughts in my next post.

All the best for Preet and Curlybee.

Into the last week

Finally, i am into the last week of my preparation. The d-day is six days away. A little apprehensive, a little excited and a little anxious. Too many questions sprinkled with occasional if's and but's are popping up every now and then. Nevertheless, i am reasonably confident of doing well. I learnt one thing for sure in this whole process. The fear of failure is the hardest thing to overcome with.

I visited my test center yesterday. Its a fourty minute drive from my place. The only problem is the parking. The place is little congested, its better to go early and find some place to park. I asked the receptionist about the id requirements that i need to carry, just to ensure in case..Its just the passport and the printed copy of the letter/receipt. I still have to get that printed. I already decided on the five schools. The only thing pending is to make a note of school name, code and the program.
I still didn't pratice AWA. Not even once. But the good thing is that i am ready with the template for issue and arguement. I want to practice two or three essays before the exam.

I didn't practice any RC's except for the one's i encountered in mock tests. So i want to do atleast four RC's per day for the coming five days, just to make myself comfortable with them. I love to start my verbal with SC. What if my verbal starts with RC? OMG..this really is not a confidence booster, but i have to prepare for the worst.

I am planning to take one full length test on saturday simulating the test environment. I think i am prepared okay for the exam. Lets see how it goes..