English

In two days… China!

In less than 48 hours I will be on vacations in China! I’ve been looking forward to this trip from months. Not only because the trip itself, but also because my family (and my wife’s) are also coming with us, and it’s been 8 months since we don’t see them.

Similarly as we did last year in our US RoadTrip, we are going to make a big tour visiting several cities and places, this time in almost two weeks.

The planned itinerary is the following: Beijing (4 days), Xian (2), Guillin(2), Hangzhou(1), Suzhou(1), Shanghai(2) and back to Hong Kong.

I will post pics and info about the trip when I get back.

See you in September 🙂

TOEFL final attempt

Hi guys,

Today I’ve taken the TOEFL for the second time (the first was in March and I scored 102) and I think I did better than the first one. I expect between 105 and 110, but we never know. I need at least a 104 to apply to Chicago Booth, hopefully I get that!. Harvard seems more difficult (109), tough I’m still thinking about whether I should apply there when I’m not super fan of that school. We’ll see.

Just in case that helps, I’ve worn earplugs all the time and I think it has been the best decision I’ve made, as last time I got distracted in every question.

Thankfully I did that because it was the worst test room, organization, etc I’ve ever seen in my experience doing these kind of exams (TOEFL(2), TOEIC, French exams, GMAT, etc).

There were no separations between desks and we were like 30 guys in a very small room. My elbows were almost touching the guys next to me. I had direct view to the guy in front of me, and the guy next to him, and so on. Half of the headphones didn’t work and while some guys were trying to concentrate in the reading passages, the others were shouting «describe the city you live in, describe the city you live in, DESCRIBE THE CITY YOU LIVE IN!!!» louder and louder. No luck, they didn’t work guys. In fact, they seemed from 1980s. I saw 3 guys doing the exam in CRTs screens that remembered me my old 486 computer.

Honestly, it was like doing the exam in a McDonalds.

And that’s not all, the exam was scheduled to start at 9 AM, and at 8:30 we were already grouped next to the room door, but we were outdoors! you know this is Hong Kong, 32 degrees and 98% humidity. The guy was calling one by one and by the time I entered the room it was 9:30! and I was sweating like if I were in my way to finish a Marathon. And then, the freeze with full power air conditioning.

I decided to put my earplugs, forget about the world and focus on the exam.

Really, what an experience! but no doubt the earplugs saved my exam.

Cracked the GMAT, 740!

Hi guys,

I’ve taken the GMAT again, and I scored 740 (Q50, V40)!! I’m, finally, very satisfied.

As you probably remember, I took the exam last month and scored 690 (visit GMAT is done… but not over), after having a big trouble sleeping the night before. At that time, I was pretty deceived and wanted to retake it as soon as possible. I was strongly convinced that I would score higher with no much effort, as last time the practice tests showed that I could break 700.

How did I prepare this time?

First, I tried to focus on my weakness and to think about «what I did wrong» last time and «what I should improve».

What I did wrong was easy to answer: I didn’t sleep the night before. What should I improve? I thought I was already well prepared last time to break 700. However, I needed to keep the current level, so I decided to do again a lot of exercises.

I prepared it for around three weeks. This is the material I used:
– Official Guide 11 and 12 (OG11 and OG12): I did the last 50 questions of PS, last 75 of DS, all SC, all CR and around 30 questions of RC. From OG12 I did only the exercises that were not in the OG11 using this useful site What has changed?.
– Manhattan GMAT Sentence Correction book: I reviewed my notes, which contained the most important concepts explained on it.
– GMAT Club: I have free access to all their GMAT quantitative practice tests because I’m moderator of this community. The tests are much harder than the real thing, but quite useful for people targeting +Q49.

I made the following practice tests:
– GMATPrep1 720 (50,38)
– PowerPrep 750 (50,42)
– PowerPrep2 740 (50,41)
– Knewton 690 (47,37) -> Knewton scoring algorithm is totally faulty. I only missed 3 questions in Quant and 4 in Verbal…
– GMATPrep2 760 (Q50,V41)

In the real test I wanted to secure a +700 score, and I knew that it was very important to not getting stuck in any question that could put at risk the whole exam (i.e. spending 8 minutes in one question). I was decided to guess one or two questions if I fell short of time, as I wanted to reach the last 5-7 questions with enough time to finish the exam.

Quant section started well. I knew I was doing good because all questions were difficult (many DS, probability/combinatorics, geometry), in line with my practice tests. I had to guess one or two questions but by the time I finished the section I was confident to score at least Q49.

