Never let a chance to talk pass by

ONE OF the interesting ‘extras’ of a job like mine is meeting people. I’d be fibbing if I said this is always welcome. Sometimes (especially when tired, with pressing deadlines) you don’t actually want to catch a couple of trains and take an (unpaid) day out, speaking to strangers. Yet I never fail to feel the better for it.

So Wednesday found me in Exeter — the lunch-time speaker at an English-Speaking Union fundraising event.

Are you asking what the ESU is? When the invitation first came last year I didn’t know either. And there’s the first benefit — finding out what wonderful things go on without you ever hearing about them.

For in that room was a large gathering of interested, mostlyolder people who care so deeply about encouraging confidence and articulacy in the young that they join the ESU — a global educational charity founded after the horrors of World War I. The purpose (or should I say, ideal) was improved communication — because the more people engage with each other in dialogue, the more chance there is of peaceful co-existence. Always.

Their work is ‘enabling young people to find their voice.’ Speaking and debating activities are sponsored in schools across the UK (the head teachers have to be keen, of course), and there are international exchange programmes, scholarships and internships — with the aim of getting the young to think, stand up and express ideas in good, clear English. As someone who loved debating at school I can only say — how brilliant!

It was so easy to talk about my career and this column for 40 minutes, then take questions, because the aims of the ESU chime with my own philosophy. I said: ‘As an advice columnist I remind readers to talk, talk, talk — for surely all of us are trying to promote understanding of the human heart, mind and spirit.’

Anyway, my reward for that day was to be reminded, yet again, that the world is full of decent, intelligent people who really care.