Exam oh exam..

Salam

I just sat for the last paper (insyaAllah) for this academic year. I did not feel that I will go in and ace it because I know, anything and everything under the sun can be asked as long as it has that tiny little connection to the 3rd year medical syllabus. I walked out of the exam feeling calm, as no words or actions can describe the feeling of being in oblivion.

Back in primary school, I was so clever that by just listening to half of the question my teachers asked, my hands shot up in the air, frantically waving and inching off my seat to be the first to answer. Everything was so easy back then.

Then, came high school where I memorised every detail (yes, the colour of the page, the layout, where precisely on the page, and sometimes even the page number) of every page and answered questions when they were asked. It got a bit harder since I had to wait for the questions to be completed before I could answer.

In college, revision was ultimate. If you don't study, you won't be able to answer. I stored all the information in the IB guides in my head and was able to reel them off at the tip of my fingers. It was more about 'application' people said, rather than just purely regurgitating. I disagree to a certain extent, because puremaths was the only subject that required application. Everything else was still regurgitation.

I realised that I did not have the knack for maths (mainly because I was not interested) and thought yes, if I pursue something where I can utilise my memorising abilities, insyaAllah I can make it through. In the 3rd year of my medical degree, I was given a real shocker. Today, as I finished my exam, I realised no matter how much I try to memorise, there was no way I was going to be able to answer all the questions just now. Up till IB, the syllabus had a fence, it was kept within an area, like a park surrounded by fences. You can run, you can hide, yet still you will always be in that fenced area. Today, I jumped into the ocean. I started slowly, until I lost sight of land. I drifted, until I realised that I was actually lost. I looked at the stars, they made no sense. There was no shadows to help point me towards the direction I intended to follow. At times, I was so lost during the exams that all I thought was "you don't know the answer, you've tried to work it out but you can't, only thing left to do is to make sure that the answer boxes are not left empty". Bismillah, I took a whim guided guess and insyaAllah I will get it right. If not, my own weakness to blame.

A week ago, I met my personal tutor for a chat. I said I always aspire to get an A. He said "yes, we always work towards that. But the thing in medicine is that you need to be content knowing that you will never know everything in medicine. If you are able to do that, you will become a great doctor". Thanks Keith, my Consultant Paediatrician personal tutor who specialises in Cystic Fibrosis. He told me he did his electives an odd 30+ years ago in Banting, Malaysia. What a coincidence!

Anyway, I realised a trend in examinations as life progresses. First, you know the answer even before the questions were asked. Then, you know the answers but it takes a little longer. That is then followed by having to work things out after looking at the question. Now, its reading the question but not having a clue what it was going on about. Up to this stage, this very exam is the determining factor whether I will proceed to 4th year or not. My UPSR, PMR, SPM, IB, Year 1 and Year 2 exams are all of no or little worth. The exams I face at this moment in time will always be the most important, the same said when I was 12, 15, 17 and 19. In the future, this Year 3 exam will be of the least value when I have a patient's life at stake. Will I know the answers then? Will I make a guess and gamble?

But thats not what worries me the most. I fear that one day, on That Day, where mothers forget their babies, when the sun is a hands width above my head, I will be asked questions that I know the answers but I dare not speak of them. On that day, every cell in my body will be answering for me. If it was left to my tongue, I can foresee myself lying in the face of The Fire for I will be so scared. That will be the ultimate examination for me and every other exam will be of no value. And insyaAllah, I pray to Allah that not only me, but all of us will be able to pass That Exam by doing our best and more in the series of exams and tests we face on this earth. May our knowledge bring us back and closer to The Almighty and may everything we do is for the cause of the Almighty, lillahi Taala.

NB: ok guys, I hope I didn't freak you out but that sure was the most difficult exam so far.. (T_T)