hi.

i'm still coughing like nobody's business.
if coughing is still considered as me being sick, then i have been sick for the whole week already.

today will be a random post about my day,
for i wish not to forget this day for as long as i can remember,
today, it the day, where i am confused.

quite retardedly, i am actually confused almost every second available,
but like i said, i, want to type this out, in memories of today, for i do not wish to forget this day.

well, in a way, i'm actually using this as an excuse for me to compose something,
just to practise my language skills as i have an english examination coming up this thursday.

let's begin with today, shall we? =)

well, today is the first day of my WACE examination
and it begins with a biology paper.
bio is my favourite subject.
despite whatever that happens, it will remain as my favourite subject. IT WILL!! =X
and so, my nervousness shone brightly amongst the smog of calmness.
was really worried that i would be late for my paper that i rushed my way though everything.
i forgotten that i had already packed my purse in my bag,
i forgotten to bring water along with me to college,
i forgotten to bring my jacket along with me to college,
because i was so afraid that i would freeze to death,
i actually went home just to get my jacket.
through all those panicky moments, it got me in a state where i was much more panicked than i was supposedly was.
even that last sentence didn't make sense. =O
but anyhow, it was a good thing that i did not take the wheels to college today,
i would most probably get involved in an accident and would turn up late for my exam anyways, maybe i won't be able to turn up at all.
thanks for being in a panicked state, i couldn't really focus.

and the clock hit 1.30pm,
it was time for us to wait outside the doors towards hell... more like a freezer.
it used to be a freezer, but not anymore, they figured out how to control the coldness of the hall now. =D
hrm...
but anyhow, i was that confused that i almost forgotten my own table when i entered the hall.
we were given a super thick yellow book as our examination paper and also a piece of green paper, one small blue card and also a piece of sticker with our own information on it.
what got me interested was the green piece of paper.
for the whole ausmat course, we were stressed by the lecturers, telling us to shade properly with pencils, and also filling our names up at the specific column.
some of us even have marks deducted just because we forgotten to fill up our names at the designated columns.
and what turns out was,
our details were all printed readily for us to simply peel off the sticker and pasting it on our book.
all that was left to do, was to rewrite our student id, both in numbers and spellings of the numbers.
and the green sheet of paper?
we have been shading oblong shapped spaces with 2B/HB pencils,
but this time, we were to shade tiny squares with either black or blue pen.
due to inexperience we have, i believe shading with PEN is rather queer and takes a tad bit of extra time for the careful shadings to be done.
i am not complaining, i actually find it really fascinating. =D
*see why i don't want to forget this day? =P*

and lo and behold,
wait.
i'm not there yet.
it is also the first time that the invigilators will go through each page, slowly mentioning the beginning few words and the last few words of the particular page, just to make sure we all had the same paper.
how considerate.
unlike SPM, we were to flip through ours books of question, just to check if we have enough pages. HAHAHAH.
those days.
and then as soon as we were done flipping through, we had to close it and place it in front of us.
here, we were given READING TIME! yeay!
it gives us an extra ten minutes to look through the questions to have a good grasp of it, and then probably we could vomit whatever we knew without troubles.
really considerate. =)

but the thing is, why does the exam have to be so long?
=O
i get hungry easily, what am i to do? =/

but anyhow,
it was time to preceed with the questions.
i decided to spend some time speed reading through the questions on the 2nd section first before going back to visual answer questions on the 1st section.
i believe this was my first mistake, one that had cost me alot. *this will be explained sometime later in this post. =) *
the questions were somewhat tough.
questions that require one to think through before answering the question,
before making sure that the answer written would be the right one,
because there is barely enough time for you to check back.
three hours, and it was still not enough.
haha. insane.
so there were a few questions that still lingered in my mind,
causing me to have debates over and over again until this very moment,
- what are the two purposes of using DNA microarray.
here was my reaction : whaaaaattttt???????!!!!?!?!?!
initially the question came with a small description on PCR and DNA microarray, the first question under that description was regarding PCR, and of course, a question would be asked on DNA microarray.
but there was a problem.
i have NEVER seen or heard that term anywhere before.
it never hit my mind what on earth it was and also what it could be used for.
even had to googled for it when i got home.
turns out it was related to 'probes'.
=/

then there was another question
- organisms with large Surface Area / Volume ratio had its advantages and disadvantages in arid areas.
we were to describe how so.
i answered that question with breeze.
but two to three questions after that, popped up another question related to SA/V ratio, which got me into a standstill.
- large mammals are able to stay in the sun for long periods of time, but small mammals would have to hide when it's hot.
this question made me doubt my answer for that previous question,
i was debating against myself for a good 3-5 minutes, just deciding on which thought was right, and which was wrong.
here, would be my mistake number 2.
=/

and so i was done with section 1 and 2, i'm left with section 3,
a total of 4 essays, worth 15 marks each.
third mistake, spending too much time pondering on how to answer the questions.

all those mistakes summed up to a total loss of 15 marks,
simply because i didn't have enough time to even start with my 4th essay.
and because i saw that noone was collecting the book and sheet from my row yet,
i took the opportunity to try to write at least a few sentence to gain back some marks,
at least it's not a whole of 15 marks lost just like that.
but seriously, if i wasn't lucky enough to do that, i would probably be toast.
the moment i wanted to start on my fourth essay, the moment the invigilator announced for us to put our pens down.
i was in a state of shock that i couldnt even start with my last essay.
serious shock..

ahh.
there goes bio.