My experience @12 SSB Bangalore .... By Mani for Navy

SSB....what to tell about it !!!! i got recommended in my first attempt for UES  Navy  ...So happy once again thanks to www.ssbinterviewtips.com

And every time when i used to think of it only the thing that used to come into my mind was "SSB interview is very tough to get through and i cant make it out"...but friends ..who are all Indian armed forces aspirants i can tell you only one thing SSB is very easy for those who are really passionate about Indian armed forces ,only for those who are really passionate..but one thing you should follow is BE TRUE TO YOURSELF & DON'T HIDE OR LIE ANYTHING IN INTERVIEW.....   everybody on this earth are born for some reason and if that reason for your birth is to serve the country being in the armed forces you are going to get it for sure but don't get discouraged if u are conferenced out or screened out....search for your passion ,find it out and work on it you can be a winner...this is what i learned from SSB 

Here i want to give some tips that are going to work out for SSB:

• Don't waste your money in going to SSB coaching..coaching is not going to fetch you anything rather it will ditch you
• Don't read examples for SRT, WAT,PPDT,TAT,SD etc...because those examples ll have an affect on you and those examples are going to be reflected in the real  SSB(which ll ultimately hide a real person in you and ll portrait a fake one out) ,the reason why i said no to coaching is this.
• Don't lie anywhere and anytime during those 5 days
• Be yourself come what may and believe in yourself
• Go through the SSB procedure just to make you aware of what s going to happen during those 5 days

Those five days from 10-1-13 to 15-1-13 were awesome and really enjoyed it
as i am from hyderabad i had to start off on the day before and i was at the Bangalore railway station at 7 am in the morning and there i met a guy from kerala (palakkad) who  was there for the same purpose and a the day day progressed we met so many in railway station who are all SSB aspirants..and we had wait there itself till 3pm for SSB bus and it came finally around 3.30 and took us to SSB center south we kept our luggage in respective cloak rooms and got our certificates verified ,collected all our mobile phones,given with our chest numbers ...after that we were sent for supper(in my first few minutes of supper i decided that i had to compromise with the food provided there..to say frankly i could eat only roti .food is not really that good) after that we were sent to dormitory of first stage and had our shavings bathing and slept that day

DAY ONE:
 They woke us up at around 3'o clock in the morning and we had bath and said good bye to that dormitory and kept our luggage in the cloak room again had our breakfast
and then that was all set to go for PPDT ..one sir came and assembled us and explained
what was gonna happen. we were sent to PPDT room and there again they described everything about that test.In this they showed us a HAAAAAAzy picture really hazy no one could understand what it was but could manage to write some story about it.. when you cant understand what that picture is don't put yourself into confusion thinking on what to write ..time really matters there ..write what ever that comes into your mind immediately ..they say that time for PPDT is 4mins but if am not wrong they hardly gave us 2mins(you cant have an eye at you watch because you are not allowed to wear your watches) so be quick and write a POSITIVE story that comes into your mind(don't make fun and show negligence in the story if don't understand the pic at all ,some of buddies in our batch wrote love stories bla bla bla dash dash, they were all screened out.) after that we went through very easy quant exam (you dont actually need to prepare for it ,it is very easy)
after that GROUP DISCUSSION on the story you we wrote,they divided us into teams ,as soon as we entered the room we wished those who were there to analyse us and took our seats ,then we were given with the answers we wrote we went through that and then we had to explain our stories individually as soon the last one in the group explained his story GD started and that was only for two minutes.
after the lunch results were announced and those who got screened out were sent back on the same day and we, those who got through screening were given with many forms to be filled in,and then we were all(32 who got screened in out of 109) moved to second stage rooms
Filling up PIQ is very important because it is nothing but telling them everything about yourself, PIQ is the only thing from which they ll question you in the interview,so take little care while filling it up.
DAY TWO:
It was psych day and we got up got ready , had our breakfast at 5.30 am and assembled at tea point and later on we we were taken to psych room in which there was projector .day two consisted of 4 tests (if you are very lucky you would be called to interview on the same day it self).
fist of all sir explained everything about day 2 and started off the tests

TAT: thematic appreciation test ,in this they showed us a series of 11 pictures and one empty slide(in TAT pics were clear and not hazy) and we had to write a story on it and move on to the next slide as soon as we hear buzzer..

WAT: Word Association Test in this series of sixty words were shown to us on screen and we had to write our reaction on that word(sentence need not have the word shown to us they just needed our reaction on seeing that word) so i could make out for all the 60 words except one (that word was ALOOF and i didn't know the meaning of that word so i wrote ALOOF IS A WORD so funny right but i didnt want to leave any word so i wrote that way And in interview ,interviewer directly asked me what did you mean by writing ALOOF IS A WORD in your WAT ,so i had give explanation for that)

SRT: Situation Reaction Test  this was the test that i liked most i was really honest and short too i could make out 53 situations out 60. they gave us 30 seconds for each situation so on total we got 30 mins for 60 situations...after SRT i was pretty confident that i would get good marks in psych(if am not wrong PSYCH was the thing that fetched me more marks in SSB)
some of my reactions were like
I will slap that guy
I will not talk to them
I will use GPS in my mobile.... my reactions were so short and stright
(My suggestion to all is in SRT don't waste time in writing long long reaction it gonna kill your time )

SD: Self Description ,in this they asked us to write about ourselves in the view of our parents,friends,teachers,and in my view and qualities to be improved in our self.... it was very easy because it is just to write about me ...(relate the qualities that you mentioned in PIQ with the one that you are writing in SD that ll help you out)

All these four tests took around  3 hrs and after that some were called for interview and remaining were allowed to go out for sight seeing.

i was really so happy after the second day because i felt that i did very well in that and 2nd day really boosted up my confidence levels ..

