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Updated on: 19 Sep 2016, 10:44
Originally posted by LogicGuru1 on 09 Aug 2016, 13:32.
Last edited by LogicGuru1 on 19 Sep 2016, 10:44, edited 23 times in total.
Last edited by LogicGuru1 on 19 Sep 2016, 10:44, edited 23 times in total.
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ORIGINAL POSTED ON 9TH AUGUST
REDITED ON 13th AUGUST WITH AWA SCORE, STUDY MATERIAL AND PREPARATION METHODOLOGY
My fellow GMATCLUB members,
I am finally done with GMAT. I took the test today on 9th August 2016 and got a score of 750. It is a little less than what I was expecting because my target score was 760+ but i guess the lack of concentration in the final stages of Verbal section stopped me from doing so. My official consolidated scores along just arrived in my mail box (on 13th August) . The break up is follows :-
Analytical writing assessment :- 6/6
Integrated Reasoning :- 6/12
Quant:- 49/51
Verbal :- 43/51
---------------------------------------------------------
Total 750/800
Looking back at my journey, whose seed was sown in my mind during January this year, I feel a sense of satisfaction and catharsis. I first thought about the exam as a new year resolution, did some research during January. Gathered material and had prelim talks with various coaching institute in February. I finally decided that I am better on my own rather than joining a institute. Main reasons for not joining a coaching class and prepare on my own were :-
1) I had no intentions to spend a huge sum of money on a class room coaching which has actually turned into a business resembling a assembly line. I thought to myself, if I am not able to crack GMAT on my own, then how could I expect to do well in my future studies, in case I get admitted to a prestigious MBA program. I decided against shortcuts and spoon feeding methods that are the prevalent norms in the current coaching industry. I decided to understand the fundamental again (like a school education) and then apply and derive my own shortcuts based on my understanding of those concepts.
2) The second reason for not joining any coaching center was the proximity (or rather the lack of it). Travelling (to and fro) from a coaching institute to my place 3 times a week seemed to be a lot of hassle and a huge waste of time. My initial visit to these coaching centers made me realize one thing- most of the students in the coaching classes were extremely ordinary in terms of verbal and quant studies. Other half were not serious enough and were just going through the motion. Some others were still in college and had no previous work experience. And lastly the remaining 2-3 students out of the 15 were extremely intelligent and sharp. So as a student I fit in none of the categories. I have 8 years of experience both national and international. I was probably the oldest and in terms of intellectual prowess, I was better than 80 % of them but worse than 20 %. So I was the odd man out.
3) I was confident that math (especially GMAT Math that uses a restrictive subset of integers) was not going to be a problem. I was equally confident that my verbal performance either good or bad will not get better until I myself work hard on it.
4) I am a big supporter of copy-left movement. As the name suggests copyleft is opposite of Copyright. Copyleft movement essentially believes that any art, science, technology or human effort that benefits the humanity as a whole should be made free after the initial investment cost has been recovered and an obscenely huge profit has been made from that work. The best things in life are free (Sunlight, air, water, firewood, parents love, friendship, free will) or were used to be free unless greedy corporations swooped in and took control of them. The only money I invested was about 15$ for buying new OG 2016. I got the older OG 2105 for 2$ from a local book and newspaper recycling merchant. Manhattan books and Veritas books were downloaded from Internet and rest of all the material I used and studied was available on GMATCLUB and therefore free.
With these key points as a major contributors for opting the self study plan, I decided to take the exam in june 1st week. I started warming up in March. Getting a feel of the exam, categorizing question type and important topics. My study picked up little pace during april and may. In the first week of June I took my first GMAT and scored a decent 680 which I cancelled without thinking twice. Seeing 680 on my first try after just 2 months of practice with no fixed time table or routine made me very excited about my prospects to actually scoring a good score upon my second try. I identified verbal as a high scoring area specially Reading comprehension. I realised during my first GMAT that I need to work on my verbal and I need endless resources to improve it. Till then I was using mostly official guide 2015 and 2016 edition and old manhattan and veritas material. Then one day suddenly it struck me that I have an endless supply of questions, study material, advise, coaches and virtually every imprtant resource for GMAT in the form of GMATCLUB. I feel funny to admit that I was a lurker on Gmatclub for almost 2 months during April and May. I was a selfish child who would visit Gmatclub for doubt clearing sessions and as soon as I would understand the question, I would bolt out of here. I was selfish because I want to study my Manhattan, my veritas and kaplan material and just score a high GMAT score. During those days my chief aim was to possess as much knowledge as I can without investing my time in the forum. I have no shame to admit that I learned a lot from this website. But after my first GMAT (some of the members know what my above respectable score was
) I realised that just gaining knowledge is not enough if it cannot be shared. A shared knowledge not only benefits others but also help in ones personal and intellectual growth. So during the first weak of June I decided that I must contribute to this wonderful community as a mark of paying back. And thus started this beautiful journey that lasted for 2 months and more than 600 posts. As I am writing this post I can see below my profile that I am the top ten contributor in DS, PS, SC and CR and I can see on the right side of open forum that I am the 2nd top user after Bunuel. To imagine that I achieved this in a short span of about 65 days is overwhelming to me; not because I think i have done something wonderful but because I was able to contribute to this forum in a meaningful way. May be some of my answers/posts will help some other fellow members to attain clarity about a particular doubt and this making his GMAT dream a little more with in the reach.
I would take advantage of this post to thank a lot of fellow member. These members have contributed a lot of meaningful posts and answers in the forum. I am indebted to VeritasPrepKarishma who solved a bunch of doubts for me, given the fact my approach to those questions was a little different from conventional methods, thus at times creating great doubts in my mind about the validity of my methods. Karishma helped me iron out those wrinkles and made me realise that I was doing everything correct albeit there were ready made formulas for those questions. I want to extend my thanks to Bunuel for his relentless flow of Quant questions of all levels that kept me occupied all through the preparation period and helped me gain immense knowledge and practice. He has uploaded more examples here in GMATCLUB than one can ever find in all coaching books combined. Great Work !! I am also grateful to sayantanc2k. Despite being busy in his studies in Germany, he always took time to help me out in a couple of trickiest verbal question/RC questions. He always helped me whenever i called for his help. I extend my thanks to chetan2u for his excellent mathematical CR skills (the tricky percentage CR) as well as a bunch of quant questions. He also helped in a couple of tough SC questions. Though he seems a bit busy now a days, he provided excellent explanations and analysis whenever I asked him.
bb is another fine gentleman I am thankful to. He started this website, composed and edited the gmatclub verbal and quant book. Sorted topic directories for RC CR PS DS as per the difficulty level. He also happens to a great guy who helped me a lot in my initial phase when i struggled to use the website properly. He redirected me to the latest version and updated material within a day whenever I asked him. He cheered me after my first GMAT by assuring me that verbal can be improved (I scored a decent 50 in Quant but faltered in verbal). I also like to thank Souvik and daagh for their contributions and posts which i visited a lot to clarify my doubts. Souvik also have made great contributions in downloadable pdf with answers. For RC I would like to thank PiyushK for his RC collection Challenge series. I would like to say a big thanks to MBAPrepCoach. We started interacting just 2 weeks back and I wonder whether I should have sought out her advise earlier. But since she also have a keen interest in admission process I am sure my interaction with her are going to increase now. AND last but not the least many heartfelt thanks to Divyadisha for her encouragement and pep talks as well as her clever helpful tips about "after gmat" scenario. She really helped me a lot in seeing the way things are supposed to be. BY THE WAY IF YOU ARE READING THE POST THEN CONGRATULATION ON YOUR B-SCHOOL. YOU GOT A REAL GOOD ONE !!.
