The Day I Gave My First Speech

"Layla, WAKE UP, we have to be at the marina port by 11 am"

My friend's screams made my heart jump.

I squeezed my eyes to look at the room clock, its 10 am. My God!

Rushing to get ready and leaving the house in 15 minutes was a breaking record for me. Also, making sure I eat my usual breakfast “A Banana". I'm a strong believer in the whole good mood effect stuffed in bananas.

Me & Phenomenal Z, who is a dear bestie and workmate as well, were chosen to give a small speech to a group of young girls, telling them about our experience working in the private sector.

It was a great opportunity for us to teach those girls what to expect when they leave the carefree life and join the stricter "time management" labeled environment.

Back in the port, we waited for an hour for the water taxi to reach. The weather was unusually windy; I could see the waves hitting the boats so hard and splashing back to the sea. I whispered to my friend:
"Tara I don't know how to swim"

"It's okay, I'll save you, just don't pull me back to the water, relax and I'll hold you" She replied calmly.

The water taxi dude made us wear colorful life jackets and he started the engine. 20 minutes ride in the sea of my beloved city was a pleasure of its own. I'm not a sea person when it comes to actually being in the middle of it. I just enjoy the other senses, let me dip my legs, touch the sand, hear the sound of the waves and that's it.

Those 20 minutes passed so fast as we reached Al Futaisy Island!

The young girls were having a leadership camp for three days. We proceeded to the cafeteria where they were having lunch. A bus comes to take us from the cafeteria to where we will give the speech.

An Airy room with theater style chairs lined up. Girls were supposed to be there, but half an hour passed and the 30 girls were coming one by one. How frustrating, yet funny! I was in their shoes a year and a half ago. God how much I changed.

Two girls were sitting in the corner of the room, they seemed like good friends. Communicating softly about their work plans, how much they like to do volunteer work and the fact they are looking forward to our speech.

I wouldn't want to bore you with the details of the speech, other than it went really great. We saw a response from those stubborn girls. We tried to feed them the fact that "you have to love what you do, in order to succeed", all what they were thinking “how can you sit in an office for 9 hours"

As we were about to leave, I approached the two girls in the corner and wished them good luck in their life. I left with a tear that was about to fall, but I held it so hard.

It's fascinating how much hardship of life makes up a person. The two girls lived all their life in an orphanage house, they never saw their parents. One of them was on a wheelchair. She looked so perfect, so complete to me more than any of the 30 girls filling the classroom nudging each other and joking around.

I went there to teach them about myself, not knowing how much I needed to learn from them.