What gets lost when we treat conversations like transactions | Khaya Dlanga

You're listening to Ted Talk's Daily, where we bring you new ideas and conversations to spark your curiosity every day. I'm your host, Elise Hugh. In South Africa, a common greeting is "Sani Bona," which roughly translates to "We see you." In this talk, author and social commentator, Kaya Shanga, shares why he believes the most powerful stories are the ones told simply to connect with another human. Through personal memories, conversations and moments of deep listening, he shows how conversation, without strategy or agenda, helps us feel truly seen and be present with one another. So it is quite traditional in my country to walk into a room and to greet, but it's not just to greet, you're supposed to respond back to the greeting that I'm about to teach you. I promise you, it's very easy. So there are two things that I'm going to ask of you today, because I imagine part of some of you are maybe I'm pretty shy, okay? So what I will say is "Sani Bona," and you will respond back by saying "Sago Bona." All right? Are we ready? "Sani Bona." [laughter] Thank you. That was very easy, right? Very easy. So, in my culture, it is considered considerably rude to walk into a room without any greeting, as I mentioned to you before. What "Sani Bona" really means is we see you. It's kind of crazy to think that I'm saying that we see you, right? But it's just one person, it's just me standing here. What it really means is that everything that I am, everything that I come with, sees all the stories that come with you. It also means that the ancestors come with me and they to see you. That's what "Sani Bona" truly means. This is the second thing I'm going to ask you to do today, a promise is the last thing I want to ask you, and it's even easier than "Sago Bona," all right? So I'm going to ask you to repeat after me. It is a tradition that you have to say this after you say "Sago Bona," are you ready? [laughter] All right, [speaks in foreign language] That is a notoriously difficult tongue to say in my language of Issa Tosa. Issa Tosa, I'm pretty sure even that is pretty difficult to say, the language itself. So this is the language that I speak. And I'm pretty sure you're saying that, okay, great Kaya, what are you here to tell us? What is the great new insight that you're going to reveal to us today besides doing some breakdancing with your time? To tell you the truth is that I'm literally just here to have a conversation for the sake of conversation. I'm here to tell stories for the sake of telling stories. There's a great South African philosopher by the name of Steve Beekle. He wrote an amazing book called "I Write What I Like." And in it he says, "Westerners are often quite surprised by our capacity as Africans for talking to one another." And not to talk because there is any particular conclusion you want to arrive at, but simply to have a conversation for your sake. And this is what I want to do today. So I'm going to tell you three stories for the sake of telling stories. And I really do hope that you have nothing to learn from these stories. The first story that I want to tell you is when I began my career in advertising many, many years ago, my cousin who was also in advertising had to shoot an avid with the great and legendary William Shepner back in South Africa. So William Shepner went and flew to South Africa. And I was an incredible fan of Boston Eagle, his TV show. And I shared my love with my cousin, whose name is Felisa. I shared this love with him. And he fell in love with the show. And so somebody told William Shepner that they are these young guys who just love the show. And so he was so moved that he conspired to have a lunch with us the day before he left South Africa to go back to the United States. And we went to this incredible, expensive, exclusive hotel that I've never been to in my entire life. And then he got to this hotel. He was waiting for us. And he was so kind and so generous. And he called the waiter and said to the waiter, "Can I have three glasses of whiskey? The most expensive whiskey that you had. But before you get me those whiskies, if mine was all object for you, I want to ask you a question. What kind of cigar would you choose for yourself?" And the young man thought about it and he said, "Did you say that mine is all object?" And the young man said, "The barman said, "Okay, yeah, I know what to give you." And he gave us three cigars. And I've never, I mean, I don't smoke cigars, I know nothing about cigars. But if you know anything about Boston Digger, you will know that at the end of every single episode, William Shetner's character sits with his protege and they have a glass of whiskey and smoke a cigar. And so we sat with William Shetner and we did this. And when we are having amazing conversations with him and the most incredible thing about William Shetner and to this day, I've never met someone who listens like he does. It felt like his entire body was listening to us. His whole being had never been seen like that in my entire life. He was so generous with his time. And I remember looking at my cousin that I was thinking, he's spending his time with us, they're also spending his money with those expensive whiskey and those expensive cigars. He talked about his family, he talked about his religion and I didn't feel like I was talking to a superstar but I felt like I was speaking to my long-lost grandfather. And then after two and a half hours of having amazing conversation with Mr. Shetner, somebody came up to us and said, "Mr. Shetner, we have to take you to the airport now." And so he got up and he said, "Thank you so very much. I really do appreciate what you guys did for me." And then he pointed to the waiter and they said to him, "They are paying." But I felt so seen. It was priceless. That particular experience. And this is my second story that I'm going to tell you. So my second story that I'm about to tell you is that I grew up towards the tail end of apartheid South Africa. And what that meant was that I was in the first cohort of kids, of black kids, who were allowed to go to previously white only government schools. In fact, I was the only