TEDxBristol has NOT been a failure!

At last, I have been in a TEDx event, something I can already cross from my bucket list. Two months after purchasing my ticket for the event, the day finally arrived. And it happened to be a success: very inspiring people with "ideas worth spreading".

The day started at 9.20am, when I arrived to Colston Hall for the registration. I got my very own blue wristband which would give me access (and also discounts) and the official programme which had all the information I needed about speakers, organisers, sponsors... There was already a queue to get the best seats, but once the doors were opened, we all went inside very fast. Obviating what was written in the programme ("be seated by 9.50"), most of the audience arrived few minutes before the start of the event. 

We were around 1000 people in the audience, most of us around our 30s, but I could also see people in their 20s as well as 50s... or even older!

The event started at 10.15am with a video, then some useful instructions given by Becky Sage (the Project & Logistics Manager), and followed by a welcome presentation of the Curator of the TEDxBristol, Nat Al-Tahhan.

The first speaker, Professor David Nutt, introduced his presentation about drugs with Amy Winehouse, explaining how he got dismissed from his Government position for "repeteadly clashing with ministers over issues of drug harm and classification". Then, there was a change on the original schedule, and it was Simon Edwards who talked next about how "it takes courage to fail" in the military world. At sharp 11am, there was a 2-minutes silence for the Remembrance Day.

Brian Goldman was next and he told a very touching story of his own failures as a doctor, and the period of shame and recrimination he suffered after failures happened (video). As the event was behind schedule, they skipped the video-talk of Stanley McChrystal and we went directly to break time. We were asked to change our seats after the break to have new faces around to network with.

Paul Burden, who came up to the stage after the morning break, emphasized how "failures are actually valuable discoveries" and that "avoiding failure is not a success".

The video of Eddie Obeng's talk came next. Dressed with a bright orange shirt, Eddie explained how he did 60,000 miles without even moving from his desk in a very funny and entertaining way. I could tell that the audience really loved this talk. Then, Tomas Rawlings talked about news video games, and failures he experienced when launching a new idea for a video game.

After, the start of the day arrived: Sarah Abell. She clearly connected with the audience with a very touching second presentation about herself, adding personal experiences and giving us some tips on how to build "Authentic Relationships" in our lifes. I really loved her talk.

Matt Smith's video had some technical issues and couldn't be played. Michael Johnson then came up to the stage to give us a great engineering presentation about pocket space crafts. Karl Loudon was the next speaker, the managing director and co-founder at the Responsive Website Company, who used some slides that spoke volumes of his graphic design abilities.

The last speaker before the lunch break was Luke Williams, who explained the workshops which have been run during lunch time. Then, Hepzibah Theatre, did a very modern artistic performance, mixing dance, music and spoken word poetry. It is probably the only thing I didn't like from the whole event.

Lunchtime - Just by flashing our wristband, some venues were offering discounts to TEDxBristol delegates: a 10% discount at Beatroot Cafe, Roll for the Soul and Friska, and a 20% discount at Brigstow Cafe, MyBurrito, Quick Crepes and the Birdcage. I decided to go to The Birdcage, in Clare Street. I had a goat cheese toasted sandwich and a latte for as little as 5.35 pounds.



The afternoon session started with Ed Ley, a gym owner who told us Angela's story, a customer who wanted to punish herself with a hard diet and strong physical exercises to go from a size 16 to a 14. At one moment, he went silence for longer than expected. I wonder if he forgot what he had to say next. However, he wisely managed to go on with the speech and get the applause he deserved.

Jian Jiang (video) spoke about how donuts had changed his life in his "rejection therapy" to lose his fear of failing; a very funny speech which deserved a very big round of applause. Paul Robertson involved the audience asking for their experience during the driving learning process, and highlighted the importance of practicing and also understanding in order to improve.

Karl Belizaire, policy manager at UnLtd, made two questions to the audience: "what is failing in your community?" and "what are you going to do about it?". Sophie Mather, founder of Biov8tion sustainable textiles experts, brought a big mountain of old clothes to make us aware of the amount of waste we create in the textile market. I also loved her presentation slides using Prezi, a very cool software alternative to Power Point.

After the afternoon break, we travelled around the world with Paul Archer's stories (and failures), who wouldn't have got good stories if everything had gone according to the plan. Regina Dugan's (long) video introduced us into the aerospace industry, where there is "no big success without numerous failures happening before".

The event came to final stage with the aero acrobat Sven Hopla and his presentation about failure in the circus, and the scottish wildlife cameraman Doug Allan and his experiences when filming animals during 8 days to get 1 minute video.

Overall, I say that TEDxBristol has NOT been a failure, although there were some technical issues that could have been prevented. There were genious speakers who left no one indifferent.
I have to also congratulate the TEDx team for organising such an ispiring event. However, I must also add that the blog "Great little place called Bristol" wanted to get involved and volunteer for the event, and contacted the TEDx team to offer help back in August. The reply I got from the Curator was that I would be "added to the list of volunteers that we will undoubtedly be calling on nearer the time to help with logistics". Today, I am very disappointed: I have never got that call.

LINKS
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Webpage: http://tedxbristol.com/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/TEDxBristol
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TEDxBristol