I am sure there are numerous other people who have indirectly or directly helped me in my journey and I am indebted to them all and apologize if I have forgotten to mention their contribution.
STUDY MATERIAL I USED :- For my preparation I relied on four main sources. Manhattan, Veritas, Kaplan (selective) and GMAT CLUB.
I started Quant with Manhattan and liked it immediately. It's a good source to brush up your knowledge and learn new concepts. After finishing all Manhattan Quant I studied Veritas. Veritas is also another excellent Quant material. I recommend it to novice starters because unlike Manhattan, Veritas starts a very fundamental level and then improve and adds upon the foundation. I enjoyed Veritas a lot. The only drawback in Veritas material is that it does not address inequalities in detail. The limitations with Manhattan was not many practice questions were available. I did both Manhattan and Veritas Quant 2 times. And I did a lot (really a LOT) of questions from the GMATCLUB. You tube videos were a staple of my preparation and I watched a lot of videos on Math on youtube. I also did GMATCLUB's ALL YOU NEED FOR QUANT BOOK. One of my friend supplied me with a huge number of Quant problem from Kaplan's material. That was the only time I used Kaplan. Having said that I realised that Kaplan and Manhattan have questions that are closer to REAL GMAT but Veritas examples are not quite like REAL GMAT QUESTIONS. Although to veritas' credit their questions are good enough to stimulate oneself mentally. So I am happy with all of them as far as Quant is concerned.
For verbal I again used Manhattan and Veritas and GMATCLUB 's example. I like Manhattan SC. It is a good resource. Again lack of examples. Veritas SC is a lot like the problems posted on Gmat club and I liked it too. For CR, I started with Veritas and I am still not sure how to rate it. Frankly speaking I have mix feeling about this one. It is ok, not great, not terrible either. It just barely scratches the surface of CR course but someone tries to make itself look like a full course. Don't be fooled. After finishing Veritas CR not quite satisifed I switched to Manhattan and to my horror I realised that Manhattan CR is absolutely worst. I have seen people praising Manhattan CR but I hated it the moment I touched it. My hatred for Manhattan CR grew so much that after studying it for a few days, I literally tossed the book in my garbage bin. Then I started doing POWERSCORE GMAT and POWERSCORE LSAT CR bibles. Oh boy !! what excellent books. I dedicate my CR success to POWERSCORE. I also have occasionally studied philosophy and logic in free time earlier and I realised that POWERSCORE is the real deal when it comes to CR. I took to CR like fish to water With my previous interest in logic and philosophy, CR become a breath of fresh air.
For RC, it was a challenge to choose the correct material. I did RC from both Manhattan and disliked its methodology. I did it RC from Veritas and didn't liked it either. Anyway RC as a exam section was never my worry because I am a voracious reader. I have read and continue to read great writers such as P G Wodehouse, V S Naipaul, Kafka, Haruki Murakami, Leo tolstoy, Anton Chekhov, Premchand, O Henry, Oscar Wilde, Alexander Dumas, George Orwell, Ernest Hemingway etc etc. I also read a lot of mediocre and popular writers such as Agatha Christie, Sidney Sheldon, John Grisham , James Hadley Chase, and what not. So RC as such was not a problem (or I thought). With this confidence I started practicing RC and was surprised to see the weird and archaic passages that GMAT had. I realized at that point that knowledge of literature is not going to help me because the grammatical composition and language of GMAT passages is not like classic or popular literature. So I decided to do RC99 and more passages directly from GMATCLUB. With practice I become good in RC. But I decided that RC is not something to be taken lightly because one it is a high scoring area. If I understood the passage correctly then I will be getting 4 -5 correct answer per passage and that's gonna help me in getting a high score. In fact I never stopped doing verbal exercises until the eve of my exam.
STUDY MATERIAL I AVOIDED LIKE A HAUNTED CASTLE ON A MOONLESS NIGHT :- In my opinion, choosing what to study is as important to succeed in GMAT as how to study. There are dime a dozen so called GMAT "experts" that "guarantee" to increase your GMAT score from 480 to 700+. Take all such claims with a grain of salt. They represents just the odd exception- 1 guy in 50 who probably already had the potential to do so but lacked guidance or material or approach. Useless topics, useless derivative formulas and shortcuts without strengthening the foundation, too many tricks and a cursory preparation are what these so called "experts" offer. I avoided the following material as a precaution based on my research and my conversation with a lot of top scorers in this forum:- Economist entire package, BYJU's, Manhattan's CR, Kaplan's verbal (I didn't actively avoided but I also didn't crazy looking for it because it swings between very good to really crappy), Magoosh videos (they just teach you 3 or 4 idioms or grammar rule and eat 30-40 minutes of your time), epower GMAT entire course (they specialize in teaching non natives ; yeah whatever that means !!), and most of the fringe players optimus prime, zamboree and yes the weird and illogical MATH-REVOLUTION. (This company really needs a psychiatric evaluation; In my opinion they must rename themselves to MATHCONFUSION). I also tried Manhattan new editions (6th edition i think) but realized that the older 4th edition is the real deal. In the new edition they just succumbed to the market gimmicks and toned down the material and had followed a absurd arrangements of topics. 4th edition of Manhattan is an excellent treat to serious test takers who love challenges and rising up to the occasion.
PREPARATION METHODOLOGY :- I started with an intense study plan that included 14-16 hour of study everyday for almost 65 days. Yes I know it sounds like an over kill but that's the plan I followed. I took a three month sabbatical from work starting June. (The sabbatical is going to extend for sure now). Each day i would get up at 7 o clock in the morning. At 8 o clock I would be out of my bathroom, all ready to face a new day. I would effectively start from day at 8 o clock with a cup of coffee/breakfast and two newspapers. The first a national daily and the second a Financial one. I would read the articles, editorial, finance news and banking news while having my breakfast. At 9 0 clock I would be at my study area. My first topic would always be Sentence correction. Oh but first wait ... I also had a rule called "THREE TIMES THE GMAT" which essentially means I would do three times the normal number of a real GMAT test. As it well known that in REAL GMAT one expect to encounter 17-18 SC, 16-17 CR and 16-17 RC, 18PS and 17 DS questions. My rule was to to complete almost three times these numbers. I would do 40 SC, 30 CR and 8 passages of RC amounting to 32-38 RC questions.