Verbal section, however, started much worse. I received soon two very tough RC texts. In the second one, I doubted in the 5 questions. Usually, when I doubt in RC questions, this almost always means that I choose the incorrect answer. After this RC text, the level went down considerably, and I received in a row quite easy SC and CR questions. Although the level increased by the end of the exam, it never was as tougher as it was in the first 10 questions. By question 37, I thought I was going to score around V36-V38, and I realized that I haven’t received a bold CR question yet (the bold ones are used to be difficult, meaning that you are doing good). Luckily, I received the first and unique bold question in the 40th question.

I finished the test and before clicking on view score, I tried to imagine my score. I was expecting good quant mark, but I didn’t have a clue about Verbal. The only thing I wanted to see is a 7 in the hundreds digit, and I was not convinced. However, I clicked and saw 740. I felt relieved, the pain was gone. It was worth the effort I put on this. I finally felt accomplished: I cracked the GMAT!

GMAT is done… but not over

Hi guys,

Today I’ve taken the GMAT but unfortunately I will retake it. Why that? because I’ve performed much worse than expected.

I ended with a 690. You might think that it is not a bad score, but considering that during the last week I’ve taken several mock tests and in all of them I scored above 700, then I consider it a failure.

It is likely that the main reason of my under-performance today is the fact that I had big trouble yesterday night to fall sleep and I ended sleeping 2 hours. As a result, I wasn’t in the best physical conditions during the exam.

Well, I have written a long debrief of this GMAT experience. During my preparation, I read many other people’s debriefs and they helped me a lot, so now it is my turn to contribute.

Preparation

My preparation started more than a year ago, when I bought OG11 (Official Guide 11th Edition) and Kaplan Premier books. At that time, my English and my motivation regarding GMAT weren’t too high and after a month reading the Kaplan’s book my scores in the Kaplan CATs were pretty low. As I didn’t plan to apply to an MBA that year, I made a break in my GMAT preparation and focused on improving English.

Then, beginning this year I did some research about what preparation books were a must and I bought some MGMAT (Manhattan GMAT) guides and a friend let me OG12 and some other material.

My preparation started reading MGMAT books one by one, and doing many of their exercises. At the same time, I was doing the exercises of the OG11. In general, I studied Maths and Verbal alternatively.

While I was studying/practicing, I maintained a small notebook with Math concepts that I wanted to learn by heart. For example things such as:
11*11= 121, 12*12 = 144… 18*18=324, etc.
180(n-2) = Sum angles of polygon.
Number of zeros of 30! = 30/5 + 30/(5^2) = 6 + 1 = 7
a^n – b^n is always divisible by a-b, and only by a+b if n even
a^n + b^n is divisible by a+b if n is odd, and never if n is even
…
For this notebook I found extremely useful the Bunuel’s Math Fundation. At the end, my notebook had many pages with key things.
During the last month of preparation (May) I checked the MGMAT comparison between OG11 and OG12 to select the new exercises in OG12 and I did all of them (by the way, I found much harder the Quant exercises from OG12 than from the OG11).

CAT results from May to July in order:

[*] Two months to go
MGMAT1 630 (Q44, V32)

[*] One month to go
Princeton 730 (Q46, V45)
MGMAT2 650(Q40, V38)
MGMAT3 680 (Q47, V35)
MGMAT4 770 (Q50, V45) —- untimed
Kaplan free test: 700 (Q45, V43)
PowerPrep1 710 (Q48, V38)
GMATPrep1 730 (Q50, V40) — 1st time
GMATPrep2 740 (Q49, V41) — 1st time

[*]Last week:
GMATPrep1 760 (Q51, V42) – 2nd time
GMATPrep2 730 (Q50, V38) – 2nd time
MGMAT free test: 730 (Q48, V42)

Exam day

Things started very badly the night before. Even if I didn’t open a book during the afternoon (tough I did a CAT in the morning), I started to feel nervous and anxious, a very bad combination.
As a result, when I went to bed I couldn’t stop thinking about the exam, consequences and all sort of crappy things. The night was a nightmare for me because I knew the importance of sleeping well the night before, but everybody knows that «when one MUST fall asleep, then everything can happen EXCEPT falling asleep». At the end, the last time I watched the clock was 5:30 AM, and my alarm clock rang at 7:15. Thus, I slept less than 2 hours.

