Re: PM’s French Re-entry into the Matrix - Phase 1: 500 Hours Extensive Reading

[smallwhite]

Good luck for the exam, PM!

[blaurebell]

Good luck and all fingers / toes crossed!

[luke]

Le cœur!

[tomgosse]

Bon courage mon ami !

I won't write good luck because that insinuates that you are not prepared, and will only pass the exam by luck. But, you are prepared, so you don't need luck. Just have courage as you face the test

[smallwhite]

I won't write good luck because that insinuates that you are not prepared, and will only pass the exam by luck.

That good luck thing was probably the biggest culture shock for me when I first came to Australia. I was as diligent a student as you could get, and people wished me luck for exams?!

[Carmody]

Portez-vous bien et bon vent pour l'examin.

Nos pensées et nos cœurs sont avec vous.

[MorkTheFiddle]

Break a leg!

[tastyonions]

Je te dis merde.

[PeterMollenburg]

Okay, back from 3/4 of the exam. The last 1/4 is tomorrow. Thanks everyone for your support!!!

So today I completed the listening, reading and writing components.

Listening:
My weakest! I was nervous, and couldn't gather any information on first listen to the first 5 minute snippet of audio. I found it hard to understand what information i was trying to search for/decipher when there was little time to read all questions and take it all on board (i'm a little slow). I found it difficult to compose myself and was feeling a little despair at times. I composed myself and did what I could. Fortunately with this piece of audio there was a 2nd listen, but still I found it tricky. Some guessing involved to be quite frank. The next piece of audio was easier and one listen only. All in all my guess mark out of 25 is 8. I hope it's not below the required 5 out of 25, would be a shame to fail. Not confident! I even came back to this portion when the reading component officially commenced, in vain trying to salvage something here and there by at least answering questions I was drawing blanks on.

Listening is clearly my weak point at this stage. And by weak point, what I find tricky at times is not necessarily hearing words, phrases and sentences, but deciphering the nuances in the information provided in order to correctly respond to the questions. Not fun!

Reading:
Very confident. Minimum mark I believe I will get is 15, but potentially over 20 without issue. Official guess mark 22. A little work is involved, it's not a walk in the park, but not far off it.

Writing:
Pretty similar to reading, but due to the fact i couldn't cut out quite enough words in the end to bring it into the correct word count range, a tiny bit less confident than reading. Guess mark 20.

Oh and in the middle of the exam i was busting to go to the toilet (yes I did go before the exam too, more than once). No issue, that was explained... I went out and then on finding my way back to exam room realised I'd gone up the wrong (small) flight of stairs. I looked quickly for the right door, couldn't find it, went back up the same wrong flight of stairs as I followed a cleaner's directions, but at the top of the stairs in the room I could hear French behind the door spoken out loud- not an exam going on there! Rushed back down, outside... quick select the right door!!! Phew, this time the cleaner got it right. An example of panicking making a situation confusing I think.

Oral component tomorrow.

Had to write about all this today before I forget the details!!

[rlnv]

I hope you get the marks you're estimating, and good luck on the oral tomorrow! As a person that drinks a lot of water, I can completely relate to your story, as a matter of fact something similar happened to me at the dentist today.

When you get a chance, can you give a bit more detail on the writing section? Topic, time allotted, and whatnot.