At 9 o clock i would start with SC. I will not only choose a answer but also make note why other answers were wrong. Then I would post some tricky ones on GMAT CLUB. This entire SC session would take almost three and a half hour. I would finish with my SC around 12.30. Then I would immediately watch some youtube video on Math till 1 o clock. I would then, at 1 O clock have lunch and then I would do silly stuff like calling my friends, checking mails, watching TV till 2 o clock . At 2 o clock I would start doing CR mostly 30 questions in one sitting with proper explanation regarding right and wrong answers. I would post on forums answers to some tricky question too. Depending upon the level 600-700 I would finish CR at 4.30 or 5 at which time I would have tea and play with my kittens for half and hour, restock their food and water. Make them chase strings and laser lights .. you get the idea. At 5 or 5.30 I would start with RC. In my initial days of preparation I would go for 8 passages in one sitting but as a result my error rate would creep up for the last 2 passages. After noticing this phenomenon I contemplated for some time and decided to break my RC session into two sittings of 5 and 3 passages respectively. I would do 5 passages in one sitting and then I would watch math videos on youtube for a while and then I would finish the remaining 3 passages. This RC exercise would take another 3 hours and by 8.30 I would be done with verbal for the day. After 8 .30 I wont touch any study material for the next two hours. I would rather go out in an adjoining park, or on a walk to a lake and would return after an hour. A very light dinner around 9.30 or 10 at night would be followed by QUANT studies. For Quant I had no fixed timetable or number of questions, I would choose any topic I fancy and just go with the flow. I would do coordinate geometry one night, compound interest and percent problems the following night, probability the next night, then Rate and alligation , then algebra, then number system, then geometry , then statistics and so on. Some nights I would just practice the tricks like reciting all primes till 100, factorial till 15, tables till 30, root and square values till 20, triangle rules, rules for circle quadrilateral properties, probability formulas, permutation formulas, LSAT mathematical puzzles, Inequalitly rules, Volume and surface areas formula for solid geometrical objects, standard deviation and statistics formula and so on. I would, some nights do only PS, some times only DS and sometimes a mixture a both. At any cost I would do about 75-100 question in a supersonic speed making sure I don't make silly problems. Most of the times my brain would work like a well maintained Ferrari zooming past even the most difficult problems in a ziffy. At occasions my brain would act like a rusted farm tractor- getting fried and working the problems slowly with brute force without any elegance, but I would still go through the problems using sheer force and determination as not to deviate from the rouine. So in essence Quant preparation was totally random because I was sure that Math is not going to be a worry. If there is a math question being asked then there is definitely a correct answer. It's just a matter of understanding the problem as quickly as you can and apply the correct formula and logic. I would finish Quant around 1.30 at night. After that sapped of all energy I would search for my two baby kitten, pick them up from their various hiding places, tuck one of them in a pillow adjacent to my head, put another on my blanket over my chest and then drift into oblivion and fall into a sound and dreamless sleep.. Then next morning I would follow the exact same routine. (By the way till date I had never seen them kittens around me when I wake up ti !! Kittens are so weirdly funny )They are either always glued to the windows looking at the birds or sleeping in wash basin or inside the laundry cabinet)
THINGS I DID DIFFERENT :- One important thing that may or may not work for other guys. I DID NOT TOOK A SINGLE MOCK TEST. Basically I just finished studying upto my heart's content and went to the center for real GMAT. I did not assess hypothetical scores using MGMAT mock test or any other mock test. I find the entire exercise to take a fake gmat before a real gmat pointless and exhausting. I am sure taking mock test work like a charm to many people and i would suggest strongly not to skip it because it is essential part to monitor your progress.
Another thing is where I did not followed the standard and often advised suggestion was in my clothing choices for the exam. I deliberately chose a very old but comfortable Tshirt and a loose comfortable cotton pyjama (Yes I went to the center looking like a homeless Hobo !! ). At the test center, I remember the mild contempt in the eyes of a girl who was all dressed dandy as if she was about to appear in the cover of Vogue magazine. My main aim was to be as comfortable as possible and trick my body into creating the same excellent responses that it used to create during my practice sessions at home. I also avoided dressing in layers because I notice that I concentrate better when there is some sort of adversary present. Too much comfort and I slip into complacency, so the chill of the AC of testing center that was a mild bother in the back of my mind kept my animal instinct active. I was mentally alert and a little cold during the entire duration of the exam.
EXAM DAY ; COMEDY of ERRORS :- My exam timing was 4 o clock in the evening. And out of all days in my life, exactly on the day of my exam either the municipality decided to cut the water supply or excessive monsoon created some problem in the water pipe, therefore I woke up to a dry tap and no chance of water supply getting restored until 7 o clock in the evening. Now at this point I must tell you that I am extremely negligent to day to day household activities of a common human being. So I have no stored water in the house except for half a bucket. Anyway long story short I used water from my water purifier to brush my teeth and taking a bath was a mere formality in which i dipped a towel in about mug of water and scrubbed my body with that wet towel. I thought of applying a generous amount of perfume and body spray to make up for the lack of shower but I decided against it realizing that it might not be conducive to other candidates who would be sitting close to me in a confined environment. I just dabbed a little bit of mild musk cologne in strategic areas.
My exam center was situated a good 2 hour ride away from my house. Unlike my first GMAT when I called an Uber and was fidgety and nervous during the whole ride trying to remember last minute grammar rules and stuff, this time I took the public transport. I took an AC bus, a great singing legend was crooning a old number in his honey laden voice on FM. Then came another song from another legend. I enjoyed the entire one hour ride in the bus humming the songs occasionally. Once the bus reached the station, I moved into the associated nearby train station , boarded a train and finally reached the test center a good hour earlier. I searched for a resting place and waited till it was time to get inside the test center. All in all traveling to the test center was fun.
TEST CENTER EXPERIENCE:- The test center was like any other Pearson VUE center. The staff was robotic going through the motion but polite and helpful. I was provided with a notebook that had 4 laminated sheets. The pages were not plain or lined but had small check box (like a graph paper) all over them. They also gave each test taker two markers. I told them that last time one of my markers didn't worked properly, so the staff gave me two extra markers. I tested all four of them even before entering the room. All were smooth, new and working properly. Thus started my exam.
