random ramblings

TOPIC 1
Discuss your intermediate and long–term career goals, as well as a current vision of your desired employment upon graduation. Your explanation should include, but is not necessarily limited to the following: how you will leverage your professional and personal experiences in pursuit of these goals; why an MBA is necessary to achieve them; and why McCombs is the right MBA program for your career path.

TOPIC 2 
Please choose ONE of the following:
A. What non–professional accomplishment are you most proud of and why?
B. What special contributions do you feel you would bring to the McCombs community? Please include contributions beyond your professional skills and talents.

TOPIC 3
Please choose ONE of the following:
A. Discuss a time when you were faced with professional disappointment. How did you handle the disappointment and what did you learn from the situation?
B. Are there any aspects of your application, which you feel require further clarification, that are not addressed elsewhere?

So those are the 3 required Essays .. yes, all three.. by UT Austin…. Oh God, please help me so that I don’t procrastinate as much as I did to prepare for the GMAT..

I also need to get at least 2 letters of recommendation *sigh*..  I’ve got a few names of people at work  that I would like to ask.. but I’m not sure how to ask since I haven’t really told them about *my plan*  hihihi

aaargh so many things to do.. so little time..

Right now work still should be my top priority and I’m just swamped… my apartment is also a mess …. next week I’m flying home..

tomorrow I have an all day meeting, 9am-5pm and Friday I’ll only have 2-3 hours at work because my group is going to have our annual Holiday Lunch .. this year at Bucca di Beppo up in Greenwood…. and this weekend is pretty much gone since I’m going to Purdue for graduation weekend.. .. so I really only have 4 workdays left from Monday to Thursday of next week .. but  I still have so many things I have yet to do (work)  !!!  HELPPPPPP !!!!!

I have so many things I want to write about here, but no time  hehehehe… this week is a little crazy at work :p

anyways, i just catched up reading some blogs and saw Patty’s Johari Window on her blog.. so I decided to make one for myself…. will you,  yes you ! whoever you are, take a minute and chose several adjectives that you think describe me or my personality ?

So my birthday is coming in a few days.. *turning 26 soon* :’( 

But my dear friends here already threw me a surprise bday party. Well actually it’s a combined bday party for me and Arine last Friday.. Arine’s bday was Dec 5th. NEither of us knew anything about it. We thought we were just going to a regular potluck dinner, actually Arine was the one who suggested that we get together one more time before the holidays a couple of weeks ago. Funny things is, in the middle of dinner, Feli blurted out "So tonight’s dinner is for Arine’s and Vera’s .."  Me and Arine looked at each other and said "??Huh???" and then some of the other girls were like "Oh Feli!!! Gimana sihhh "  … I kinda figured out something’s going on.. but not sure what ..  but Arine was still clueless..  Well it’s because about a month ago Arine and I shamelessly hehehe well, jokingly, told her to tell Kas to cook for us since our birthday is coming…  a Saggitarians bday party for Magda, Arine, and I  .. so Arine thought Feli was not serious when she accidentally spilled the plan.

So the night went on.. chit chat.. and all the girls even had second round of dinner.. he first round was all the different dishes that everyone made .. Everything was fabulous.. so many variety .. indian, chinese, thai, indonesian, malaysian .. the second round was the special Curry Mee with Fishballs that host (Kas) made..

and then Jamie & Karthik called everyone to the living room to show a magic show hahahhaaha.. they learned quite a few tricks on their recent trip to Korea… and, while I was distracted by their "magic" tricks, Andrew? and Patty? (am I right? not too sure)  brought in our birthday cakes and everybody started singing… aaaaaw thanks guys.. so the first cake has my name on it, and the other Arine’s… but I was toooooo full from dinner so I didn’t even had a bite ( I later regretted hehe )

So it was a succesful surprise To think that I even rode to the party in the car that  brought the cakes in ..  I had no idea ! I even thought that I was the one who invited Andrew to the party !

I haven’t had that many people celebrating my birthday since … hmmm I think 1999… it’s a really nice surprise .. I’m very grateful to have all of you here
no pictures for now.. Mimi took some pics.. I have to ask her for them..

Ok so that was Friday…

Saturday we had another makan-makan This time Niaz cooked a spread of Bangladeshi dishes..  absolutely delicious ! It was really nice and generous of him to cook everything .. he spent the whole day preparing and cooking for all of us…

This weekend is all about eating, eating, and eating

Thursday :
We had the annual Holiday Luncheon at my office where they served a typical American buffet lunch. The party organizer transformed the hallways of the lab building of my office into long dining rooms with a super long tables and hundreds of chairs. There were a couple of employees dressed up as Santa Clause giving out candies. They rented this huge nicely decorated sleigh for decoration. They hired a harp player who played holiday songs for the 2 whole hours which were very nice, they gave out tons of doorprizes.. first prize was an HP notebook, the smallest prizes were $20 gift certificates, but I didn’t win anything :’(

And then just a few hours later  I attended a cocktail, networking party, also organized by a group from work.  But there wasn’t much food there, just finger food, but anyways I was still stuffed from lunch hehehe.

Took the GMAT last Saturday .. what a big relief .. after procrastinating for .. hmm 2 years ?  hehe I finally registered for the test 6 weeks ago..  I thought that by registering and paying $250 I would get serious and study !  Still didn’t study as much as I should .. but hey I got a good score !!   I honestly didn’t know how I got it either.. I was pleasantly surprised hehe… maybe I got lucky,  especially on the Verbal section :p However, I didn’t do as well as I should have on the Quantitative section. 

