PILN MARA Interview.

Aloha everyone! Okay, sepatutnya the deal was to update pasal interview MARA as soon as possible kan. But due to certain circumstances yang bakal aku ceritakan dalam post ni, maka ter-delayed lah post aku ni. Kesian Elma, deprived of aku punya cerita untuk beberapa hari, huhuu. Jangan marah El ;D

On 11th May, pagi2, aku siap2. Muka aku masa tu tak payah cakap lah tahap toya nya. The whole night I spent reseach pasal interview MARA ni. Pengalaman diorang lah, soalan2 yang biasa ditanya lah, "Killer Qs", and also apa yang patut ditulis untuk Essay. Haih. sambil baca sambil perut buat sommersault sampai tahap rasa nak terberak, haha. Antara soalan2 yang boleh dijadikan referrence (from blog Ammarfaris):

1. (Normally, for intro they will ask something like 'introduce yourself' - but MARA quite different) Tell me about your hometown???
1.5 Tell me about you co-curricular achievements???
2. Why MARA not JPA???
3. At which country do you plan to study??? Why???
4. How can you contribute to MARA in the future???
 *Additional notice for Medic Middle East & Medic UK/Ireland/etc * 
1. For those who applied for medic middle east the chances of getting your first question something like this is high (Can you introduce your self in arabic language???)
(Based on my friend's explanation, she said that certain interviewers tuh saje je nak tau kiter nih pandai arab ker x?? dorang kadang2 x der background arabic pun..so kalu 'goreng' pun x per la..but then , dier ckp ader gak yg terer arabic..so kena berhati2 lah.  )
2. Bakal2 doctor, you might be asked... Why do you want to be a doctor??? What are you going to do upon completion of your study???(work with the goverment hospital/private hospital/etc) Why do you choose to go to the middle east/UK/Ireland???
3. Soklan ni lagi best... Can you explain to me about 'the nerve system'??? WOW!!! but those who really want to do medic, sure tau punyer.. 

My reaction bila tengok soalan2 ni: 0_0 OMGOMGOMG! Haha. Faham2 lah orang  first time kena interview. Dah lah interview bukan calang2. MARA interview! So kena buat yang habis baik lah kan. Huhuu. Lepas habis research malam tu, kena kemaskan document2 yang diperlukan dalam fail. Kena ada 2: 1 untuk originals and 1 lagi copies untuk diserahkan kepada pihak MARA. And then, untuk interview TESL kan perlu buat essay, so aku research lah what kind of essay dia akan suruh tulis; rupanya macam tulis resume: Essay poyo2, bak kata aku, haha. Adengan poyo2 ni memang lah aku terrer, but untuk formalities, adengan poyo2 aku ni tak berguna sangat. Pfttt.

Okay, fine lah. Whatever. Malam tu aku tidur dengan memikirkan yang kalau ada errors dalam interview aku esok pun, aku kasi bantai aje lah. Ayat penyedap hati, huhuu. That morning, aku bangun, and siap2. Since dia wajibkan pakaian formal, pakaian yang paling formal and mudah tidak lain tidak bukan ialah baju kurung. Simple and flexible ;D

I'll skip adengan macam mana aku sampai sana dengan keadaan resah dan gelisah, at some point rasa macam nak muntahkan balik breakfast aku, and even harap ada aral yang melintang supaya aku tak dapat pergi interview tu, haha. Aku sampai awal sikit daripada masa interview sebab that's the only time ayah free untuk cilok kejap daripada kerja dia and hantar aku pergi Pejabat MARA, and after that, I'm on my own. On my own! Gelabah betul anak bapak ni, haha.

Bangunan MARA.

Mula sampai: Kecutttttt siot! Haha xD

So, aku sampai, and daftar. Standard lah, tulis nama apa semua. Aku bagi fail yang ada copies sijil2 aku and gambar (the last of the gambar passport aku xD). And then dia minta folder originals aku, and aku perasan yang dia just tengok sijil SPM aje. After that, dia bagi balik folder tu, bagi beberapa helai kertas, and suruh aku duduk dekat meja pelajar untuk tulis essay. The essay:" Given only 24  hours to live, what would you do?"

