Day 133: The first exam

Today I sat my first official university exam in Germany. And, just to kill any suspense right from the start, let me say it: it went BAD.

A few days ago, José Antonio (the other Spanish Erasmus student in my course) and I went to speak to the professor of “Structural Determination,” Herr Straβner. The course was split into two parts: the theory, which had started back in the summer semester of 2005, and the practical, which is when we joined. We explained our situation—that we’d covered the theory on our own, that our German wasn’t great… His response? There was nothing he could do; we’d have to sit the same exam as everyone else.

Fair enough, I thought—so long as we could use a Spanish dictionary and data tables (there are loads of them). But no. That wasn’t allowed. Nor could we take it in English. And while the rest of the class was allowed to bring the course textbook, we couldn’t, simply because ours was in Spanish.

So today I took exactly the same exam as everyone else, same time limit (an hour and a half), same language. I wasn’t too worried, though—I’d been cramming solidly for two weeks. I walked into the classroom frozen solid (fifteen minutes waiting outside in -15°C will do that), and they handed out the papers.

Exams here (at least this one) aren’t too different from those back home: you get the question sheets, and you write your answers on the paper they give you. The only difference is you have to put down a collection of ID numbers—enrolment, exam, and so on. The seating is spaced out, three to a row.

The paper had three questions: one theory question worth 20 points, and two exercises worth 40 points each—both extremely difficult. I skipped the theory straight away (I’d come back to it if there was time) and tackled the exercises. I managed to finish one and almost finish the other. One, I think, was correct (I think), and the part I did of the other was fine, but I ran out of time.

Now it’s just a waiting game. If the professor compares my results to the rest of the class (these German chemists don’t have a clue), I might scrape a pass. If not, I’m out, and we’ll have to figure out what to do—probably take the first part of the course next semester.

What stings the most is that I’d staked all my pride on this exam. I wanted to prove to myself—and to these frosty Germans—that we’re worth something, that we’re not idiots, by smashing the exam and scoring high. But it didn’t happen, and I’ve got nothing to show for it.

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