My First Certificate Experience

Last Saturday, I did the First Certificate Exam. I was really nervous and that was, why funny and annoying things at the same time, happened to me.

It only was a simple detail, which started my story, I didn’t set the alarm clock. I woke up at 8:15 am and I had to be there at 8:30. That morning, I was running late, I didn’t even have breakfast, I got dressed and I rushed to the Hotel. But by the time I got there I realised to my utter horror, that I’d left my Confirmation of entrie at home! As you can imagine, I didn’t have any time to go back home and when I went into the exam room I was shaking like a leaf. Luckily, the examiner let me in because I had my ID card.

When I calmed down and focused on the reading paper, two of the candidates were disqualified because they were caught cheating. This, only made me feel more nervous. After the short break, we had the Use of English and thankfully everything went fine although it was a little bit difficult. In the writing, however, I messed up with the instructions and ended up doing task five, which was the only one our teacher had advised us not to do it. It a review of a book that I haden’t even read, I just made it up as I didn’t remember we weren’t supposed to do it. My classmates laughed at me at the break.

But this wasn’t all, in the listening part, I forgot to turn off my mobile phone and it rang. Everyone started staring at me, and we had to repeat one part of the listening.

However, the examiner felt sorry for me and I wasn’t disqualified.

Overall, it was one of the worst experiences of my life, but the exam went alright. Next time, I will remember to set my alarm clock properly.

BY: PAULA ARRATIBEL AND AINHOA PEÑA