Did I mention how much it disturbs me to speak in public? Well, it does. I can’t say I don’t like it, or that I am not good at it, I can only say that it disturbs me beyond reasonable levels.
Tonight, I had a dinner, in “Academia do Bacalhau”, funny enough it means “Academy of the Cod” a kind of Portuguese association abroad that exists in over 5 countries. They invited me over since they sponsor 5 children in the Mission of Chongoene and this afternoon I found out I was supposed to speak. I manage to keep away from the hand shaking and stomach pain just until before my name was called. And I even followed all the rules today, prepare the speech, know the place in advance, all the good stuff that they taught us in some Harvard seminar about the “Fear of Public Speaking”. The only thing I did not do was eating bananas before. And it still clearly did not work. The piece of paper that I had lovingly prepared with the stories of Nomussa and Piedade that I told you last week seemed to be alive in my hands and I had to put it down in the table. On top of it, I tried holding the microphone with two hands, but that also did not work, it was surely alive too.
I ended up skipping parts of the story but I guess in the end they got the point – two children, which I seemed not to know the names since I kept on switching them, and transformational experiences (missing some HBS jargon here) with only little gestures. Something along those lines.
Next time, no paper, and no microphone. You could wonder why do I have to do a next time… Well, I have to, it is for a good cause. It is no wonder that I got no HBS grants last year, not even from the section, I really suck at fund raising :-)
Tonight, I had a dinner, in “Academia do Bacalhau”, funny enough it means “Academy of the Cod” a kind of Portuguese association abroad that exists in over 5 countries. They invited me over since they sponsor 5 children in the Mission of Chongoene and this afternoon I found out I was supposed to speak. I manage to keep away from the hand shaking and stomach pain just until before my name was called. And I even followed all the rules today, prepare the speech, know the place in advance, all the good stuff that they taught us in some Harvard seminar about the “Fear of Public Speaking”. The only thing I did not do was eating bananas before. And it still clearly did not work. The piece of paper that I had lovingly prepared with the stories of Nomussa and Piedade that I told you last week seemed to be alive in my hands and I had to put it down in the table. On top of it, I tried holding the microphone with two hands, but that also did not work, it was surely alive too.
I ended up skipping parts of the story but I guess in the end they got the point – two children, which I seemed not to know the names since I kept on switching them, and transformational experiences (missing some HBS jargon here) with only little gestures. Something along those lines.
Next time, no paper, and no microphone. You could wonder why do I have to do a next time… Well, I have to, it is for a good cause. It is no wonder that I got no HBS grants last year, not even from the section, I really suck at fund raising :-)
Comments
Thank you for your visit and speach in our Academia do Bacalhau meeting.
Do not worry about speaches.... which by the way was good because it was ... real!!!
You are welcome to come everytime you be in Maputo.
best regards
Joao
coming for dinner.