TOEFL End of journey:- TOEFL 110 !!

Hello Fellow Gmatclub members,

Finally I am done with TOEFL EXAM as well as GMAT EXAM
I have already posted a detailed debriefing of my GMAT score, preparation, methodology and material in the forum:-

gmat-750-end-of-journey-thank-you-all-223469.html#p1720797

This post is about my TOEFL preparation.
Just around 11 o clock at night on 7th September I got my TOEFL SCORE in mail.

The breakup is as follows: (See the attached watermarked score card at the end of the post)
Reading:- 28/30
Listening:-29/30
Speaking:-24/30
Writing:- 29/30
TOTAL:- 110/120
I am not sure what my expectations were because I just took the exam in a hurry when I realised that a lot of B school are asking for it. I dont even know if 110/120 is a good score or an average median score around the world. Any way it is almost close to what most colleges had listed as a criteria so I think this is not going to be a problem..Fingers crossed

Background:- I am a non native speaker of English. I am fluent (either native or very close to native-like proficieny) in a total of 4 languages. English is actually my third language in terms of understanding, exposure and daily use.

Preparation time :- 2 days . Day one I surfed TOEFL website and youtube to see what the exam is about and to get an idea about how many questions and sections are there.
I made a note that there are 4 exam section. The rest of the day I tried using the forget password option to log into my acount. I had made my TOEFL account in January and in August I had forgotten both the username and password for the account as well as the fact that which of the many gmail id I used to register myself for TOEFL. I scrambled through my three gmail accounts (Yeah I am that old as to have three gmail acount ) to find a registration mail from TOEFL. Finally I remembered that my GMAT and TOEFL account mail id are same. At last I was able to log into the account. There was an opening after two days and i booked an exam on Saturday morning 27th at 9 AM.
That is all I did. I tried looking at the breakup of total number of questions but nothing was explicitly stated and there was too much contradictory or irrelevant information on the internet. So I decided to forgo checking anything about TOEFL.

Material Used :- None ! Since I did not prepare for the exam, so there was no question of using any material. I think my preparation for GMAT verbal was already kicking somewhere in my mind.

Exam Center experience:- If you have read my GMAT debriefing then you would realize that I am the male equivalent of Jennifer Lawrence. Stupid things happen to me on important occasions all the time. For people who have read my GMAT debrief would remember the "the no water in the tap" problem that I faced on my GMAT exam, exactly staying true to my Jennifer Lawrence persona I faced another "I cant find the test center" problem on the TOEFL exam day. Here's what happened. My htc M8 had a problem related to Sim reading where it wont recognise the SIM in the the phone. So I had switched temporarily to my 9 year old NOKIA 3310. (People who have been born and bought up in the post smartphone world, should be surprised to know that nokia 3310 is a black and white phone with no touch screen, no wifi, no google map and a battery that last 7 days with heavy use). Since I was using a plain phone I couldn't use google map or any internet related services to locate the center. So after getting thoroughly lost while trying to locate the exam center using good old fashinoned human recon (asking people in the street) and switching my original Uber with a local taxi I was panicking, looking at the time trickle away. Finally when only half an hour was left and I was still not able to locate the test center, I saw a Police vehicle patrolling in the area. I went to the Inspector-in charge and told him about my exam and asked him the landmark. The entire police team was super decent and helpful. One of the senior Inspector looked around and asked a lady constable who was on a motorbike to drop me to the test center. To my surprise the test center was just 5-7 minute away but rain washed slippery roads, congested traffic made the actual travel route extremely tricky. I had also mis-navigated myself into a weird housing complex area which was more of a new built giant housing complex and a lot of general day to day shops in the vicinity. In reality the test center was much closer from the main road where my taxi had dropped me. Anyway long story short, I reached the center 20 minutes before the exam. I thanked the police lady and once she was gone I rushed inside the center. It was packed. dozen of Indians , 6 Japanese with bored expressions, a black couple and one very beaming happy Chinese guy was already there. The staff was exceedingly polite and helpful. We were asked to remove the shoes and socks and then after verification and locker allotment for keeping our mobile and other stuff, lead to the test room. The machines used for test were WINDOWS XP based desktops with huge screen and were working fine. My keyboard did not felt smooth (probably coz I am used to a Macbook Pro) but it was not much of a bother.

