The day of the test

Finally, we were at the center, a Manipal Learning Center. But we reached earlier, at 11:45am. And the entry was supposed to start at 12:30pm. So we waited at "Laziz fast food", which was a van :-w. "Woh van hai, wahin par hai" :-ww.

Finally, the entry started. Our documents were checked. Some were without the originals, some were without the photocopies. But the center was good, the entire building was AC. ;)

Once the docs were checked, we were told to sit in a waiting room. Made a few friends there. And we passed time... donno how. It was 1.5 hours before they actually started the registration process. Our documents were checked again, and photocopies were taken. The admit card was stamped and returned.

Finally, we were told to enter Lab 3. It was good. Lots of TFT monitors, and webcams. But then... we were told to goto Lab 4. It was ok... umm... the CPUs were a bit strange... they looked like servers, at least to me.

We were told to start internet explorer. And we were shows instructions on IE itself... I thought wow, I'll get 100% score in this one. But then, alas, they instructed us to click a button, and that launched an exe file, that was much more secure :(

The test started. It was similar to BITSAT, but the BITSAT had a better interface. Indian software is much much better ;).

The questions were easy. I was able to answer around 36/40 questions. Completed t he test at the end of 1 hour, and had 30 minutes to go through the questions again. :-w I was thinking this is so easy... i'd never get into the top 40. But once the test was over, it was out of the head.

We were given a sheet with all formulae and constants. At the end of the test we submitted it back. And once candidate (kandidate?) got to know that everyone else had got a sheet of formulae, and was sad abt not getting it. If you ever read this blog, take my word... that sheet was useless... unless of course you don't know what the half life of radioactive things does not depend on the amount of substance taken, and other simple things.

The test had started at 2:30pm and ended at 4. And again, we had to wait for 2 hours... for the results. We got some "snacks", a sandwich, chocolate covered "doughnut" and jaljeera. And then there were discussions about PEC, NITs, etc. And a round of jokes (erm... Indians waale jokes ;)) I too took out my deck of cards, and the people were causing pandemonium. Showed a self levitation to everyone, even a teacher there... and strange silence followed :)

Finally the results were out. Somehow, I got an AIR 4. Couldn't believe it myself at first. But thats the truth ;). Finally all of us started leaving. All of us took each others' email/phone no. Lets see who all make it through the next round, the Interview.

Finally, we again reached rail yatri... I was exhausted completely. Stayed a bit there, and then we were again off to CP, searching for a good enough restaurant. But found none. I think we traveled the complete outer circle, but still found none. So we decided to go into the next restaurant/bar we saw. The man at the gate thought we would be drinking, and told us... go up. It was fun, eating normal Indian food while others drank and drank :P

Now with a bit of energy, we headed back. We had a train at 11pm.

We reached the station, and it was FILLED with people. Some more people and it would have started overflowing like water. :-w

Got onto the train, again two sardarjis. One old, one small :) Slept well that night, and reached home at around 8am the next day :)

Reaching Delhi for NDTV Scholar hunt

Okay, so I did qualify the Preliminary Online Test (POT). It was very very easy, but I still took a bit of help from Google and , well, completed the test in 18 mins. After the test was over, I just forgot about it... for WEEKS... until one day, I was fed up of the "Study for JEE 2008". Checked www.ndtvscholar.com and I had passed the POT. I was in the top 400 of India. But still, it wasnt much of an achievement. The achievement was yet to come.

Having passed the POT (no pun intended, please), I had to appear for a subject exam. My centre was Delhi. I had no idea what the exam would be about... would it be about general things, or would it be about making things (engineering) or would it be about *sigh* PCM. I decided to work for the worst case, PCM ;). Glanced through Brilliant's YG File, revising all major concepts and even doing some questions.

There was a lot of photocopying that day and hunting for photographs. And by the evening my father an I were ready to leave for New Delhi. It was a "tough" way to the railway station. You don't want to know that :).

Finally I was in the AC sleeper. And as always, there was also a sardarji. :) As usual, very talkative, his 2 mobiles were continuously being used until the train started. And there was another person, continuously talking on the phone... for... 3 hours... in a very "hushed" tone. ;)

Finally, everyone went off to sleep, at around 12:30. I needed some rest... I had an exam the other day. I don't remember a thing. But I remember Mr. Walia and Mr Deb (Kasam se watchers know them reeeaaallllly well!!!). Mr Walia's phone was vibrating, and Deb could feel it. Both were staring at each other. And suddenly I woke up, my phone was vibrating... I had setup an alarm... long time back... and it had to vibrate today... when I had an exam and I had had just 4 hours of sleep. :-w

Tried to go back to sleep, but couldn't. Slowly everyone woke up. Finally, we were at New delhi railway station. We went, as usual, to Rail Yatri Niwaas :D. Got a room there. Both of us got ready and got a bit of sleep. And then we were off to the center. It took 45 minutes to reach there.

to be continued