Being the only tourist in a far-off place always leads to some interesting invitations — as when the mayor of Yamoussoukro, Côte d’Ivoire, suggested I attend the celebration of his son’s baptism. The elders from the mayor’s village welcomed me into their midst and gave me a front-row seat for the start of the afternoon’s entertainment.
Musicians played a soft melody as a skinny man opened a small suitcase filled with snakes. He pulled out a colorful specimen, held it up, and danced around with it. As it crawled onto his shoulders, he pulled out a second snake, then a third, chanting as he waved them around and brought them close together.
Without intending to, I had become the volunteer
I was keeping an eye on the suitcase, wary that other snakes inside might crawl out. But that distracted me at a critical moment. For the next part of his act, the snake charmer said, he would need a volunteer from the audience. In the blink of an eye, everyone else moved back a row, leaving the rest of my row empty. Without intending to, I had become the volunteer.
A fear of snakes in West Africa is not irrational. Some of them can be very dangerous. But having been thrust into this situation, I had no choice but to make the most of it.
So I stood up before the guests and allowed the snake charmer to put two of the snakes around my neck while he waved the third in front of them. The audience gasped. What a test of bravery! Would this young man survive the ordeal?
Naturally, I did, and it was over within a few minutes. What is more, this made me the hero of the day. The guests all came up to me and expressed their admiration.
I wasn’t brave. I was just braver than those around me.
“I’d be terrified,” she said
From time to time, I find myself in similar situations, most of which involve public speaking.
I was rather surprised, while having dinner last fall with the American exchange students I advise, when one of them turned to me and, out of the blue, said she admired my public-speaking ability. I had spoken to the group at length the day before, without having met them previously, and I had given a brief impromptu speech to nearly 200 strangers that afternoon. “I could never do that,” she said. “I’d be terrified.”
I told her that most people don’t feel any differently, and that knowing that gave me the required confidence. Being thrust into the situation had also forced me to focus.
Still, her observation amazed me, because she’s not a shy person. She has the looks and poise of a fashion model, and had easily made friends within the group. But she wasn’t alone.
At another event, a young man posed a question to one of our speakers in excellent German, but lost confidence at a critical moment and switched back to his native English. This bothered him enough that he brought it up in conversation later that evening. At a third event, I asked one of the most confident girls in the group to say a few words to representatives of our organization. She prepared her remarks well and delivered them flawlessly, but told me afterwards that she’d practiced all afternoon in order to be able to do that.
Practice is indeed a big part of public speaking. As the admiral taught us, it’s important to volunteer whenever such an opportunity arises. It’s a way of developing a skill that is required in a wide variety of jobs and situations.
American schools and universities recognize this. A lot of class time from grades 1 to 12 is devoted to reading aloud from books. Pupils are frequently called to the front of the room to present something to the class, even for just a minute. Teachers often advise them to slow down, make eye contact, speak loud enough to be heard in the back of the room and tune out the giggles of their classmates.
By contrast, a lot of the mumbled oral reports (and even lectures) I witnessed at a German university betrayed a lack of this kind of practice. What the German system does better is to require substantially more writing, which teaches one to organize one’s thoughts — also very important for public speaking.
The fear factor still seems to dominate on both sides of the Atlantic, though. Maybe you do have to get on a plane to Africa to find that courage.