ACTUAL EXAM:-
AWA was easy. The argument has two main glaring errors and another error resulting from the combination of these two errors and a unsubstantiated assumption. so I went on deconstructing the argument in precise logical terms using all the "fancy" vocabulary pertinent to the argument. I reinstated the argument in my words. introduced the errors quickly and showed how they affect the argument. Measured the validity and cogency of the argument. Suggested strengthener to make the argument more logical and ended it with personal remark. In my first GMAT I got 5.5 in AWA and I was not trying to top or improve upon that score. It's a pleasant surprise that I got 6/6
IR :- Damn lucky I was !! Frankly speaking IR was a close shave. Please do spend some time on IR when you guys are preparing. It is a nasty bugger. I had probably practiced just 15-20 questions of IR in all my life!! IR is freakishly tough. I would say I consider myself very lucky that I was able to score 6/12. At one point after the 3rd question I thought I have almost flunked the IR section completely, but then I took a deep breath, told myself - dont worry .. it's just fancy math. pay attention and do your best. Finally I finished a few question with confidence. Took a wild guess on one of the question and was tentative about 2 of the questions. But I killed the last IR question with extreme mental agility and 20 seconds to spare. IR was the only section where I checked the timer/clock after every question and adjusted my speed as per the remaining available time. Just completed the section with 18-20 seconds to spare.
FIRST BREAK :- I took the break of 8 minutes, went to the washroom, peed, washed my face, finger brushed my teeth. It felt so good. Another guy came to the washroom while I was finger brushing my teeth and he shot a chilly stare at me. If his stare could talk then this is what it would have sounded:- "ahhh... ewww.. what a homeless beggar. why the hell is he even here. Looks like a peon of some courier company " . Anyway after that look we duly ignored each other, meanwhile 4 more test takers entered the washroom. I came back to my locker, ate a banana, gulped 4 sips of a energy drink and paced around in the waiting area allowing blood circulation in my body. I gently stretched a little. Then I went back to my seat and when the attendant logged me back in I had used 23 seconds more. I was not alarmed.
Quant started the way I suppose it does- baby question, easy question, more easy question, another easy questions, bunch of medium level questions tricky question, clever question, more clever question, Confusing question, questions with obscure language, relatively difficult question , difficult question, Very difficult question, difficult and tricky question and done. When I had calculated the answer for the last question I looked at the clock in the upper right corner of the screen . I had almost completed Quant 11 minutes earlier than the allocated time. In my mind all of the questions I attempted were right. So i gave myself a mental hi-five. I was about to submit the question then suddenly an idea struck me to use those 11 minutes for Verbal Preparation. I did not submitted the last answer but I decided to use those 11 minutes for my verbal section. I signaled for a brand new notebook and in 10 seconds I was provided one. In the new notebook I made many helpful notes related to VERBAL which was my next section. I made areas for RC passages, (anticipating a maximum of 4 passages, because If you are doing well in verbal you will probably get 4 tough paragraphs with 5 questions in first passages and 4 question in second passage, then three very tough questions in 3rd and fouth passage ). I wrote all shortcuts and their rules (My - mother- makes-mango-fruit punch-&-chutney) which is actually a short cut for Must be be true-most supported-main point-method of reasoning-Flaw in the reasoning-parallel reasoning- cannot be true. (take the first letter)
F-IDEL C-ASTRO L-OVES U-MBRELLA :- Few Countable Less Uncountable
and so on.. I made a bunch of concise notes for some of the trickiest and problematic areas for me and was ready for Verbal with an extra added advantage of 11 minutes.
Just when only 4 seconds were left I submitted the last question and My QUANT and preparation part of verbal was done .
SECOND BREAK:- I took the break, went to the washroom, came back, drank some more energy drink-about 5 - 6 sips. I ate half a energy bar and half a banana. Then I paced very slowly in the waiting area, stretched the body a little. This time I was back inside the exam room with in time.
VERBAL :- I was not scared of verbal but I was aware that this now is the make or break time of my entire 4 month of preparation. Verbal started off nicely. I took my time to analyze each answer choices in SC and CR. I knew I was doing something right as soon as CR questions changed into tricky Evaluate the argument and Parallel reasoning question. RC become more and more dense with unexpected question popping that required careful reading into negated and double negative sentences. CR passages become like mini paragraphs with tough language and tricky hidden assumptions, attractive wrong answers and so on. Sentence correction took a sinister turn with subjunctive mood and less and less underlined portion making it difficult to look for decision points to eliminate at least some options. I took a deep breath after seeing this pattern repeating constantly because I was sure that at least I have crossed the decent score limit and moved into a good score limit on Verbal. I tried maintaining the same level and thus probably invested a wee bit of extra time in each question that I shouldn't have. I mean I had practiced thousand of questions and there was no sense in fearing the verbal section now. But at that point I was just another GMAT aspirant with the same fear, insecurity and tension. During the last 4 or 5 questions I almost become numb and despite the noise cancellation headphone, all I could hear was a my heartbeat. It was a surreal moment i was seeing nothing except the screen and feeling nothing except that my heart would burst out of my chest any moment. And then I selected a clearly wrong answer after deliberating for some time (the moment i locked the answer i knew it was wrong). I am sure I must have selected more than a few wrong answers but this was the "one" that I knew for sure was wrong and in nervousness i selected it. I am not even sure now what the last three questions were. CR SC RC .. its all a blur. I must have read them and selected an answer for them but for the love of god I don't recall what were those last 3 question. My concentration broke when the software prompted me for the score and I saw 750 !! ok !! 750 !! I felt happy and sad at the same time. Like a bipolar burst of ice and fire. 760 would have been better !! The greedy little child again. "770 -780 what great scores that would have been? What if you had scored 50 in Quant like the first time .. you dropped a point in Quant ..... 49only !! You moron !! you should have practiced more rather than answering to peoples mails on gmatclub". Then some part of heart would say - "Its a great score. You overachieved. Deep down you were happy to get anything above 720 .. now you got 750 .. so enjoy.. GMAT score is not the only criteria for getting into a good B school.
"Sir !! Please accept the score.." Those were the last word spoken by the attendant that bought me back to my senses. He must have seen me sitting me like zombie or he must have hovering around in the room for a while I don't know for sure. I realized I should quickly accept the score before it self cancels within the prescribed 2 -3 minute limit. I came out towards the main desk. The lady asked me my name and handed me my printed score card while simultaneously rebuking two guys who were chatting at the locker while collecting their items. I folded the three sheets of A4 paper and at that moment it dawned upon me that even though my GMAT journey has came to an end , an even more difficult challenge lies ahead. But I smiled and shrugged off the pesky thoughts. For all I wanted at that moment was to bolt out of the door and find a nice restaurant to treat me with a tall cup of hot tea and some cookies.
