Time up??? It was just about that we started working on our task. Moreover, it was just about that our group had finally started working as a team, rather than than concentrating on earning individual brownie points by trying to gain attention of the examiners by trying to put each others individual points forward. Time indeed flew past. Reminded me of how under pressure my engineering exams which used to last literally for a month would pass by like a week. We had decided to to read out political, economic, entertainment, sports, crime and miscellaneous news. The content providing work was done. I was still confirming with the content gathering team if they needed any more news on any of these topics. It seemed at that moment that there was enough of content to be read out for the bulletin. I had no idea as on who was going to read the bulletin, how the news reading was going to be managed. Seeing our condition the examiners said, "Ok. We give you 2 minutes more. Just assemble everything within this time.". Did nothing productive in that time except for gathering the chart papers on which we had stuck the news to be read out and discussing how the news reading process would happen. Finally we had to start reading our bulletin. We expressed the categories of news that we were going to read out. The examiners then asked us, "So who is going to read the sports news?". I thought the entire process was set up. I also thought that though I didn't have much of an idea about the news reading department, atleast the news reading department would be having complete idea about what they are supposed to be done. After the question there were a million exchange of glances that our group members had with each other. Finally somebody from the news reading department stepped in and she read out the news pretty well. Ya, pretty well it was, but only to realize that there was only 1 news item as far as sports news was concerned. I looked at the damn chart paper in astonishment. Providing content was my job. But, Hey!!! I did ask everybody if any more content was required. If it was one of my mundane arguments I wouldn't have hesitated to argue. Of course I chose to be calm at that moment. With hiccups at various stages of the protocol of reading the news we were finally done with once and for all. The examiners weren't done with us. The picked one of us and asked," What do you think went wrong in this task?". He answered,"I think we were not clear about what we are supposed to do. And we did everything just randomly. We could have structured the process in a more efficient way.".
Now now... I was immediately asked the same question. "Yes no. 6. What do you think you'll could have done better??"
I don't know why I get stuck between my straightforward self and my diplomatic alter ego. I decided to go the diplomatic way. Mr Diplomatic answers, "I think our team started off pretty well." One of them immediately snapped at me,"Started off well???" And gave me such an offended look as if I told her to touch my feet and beg for mercy. Now again I had 2 options, either stick with my point or correct with sufficient support to do so. I chose to do the former and continued, "Yes, We started off well. As a group full of strangers it was going to be naturally difficult to come up with a plan which everybody would agree to. But we still managed to sort things out pretty quickly. Slowly we also started getting into the groove of how to go about things and give the task the proper direction. As a group in the allotted 20 minutes(oh oh... mistake... 30 minutes were allotted) we did a fairly god job as a team of 9 people." She seemed pretty content with the answer now. But to convince the examiner that our group had done a decent job i feel 'maine khudko bali ka bakra bana diya'. But after my answer I got some respite in seeing my group members being happy with my answer. Yeah, why not. I batted for you'll. You'll should be. A couple of more questions that I don't remember as I started thinking about my answer and evaluating it. Hey no offense to any of my group members. We were indeed a rocking group. So rocking, that inspite of knowing that we hadn't done kind of a good job, at the end of the task we gathered as a group in front of the examiners and clapped for ourselves gleefully. (And also for the fact that 2 girls got spot offers and 4 other guys got into the merit list.)
After the Group Exercise we came back to the classroom. Discussed for a few minutes of what we could have done better. Finally we got frustrated and started discussing about how we would sleep behind the last row of benches if we would get bored in a particular lecture. Really, there was ample amount of space to do that. We were the 1st group. After some time the other groups also started coming into the classroom. They started describing how rocking their group exercise was. Another group was proud of having completed the task 5 minutes before the time could end. Now on a comparative analysis I started to feel a bit tense. Finally all of us decided to just forget all of it and stay calm for the upcoming events.
After all the groups assembled in the classroom a couple of teachers entered with sheets of paper and distributed them. A middle aged pleasant looking teacher started giving instructions,"On this sheet there is a case of a particular person given to you who is facing a certain problem at his job. You have to write a solution in not more than 5-6 lines that are provided. When you turn the page there is a small questionnaire regarding your fitness that you need to answer. Fill the form really carefully. 20 minutes are more than sufficient to fill it. Please note that no replacement of the form shall be provided in any case."
The problem was as follows, "Mr. Chetan Shah has recently been appointed as the representative in a UN group. He has been asked to write a false report about an employee who is not so competent so that another person of the ministries choice could replace that person. He is also about to get a $3 million deal from the ministry soon. What advice would you give Mr. Chetan and why. I read this entire problem a couple of time, few instantaneous solutions jumped up but I didn't want to jump up to conclusions that soon. I turned the page, saw a questionnaire of 4 questions related to personal fitness. I had known a golden rule from seniors regarding the process to get into MICA,"Be yourself. Simply don't fake." The questionnaire was as follows:
1. Do you exercise regularly Yes/No
2. Do you Engage in any sport regularly including Yoga? If yes mention sport
3. How important do you rate fitness as a beneficial activity on a scale of 10
4. What would you rate your fitness on a scale of 10?
My answers went in the following order:
Exercise Regularly?? No, frankly I dont. Marked No.
Do you engage in any sport regularly? No. Not in my recent past or present. Heyyy... But I do walk regularly. But that has become my default routine and I consider that as a stress reliever rather than a way of exercise. Moreover, in one of my likes in the SOP form I had also mentioned one of my likes as going for a long walk. I had marked NO for regular exercise. I thought again what to do. And I scribbled on my answer...... (dhanae dhanae dhanae dhanae dhanae)
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