24 hours to live? Apa ni? Mana essay poyo2? Mana essay syok sendiri? Manaaaa???? Aku bermonolog sendiri kejap sebelum mula brainstorm mencari idea untuk essay ni. Jangan tanya aku tulis apa, sebab under such hectic circumstances, my brain works involuntarily, and semua yang aku tulis tu memang super spontan ;P Apa2 pun, dalam instructions, the due time is 15 minit, but I think I exceeded the time limit anyway (ada seorang budak yang sampai lambat sikit daripada aku tu siap tulis essay dulu sebelum aku), and dalam dok pening2 nak tulis apa untuk essay berdebah tu, aku tetap tulis one and a half muka surat juga, and bonus that tulisan aku memang kecil and sikit lagi ada rupa cakar ayam. Passably readible. ;P

After siap tulis essay, the staff dekat kaunter pendaftaran tu still belum panggil aku or any other calon dekat meja aku duduk tadi tu untuk interview, so aku pun duduk balik kat seat aku tadi and sembang2 sekejap dengan yang lain2 tu, konon untuk kurangkan sikit lah gelabah tu. Ada yang daripada Kedah, daripada KL ni, and budak yang siap essay dulu sebelum aku walaupun dia sampai lambat tu budak MRSM Kuantan. So undoubtfully, chances dia untuk interview ni was at least 10% higher lah daripada kitorang kan. Huhuu.

And masa tengah2 bercakap tu, meja kitorang didekati seorang lelaki yang nampak sedikit berumur, tetap masih nampak sihat, smart and bergaya sempoi. Pakai baju kemeja tanpa tie, berseluar slack, and kat tangan dia hanya ada surat khabar. Rasanya pekerja MARA ni kot. Dia nampak friendly. And friendly he is:

"Going for the TESL interview?"
"Yes, sir." we said.
"Anyone from MRSM?"
"I'm from MRSM Kuantan," budak yang tadi tu kata. Ohh, yeah, nama dia Azwa, lupa nak bagitau.
"Okay, okay, good... So who's the founder of MRSM?"
Reaction kitorang: Tergamam. Dalam hati secretly praying that they won't ask these kind of questions.
"I do not know, sir." Azwa said. Actually from that point onwards, the question were only for Azwa, so we just watched them and listened to the questions that followed.
"On what year was MRSM Kuantan built?"
"I'm not sure, sir, but I do know it was one of the oldest MRSM ever built."
"Which one was the first MRSM ever built?"
"Kolej MARA Seremban, sir."
"Okay," he said, "By the way, My name is Wahab Alwi. And I'm the founder of MRSM, actually."

Reaction: Macam kena slap atas dahi. The founder of MRSM?! Oh so that's what the questions are for! We expected him to be "someone" in MARA, but the founder of MRSM wasn't in the league! But seriously, dia memang sempoi gila xD

And then, after a while, one of the staff panggil nama, one after another. Then briefing time. Dia cakap we will have two activities: 1 individual assesment, the other, group assesment. But even kalau dia nak buat individual assesment pun, dia akan address us personally, and kitorang tak perlu berpecah from the group of 6 during the whole interview. That friendly "abang" cakap: "It's alright, don't be afraid, the interviewers won't harm you!" Pftt, right they won't. They'll just rip our hearts out of our nervousness ;P

But never mind the "jangan nervous" nasihat, macam lah masuk nasihat tu dalam kepala; the point is, GROUP INTERVIEW! Yeay and hooray~~~ Kurang lah sikit nervous aku. At least rasa macam masa buat Symposium dekat INTI dulu sikit. Individual interview really give me the creeps :/

So, after diberi beberapa minit untuk beri peluang calon2 salam tangan parents and ambil restu ibu ayah sebelum masuk interview (fuhhh terasa forever alone kejap masa tu, parents aku kerja lah woiii T_T), kitorang pun pergi ke tingkat 20+ (lupa), guided by that friendly abang, to the interview in Bilik Perbincangan 3.

The atmostphere was surprisingly usual. Takde aura2 gelap atau menakutkan emitted from the room, haha. Ada 2 interviewer, seorang lelaki and seorang perempuan. Kitorang masuk ikut urutan tag nama (mine: TESL-L-4), and accidentally sat down before interviewers tu suruh kitorang duduk! Sumpah malu xD Aku masa tu macam slow sikit pickup otak aku masa mula2 masuk tu, so aku pun, tengok calon lain yang dah masuk dulu tu duduk, aku pun duduk aje lah. And then after we were all seated the interviewers tu baru cakap: "Please have a sit," then baru kitorang perasan, lepas tu tersengih2 macam kerang busuk cover malu >.<

As usual, dia tanya: "How are you?", and naturally, kitorang pun cakap: "Fine, sir.", but then dia boleh melawak pulak cakap: "It's weird, really, but it seemed that everytime ask ask that to the candidates they always said fine." Eh, lawak sangat lah konon ;P Takpe2 kau uji kitorang eh, fine, fine.. So kitorang konon jujur lah sikit, cakap kitorang nervous. And then, the real deal starts.