COMING SOON :- A decent collection of 20 AWA essays that I have written as part of my preparation. Actually I practiced more than 50 essays but I have only 20 in my computers, the rest are in hard copies that I have no intention to transfer to type. I am currently busy in taking care of a family matter as well as writing personal essays for my application in any free time I am getting. As soon as I am done with the family responsibility and also with the task of applying to schools, I will post those AWA essays here in gmatclub one by one. Keep an eye out. I personally think they are awesome; so does the GMAC examiners
MY TOEFL JOURNEY:- Debriefing and strategy and exam center experience
toefl-end-of-journey-toefl-225044.html
REDITED ON 13th AUGUST WITH AWA SCORE, STUDY MATERIAL AND PREPARATION METHODOLOGY
My fellow GMATCLUB members,
I am finally done with GMAT. I took the test today on 9th August 2016 and got a score of 750. It is a little less than what I was expecting because my target score was 760+ but i guess the lack of concentration in the final stages of Verbal section stopped me from doing so. My official consolidated scores along just arrived in my mail box (on 13th August) . The break up is follows :-
Analytical writing assessment :- 6/6
Integrated Reasoning :- 6/12
Quant:- 49/51
Verbal :- 43/51
---------------------------------------------------------
Total 750/800
Looking back at my journey, whose seed was sown in my mind during January this year, I feel a sense of satisfaction and catharsis. I first thought about the exam as a new year resolution, did some research during January. Gathered material and had prelim talks with various coaching institute in February. I finally decided that I am better on my own rather than joining a institute. Main reasons for not joining a coaching class and prepare on my own were :-
1) I had no intentions to spend a huge sum of money on a class room coaching which has actually turned into a business resembling a assembly line. I thought to myself, if I am not able to crack GMAT on my own, then how could I expect to do well in my future studies, in case I get admitted to a prestigious MBA program. I decided against shortcuts and spoon feeding methods that are the prevalent norms in the current coaching industry. I decided to understand the fundamental again (like a school education) and then apply and derive my own shortcuts based on my understanding of those concepts.
2) The second reason for not joining any coaching center was the proximity (or rather the lack of it). Travelling (to and fro) from a coaching institute to my place 3 times a week seemed to be a lot of hassle and a huge waste of time. My initial visit to these coaching centers made me realize one thing- most of the students in the coaching classes were extremely ordinary in terms of verbal and quant studies. Other half were not serious enough and were just going through the motion. Some others were still in college and had no previous work experience. And lastly the remaining 2-3 students out of the 15 were extremely intelligent and sharp. So as a student I fit in none of the categories. I have 8 years of experience both national and international. I was probably the oldest and in terms of intellectual prowess, I was better than 80 % of them but worse than 20 %. So I was the odd man out.
3) I was confident that math (especially GMAT Math that uses a restrictive subset of integers) was not going to be a problem. I was equally confident that my verbal performance either good or bad will not get better until I myself work hard on it.
4) I am a big supporter of copy-left movement. As the name suggests copyleft is opposite of Copyright. Copyleft movement essentially believes that any art, science, technology or human effort that benefits the humanity as a whole should be made free after the initial investment cost has been recovered and an obscenely huge profit has been made from that work. The best things in life are free (Sunlight, air, water, firewood, parents love, friendship, free will) or were used to be free unless greedy corporations swooped in and took control of them. The only money I invested was about 15$ for buying new OG 2016. I got the older OG 2105 for 2$ from a local book and newspaper recycling merchant. Manhattan books and Veritas books were downloaded from Internet and rest of all the material I used and studied was available on GMATCLUB and therefore free.
With these key points as a major contributors for opting the self study plan, I decided to take the exam in june 1st week. I started warming up in March. Getting a feel of the exam, categorizing question type and important topics. My study picked up little pace during april and may. In the first week of June I took my first GMAT and scored a decent 680 which I cancelled without thinking twice. Seeing 680 on my first try after just 2 months of practice with no fixed time table or routine made me very excited about my prospects to actually scoring a good score upon my second try. I identified verbal as a high scoring area specially Reading comprehension. I realised during my first GMAT that I need to work on my verbal and I need endless resources to improve it. Till then I was using mostly official guide 2015 and 2016 edition and old manhattan and veritas material. Then one day suddenly it struck me that I have an endless supply of questions, study material, advise, coaches and virtually every imprtant resource for GMAT in the form of GMATCLUB. I feel funny to admit that I was a lurker on Gmatclub for almost 2 months during April and May. I was a selfish child who would visit Gmatclub for doubt clearing sessions and as soon as I would understand the question, I would bolt out of here. I was selfish because I want to study my Manhattan, my veritas and kaplan material and just score a high GMAT score. During those days my chief aim was to possess as much knowledge as I can without investing my time in the forum. I have no shame to admit that I learned a lot from this website. But after my first GMAT (some of the members know what my above respectable score was
) I realised that just gaining knowledge is not enough if it cannot be shared. A shared knowledge not only benefits others but also help in ones personal and intellectual growth. So during the first weak of June I decided that I must contribute to this wonderful community as a mark of paying back. And thus started this beautiful journey that lasted for 2 months and more than 600 posts. As I am writing this post I can see below my profile that I am the top ten contributor in DS, PS, SC and CR and I can see on the right side of open forum that I am the 2nd top user after Bunuel. To imagine that I achieved this in a short span of about 65 days is overwhelming to me; not because I think i have done something wonderful but because I was able to contribute to this forum in a meaningful way. May be some of my answers/posts will help some other fellow members to attain clarity about a particular doubt and this making his GMAT dream a little more with in the reach.I would take advantage of this post to thank a lot of fellow member. These members have contributed a lot of meaningful posts and answers in the forum. I am indebted to VeritasPrepKarishma who solved a bunch of doubts for me, given the fact my approach to those questions was a little different from conventional methods, thus at times creating great doubts in my mind about the validity of my methods. Karishma helped me iron out those wrinkles and made me realise that I was doing everything correct albeit there were ready made formulas for those questions. I want to extend my thanks to Bunuel for his relentless flow of Quant questions of all levels that kept me occupied all through the preparation period and helped me gain immense knowledge and practice. He has uploaded more examples here in GMATCLUB than one can ever find in all coaching books combined. Great Work !! I am also grateful to sayantanc2k. Despite being busy in his studies in Germany, he always took time to help me out in a couple of trickiest verbal question/RC questions. He always helped me whenever i called for his help. I extend my thanks to chetan2u for his excellent mathematical CR skills (the tricky percentage CR) as well as a bunch of quant questions. He also helped in a couple of tough SC questions. Though he seems a bit busy now a days, he provided excellent explanations and analysis whenever I asked him.
bb is another fine gentleman I am thankful to. He started this website, composed and edited the gmatclub verbal and quant book. Sorted topic directories for RC CR PS DS as per the difficulty level. He also happens to a great guy who helped me a lot in my initial phase when i struggled to use the website properly. He redirected me to the latest version and updated material within a day whenever I asked him. He cheered me after my first GMAT by assuring me that verbal can be improved (I scored a decent 50 in Quant but faltered in verbal). I also like to thank Souvik and daagh for their contributions and posts which i visited a lot to clarify my doubts. Souvik also have made great contributions in downloadable pdf with answers. For RC I would like to thank PiyushK for his RC collection Challenge series. I would like to say a big thanks to MBAPrepCoach. We started interacting just 2 weeks back and I wonder whether I should have sought out her advise earlier. But since she also have a keen interest in admission process I am sure my interaction with her are going to increase now. AND last but not the least many heartfelt thanks to Divyadisha for her encouragement and pep talks as well as her clever helpful tips about "after gmat" scenario. She really helped me a lot in seeing the way things are supposed to be. BY THE WAY IF YOU ARE READING THE POST THEN CONGRATULATION ON YOUR B-SCHOOL. YOU GOT A REAL GOOD ONE !!.