When I woke up, I took a coffee, a good breakfast and before leaving home I drank a redbull to wake me up. In the way to the test center I tried to forget about what happened during the night but it was difficult as I felt soooo tired. However, I wanted to take the test without a doubt and tough some thoughts about rescheduling crossed my mind, I was convinced that I could score 700 even tough my physical condition.

* AWA

The test started well. I managed to write acceptable AWA essays. I used the Chinese burned template with some little modification. In the first 5 minutes I wrote the full template without even looking at the prompt (this is how I had practiced). For me this worked much better than writing the template at the same time that completing the sentences, because doing so I used to forget parts of the template or to spend more time thinking about the template than if I did otherwise.
So when I finished writing the full template I had about 25 minutes to complete the template with my own ideas. Another 5′ were enough to find good arguments and examples so I spent 20 minutes writing each essay and reviewing them.

* Quant

I was happy with the AWA and my confidence was high even if I would have loved to do a 4-hours nap.

However, in Quant things started in the worst way. In fact, I didn’t know how to solve the first question! I didn’t believe it. It seemed a root straightforward question but none of the answers matched mine. I started to panic and after 4 minutes I decided to make a guess and continue….
Then in the second question I tried to stop thinking about the first one: «You failed the first but it doesn’t matter, it doesn’t matter, it doesn’t… CRAP WHAT THE **** YOU DIDN’T KNOW HOW TO ANSWER A ***** ROOT QUESTION, ****** MORON!!! ?!!».
I don’t know what I did in the next 4 or 5 questions but I struggled in the third and fifth. By the time I was calmed I was about the 10th.

I knew that my super-star debut had hurt a lot because between 10th and 20th I received the easiest questions I had ever seen during my preparation time. Between 20th and 30th things started to be more complicated but I wasn’t feeling very well. By question 30th, I was about 15 minutes ahead of time and then I received the first real tough question. It was the 34th or so. I thought, «Oh god… finally I’m going to use my brain! last time I used it was in the first question, a 550 level roots question that by the way I missed….crap how the hell I could have missed it?… ok come on, shut up! and lets answer this well so you might fix this».

After thinking peacefully about the reasoning I was sure that it was correct, so then I started solving the question (I had even time to go to the restroom and come back if I wanted). By the time I got the result (something like 4565) I was completely sure that it was correct. Then a quick look at the 5 answers… but…. «what? where are you? Pearsons forgot to put the correct answer or what?!!» «OK OK lets try again, review your calculations…» 2 minutes after… 4565. «I can believe it!» Well, I have a lot of time, in fact I’m how many minutes ahead…… .?.. WHAT!!? NO WAY! 2 minutes behind the clock!!!! I have spent like a century solving this question again and again and 4565 still doesn’t appear in the answers!!! Well, lets click C and continue».

By the way, after the exam my wife, who received that same ‘tough’ question, told me about the part in the prompt saying (X inches…. Y centimeters). Oh come on!!! I had not only missed that, but also the whole last sentence where it was indicated the conversion (1 inch = 2,54 cm).

In conclusion, my Quant part was a pain and I should have missed many many questions because I wasn’t in good condition, I was nervous and I wasn’t concentrated.

* Break
Half redbull, half banana, chocolate bar.
I tried to find some good thoughts: «I can crack verbal» «first root question was experimental», «Vamos!! I can do it, lets go!», «Spain will win the World Cup!»

* Verbal
I don’t have much to say about Verbal, only that it seemed much harder than GMAT Preps and I wasn’t able to find the answers to CR questions or understanding well the RCs. Usually, I was very strong in CR and most of the times I knew the answers of the questions even before looking at the answers. However, in this case every answer of the questions seemed confusing and I had to guess between two answers a lot of times (very bad sign). The RC passages were unbearable and during the exam I was constantly looking at the question number «oh come on! still 10 to go? I only want to finish this pain and have a beer with my friends, or two, or ten».

By the time I ended I knew that my score wasn’t going to be as high as I expected before taking the test. However, I would never cancel a score so I had no doubts in the screen «Do you want to report this score?» Of course I want to know my score, even if it is a 500.

Then I saw 690 (Q47, V38). One of my worst Quant score in all my preparation time, and a Verbal score worse than any of my last practice tests.
Even if I knew during the exam that I was doing very bad, I always had the hope to score 700 (I’m an optimistic guy…).