Exam Sections :-
Reading was easy. I just used my RC experience and answered. The passages were very easy almost like 300 level on GMAT.

Listening was again easy. I closed my eyes and took notes with my eyes closed. (That's an old school day's habit) . A few words for reference here and there were enough for me.

Speaking was easy but I stumbled on the section because I had finished reading and listening with great speed. So my speaking section started much early than other people's in the room. This made me very uncomfortable because I felt like an idiot muttering seemingly weird sentences through the microphone. To make matter worse the was a very small partition between my monitor and the fellow on my left and right. For some reasons these two guys were constantly peeking at my screen. One was audacious (read stupid) enough to take notes on my question rather than focusing on his own listening section. I almost made my mind to report him to the invigilator present in the room, but then my nice guy gene kicked in and stopped me from doing so. Coming back to the post- the test room had almost 30 other students and I was in the middle of room and that made my even more conscious. . During the break I forgot to drink water to sooth my throat which was a bit hoarse because of the AC. Anyway, my shyness killed my first speaking task completely. The second was was average. While preparing for the third speaking question , I decided to screw shyness ; It was no time to show courtesy to the fellow test takers ALL OF WHOM were still dealing with the listening section. I cleared my throat and had a go at the third question in as loud and clear a voice as was legally and technically possible.

Writing was again an easy section. My practice with AWA in GMAT came in handy. I wrote two essays in clear concise language. But I was distracted while revising the last paragraph of my last essay because like a share market floor suddenly more than two dozens people started speaking their answers in loud voices, so the general vibe which was awkward during my speaking section turned into that of fish market. Anyway it was not much trouble because I didn't stayed in the room for more than 2 minutes after that as I was already done revising my essay.

So I finished the exam almost an hour earlier than the scheduled time table. I was escorted out of the exam room to the locker area where I collected my things from the locker and as soon as I thanked all the relevant people in sight, I came out of the test center. It was raining cats and dogs outside. So I decided to have some food because I HAD NOT eaten one single grain of food (except a cafe late' in the morning at 7, which was lovingly prepared by my wife. She also prepared a whole grain sandwich which I secretly put back in the casserole as soon as she was out of my sight. I mean nothing against her cooking but a whole grain sandwich is a terrible idea Looking at the restaurant made me realise how hungry I was. I went inside the restaurant which was ironically also the landmark I was so desperately searching for in the morning . After finishing a excellent assorted snack based meal with the famous monsoon malabar blend of Indian coffee and then enjoying a (very out of character for me) cigarette, since I rarely smoke, I took a taxi and reached home.

So this is my TOEFL experience. I would humbly request other fellow test takers to let me know about the strength of this scores. Comments from TOEFL coaches and current/past MBA students (for whom TOEFL was a must) are also welcome. Do you think I should retake the exam because I am confident to score at least 116-118 in my second try as I know now not to be to shy while dealing with the speaking section ? All and any suggestions are welcome.

p.s:- Attached is a watermarked score card in the form of a screenshot from my TOEFL-iBT acount showing my individual and total score. I have heavily "watermarked" the screenshot after getting some offers from a bunch of coaching institutes to buy my GMAT score card. I don't know why they need it for, but I am absolutely sure that I do not want my hard work and self study to be used a mean for luring unsuspecting students. (A very experienced friend here in GMATCLUB told me that's what the coaching companies do after buying one's scorecards and testimonial. Use it for as a before-after advertisement to potential students.)

gmat-750-end-of-journey-thank-you-all-223469.html#p1720797