I am sure there are numerous other people who have indirectly or directly helped me in my journey and I am indebted to them all and apologize if I have forgotten to mention their contribution.
STUDY MATERIAL I USED :- For my preparation I relied on four main sources. Manhattan, Veritas, Kaplan (selective) and GMAT CLUB.
I started Quant with Manhattan and liked it immediately. It's a good source to brush up your knowledge and learn new concepts. After finishing all Manhattan Quant I studied Veritas. Veritas is also another excellent Quant material. I recommend it to novice starters because unlike Manhattan, Veritas starts a very fundamental level and then improve and adds upon the foundation. I enjoyed Veritas a lot. The only drawback in Veritas material is that it does not address inequalities in detail. The limitations with Manhattan was not many practice questions were available. I did both Manhattan and Veritas Quant 2 times. And I did a lot (really a LOT) of questions from the GMATCLUB. You tube videos were a staple of my preparation and I watched a lot of videos on Math on youtube. I also did GMATCLUB's ALL YOU NEED FOR QUANT BOOK. One of my friend supplied me with a huge number of Quant problem from Kaplan's material. That was the only time I used Kaplan. Having said that I realised that Kaplan and Manhattan have questions that are closer to REAL GMAT but Veritas examples are not quite like REAL GMAT QUESTIONS. Although to veritas' credit their questions are good enough to stimulate oneself mentally. So I am happy with all of them as far as Quant is concerned.
For verbal I again used Manhattan and Veritas and GMATCLUB 's example. I like Manhattan SC. It is a good resource. Again lack of examples. Veritas SC is a lot like the problems posted on Gmat club and I liked it too. For CR, I started with Veritas and I am still not sure how to rate it. Frankly speaking I have mix feeling about this one. It is ok, not great, not terrible either. It just barely scratches the surface of CR course but someone tries to make itself look like a full course. Don't be fooled. After finishing Veritas CR not quite satisifed I switched to Manhattan and to my horror I realised that Manhattan CR is absolutely worst. I have seen people praising Manhattan CR but I hated it the moment I touched it. My hatred for Manhattan CR grew so much that after studying it for a few days, I literally tossed the book in my garbage bin. Then I started doing POWERSCORE GMAT and POWERSCORE LSAT CR bibles. Oh boy !! what excellent books. I dedicate my CR success to POWERSCORE. I also have occasionally studied philosophy and logic in free time earlier and I realised that POWERSCORE is the real deal when it comes to CR. I took to CR like fish to water
With my previous interest in logic and philosophy, CR become a breath of fresh air. For RC, it was a challenge to choose the correct material. I did RC from both Manhattan and disliked its methodology. I did it RC from Veritas and didn't liked it either. Anyway RC as a exam section was never my worry because I am a voracious reader. I have read and continue to read great writers such as P G Wodehouse, V S Naipaul, Kafka, Haruki Murakami, Leo tolstoy, Anton Chekhov, Premchand, O Henry, Oscar Wilde, Alexander Dumas, George Orwell, Ernest Hemingway etc etc. I also read a lot of mediocre and popular writers such as Agatha Christie, Sidney Sheldon, John Grisham , James Hadley Chase, and what not. So RC as such was not a problem (or I thought). With this confidence I started practicing RC and was surprised to see the weird and archaic passages that GMAT had. I realized at that point that knowledge of literature is not going to help me because the grammatical composition and language of GMAT passages is not like classic or popular literature. So I decided to do RC99 and more passages directly from GMATCLUB. With practice I become good in RC. But I decided that RC is not something to be taken lightly because one it is a high scoring area. If I understood the passage correctly then I will be getting 4 -5 correct answer per passage and that's gonna help me in getting a high score. In fact I never stopped doing verbal exercises until the eve of my exam.
STUDY MATERIAL I AVOIDED LIKE A HAUNTED CASTLE ON A MOONLESS NIGHT :- In my opinion, choosing what to study is as important to succeed in GMAT as how to study. There are dime a dozen so called GMAT "experts" that "guarantee" to increase your GMAT score from 480 to 700+. Take all such claims with a grain of salt. They represents just the odd exception- 1 guy in 50 who probably already had the potential to do so but lacked guidance or material or approach. Useless topics, useless derivative formulas and shortcuts without strengthening the foundation, too many tricks and a cursory preparation are what these so called "experts" offer. I avoided the following material as a precaution based on my research and my conversation with a lot of top scorers in this forum:- Economist entire package, BYJU's, Manhattan's CR, Kaplan's verbal (I didn't actively avoided but I also didn't crazy looking for it because it swings between very good to really crappy), Magoosh videos (they just teach you 3 or 4 idioms or grammar rule and eat 30-40 minutes of your time), epower GMAT entire course (they specialize in teaching non natives ; yeah whatever that means !!
), and most of the fringe players optimus prime, zamboree and yes the weird and illogical MATH-REVOLUTION. (This company really needs a psychiatric evaluation; In my opinion they must rename themselves to MATHCONFUSION). I also tried Manhattan new editions (6th edition i think) but realized that the older 4th edition is the real deal. In the new edition they just succumbed to the market gimmicks and toned down the material and had followed a absurd arrangements of topics. 4th edition of Manhattan is an excellent treat to serious test takers who love challenges and rising up to the occasion. PREPARATION METHODOLOGY :- I started with an intense study plan that included 14-16 hour of study everyday for almost 65 days. Yes I know it sounds like an over kill but that's the plan I followed. I took a three month sabbatical from work starting June. (The sabbatical is going to extend for sure now). Each day i would get up at 7 o clock in the morning. At 8 o clock I would be out of my bathroom, all ready to face a new day. I would effectively start from day at 8 o clock with a cup of coffee/breakfast and two newspapers. The first a national daily and the second a Financial one. I would read the articles, editorial, finance news and banking news while having my breakfast. At 9 0 clock I would be at my study area. My first topic would always be Sentence correction. Oh but first wait ... I also had a rule called "THREE TIMES THE GMAT" which essentially means I would do three times the normal number of a real GMAT test. As it well known that in REAL GMAT one expect to encounter 17-18 SC, 16-17 CR and 16-17 RC, 18PS and 17 DS questions. My rule was to to complete almost three times these numbers. I would do 40 SC, 30 CR and 8 passages of RC amounting to 32-38 RC questions.