Well, that’s it. This is a not a very successful story about GMAT, but I hope it can help some others. I feel disappointed right now but I will retake it 99%. Anyway, I’m sure that in a few days I would feel better…. most of all because Spain is going to win the WORLD CUP!!!!! 😀

Wharton 2011 Essays and Chicago Booth information session

Wharton, another of my target schools, has published its essays. Here they are:

* What are your professional objectives? (300 words)
Please respond to three of the following:
1) Student and alumni engagement has at times led to the creation of innovative classes. For example, through extraordinary efforts, a small group of current students partnered with faculty to create a timely course entitled, “Disaster Response: Haiti and Beyond,” empowering students to leverage the talented Wharton community to improve the lives of the Haiti earthquake victims. Similarly, Wharton students and alumni helped to create the “Innovation and the Indian Healthcare Industry” which took students to India where they studied the full range of healthcare issues in India. If you were able to create a Wharton course on any topic, what would it be? (700 words)
2) Reflect on a time when you turned down an opportunity. What was the thought process behind your decision? Would you make the same decision today? (600 words)
3) Describe a failure that you have experienced. What role did you play, and what did you learn about yourself? How did this experience help to create your definition of failure? (600 words)
4) Discuss a time when you navigated a challenging experience in either a personal or professional relationship. (600 words)

I already have some ideas of what I will write in some of the essays. In fact, I have been doing some brainstorming about my life in the last weeks. In addition, I have asked close family and friends and they are helping me to find good stories.

On the other hand, I’ve assisted today to an online Chicago Booth’s information session hosted by Kaplan. Rose Martinelli, Associate Dean for Student Recruitment and Admissions, has provided a presentation of the school and answered some questions. It has been a good opportunity to learn about the school and its community. Rose seemed to know perfectly well how to do her job and I liked her way to talk about the school and her answers to the questions.  Honestly, I knew almost everything she has said, but that’s because I know a couple of friends who attended Chicago MBA some years ago, and that are giving me a lot of information about the school. Anyway, I enjoyed the presentation.

TOEFL retake date

I already made the appointment for the TOEFL retake. I will retake it on August 14th, the first date available in Hong Kong.

To recall you, I scored a 102 in my first TOEFL attempt (March 13th), which is not enough for some top schools. I’m confident that I will score higher next time, as the GMAT preparation should improve my English skills (at least, reading and writing sections).

Harvard 2011’s essays questions

The HBS’s essays and recommendation questions for the next class have been published!

Although I’m still not sure whether I’ll apply to HBS, I have to say that these questions, having the question so early will definitely help. Here the questions:

Essays questions
*  What are your three most substantial accomplishments and why do you view them as such? (600-word limit)
* What have you learned from a mistake? (400-word limit)
* Please respond to two of the following (400-word limit each):
1. What would you like the MBA Admissions Board to know about your undergraduate academic experience?
2. What is your career vision and why is this choice meaningful to you?
3. Tell us about a time in your professional experience when you were frustrated or disappointed.
4. When you join the HBS Class of 2013, how will you introduce yourself to your new classmates?

I really like the HBS’s questions (straight to the point) and I’m pretty sure that I could manage to write good answers.

Recommendation questions:
* Please comment on the context of your interaction with the applicant. How long have you known the applicant and in what connection? If applicable, briefly describe the applicant’s role in your organization. (250-word limit)
* Please describe the most important piece of constructive feedback you have given the applicant. Please detail the circumstances and the applicant’s response. (250-word limit)
* Please make additional statements about the applicant’s performance, potential, or personal qualities you believe would be helpful to the MBA Admissions Board. (250-word limit)

By the way, Harvard requires three recommenders (some schools require only two). I already have two of them decided (my former boss in New York and a work colleague also from New York’s job). About the third I’m still undecided. Naturally, it would have to be someone from my current Hong Kong’s job, but the truth is that they don’t know about my MBA project and telling them about it could have some serious consequences, such as not renovating my expat contract that finishes in December’10. Well, I need to think about it sooner than later.

GMAT Test date: July 6

I didn’t have much time during the last weeks, and I forgot to tell you that I finally booked a date for the GMAT exam. I will take it on July 6.

For that reason I will start studying as much as possible. That is about 1h during weekdays after work, and 5h/day during weekends).

My goal is to get 700 or more, so during the next weeks I need to improve the accuracy and timing in Quant, and practice Verbal as much as possible.