Hendrik soooo underestimated my ability haha  He predicted I would blow it since he knew how little time I spent preparing for it.   After the test I called and asked him to guess how I had done and he guessed I scored between 550-650, most likely around 600.  HUAHAHA I got a 710 !  The max possible score is 800. That’s better than 94% of 200,000 people who took this test every year. Lalalalala I’m very satisfied and happy   oh btw I’m pretty sure I screwed up the Analytical Writing section, I totally blanked out, didn’t know what else to write after 2-3 sentences.. oh well, I’ll find out my writing score in about 2 weeks.. but I read it’s not as important as the scaled Verbal / Quantitative score.. so I’m not too worried about that.

Anyways..  if you’re wondering what kinds of questions were asked .. it’s a Computer Adaptive Test (CAT), so each question’s difficulty increases or decreases depending on whether or not I answer the previous question correctly.  So people should have a pretty good idea how well they did at the end of the test. 

ANALYTICAL WRITING SECTION  ( 2 x 30 minutes ) 

1. Analysis of an issue 
The primary responsibility of citizens is to obey their nation’s civil and criminal laws.
Discuss the extent to which you agree or disagree with the opinion stated above. Support your views with reasons and/or examples from your own experience, observations, or reading.

2. Analysis of an argument
Discuss how well reasoned you find this argument. In your discussion be sure to analyze the line of reasoning and the use of evidence in the argument. For example, you may need to consider what questionable assumptions underlie the thinking and what alternative explanations or counterexamples might weaken the conclusion. You can also discuss what sort of evidence would strengthen or refute the argument, what changes in the argument would make it more logically sound, and what, if anything, would help you better evaluate its conclusion.
The following is part of a business plan created by the management of the Megamart grocery store:
“Our total sales have increased this year by 20 percent since we added
a pharmacy section to our grocery store. Clearly, the customer’s main
concern is the convenience afforded by one-stop shopping. The surest
way to increaseour profits over the next couple of years, therefore, is
to add a clothing department along with an automotive supplies and
repair shop. We should also plan to continue adding new departments and
services, such as a restaurant and a garden shop, in subsequent years.
Being the only store in the area that offers such a range of services
will give us a competitive advantage over other local stores.”

QUANTITATIVE SECTION ( 75 minutes, 37 questions, 2 different types ) 

 Problem Solving sample questions ( should be a piece of cake if I were to take this test  hmm 6-7 years ago ?  now, it’s not that easy anymore…. ) :

If an integer n is to be chosen at random from the integers 1 to 96,
inclusive, what is the probability that n(n + 1)(n + 2) will be
divisible by 8?
A) 1/4
B) 3/8
C) 1/2
D) 5/8
E) 3/4

A family pays $800 per year for an insurance plan that pays 80 percent of the first $1,000 in expenses and 100 percent of all medical expenses thereafter. In any given year, the total amount paid by the family will equal the amount paid by the plan when the family’s medical expenses total which of the following?
(A) $1,000
(B) $1,200
(C) $1,400
(D) $1,800
(E) $2,200

Data Sufficiency sample question

If k is a positive constant and y = |x – k| – |x + k|, what is the maximum value of y?

(1) x < 0
(2) k = 3

A) Statement 1 alone is sufficient but statement 2 alone is not sufficient to answer the question asked

B) Statement 2 alone is sufficient but statement 1 alone is not sufficient to answer the question asked

C) Both statements (1) and (2) together are sufficient to answer the question asked, but neither statement alone is sufficient
D) Each statement alone is sufficient to answer the question asked

E) Statements
(1) and (2) together are not sufficient to answer the question asked,
and additional data specific to the problem are needed

VERBAL SECTION ( 75 minutes, 41 questions, 3 different types ) 

Critical Reasoning sample question :
Reva: Using extraneous incentives to get teenagers to change their
attitude toward school and schoolwork won’t work. Take the program in
West Virginia, for instance, where they tried to reduce their dropout
rate by revoking the driving licenses of kids who left school. The
program failed miserably.
Anne: It’s true that the West Virginia program failed, but many schools
have devised incentive programs that have been very successful in
improving attendance and reducing discipline problems.
According to Anne, the weak point in Reva’s claim is that it
(A) fails to consider the possibility that the majority of potential dropouts in West Virginia do not have driving licenses
(B) doesn’t provide any exact figures for the dropout rate in West Virginia before and during the program
(C) ignores a substantial body of evidence showing that parents and
employers have been using extrinsic incentives with positive results
for years
(D) assumes that a positive incentive—a prize or a reward—will be no
more effective than a negative incentive, like the revoking of a
driving license
(E) is based on a single example, the incentive program in West Virginia, which may not be typical

Sentence Correction sample question :
(A) Because oil prices are declining, demand for alternative energy products is lessening.
(B) Because of declining oil prices, alternative energy products are lower in demand.
(C) In view of the decline of oil prices, demand for alternative energy products is also declining.
(D) Being that oil prices are lessening in amount, so too is the demand for alternative energy products.
(E) Considering the fact that oil prices are declining, demand for alternative energy products is lessening.

Reading Comprehension Questions .. 3-4 passages, 3-4 questions each. I guess knows what this is. Just like back in elementary school, but this time  the topics can be about politics, history, medicine, business, etc. Not that easy !

So I have taken the GMAT now, what’s next ? …