At 9 o clock i would start with SC. I will not only choose a answer but also make note why other answers were wrong. Then I would post some tricky ones on GMAT CLUB. This entire SC session would take almost three and a half hour. I would finish with my SC around 12.30. Then I would immediately watch some youtube video on Math till 1 o clock. I would then, at 1 O clock have lunch and then I would do silly stuff like calling my friends, checking mails, watching TV till 2 o clock . At 2 o clock I would start doing CR mostly 30 questions in one sitting with proper explanation regarding right and wrong answers. I would post on forums answers to some tricky question too. Depending upon the level 600-700 I would finish CR at 4.30 or 5 at which time I would have tea and play with my kittens for half and hour, restock their food and water. Make them chase strings and laser lights .. you get the idea
. At 5 or 5.30 I would start with RC. In my initial days of preparation I would go for 8 passages in one sitting but as a result my error rate would creep up for the last 2 passages. After noticing this phenomenon I contemplated for some time and decided to break my RC session into two sittings of 5 and 3 passages respectively. I would do 5 passages in one sitting and then I would watch math videos on youtube for a while and then I would finish the remaining 3 passages. This RC exercise would take another 3 hours and by 8.30 I would be done with verbal for the day. After 8 .30 I wont touch any study material for the next two hours. I would rather go out in an adjoining park, or on a walk to a lake and would return after an hour. A very light dinner around 9.30 or 10 at night would be followed by QUANT studies. For Quant I had no fixed timetable or number of questions, I would choose any topic I fancy and just go with the flow. I would do coordinate geometry one night, compound interest and percent problems the following night, probability the next night, then Rate and alligation , then algebra, then number system, then geometry , then statistics and so on. Some nights I would just practice the tricks like reciting all primes till 100, factorial till 15, tables till 30, root and square values till 20, triangle rules, rules for circle quadrilateral properties, probability formulas, permutation formulas, LSAT mathematical puzzles, Inequalitly rules, Volume and surface areas formula for solid geometrical objects, standard deviation and statistics formula and so on. I would, some nights do only PS, some times only DS and sometimes a mixture a both. At any cost I would do about 75-100 question in a supersonic speed making sure I don't make silly problems. Most of the times my brain would work like a well maintained Ferrari zooming past even the most difficult problems in a ziffy. At occasions my brain would act like a rusted farm tractor- getting fried and working the problems slowly with brute force without any elegance, but I would still go through the problems using sheer force and determination as not to deviate from the rouine. So in essence Quant preparation was totally random because I was sure that Math is not going to be a worry. If there is a math question being asked then there is definitely a correct answer. It's just a matter of understanding the problem as quickly as you can and apply the correct formula and logic. I would finish Quant around 1.30 at night. After that sapped of all energy I would search for my two baby kitten, pick them up from their various hiding places, tuck one of them in a pillow adjacent to my head, put another on my blanket over my chest and then drift into oblivion and fall into a sound and dreamless sleep.. Then next morning I would follow the exact same routine. (By the way till date I had never seen them kittens around me when I wake up ti !! Kittens are so weirdly funny )They are either always glued to the windows looking at the birds or sleeping in wash basin or inside the laundry cabinet)THINGS I DID DIFFERENT :- One important thing that may or may not work for other guys. I DID NOT TOOK A SINGLE MOCK TEST. Basically I just finished studying upto my heart's content and went to the center for real GMAT. I did not assess hypothetical scores using MGMAT mock test or any other mock test. I find the entire exercise to take a fake gmat before a real gmat pointless and exhausting. I am sure taking mock test work like a charm to many people and i would suggest strongly not to skip it because it is essential part to monitor your progress.
Another thing is where I did not followed the standard and often advised suggestion was in my clothing choices for the exam. I deliberately chose a very old but comfortable Tshirt and a loose comfortable cotton pyjama (Yes I went to the center looking like a homeless Hobo !! ). At the test center, I remember the mild contempt in the eyes of a girl who was all dressed dandy as if she was about to appear in the cover of Vogue magazine. My main aim was to be as comfortable as possible and trick my body into creating the same excellent responses that it used to create during my practice sessions at home. I also avoided dressing in layers because I notice that I concentrate better when there is some sort of adversary present. Too much comfort and I slip into complacency, so the chill of the AC of testing center that was a mild bother in the back of my mind kept my animal instinct active. I was mentally alert and a little cold during the entire duration of the exam.
EXAM DAY ; COMEDY of ERRORS :- My exam timing was 4 o clock in the evening. And out of all days in my life, exactly on the day of my exam either the municipality decided to cut the water supply or excessive monsoon created some problem in the water pipe, therefore I woke up to a dry tap and no chance of water supply getting restored until 7 o clock in the evening. Now at this point I must tell you that I am extremely negligent to day to day household activities of a common human being. So I have no stored water in the house except for half a bucket. Anyway long story short I used water from my water purifier to brush my teeth and taking a bath was a mere formality in which i dipped a towel in about mug of water and scrubbed my body with that wet towel. I thought of applying a generous amount of perfume and body spray to make up for the lack of shower but I decided against it realizing that it might not be conducive to other candidates who would be sitting close to me in a confined environment. I just dabbed a little bit of mild musk cologne in strategic areas.
My exam center was situated a good 2 hour ride away from my house. Unlike my first GMAT when I called an Uber and was fidgety and nervous during the whole ride trying to remember last minute grammar rules and stuff, this time I took the public transport. I took an AC bus, a great singing legend was crooning a old number in his honey laden voice on FM. Then came another song from another legend. I enjoyed the entire one hour ride in the bus humming the songs occasionally. Once the bus reached the station, I moved into the associated nearby train station , boarded a train and finally reached the test center a good hour earlier. I searched for a resting place and waited till it was time to get inside the test center. All in all traveling to the test center was fun.
TEST CENTER EXPERIENCE:- The test center was like any other Pearson VUE center. The staff was robotic going through the motion but polite and helpful. I was provided with a notebook that had 4 laminated sheets. The pages were not plain or lined but had small check box (like a graph paper) all over them. They also gave each test taker two markers. I told them that last time one of my markers didn't worked properly, so the staff gave me two extra markers. I tested all four of them even before entering the room. All were smooth, new and working properly. Thus started my exam.
ACTUAL EXAM:-
AWA was easy. The argument has two main glaring errors and another error resulting from the combination of these two errors and a unsubstantiated assumption. so I went on deconstructing the argument in precise logical terms using all the "fancy" vocabulary pertinent to the argument. I reinstated the argument in my words. introduced the errors quickly and showed how they affect the argument. Measured the validity and cogency of the argument. Suggested strengthener to make the argument more logical and ended it with personal remark. In my first GMAT I got 5.5 in AWA and I was not trying to top or improve upon that score. It's a pleasant surprise that I got 6/6
IR :- Damn lucky I was !! Frankly speaking IR was a close shave. Please do spend some time on IR when you guys are preparing. It is a nasty bugger. I had probably practiced just 15-20 questions of IR in all my life!! IR is freakishly tough. I would say I consider myself very lucky that I was able to score 6/12. At one point after the 3rd question I thought I have almost flunked the IR section completely, but then I took a deep breath, told myself - dont worry .. it's just fancy math. pay attention and do your best. Finally I finished a few question with confidence. Took a wild guess on one of the question and was tentative about 2 of the questions. But I killed the last IR question with extreme mental agility and 20 seconds to spare. IR was the only section where I checked the timer/clock after every question and adjusted my speed as per the remaining available time. Just completed the section with 18-20 seconds to spare.