Aku tak ingat semua soalan2 yang dilemparkan oleh interviewer yang macam bom tu, and jawapan aku? Barely went through my brain. So aku coretkan dekat sini yang mana ada aje lah. The remarkable ones, yang ada solid imprint dalam kepala aku ni:

"What do you think of cheating in exams and plagarism?"
Why it was remarkable: Sebab time ni aku tengah karang ayat baik punya dalam kepala aku, sampai aku tak perasan yang lain dah jawab dah soalan interviewer tu, so interviewer tu cakap: "Number four, what's your say on this matter?" Masa tu aku tiba2 terbayang cerita 'I am Number Four' pula dalam kepala aku, terus hilang ayat kaw2, so terpaksa aku spontan aje jawab. Haha. So moral of the story: Jangan mengelamun ;P

"I AM NUMBER FOUR!" Hahaha xD

"Who is your role model in becoming an English teacher?"
Why was it remarkable: "Well, for me, I don't have any role models in becoming an English teacher. I want to become an English teacher for the love of English itself. I was brought up in an English environment: English kindergarden, I spent my childhood watching English cartoons. And I went to a chinese elementary school, and I had a hard time trying to communicate with the other students; I was just hanging through times, and I had to learn language in a hard way. But from that point onwards I found an appreciation towards language as it is. I want to teach English to change the perception that English was hard to learn." Ayat created in a minute's time, hahaa. Orang lain semua dok cakap abang lah, cikgu lah sebagai role model, but aku? Well aku kan pelik sikit, hehe xD

"The situation was that some students, after they graduated, they refused to work with MARA, as they agreed they would before they went overseas. So what do you have to say about it?"
Why was it remarkable: Ada seorang calon tu, dia kena hemtam teruk masa ni sebab dia cakap dia kalau boleh tak nak stick to being a teacher aje. Dia nak jadi lecturer TESL. So the interviewer told her to just forget about it, and he moved on to the next candidate. Kesian calon tu. Me? My answer was pretty much plain. Ayat bunga2, but the point is, I don't mind just being a teacher as long as I can teach. :)

"Can you briefly state your curriculum activities, anything regarding with English?"
Why was it remarkable: Because semua calon debaters, wow! 0_0

"Any last say before the interview session ends?"
Why was it remarkable: Because everyone have something to say. Calon yang kena hentam dengan interviewer tu balas balik masa ni. And everyone cakap lah kenapa diorang nak jadi English teacher and sebagainya. Aku reuse and recycle balik aje ayat aku, hehe xD

And finally, what felt like hours: The interview session ended! Fuhhh hilang seram sejuk, hilang segala gundah gulana, balik rumah buat party tidur~ Haha. The interviewers ended the session on a cheerful note, saying that if we've done our best during the interview, we should feel satisfied with it. So lepas tu, kitorang pun bagi salam, keluar, and senyum2 puas hati. And I agreed with them that at some point terasa macam kat dalam debate balik, so ex-debaters, you're highly advantageous in an interview, hooray~! :)

So, after the interview, aku pergi balik dekat abang yang friendly tu, said thanks to him and everything, and dia perasan tau aku datang interview ni sorang2, parents takde nak temankan, so we chatted for a while: dia tanya stay mana, and how was the interview and all. Aku cakap dengan dia the interview was okay, tak nervous sangat sebab in groups kan. Macam ada batu karang gugur daripada jantung ni, haha. And he said (dengan berkobar-kobar), memang MARA buat group interview aje tahun ni, sebab there's no point putting calon in individual interviews tapi diorang tak boleh nak perform sebab terlampau nervous.

Oh, and he also told me that the results of the interview will be released on the first week of June. But by that time aku dah kat UiTM lah woi, haha. So aku tak tahu lah, kalau ada rezeki aku lulus interview tu, and dapat tajaan MARA tu, aku akan pilih either that or Asasi. Arghhhh I love both! :/ Kalau macam UTP punya interview offer dulu lain lah, dengan kadar segera aku reject, sebab aku tak berminat, huhuu. Aku apply UTP dulu pun sebab mak aku suruh aje, padahal course2 yang aku pilih masa tu memang tak ngam. Bussiness management, Info and Communication Technology, Civil Engineering. Pfttt. Walaupun rasa bersalah sebab bukan senang nak dapat interview tu, ramai yang nak, tapi tak dapat, aku pulak boleh dengan tidak berfikir panjang walau sesaat reject interview tu menyebabkan aku dimarahi oleh kawan2 mak aku yang follow perkembangan hidup aku, but still, aku REJECT. Tau tak REJECT!! Haha xD

Habis interview. Kelegaan yang terpancar, hahaa. Ada muka bakal cikgu BI? Haha xD

Okay, that's all about the interview. Lepas tu, aku balik, terbongkang tidur dengan aman dan damai. Adik2 yang research tentang MARA interview in the future, please note that post ni tak dapat membantu langsung, I'm sorry ^_^


Adios :)