My Turn

In slow, smiling English I explain to the guard that I don't need a locker key. I'm an American you see and when I read that I was only allowed to bring my passport and pencils, well...that's all I brought. He gives me a sympathetic look not understanding a word I said and motioned that I needed to write my name in the book anyway.

It is 8am on the hottest Friday in June and it is time for me to take the GRE. I follow the signs farther into the building and find a group of young people who look like they are waiting for an unpleasant medical procedure. I take my seat next to a girl who couldn't have been any older than eighteen. Looking around I realize that my fellow test-takers seemed rather young; all of them except that tubby middle-aged man. Are these teenagers really applying to graduate school or do they just have over-eager parents?

The others talk to each other in low tones in a mixture of Tamil and English; all the while staring at me. I imagine them laboring to deduce why the white lady with only her passport and pencils was taking the GRE in Chennai. I must admit that it is a bit odd but I have grown used to seeming a bit odd to Indians. I walk my own dog for crying out loud!

At 8:45 the proctor begins taking "candidates" one by one into the test room. At 8:50 the power goes out which caused the test servers to reboot. Twenty minutes later our test mistress reemerges to take the next victim to register. After another twenty minutes and only two more people out of twenty have registered. I start to worry. The exam website said to allot four hours to take the test. It was already past nine and I needed to be at work by one! While I know I am a fast tester, I don't think I will make up too much time on this one. My innate American self emerges once again. I take my passport and pencils and dash across the room to the chair closest to the test room door. I am not going to let politeness overshadow my desire to be punctual. Cutting in line is one skill I have picked up over the past two years that I am determined to utilize in this situation. In this moment, it is oddly important for me to report to work on time.

Luckily this punctuality conundrum distracts me from all of my pre-test jitters. For weeks I pored over prep materials with special attention paid to the math section. While I write and read every day and felt very prepared for the verbal section, it has been six years since I attempted any math other than basic algebra.

When I resign myself to being late for work a thought occurs to me. Everyone in the room has a lot riding on their performance on this exam. For me it is a step to get me closer to admission into a Master's program that would teach me how to teach. For some in the room it is a necessary evil to secure a spot in a competitive engineering school. For others it could be a ticket to the United States. For all of us it means a chance at a new beginning. I realize that my possible new beginning might be far less life-changing than that of the people sitting around me. I am happily married to a man whose career is stable enough that I can take time to go to graduate school. Sure, some of my fellow test-takers likely come from wealthy families but there are also probably a few whose parents will risk everything they own to give their children a shot at a more comfortable life. With that humbling thought in mind it's my turn.

-Abbie