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Trial by TV

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By Natalia M., YES Abroad 2014-2015, Macedonia

On Friday the 6th of March, a day off from school prompted Faber, Emily, and me, the three YES Abroad students in Macedonia, to head to the American Councils office for a quick meeting that updated us on the activities planned for the upcoming weeks. Near the end of our meeting, Velika, our coordinator, threw in one more plan: "Do any of you want to be on TV on Tuesday?"

I almost, almost said no—because going on morning television to speak, in Macedonian, about YES Abroad was frankly terrifying. However, I couldn't imagine looking back on this and having said no, realizing that it was only an irrational fear that held me back. I asked Faber to literally yell encouragement at me until I agreed, and the plan was set—we three students and Velika were to be at Alfa TV at 7:40 AM on Tuesday the 10th.

Over the weekend, I completely forgot about the whole prospect, but on Monday, we received a list of potential interview questions, and I proceeded to freak out again. I could think of answers at home, even ones that I thought were insightful, but to do them live without my helpful notes seemed impossible. The other two girls felt close to the same way, and our group chat that night included messages, such as "fear" and "I can't" and "I'm not ready for this," that were clear signs of collective desperation. No one, for one second, thought about backing away from the offer, though. Seven months of exchange had at least given us that.

Tuesday morning, after waking up much later than expected and calling a cab much later than expected, I was still not ready. The cab picked up Faber, then me, and drove us to the studio, which was practically in Kosovo.  (I am not kidding - our host families told us "oh, Alfa TV - that's out towards Kosovo!" and the cab driver told us we were about 15 km away from the border.)  We were about 10 minutes late and therefore 10 minutes before the show was supposed to start. Traffic had delayed Velika even further, so the stage manager called us into the studio after a mere three minutes of sitting, freaking out, and (of course) sipping on their complementary coffee.

Sometime during the long drive over, or the freak-out the night before, or the moments of coffee and apprehension, I thought of two things. One—that if I wasn't an exchange student, completely aware that opportunities are often presented just once, I would have let my need for comfort prevail and wouldn't have hesitated in politely declining the offer. Two—that if this interview were just in English, it would hold absolutely no difficulties for me, and that the prospect of being on live TV just could not faze me like it once would. I think that this is one of the biggest benefits of taking an academic year away from home to live as fully as you can for ten months—after I return, there will be no excuse for avoiding things that require me to put my fear behind me. I won't be able to back out of public speaking or avoid asking a stranger for directions because, after all, it'll be in my native language.  After this, nothing could even come close to preventing my success, other than an irrational, irrelevant fear that exchange is actively working to kill.

I digress. We went into the studio, sat down on a low red couch, and just in time, Velika appeared. It turned out that there were a few things to announce before we spoke, and just like that, when the hostess began to talk, it was all perfectly, totally fine. Velika was able to promote the YES inbound program to students and host to families, and when it came to be our turn to speak, somewhat clumsy grammar and vocabulary didn't seem to matter. The hostess was extremely good at her job—she asked questions clearly but not condescendingly, finished sentences when she saw us struggling, and made the experience go much more smoothly overall than my mind had made it out to be the night before. 

I can't imagine that my television appearance had quite as big of an impact on any of the viewers as it had on me, but I like to think that some baba (grandmother) watching took a second out of her day to think, "That foreigner's Macedonian isn't even that bad!" Even though the questions turned out to be much easier than what I was imagining, the morning felt like a huge success.