As someone that is a student, I am very much familiar with the idea of impromptu tests and how annoying it can be. Right from my first year in school, I’ve gotten used to the fact that any day you leave your hostel for school could very well be another day you have to sit a test.
Anything at all could bring the test about; probably the lecturer’s head is sparking like two live wires were bridging, or they notice students are not serious and decide to use the test to punish everyone. Either way, it’s not something I’ve particularly liked because I find it sneaky and deceptive seeing as how the main idea is to catch students unaware and therefore fail in the course.
However, I’m not going to talk about my higher education here. I’ll take us back to over a decade ago when I had to experience an impromptu test. Or should I just call it a quiz? It was held by my church and we had no idea about it until the very day it was to take place.
Now, the way the catholic church is structured in the locality is that there are parishes. As the parish grows and more people come from far, they open up branches in these far places to cater to those people. It takes a while before such branches will get to the status of parish, so during that time, they will be known simply as outstations. However, in the eye of the Diocese, the parish is more recognized, not the outstation. I don’t know the maximum number of outstations a parish can have, but ours had almost eight of them. My family and I worshipped at one of the outstations.
One Sunday, while I was still a Catechumen and studying for my First Holy Communion, I was approached by my Catechist. A catechist teaches catechumens about the teachings and doctrines of the church. That day, she said there was a quiz at the parish and she wanted me and two others to come and represent our outstation. This was after mass and all I wanted was to go home and enjoy my Sunday rice that my Mom would be sure to prepare. The quiz was out of the blue and not in my plans at all, even my Mom didn’t want me to go because she doesn’t like last-minute deals like that.
However, the Catechist explained that she herself only just got the news and it won’t be fair if our outstation was just canceled out if we didn’t at least try. She was able to convince my Mom and the parents of two kids to allow us to go and she took us to the parish herself which was about two bus rides away.
When we got there, she told us to relax and not be pressured. She knew that everything was impromptu and so she was not expecting much from us. We were simply to represent and do our best, however, the quiz went, and she would not hold it against us. I guess the “impromptu-ish” of it all also got to us because we started feeling like the quiz would be a disaster seeing as we didn’t prepare for it at all and we knew very well that catechumens from the parish were very sound when it came to quizzes. Still, we went in for the quiz.
Turned out we didn’t do as bad as we had feared. Out of the eight teams (all the outstations including the parish) present, we came second! The parish came first, but even that was by a close call. The win made us all happy, because fortunately most of the questions we were asked were the same things we were taught in catechisms, some of them were even taught the previous day (which was a Saturday), so it was still fresh in our heads.
For our prizes, we were given prayer books (mine was a Divine Mercy prayer book which I still have to this day) and rosaries, along with extra biscuits and juice. That day, we were just feeling like we broke a record or something. Our catechist couldn’t stop her smiling as she told the other catechists to present that we didn’t even prepare for the quiz, yet we came second. I wonder how we would have floored them all if we had actually prepared for it.
The next Sunday, our feat was announced in church during announcements, and the lector made sure to note the fact that we didn’t prepare for the quiz. I was riding on that high for more than a few weeks, and the team and I became known for that quiz. Making us represent our outstation in other quizzes as well, not just in catechisms, but for other functions like Tarcisians and the like.
For some reason, this is what came to mind when I saw the topic and I felt I should share it with you all. It makes for a happy read and will leave you smiling because if I should go into the tales of the impromptu tests I’ve faced in school, this platform will not let me finish it. So, maybe on another post, we’ll try again.