Shankar Vedantam

Reduce unnecessary meetings and make the ones that matter more effective.

Unstuck your teams today at loom.com.

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I'm Shankar Vedantam.

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He was a heroic figure already by that time.

But to many white South Africans, they saw him as a criminal and a terrorist.

Play continues.

Offside by New Zealand.

He used the Rugby World Cup, which was being hosted in South Africa.

And during the apartheid era, South Africa had been banned from competition.

And the South African team was known as the Springboks.

And they were beloved by the white South Africans and despised by the black population.

But what Mandela did was he went out onto the podium, not just as the president, but as a fan, he had the green Springboks cap and jersey, and he used it as a way to make a statement that we're one team, we're one country now, and he took a symbol of oppression and used it as a symbol of togetherness.

The president to the captain.

Thanks for having me.

Yeah, so this is a great piece of advice you learn if you're ever going to travel in Canada.

Your family, your friends will tell you to sew a Canadian flag on your backpack so that it serves as a signal to other people in other parts of the world who you are and where you're from.

Canada is a reasonably well-liked and respected country, but it does something even better, which is it allows you to connect with people.