black child in my class and I went to this particular school. And I have this very vivid memory of me in junior school going to the library with my new white friends. And we get into the library and we have this profound obsession with these other boys of astronomy as young boys tend to do. And we went to the library and spoke in harsh tones and we were paging through and showing all what we know about the planetary systems. And this one boy says to me when I saw a picture of this moon, he said, "Oh, when you look at the moon, you can see the face of a man on the moon." And I remember being quite flabbergasted and thinking there is no man on the moon. What do you mean? And then it began to trace out these images of what you could send out. I saw a man on the moon for the first time. You see, the very difference between him and I is that I spent the first 10 years of my life in village South Africa. And now when I say village, don't imagine the idealistic village in England. So do you know what I saw when I was looking at images when I looked at the moon? I could see a woman carrying a bucket on her head with a baby on her back. I'm sorry you confuse me saying, "What is this?" This is what we grew up, we grew up saying, we saw a woman and not a man. A woman carrying a bucket on her head with a baby on her back. That's what I'd always known. And when we sat there together, we were quite, when I was looking at these images and I remember thinking, this is so different from what I thought. And both stories were so true. And no one thought that the one version was better than another, or more meaningful than the other. We obviously went home and we said this version and showed off the new thing that we learned today. So to bridge the gap between two different cultures, it is important for us to embrace all stories. In a world that we find ourselves in, especially today, when we think that our version is a correct one, that the only version we want to follow is the one that we know. We do not build a world that is great for the bridges that we need to create for ourselves. And I think we understand what kind of world we find ourselves in today. And then, I'm sure another question that you're wondering is like, Kaya, but you will hear you. Did you really mean it when you said that you're telling stories for the sake of telling stories? Yes, I meant it. And I said that I don't want to learn anything from these lessons, but I do have a question. And one of the questions that I have to ask is, when did we decide that every conversation must be transactional? When did we decide that every conversation must have some hidden KPI and not have a conversation for its sake to enjoy the company of another human? Because in reality, what we do know is that behind every casual conversation will have someone with anybody is the desire for connection. We want to connect with another human being. And the hardest thing about connection is making that fast step to connect with another person. There is this battle against loneliness that we're fighting. And yet, we think that technology is what's going to help us fight against its loneliness. But what has happened to us is that the more time we connect with our technology, the lesser get to know our neighbors. We know more about technology in our hands than we do know about our neighbors. Which is as if we have created a new commandment, which is no-dye technology, but I don't know their neighbor. And so I want to tell a very personal story now. And I decided this as I was working here, that I should share this particular story. A few short years ago, my brother, who was the youngest in my family, took his own life. And the reason he took his life was because he had a profound connection with a device. And this device exploited his addictive personality. And his addictive personality was gambling, online sports betting. He was so ashamed that he did not connect us and talked to us about his problem that eventually took his own life. And I'll never forget the day we went to his funeral. And it's meant by mother, that evening, talking to myself and my sisters. Almost talking to herself. My mother said in my language of his Etosa, "I'm going to die next year." And what I'm happy to say that the following year, she did not die. She was a very hearted woman and very active. And the year after that, my mother did not die. But exactly, almost exactly a year ago, my mother passed away from a heartbreak because she could not longer connect with her son. And her words connected to a prophecy that made her own passing a reality. And so, and what I do in return is that in order for me to be able to connect with my parents, with my mother and with my brother, is that I decided to write a book. But it felt like I was exploiting them, exploiting their death in order for me to connect with them. But it did make me feel better, despite what I felt. And so, I suppose, how I want to end this is, AI is going to take over all sorts of tasks. And correctly so, it's going to take over tasks, it's going to take over all sorts of algorithms. But the one thing it cannot do is take our humanity. It cannot do that. So, AI, you know, can tell all stories and can tell beautiful stories. It cannot tell a story that one heart can tell to another. And finally, I do want to close off with this. While human beings are made for connecting with one another. While sharing stories for the sacred, trying stories. While having conversation for the sake of conversation is not what makes us human. What really makes us human is the fact that we simply connect for the sake of connecting. Thank you. That was Kaya Shanga speaking at TED 2025. If you're curious about TED's curation, find out more at TED.com/curationguidelines. And that's it for today. TED Talks Daily is part of the TED Audio Collective. This talk was fact-checked by the TED Research Team and produced and edited by our team, Martha Estefanos, Oliver Friedman, Brian Green, Lucy Little, and Tonsaca, Songmarnivong. This episode was mixed by Lucy Little, additional support from Emma Tobner and Danielle Balorezo. I'm Elise Hugh. I'll be back tomorrow with a fresh idea for your feed. Thanks for listening. [BLANK_AUDIO]