Testimony

I had my compiler construction examination yesterday, and this is an examination thats dreaded by most students in my department. In fact,the course is so legendary, that a fraction of people in other departments in my faculty have heard of it. Apart from having a very challenging practical part which takes 70% of the total mark, you also have to sit for a true/false exam, which has 60 questions, and to pass successfully, you got to have 41 to pass. Why? because he dosent divide the marks by 2, as you would have expected, to get the mark over 30. He actually subtracts 30 from your exam score over 60. So if you get 41/60, it translates to you scoring 11/30.
So yeah the first time I wrote the exam, I had 38/60 (8/30) and the dude I taught got 41. It was scary. I made up my mind that I had to pass this bastard once and for all. I simply went and solved all the past exams. I scored low initially, but I would sit down with the book ,and look over my mistakes. So I went through all the past papers.
I had to take a break from this course to study for parallel algorithms, yeah the paper where we got to see "odu" briefly for like 5 mins.
After the crazy exam, I reread my notes and made some little notes of mine. That was the day I switched off my phone, and did like an 8 hour study-athon.
Next day, I went out to see of I could get wasiu (my bike) fixed, and yeah I forgot to mention that hes dead. I got a new bike today, so sweet and blue. Men I use double lock, padlock the thing so that these people no go tiff am, yes oh even for here we get some people wey their body they scratch them so dem go tiff .
So yeah when I got back, I sat down with the answers for the previous exams and crammed. I hate cramming, and I prefer to understand and implement, but this time I was so friggin desperate. I wanted to enjoi my summer hols without anything hanging over my head, you know madam is coming over, and I need to give her "undivided" attention (wink wink). So the day before the exam was used for cramming past answers, and looking for patterns in the exam papers.
Morning of the exam, I woke up, gave thanks to God, and I told him that even if I didnt get what I wanted in the exam, I'd still praise his name. Then I was inspired to resolve those past papers without looking at the answers. Men when I started it was crazy, I was finishing them in like 15 mins and getting 55+ /60, It was like woah. I went on till like one 0 clock, and my exam was scheduled for 2 in the afternoon. I had solved all but one, and for that one I just re-read the answers, and went for lunch.
Men before the exam I was nervous, and so I decided to go ease myself. On my way I met sheila, and it was really windy that day. So I commented on the fact that the days when we write the exams are usually windy, cus thats how it was last time.
Na so the foolish girl talk say that means I still go score 38, i.e I would still fail. Men I was so pissed, I mean some people just open that wide hole in their heads called a mouth and utter arrant nonsense. If na for naija, someone go tear am slap. Men I entered agbero mode for 2 mins and I was like "God punish you", the girl dey laff, dey think say na joke. I calmed myself down, told God I was sorry and all, and I felt the devil was threatened that I was gonna murder the exam, so he sent the chick to misyarn, anyhow sha I pushed the thought out of my head.
I got back to the hall, and they gave us the papers.
When I look the questions, men I begin smile........
See I finished those questions in 10 mins, and It was a 1 hr 30 mins exam. I just dey shade like rocket. I calmed myself down and checked again, cus I know I make silly mistakes at times. Thats how I changed one question from false to true when false was the answer. So sha I left the hall after 30 mins.
Later in the evening they put up the answers to the exam. Thats why I love these people, men if na for naija dem go take time ehn, to release results. I can never forget them releasing first semester 200 level results in first semester 300l. Imagine oh!
Fast foward to today, when they posted the results, and son of man got 53/60. Men I was like.....cool....thank God. I was the second highest, some dude had 56, but the thing was like , judging from his study number, I could tell that he had taken it times without number, so technically, I was the best in my set, for that exam attempt.....yeah I know I aint gonna get money for that, but it felt good sha.
In fact yesterday one of my friends was telling me she heard my gist of how I left the exam hall in 30 mins. I was like "omo so my legend don spread..."
I thank God and my ability to be flexible. Flexible because I tried another approach to studying. For the first exam I was trying to study the textbook , and all, and I failed. So the moral of this story is two fold---first God rocks, and answers prayers, and secondly be flexible. If you arent getting the results you want, then please change your strategy. If someone told me I would get 53/60, I'd have said he was joking.
I have to go back to writing my paper on "a comparison of Mpeg-4 motion detection architectures" now, cus I just took a break. Vassily, my friend from kazakhstan, accused me some minutes ago of "non-productive" typing in a friendly way.....
This is wavemasta logging out of your networkkkkkkkkk