Mini Scholarship for August 15 - September 15, 2006

beatthegmat · Last edited by beatthegmat on Sat Sep 16, 2006 11:14 am; edited 1 time in total

Here's the essay topic for this month's mini scholarship, for August 15 - September 15:

Describe a funny moment in your life.

You can submit your essay response by replying to this discussion thread.

Please review these rules to determine whether you are eligible to participate in this scholarship opportunity. The prize is a $50 Amazon.com gift certificate; one winner will be selected by me and announced on September 16. Please submit your essay by end of day, September 15.

I hope that I receive more responses this month than last month--c'mon folks, it's an easy way to earn a $50 prize!

Best of luck, and I look forward to reading all of your responses...

aim-wsc · Posted: Fri Sep 15, 2006 7:07 am Post subject: A funny moment of my life

I was very tempted to write that chewing gum incidence here. I’ve had a record of keeping the chewing gum for more than ten hours in my mouth. Seriously it was not funny. It was not a comedy but a tragedy. Poor Johny! couldn’t find a way to split it away. I have this story kept aside for the question like this: What is the worst thing that you ever put in your mouth? Well I am not a celebrity, still, I have kept the answer ready, just in case, anybody asks me such question...

Who knows? Eric might ask such essay next month!
But honestly when I ask this question to myself, chewing gum doesn’t come to my mind; it’s the other thing. And mind you, that episode was really funny. So I would like to share it with you.

My work is related to fabrication and manufacturing of metal plates, gears etc. I don’t have the liberty to sit in Air-conditioned office in front of a desktop.
One day for some extra work I had to go to others workshop ( my friend’s workshop) to complete the job. Since the job was urgent I skipped the lunch. My friend realized the urgency and ordered ‘VadaPav’. I tacitly agreed to have VadaPav as a lunch, since we neither had time nor we could have found the restaurant in the industrial area. I was not bothered at all, because VadaPav is my favorite junk-food.

(What‘s VadaPav by the way? Ohk, You can call it Indian hot-dog or hamburger)
My friend’s workshop was quite clumsy place, especially for eating vada-pav. It has only one table and a chair. Being the guest I was seated. Vada-pav came shortly and my friend asked one of his boys to bring a glass. Another boy unwrapped the cover, took out vada-pavs from polyethylene bag. Four VadaPavs were there along with some liquid.

'Hmmmm I love that smell', I thought.
Meantime a boy brought a dish and a glass.
Wwhoooaa look at this wine glass has come.
A WINE glass? What for? Surprised

I don’t drink; & my friend knows that well.
And I don’t think it’s a good idea for him to drink now... My chain of weird thoughts was running while that boy with wine glass came, took away scummy caliper, placed shining glass on the table and poured that red-brown liquid in it.
Surely it was not the wine. The liquid was not refined and seemed quite hot or rather warm to me. Although I was very curious to see what it was, I didn’t taste it, hoping that my friend would tell mesomething about it.

At my back, there was a saw machine cutting mild steel, splashing oil-and-water all over; on my right side: my friend, sitting on the table eating VadaPav; On the other side: two boys were standing, grinning, looking at me, eating my VadaPav. I gave them a ‘what-do-u-want?-go-back-to-ur-work’ look. But it didn’t work. In front of me there was the scummy table with VadaPav and a wine glass with red-brown liquid.
I wanted to ask “what’s in it?” but not in front of these boys. People acting like, ‘it’s a common thing’. Nothing special in it.

I think it’s a soup…A Chinese soup.
My friend ate only one VadaPav and headed to wash basin. ‘I already had a lunch, all is yours now. Enjoy your Vadapav-meal.’ He said while washing his hands.
Soup was tempting. I had this only chance. I made courage picked the glass and sipped.
SIPPED? NO. I GULPED.
Yes I gulped it, greedily.
And how it tasted? what I sensed?
Actually I couldn’t sense anything for some time. And when I took control of myself I realized that the liquid I just gulped was not a wine, was not a soup but a red chili chutney!!!

I had all mixed feelings. I was very much angry with myself or maybe dazed-n-confused. I was perplexed, idiot, stupid, fool and now sorry.

For the first time in my life I actually realized why cartoonists show the fire blowing out from the character’s mouth when she/he eats something spicy and hot!
When I regained my senses, I observed that there was nobody around to witness my stupidity.
Thanggod.

Man! Chutney in a wine glass?
Now, when I remember this incidence I laugh on myself. How funny it was to have a chutney in the wine glass. Still funnier was my behavior. I claim to be the aspiring MBA student, I blabber around and lecture people: how “proactive” one should be, to be in business, to be in business school. Crap, crap, all crap. I talk a lot but a tiny lil question I didn’t ask to my friend thinking that it would be foolish to ask such a petty thing.
Then I realized my mistake. I could rather have afforded to be foolish to ask that question than being foolish. Very Happy

beatthegmat · Posted: Fri Sep 15, 2006 11:32 am Post subject:

Thanks for your response, aim-wsc.

I encourage other folks to submit entries as well. Otherwise, aim-wsc is going to lock his second monthly mini scholarship in a row!

beatthegmat · Posted: Sat Sep 16, 2006 11:13 am Post subject:

Congratulations, aim-wsc! For the monthly mini scholarship winner for the second month in a row! Once again, this was a very easy competition for you since you were the only person who submitted an essay. We really need to get more participants for next month!

Here's some feedback on your essay:

Once again, this is a very raw piece of writing that you've submitted--your style has actually grown on me a lot, and I think it works particularly well in narratives. You did an excellent job of setting up the scenario and I got an excellent visual of the workshop where you were eating and the chaos around you.

What I appreciate most about this essay submission is its honesty. You really do take a risk when you write about an embarassing (yet funny) moment like this because you are revealing something personal to a large audience of folks whom you don't know. I'm glad you took this risk, and I hope that you take similar risks in your application essays to business schools. Admissions folks will really appreciate seeing this kind of honesty.

Other comments I have: clearly, this isn't a polished essay, but I feel like it's more tightly organized than your submission from last month. It's nice to see your writing improve.

Thanks again, aim-wsc for your entry! A $50 Amazon.com gift certificate is coming your way soon.

aim-wsc · Posted: Tue Sep 19, 2006 1:14 am Post subject:

THENKS FOR THE FEEDBACK CAPTAIN

AND THENKS FOR THE GIFT ALSO. Very Happy

and dear member feel free to comment:

suggestion, critiques, comments welcomed.

Thankyou.