Tony Deyal | Natural Mystic

I gave a speech on Friday at the site of the first job I ever had. I had just got my A Levels, the equivalent in those days of CAPE, and a scholarship, but because my father got really ill, I started teaching at a neighbourhood co-educational secondary school.

Having spent the previous six years at a Catholic boys' school, and having no sisters, I was out of my depth for a while but quickly enjoyed the difference and ended up teaching and learning. I got my schooling at the Catholic school, but a lot of my education at the co-ed school. This is why going back to the school to give the feature address was important to me.

Now, I know that I'm a great speaker. I can say that because when I make a speech, as soon as I sit down, people say it was the best thing I've ever done. I also try not to talk too long. They say it's best to leave your audience before your audience leaves you. One of the things all speakers should avoid is giving advice during their remarks. As the little schoolgirl wrote, "Socrates was a wise, Greek philosopher who walked around giving advice to people. They poisoned him."

Fortunately, the graduation lunch came after the speech and not before. But still, as I stood up to talk, I remembered a story from the Wild West days. The notorious gunman, Wild Bill Hickock, got so fed up with a long-winded speaker at a temperance meeting that he shot him. Afterwards, he went to the sheriff's office and said, "Sheriff. I just killed a keynote speaker." The sheriff, replied, "You're in the wrong place. You pick up the reward at the bounty hunter's office."

While I know that people at a graduation ceremony tend to be more mannerly and patient, given the violence in Trinidad these days, one has to be extremely careful about private or public utterances. This is why I avoided any kind of 'cute' openings like one of my previous favourites, "I feel like a mosquito in a nudist camp. I know what I have to do, but I don't know where to start ... ."

Other speakers like, "I won't speak for long on account of my throat (clears throat). At my last engagement, I talked too long, and someone threatened to cut it."

When the miniskirt first came out, one speaker seized the moment: "My speech will be like the latest fashion: long enough to cover the subject but short enough to be interesting." Given the fact that I was speaking to young graduates, the one thing I knew I should avoid was scaring them by saying that they were just beginning their lives.

So, how did I start? As anyone who has been in one of my speechwriting workshops knows, you need a hook. You need something to get the audience on your side. I had a gimmick for this one that I was sure would work. Bob Marley. His name is magic, and from the time you say it, there's a natural mystic flowing through the air.

 

TANZANIAN INCIDENT

 

My friends Clo and Sterling told me about an incident in Tanzania. Clo mentioned that she was from Jamaica, and the next thing was that they pushed her poor Trini husband out of the way and started asking questions, interspersed with "Bob Marley", about Jamaica.

Knowing his magic, I created a Marley coincidence where there was none. I started with, "Did you know that you students are attending a very famous school? Yes. It is. Thirty-eight years ago, as far back as 1980, the legendary Bob Marley sang about it in his famous hit Feeling Iere."

 

'IRIE'

 

I know that the word in Jamaica for feeling 'great', 'fine', 'all right' or saying that something is positive or meets with your approval is 'irie'. The name of the school is 'Iere', the name given to the island by the Arawaks, and means 'Land of the Humming Birds'.

While I took advantage of the pun value of the name, and even though the island ceased to be 'irie' for the Amerindians after a while, there's a certain rightness in using it interchangeably, especially when you're due to make a speech and need a gimmick that would get the audience on your side.

Besides, I did not know much socially acceptable Jamaican dialect that I could use in mixed company all dressed in their best. Suppose I wanted to tell the audience how great they were and followed the advice of an old friend to tell them, "A yasso nice?"

Fortunately, I found out, as he knew I would, that even though the expression is used when one is having a good time, it originated from an extremely X-rated song of the same name.

Then, there is 'Gaza'. I was going to introduce some lines from the poet T.S. Eliot and wanted, as context, to say he had written 'The Waste Land', which was similar to the present Gaza Strip in the Middle East, or one that we had in Trinidad during and after the war where anything and anyone could be bought.

I then found out that the word was originally used to describe the Portmore community (hometown of DJ Vybz Kartel), or also used to describe Kartel's crew. It is now used as an expression of resilience and defiance, referring to individuals or groups who stand their ground, even if it requires using violence. At this stage, the vibe was definitely not good, and I left the Gaza and the rivers of Babylon for the real Zion.

In speaking, each of the protagonists, the speaker or the audience, has a job to do. I wanted to tell them that my job was to talk and theirs was to listen. The challenge, however, was for me to finish my job before they finished theirs. This must have been the first speech that, despite the air-conditioner, ended in a dead heat.

- Tony Deyal was last seen repeating what Wild Bill Hickock told the Sheriff, "That guy's speech was like the horns on a steer. There was a point here and a point there, but in-between, it was pure bull."