Monday, December 04, 2006

It’s that time of the year

So I went to breakfast this morning, looking forward to another day full of movies, games and Torchwood when I realized that there are so many faces that I haven’t seen before. I don’t think people are that motivated to go to an 8:15 a.m. breakfast on a holiday. Plus, they all dressed smartly and looking kinda lost. That’s when I realised: it’s that time of the year again. When new prospects came to Cambridge filled with anticipation and not a little nervousness. The Cambridge interviews had now begun…

I still remembered my very own Cambridge interview… having a test that I couldn’t finish… filled with pride for being able to remember the density of air to three significant figures… one of the few times in my life that I can feel the gears in my mind turning as I struggled to understand the concept of unit cell, which, I might add, is not in the IB syllabus and is only being taught in the first year of university. Not something I’d like to repeat but it’s one of those things that made you feel pleased because it turned out well.

One of my juniors from AC came today for the interview. She had to do the dreaded Thinking Skills Assessment test. Ha ha, if I was asked a bit earlier I might have given them some tips on choosing the types of interview. Oh well.

I chatted with some interview candidates during dinner. I think I scared them a bit with my description of the interview. Oops.

There was a sketch in the Brit National evening in AC that I remembered about Oxbridge interviews. It goes a bit like this:

Interviewer: So, you came here to be interviewed.

Candidate (nervous): Err, yes.

Interviewer (holding out his hand): There’s a heavy brick in my hand. Pick it up.

The candidate picked up the empty air on the interviewer’s hand and pretended that it was really heavy.

Candidate: Urggh, urghh…

Interviewer: Feel the brick. Can you feel the texture? It’s really heavy, isn’t it? Good. Now, throw it out the window.

The candidate swung his hand backward and threw the imaginary brick towards the direction of the window.

Interviewer: Impressive. Though the next time, you might want to open the window first.


Yaz.