FIRST BREAK :- I took the break of 8 minutes, went to the washroom, peed, washed my face, finger brushed my teeth. It felt so good. Another guy came to the washroom while I was finger brushing my teeth and he shot a chilly stare at me. If his stare could talk then this is what it would have sounded:- "ahhh... ewww.. what a homeless beggar. why the hell is he even here. Looks like a peon of some courier company " . Anyway after that look we duly ignored each other, meanwhile 4 more test takers entered the washroom. I came back to my locker, ate a banana, gulped 4 sips of a energy drink and paced around in the waiting area allowing blood circulation in my body. I gently stretched a little. Then I went back to my seat and when the attendant logged me back in I had used 23 seconds more. I was not alarmed.
Quant started the way I suppose it does- baby question, easy question, more easy question, another easy questions, bunch of medium level questions tricky question, clever question, more clever question, Confusing question, questions with obscure language, relatively difficult question , difficult question, Very difficult question, difficult and tricky question and done. When I had calculated the answer for the last question I looked at the clock in the upper right corner of the screen . I had almost completed Quant 11 minutes earlier than the allocated time. In my mind all of the questions I attempted were right. So i gave myself a mental hi-five. I was about to submit the question then suddenly an idea struck me to use those 11 minutes for Verbal Preparation. I did not submitted the last answer but I decided to use those 11 minutes for my verbal section. I signaled for a brand new notebook and in 10 seconds I was provided one. In the new notebook I made many helpful notes related to VERBAL which was my next section. I made areas for RC passages, (anticipating a maximum of 4 passages, because If you are doing well in verbal you will probably get 4 tough paragraphs with 5 questions in first passages and 4 question in second passage, then three very tough questions in 3rd and fouth passage ). I wrote all shortcuts and their rules (My - mother- makes-mango-fruit punch-&-chutney) which is actually a short cut for Must be be true-most supported-main point-method of reasoning-Flaw in the reasoning-parallel reasoning- cannot be true. (take the first letter)
F-IDEL C-ASTRO L-OVES U-MBRELLA :- Few Countable Less Uncountable
and so on.. I made a bunch of concise notes for some of the trickiest and problematic areas for me and was ready for Verbal with an extra added advantage of 11 minutes.
Just when only 4 seconds were left I submitted the last question and My QUANT and preparation part of verbal was done .
SECOND BREAK:- I took the break, went to the washroom, came back, drank some more energy drink-about 5 - 6 sips. I ate half a energy bar and half a banana. Then I paced very slowly in the waiting area, stretched the body a little. This time I was back inside the exam room with in time.
VERBAL :- I was not scared of verbal but I was aware that this now is the make or break time of my entire 4 month of preparation. Verbal started off nicely. I took my time to analyze each answer choices in SC and CR. I knew I was doing something right as soon as CR questions changed into tricky Evaluate the argument and Parallel reasoning question. RC become more and more dense with unexpected question popping that required careful reading into negated and double negative sentences. CR passages become like mini paragraphs with tough language and tricky hidden assumptions, attractive wrong answers and so on. Sentence correction took a sinister turn with subjunctive mood and less and less underlined portion making it difficult to look for decision points to eliminate at least some options. I took a deep breath after seeing this pattern repeating constantly because I was sure that at least I have crossed the decent score limit and moved into a good score limit on Verbal. I tried maintaining the same level and thus probably invested a wee bit of extra time in each question that I shouldn't have. I mean I had practiced thousand of questions and there was no sense in fearing the verbal section now. But at that point I was just another GMAT aspirant with the same fear, insecurity and tension. During the last 4 or 5 questions I almost become numb and despite the noise cancellation headphone, all I could hear was a my heartbeat. It was a surreal moment i was seeing nothing except the screen and feeling nothing except that my heart would burst out of my chest any moment. And then I selected a clearly wrong answer after deliberating for some time (the moment i locked the answer i knew it was wrong). I am sure I must have selected more than a few wrong answers but this was the "one" that I knew for sure was wrong and in nervousness i selected it. I am not even sure now what the last three questions were. CR SC RC .. its all a blur. I must have read them and selected an answer for them but for the love of god I don't recall what were those last 3 question. My concentration broke when the software prompted me for the score and I saw 750 !! ok !! 750 !! I felt happy and sad at the same time. Like a bipolar burst of ice and fire. 760 would have been better !! The greedy little child again. "770 -780 what great scores that would have been? What if you had scored 50 in Quant like the first time .. you dropped a point in Quant ..... 49only !! You moron !! you should have practiced more rather than answering to peoples mails on gmatclub". Then some part of heart would say - "Its a great score. You overachieved. Deep down you were happy to get anything above 720 .. now you got 750 .. so enjoy.. GMAT score is not the only criteria for getting into a good B school.
"Sir !! Please accept the score.." Those were the last word spoken by the attendant that bought me back to my senses. He must have seen me sitting me like zombie or he must have hovering around in the room for a while I don't know for sure. I realized I should quickly accept the score before it self cancels within the prescribed 2 -3 minute limit. I came out towards the main desk. The lady asked me my name and handed me my printed score card while simultaneously rebuking two guys who were chatting at the locker while collecting their items. I folded the three sheets of A4 paper and at that moment it dawned upon me that even though my GMAT journey has came to an end , an even more difficult challenge lies ahead. But I smiled and shrugged off the pesky thoughts. For all I wanted at that moment was to bolt out of the door and find a nice restaurant to treat me with a tall cup of hot tea and some cookies.
COMING SOON :- A decent collection of 20 AWA essays that I have written as part of my preparation. Actually I practiced more than 50 essays but I have only 20 in my computers, the rest are in hard copies that I have no intention to transfer to type. I am currently busy in taking care of a family matter as well as writing personal essays for my application in any free time I am getting. As soon as I am done with the family responsibility and also with the task of applying to schools, I will post those AWA essays here in gmatclub one by one. Keep an eye out. I personally think they are awesome; so does the GMAC examiners
MY TOEFL JOURNEY:- Debriefing and strategy and exam center experience
toefl-end-of-journey-toefl-225044.html
10 Aug 2016, 01:56
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Congrats LogicGuru1...then we'll be missing your posts from now onwards...that is going to be GOD COMPLEX ... ...
Share your experience...once you get AWA score too..
...Share your experience...once you get AWA score too..
10 Aug 2016, 09:40
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YAY! Wonderful personal journey, with an outstanding outcome in many ways. Congrats! I am definitely richer for having interacted with you and I'm sure that you have helped a lot of people. Look forward to working with you on apps
Farrell Dyan Hehn, MBA
Admissions Consultant & Verbal Strategist MBAPrepCoach.com
Farrell Dyan Hehn, MBA
Admissions Consultant & Verbal Strategist MBAPrepCoach.com