The problem is that I have some friends here in Hong Kong the next days, so I need to combine work, social life and GMAT at the same time: mission impossible. Anyway, I’ve decided to take some days off from work just before the exam so hopefully they will help me to reach my goal.

Wharton Information Session

Today I attended a Wharton information session here in Hong Kong, held in JP Morgan offices in Central. There were an Adcom member plus two Wharton’s current students. Very good idea of bringing these two students as I liked hearing their thoughts about the school. However, I didn’t like so much the Adcom member.

There were more people attending the session than I expected. We were about 40 people, from which 95% were from Asian origins, so a big part of the talk was related to Asia (most of all, about China).

The session was interesting though I already knew most of what it was discussed because I have been doing lot of research during the last months because I’m very interested in this school. In fact, if I had to say which is my top choice school today, I would probably pick Booth or Wharton. Anyway, they provided useful tips about the application process and how to approach the essays. Also, they talked about school’s clubs and how the MBA curriculum is organized during the two years. Clearly, I like their structure of having an intensive core curriculum the first year, and a second year in which there is the possibility to specialize in two different majors.

Another thing I like from Wharton and Booth is their grade no disclosure policy. I believe this is great to promote the team work and team building among students.

Well, I will definitely apply to Wharton on round 1!

Back to 2009: US Road Trip

It’s been almost a year since I did this trip, but as I’m planning at this moment another big trip (this time to China), I want to share with you the planning and route of the trip, in case you are planning a similar one.

The trip lasted 25 days, and we visited San Francisco, Los Angeles, Las Vegas, and many National Parks: Grand Canyon, Monument Valley, Mesa Verde, Arches, Bryce, Zion, Death Valley and Yosemite. We were 15 (my family and the family of my wife, including partners).

It wasn’t an easy task to organize this trip and I spent a lot of time doing so, but it was totally worthy: the trip was awesome and everything went fine.

I’m not going to go in detail through each place we visited as the post would become too long. However, don’t hesitate to ask me in case you have any questions.

Day 0 – San Francisco
Trip (flights):
New York-San Francisco (my wife, my brother and I)
Madrid-Toronto-San Francisco (my family and my wife’s)
Night: Hotel Hilton San Francisco Financial District

Day 1: San Francisco
We rented bikes at «Bay City Bike» near Fisherman’s Wharf and we rode to Sausalito, crossing the Golden Gate bridge.
Night: Hotel Hilton San Francisco Financial District

Day 2: San Francisco
Union Square, China Town, Financial District, Cable cars, Lombard, City Hall, Golden Gate park, San Bruno mountain, etc
Night: Hotel Hilton San Francisco Financial District

Day 3: San Francisco to Big Sur.
We rented RVs at CruiseAmerica in Oackland.
Trip: Oackland towards Los Angeles on Highway 1, going through Monterrey. Then, road 1 to Big Sur.
Night: camping at some point in Big Sur. I don’t remember the name as it was very late and we had to improvise.

Day 4: Big Sur to Los Angeles
Big Sur to Malibu Beach, visit to Beverly Hills, Rodeo Drive, Kodak Theater.
Night: Malibu Beach RV Park.

Day 5: Los Angeles to Grand Canyon
Los Angeles: Griffith Observatory, Hollywood.
Trip: Los Angeles to Grand Canyon (800 km).
Night: Mather Campground (Grand Canyon).

Day 6: Grand Canyon
Grand Canyon first day.
South rim, view points.
Night: Mather Campground (Grand Canyon).

Day 7: Grand Canyon
Grand Canyon second day.
Trail down to the canyon.
Night: Trailer Village Grand Canyon.

Day 8: Grand Canyon, Monumental Valley, Four Corners, Mesa Verde
Desert View Area, Yaki point. Monumental Valley. Four Corners.
Trip: Grand Canyon – Monumental Valley (290 km) – Four Corners – Mesa Verde (269km).
Night: Morefield RV park (Mesa Verde).

Day 9: Mesa Verde
Mesa Verde.
Trip: Mesa Verde to Arches (233km).
Night: Devils Garden Campground (Arches).

Day 10: Arches and Bryce Canyon
Arches: Delicate Arch Viewpoint, Wofe Ranch, Window section, Double Arch.
Trip: Arches to Bryce (438 km).
Night: Ruby’s Inn Campground (Bryce).

Day 11: Bryce Canyon
Trail Queens Garden & Navajo Combo.
Night: Ruby’s Inn Campground (Bryce).

