Today, I wrote my IELTS exam. I’m hopeful that results will be chill, we’ll know in about a weeks’ time. It was a 3-hour long exam, with Listening, Reading and Writing components. This was my first time giving the computer-delivered test. I remember writing the test in Bangalore 4 years ago, somewhere in April 2015 – a chaotic month filled with all sorts of tests. Giving this one, alone, in Ahmedabad, made me realize how grateful I was for that one month, where my mom drove with me to every single test. Waiting for me to finish, and keeping snacks & water in the car (alongwith my textbooks) so I could revise/study for the board exams I had the next day. I don’t know how I would’ve done that month without her support and physical presence. I also don’t think I would’ve been able to do that month if I wasn’t in a good headspace.
At the moment, I’m not. But I’m working on it, and I’m working on myself – to understand, and to learn. And that’s important to me right now. That’s all I can do.
I’m glad that exam is done. It’s one thing off the list of things I had to get done in September.
This weekend, I managed to spend some time watching the Netflix docu-series “Inside Bill’s Brain”, which outlines conversations with Bill Gates and his perspective on a wide-range of things affecting today’s world, while providing insight into his background and the experiences that make him who he is. It’s an excellent 3-part series. I can’t recommend it enough, because it provides really good coverage of who Bill Gates is as a human being: the good, the bad, and the ugly. It’s important to remember that that’s who we are as people. We’re imperfect. Bill is too. But he works on things he can do to improve (when he agrees with people [rare]), and there’s a lesson to be learned there. I’m looking for books about Gates at the moment, and hopefully, I find one soon.
Tejas Rao 