C1 examination boo-boo.

Today’s C1 was excruciating, to say the least. No doubt, I felt prepared but....... imagine, I had to spend four long hours, in the same room (Esterel, Alliance Française KL), on the same chair, and my butt practically ached at the end of it all that I was yearning to get out of that room.

The C1 is divided according to domain ; mine was Lettres et Sciences Humaines (LSH = Arts and Social Sciences). I think they figured out my domain when they asked me last Sunday what my domain of preference was. So I had three tests within four hours : the listening comprehension took like, 45 minutes, the written comprehension took 50 minutes and the essay – the most laborious one of all – took a whopping two hours and a half. For the most part, the attachée linguistique was there to invigilate me. Yes, the same person who made one part of the jury during last week's spoken test. I was the only candidate in that room : one desk, one invigilator’s bench. That was all.

It was so excruciating, I had to take several pitstops. On my return from the second pitstop, when I met the attachée linguistique one more time I said :

troisnyx* : Et ce qui m’ennuie le plus c’est le fait que je dois passer des épreuves consecutives.

That translates to “And what troubles me the most is the fact that I have to sit for consecutive tests.” The attachée linguistique immediately understood what I was going through. But thank God that by that time it was the essay paper, and it was going to be the last.

I remember my listening comprehension had something gotta do with the monetary system (which, thank God, I learned in Business Studies), the written comprehension had something gotta do with appreciation of literature from a critic’s point of view, and the essays had something gotta do with the disappearing of languages day by day in the world, and if anything could be done about it. I finished my written comprehension in twenty-five minutes (when the actual time was fifty minutes) because I thought I had two passages – but upon realising that I had fifty whole minutes to answer a passage, I immediately went back and reviewed everything.

And then, the juicy part. The essay. I started at five minutes to noon. It was supposed to be two hours and a half. But I finished at (beat that!) 1:10 and I had more than an hour to review my work, and so I did, for the rest of the remaining time. Dictionaries were provided. But I only used them twice as spell-checkers. That was all. Kak Farita, the examination coordinator, peeked in to see if I was okay. And she was talking to the attachée linguistique for a few instants – I stared at her blankly. She said, “Taking a picture of you to make sure it’s you.” I was like, what ?? Well. She was only kidding. In another instance, DK (yes, he was there) peeked through the transparent part of the door and gestured to ask me if it was okay. I smiled. I felt it was okay.

Twenty-five minutes before the entire C1 was over I was itching to get out of my seat. The attachée linguistique had to leave because of family matters. Her son was there (and my, he’s damn cute !).

Twenty minutes.

Fifteen minutes. Farita came in and told me that I had fifteen minutes left.

Now in between all that I was humming a tune which I could use for a new song. But I dared not sing in case the people outside – and the attachée linguistique – heard me – I feared that she was there.

Ten minutes.

Five minutes.

Vous pouvez poser vos stylos.

And by the time the exam was over, I put down my pen. Farita still didn’t show up. It was only five minutes after end time that she collected my examination scripts and my drafts.
The full results for the C1 will be out in January (considering that from mid- to late December CIEP will be closed). I pray God that I get through this one. Pray for me too, s’il vous plaît !