Day 12: Zion Canyon
Zion on shuttle. Weeping Rock (Riverside walk).
Trip: Bryce to Zion (140km), to Las Vegas (269km).
Night: Sam’s Town RV Park.

Day 13: Las Vegas
Las Vegas.
Night: Sam’s Town RV Park.

Day 14: Las Vegas
Las Vegas.
Night: Sam’s Town RV Park.

Day 15: Las Vengas to Death Valley to Mammoth Lakes.
Trip: Las Vegas to Death Valley (271 km) to Mammoth Lakes (315 km).
Night: Mammoth Mountain RV Park.

Day 16: Mammoth Lake and Yosemite.
Mammoth Lake + Yosemite.
Night: Hodgon Meadow, CA.

Day 17: Yosemite
Mariposa Groove, sequoias. Outer Loop Trail
Night: Hodgon Meadow. ,CA

Day 18: Yosemite
Glacier Point. Lower Yosemite Falls. Bridalveil Fall. Taft Point and the Fissures
Yosemite Valley
Night: Oh Ridge (June Lake, CA)

Day 19: Mono Lake
Mono Lake (swim). South Tufa Trail.
June Lake (swim).
Night: Oh Ridge (June Lake, CA)

Day 20: Lake Tahoe
Trip: Mono Lake to Lake Tahoe (240 km).
Tahoe beach near Zephyr
Night: Zephyr Cove RV Park.

Day 21: Oakland
Tahoe to Oakland
Night: Anthony Chabot campground

Day 22: San Francisco
Return RVs.
Flights back (SF-Madrid and SF-New York)

In a postmortem analysis I would say that the time spend in each place was nice, and although some days may seem too stressful, we were able to visit everything we wanted.

If I had to choose my favorite places we visited I would say: San Francisco (I loved it), Grand Canyon (though I had seen it many times on TV so it was not so unexpected), Bryce (awesome) and Arches. Yosemite was impressive but we are more used to that kind of landscape in Europe (such as the Alps and the Pyrenees). However, the canyons in other national parks are something we can’t see in Europe and they are fascinating. I also liked a lot the landscapes along the way while traveling, and the big contrast between regions we crossed.

Trip to Malaysia and Thailand

As you see I haven’t had much time lately to write the blog. Mostly because I was on vacations for more than a week. In fact, there were three days of National Holiday in Hong Kong and I took another three days off to complete 11 consecutive days, which I enjoyed traveling through Malaysia and Thailand.

First of all, here you have some pics of the trip:
Kuala Lumpur flickr set
Bangkok flickr set

Some months ago I bought tickets for the Formula 1 Malaysia Grand Prix, hold in Sepang (50 km from Kuala Lumpur), on the first weekend of April. I have to say that I’m a huge fan of Formula 1 and since 1990s I have been watching it on TV and two times live (I also attended the 2007 Monaco Grand Prix). Besides, the apparition of Spaniards drivers (such as Fernando Alonso, Jaime Alguersuari, Pedro de la Rosa and Marc Gene) increased my interest in Formula. Here a couple of pictures of the Sepang circuit: one and two. And here one of the impressive Petronas twin towers.

Since we were going to Malaysia (my wife also came), we decided to make a little trip through the region, and we stayed four nights in Kuala Lumpur, one night in GeorgeTown (Penang Island) and four nights in Bangkok, Thailand.

Unfortunately, the Grand Prix wasn’t as interesting as expected, basically because the expected rain didn’t happen (so not many overtakes), and Alonso had engine problems in his Ferrari so he didn’t finish the race. Two times I’ve gone to see him racing live and both times he didn’t finish the race… I don’t bring him good luck.

Apart from that the trip was awesome and we liked everything a lot. Although I’m not going to enter in details about what we visited, there are two anecdotes that happened during the trip that are worth to relate.

The first one took place in GeorgeTown in the middle of the night. In fact, we were suddenly woken up because the building was shaking. At the beginning I thought I was dreaming, but when the bed started to move and some small objects fell down, then I definitely woke up and realized that it was an earthquake. I have never experienced one before and I was kind of freaking out as we were in the top floor of the hotel and there was no way to get out quickly of the building. We remembered primary school when teachers tell you what to do in case of an earthquake, so we decided to take cover under the bathroom door frame, just in case. Maybe we overreacted but it was our first earthquake on our life and we got scared (at the end I think my legs were shaking more than the building…). The tremor lasted between 1:30 to 2 minutes, and when it finished we show many people out of the building.