DAY THREE and FOUR:
 These two days are group task days...and those were the two days that i enjoyed most.
on day three we dressed up in white T and white shorts,waited for our GTO (he was very dynamic guy and i liked him),he came to us at 8'o clock and started with the group discussions , we had two GROUP DISCUSSIONS ,topics for those were
1)How to protect Indian women from the current day situation
2)Who is the biggest threat to India on the entire globe
for these GDs we were given with enough time unlike that we got for PPDT. and everybody could make their point.

After GDs we were taken for MILITARY PLANNING ,in this they gave us a situation which has so may problems so we had to give a perfect solution for that ,we were given 5 mins of time to read the situation,5 mins to write our reaction for that and later on 5 mins to discuss that among our group and come to a single story. this was the only test in which i think i didnt make my best i couldn't understand that problem completely and so i couldnt make my reaction appropriately ..but i participated well in the discussion.

After these we were taken to the field where we can see all the arrangements for group tasks.
There our team was given with name DELTA(remaining teams were ALFA , BETA and CHARLIE ).and after that our GTO explained about group task rules and regulations and asked gave us simple tasks and asked us to tell our idea on how to finish that task and we got really screwed up here and GTO scolded us like anything but after this task he made a statement "your's s the best batch that i have ever seen"..we were all so happy with that and our energy got doubled and then we went to PROGRESSIVE GROUP TASK (snake race) in this we had to carry a man made snake and cross the obstacles in between ,we started it with loud shouting JAIHIND JAIHIND  we did it so well and our's was the batch which won the race.
after that we were given some rest for half an hour and we then went for HALF GROUP TASK, in this task our group was divided into two and then that half group was given with simple tasks and we did it as well. again a break for 30 mins and then we went for INDIVIDUAL TASK in this each individual had to cross 10 obstacles numbered 1 to 10 and each obstacle carries corresponding number of marks. we were given with three minutes of time to cross those ten obstacles, I could cross 7 but what i did was i left those obstacles which were tougher at the same time carries very less marks..we were all exhausted after individual tasks and some were injured ..after this LECTURETE ,in this they gave us four topics out of which we had to select one and speak on that for three minutes, i didn't remember all the topics given to me but the topic that i choose was MERCY KILLING ,i spoke on that for around 2.30 mins and i finished it off well before the time.. this was the end of day 3 and the went back to rooms and had power nap..(some were called for interview )

After day 3 we were left with only COMMAND TASK and FINAL GROUP TASK.
so on day four we had the above mentioned two .
In the command task we were given with simple tasks as that of in half group task but the only difference here is that you have to do it alone with the help of one guy from your group.
In final group task a little lengthier task was given and total group had to do that in stipulated time given ...we finished it off well before time.
Then came my turn for PERSONAL INTERVIEW .for me personal interview was for one and half hour and he asked me each and everything about my life and as our entry was for navy he asked some questions about navy and some technical questions like how does tube light works? what is the working principle of ships ? Newton's laws of motion..etc..i was damn frank in the interview and i didn't lie anywhere ...he even asked me some personal questions like do you have lover?will you marry her? what if she asks you not join in Navy?...that total interview was awesome and i still remember each and every minute of that...loved it..that was the end of day 4..
and then we were given with the brand new chest numbers for conference ..

DAY FIVE : conference day
That day we all dressed up so decently and wore our new chest numbers..and around 8.30 they started calling us chest number wise, conference was only for 2 to 5 mins and they asked me three simple questions.
1) how was your stay for 5 days?
2)what are all the places that you visited during these 5 days (i think this question was asked to me because our GTO saw me and my kerala friend in one sweaters shop near commercial street when we were buying ladies sweaters for kerala boy's girl friend...that was so funny and we were dumb struck on seeing him there)
3)if you are given a chance to recommend some one except your self ,whom will you recommend?
(to my surprise one who interviewed me was the deputy president of that SSB board)
and after everybody done with conference we were sent to lunch but i could hardly eat anything because of anxiety for results..
we all assembled in one room for our results and president of the board came and delivered a speech for half an hour and then announced results...7 members got recommended out of 32..
the last name announced was mine...i was so happy that tears rolled down my cheeks... that was first time i cried like anything out of happiness and to my surprise each and every one who got recommended was with wet eyes and then we were given with our mobiles.... immediately i called my mo and told her that i got recommended ...only sad thing during that time was my kerala friend(RAJITH) didnt get recommended ... :(
then we went to call up section finished off some formalities and decided to go home..i took a break before medicals and went back home to celebrate the joy with mom..
after 14 days i again went to Bangalore for medicals and i was declared medically fit....now waiting for merit list ..hope i ll get in the merit list and join INA...
JAIHIND ...