After we calmed down a little bit, we turned on the TV and the CNN and BBC were already talking about a major Earthquake of 7.7 degrees on Richter scale, happened near Sumatra Island (Indonesia), not far from where we were. During the day the news said that fortunately nothing serious happened anywhere :). But for us was something we’ll remember for very long time. Perhaps if you live in Japan or California this is something that happens to you often, but definitely it’s not my case.  Here an article from wikipedia about this earthquake: April 2010 Sumatra earthquake.

The second anecdote happened in Bangkok. In fact, thousands of protesters are on the streets for two months, and the Government declared the state of emergency the day we arrived. They are camped in the hearth of the city and near the business and shopping district, where most of the hotels are (ours was less than 500m from them). The thing got very ugly with violent clashes between protesters and army. As a result, about 25 people were killed that day and more than 800 were injured. Thankfully, nothing happened to us and we didn’t experience any problematic situation during our stay, and we were able to visit most of the city sights without any problems. Some pictures about the ‘red shirt’ protesters here and here.

TOEFL score and University of Chicago BBQ

After two weeks of tense waiting finally I got my score of the TOEFL exam I did on March 13th.

I scored 102. The breakdown is as follows:
– Reading: 27
– Listening: 27
– Speaking: 23
– Writing: 25

I’m going to ask for rescoring on Speaking and Writing sections, as I sincerely think I did better than that (at least on the writing one). In fact, most of the schools ask for a minimum of 104 or 105 in TOEFL, so it seems worth trying.

On the other hand, today I went to the annual University of Chicago BBQ in Hong Kong, organized also with Northwestern (Kellogg), MIT (Sloan) and UPenn (Wharton) universities. It was pretty cool and I met some interesting people.

GMAT in a nutshell

Once TOEFL is passed, my next obstacle in the marathon towards MBA admission is the dreaded GMAT.

GMAT stands for Graduate Management Admission Test, and it’s a 4 hours «Computer-Adaptive standardized test (CAT) in mathematics and the English language for measuring aptitude to succeed academically in graduate business studies. The exam measures verbal, mathematical, and analytical writing skills that the examinee has developed over a long period of time in his/her education and work.»

Basically, it is one of the most important selection criteria for admission into Business Schools MBA programs.

The sections of the exam are:

Quantitative
– Problem Solving (PS)
– Data Sufficiency (DS)

Verbal
– Reading Comprehension (RC)
– Critical Reasoning (CR)
– Sentence Correction (SC)

Analytical Writing Assessment (AWA)
– Essay 1: Analyze an argument.
– Essay 2: Analyze an issue.

The score ranges from 200 to 800 and it covers Quantitative and Verbal sections. AWA is evaluated separately and the score ranges from 0 to 6.

To give you an idea, the GMAT score average of the students accepted in the top Business School is always higher than 700. For non-native English students the task is much harder as the exam’s English is extremely complicated.

I’ve planned to take the exam at the beginning of June. In fact, I want to have some time to retake it in case I don’t get the desired score (700). In August I will be on vacations for almost the whole month and in September I plan to focus only in the essays, so on July 31st the GMAT and TOEFL scores will be definitive.

I have less than 3 months to prepare it, and it’s going to be a though task as I don’t have much time during weekdays, and I won’t be able to study all the weekends (I have some trips planned in April, friends are coming in May,  etc.).

I’ve just finished a 3-months preparation planning and I will be taking test exams starting this weekend. I will be posting my test exam’s results so I will track my progression. On the other hand, I’ve just got some 2009 GMAT books to help me to prepare the exam: GMAT Official Guide, Kaplan and three Manhattan GMAT guides. I will start reading them very soon.

TOEFL Speaking rubric to scaled score

In this post you will understand how ETS converts rubric scores to scaled scores in the Speaking section.

The Speaking section contains six questions, and each one is scored from 0 to 4 points without decimal values.

For example, you can obtain the following set of results [4,4,3,3,3,3]. Then, they calculate the average of the results (sum of the the six scores divided by number of elements):
(4+4+3+3+3+3) / 6 = 20 / 6 = 3.33
and the outcome (3.33) is converted to a 30 points scale. See the following table:

To learn which are the scoring standards for each question check this link: Speaking standards

TOEFL Writing rubric to scaled score

In this post you will understand how ETS converts rubric scores to scaled scores in the Writing section.

The Writing section contains two questions/essays, and each one is scored from 0.0 to 5.0 points with an interval of 0.5 points. That means that you can score 4.5 or a 4.0 in one of the questions, but you can’t get a 4.25.

For example, lets say you obtain the following set of results: [4.5,4]. Then, they calculate the average (sum of the the two scores divided by number of elements):
(4.5 + 4) /2 = 9.5 / 2 = 4.25
and the outcome (4.25) is converted to a 30 points scale. See the following table:

To learn which are the scoring standards for each question check this link: Writing standards

TOEFL predictions

You might be wondering what happened on the TOEFL exam.

I will receive the official score in about two or three weeks. Anyway, this is what I predict (with +-5 points error):

TOTAL: 101
– Reading: 24
– Listening: 24
– Speaking: 23
– Writing: 30

I’ve performed worse in the two sections I used to do very well and better in the two in which I was less confident.

Actually, the reading was far more complicated than the ones I practiced with. Complex texts along with tricky questions. I didn’t manage well the time and at least in two questions I had to guess the answer (and one of both was worth 3 points), and many others I wasn’t sure about the answer. In addition, the listening difficulty was quite similar to my previous test, but I wasn’t able to maintain the concentration all the time, because of the guys around me were speaking all the time.

The speaking was fine. I mean, not at all perfect, but I didn’t mess up any of the question altogether. I think I did very well two of the questions, other three I answered them regular (I didn’t have time to finish in time one), and one bad (I didn’t get stuck but I didn’t answer the whole question).

Regarding the writing section, I think I did really well. The first essay question was perfect for me: a short passage with a clear idea and reasons to support the idea, and a lecture in where the professor contradicted the whole idea by casting doubts on the reading support ideas. It was something like «there is a new method called Y to do something, and it is better than the old method X because of: 1) something, 2) something, 3) something. Then, in the lecture, the professor discussed the three points giving clear ideas that contradicted the three support points in the reading. Therefore, it was easy to make the relation between lecture and reading, and I was able to write a long essay. The second essay was little more complicated but I also made a good job. I sincerely expect the highest mark (30) in this section, but we’ll see…

I’ll keep you posted whenever I receive the official score.

Willing to turn TOEFL’s page

Sincerely, I haven’t had much time this week to study TOEFL, and I’m also quite tired of doing it. I feel like I need a break…. I want to do the exam as soon as possible, turn the page and forget about it (at least for some time).

During the week, I have been doing some Speaking tests as well as Integrated Tasks of the Writing part (the first essay). 

The exam is held in Kowloon, and it begins at 9 AM. Since I live in Wanchai (Hong Kong island) it’s almost one hour to get in there. In fact, I don’t want to have any unexpected surprise, so two weeks ago we did (my wife and I) the journey to the exam location. Thank goodness we did so, because the place wasn’t so easy to find and we got lost twice.

We took the MTR (HK’s subway) to go there, but we might take a taxi this Saturday. I’m not sure if it is worthy as we need first to get out of the island in MTR and then take the taxi. In addition, lot of people work on Saturdays here in HK, so there is always the traffic risk. 

By the way, my wife is also taking the exam so I won’t be alone :), she is considering applying to an MBA too!

Wish us luck!

TOEFL, one week to go

Yeah! I’m only a week away from my first official step towards my MBA!

I’m pretty excited, even if I’m not convinced I will perform as well as needed. Realistically, I think my score will be ranging from 100 to 105, but it could be worse or better depending if the Gods are with or against me.

Today I did a full mock test and I scored 29/30 in Reading and 28/30 in Listening. The Speaking wasn’t too bad (I score myself 21) and Writing was fairly good (let’s put a 26). My final score would be around 104.

I think everything will be decided whether I do well on the Speaking or not. I can perform well some times, and really bad others. Basically, it will depend on my ability to find out good ideas during preparation time, and also if I don’t say any stupidity or get stuck while talking.

I use to perform better under pressure, but on the other hand I’m easily distracted, what can be a decisive thing during the Speaking section, as I will have plenty of people around me speaking aloud.

Anyway, during last weeks of preparation I’ve realized that I can improve much more from now until MBA application date, so I won’t be too sad if I don’t get my desired score. In fact, I don’t mind too much having to retake the exam again before or after summer, but always after GMAT, my next target.

I consider essential to have very strong English at MBA entry time, so I will continue studying it no matters what happen next Saturday.