Charles was a senior HR consultant in a firm of international consultants. He led a team who specialised in advising on remuneration and incentive schemes. It was company policy to accept invitations to speak at important conferences and, often, to have an exhibition stand for the duration of the conference. Charles thoroughly enjoyed delivering keynote addresses. He was an accomplished public speaker who loved to amuse audiences with jokes and anecdotes. Unsolicited feedback confirmed that listeners enjoyed his sessions and the whole experience was satisfying to his ego.

However, Charles did not at all enjoy manning the exhibition stand. He didn’t relish the inevitable standing idly about and also felt awkward greeting passers-by and trying to cajole them into showing some interest in their services. He regarded addressing a captive audience, with all the advantages of a raised stage, microphone, podium and visual aids at the touch of a button, as a dignified activity. By contrast, touting the company’s wares on an exhibition stand felt, well, demeaning – like a prostitute loitering in the doorway of some seedy club. Not that the company stand was in the least seedy – in fact it was quite grand and had won awards at previous exhibitions.

Charles did his best to conceal his discomfort and passed the time in ostensibly cheerful banter with visitors and, when there weren’t any of them, with the glamorous women who ran the neighbouring stands.

One day Charles received an invitation to deliver a keynote speech at a conference in Malaysia. Unfortunately the date of the conference was not convenient. Two days before it a crucial board meeting had been scheduled at which Charles was due to give a paper outlining the five-year plan for his department. Two days after it Charles was already booked to perform at a conference in San Francisco. So the trip to Kuala Lumpur would have to be a swift ‘in and out’ affair. Secretly, Charles was pleased about this. It meant he would only have time to give his speech and the distasteful business of hanging around the exhibition stand would be left to others.

As it turned out, at the last minute the board meeting was postponed, but by then it was too late for Charles to alter his travelling arrangements. Then, on the day he was due to fly, there was a security alert at Heathrow and the flight was delayed. Charles sat in the business lounge, sipping whisky and dry gingers, rehearsing his speech.

Once the flight was called, there was a further delay waiting for some passengers to board who were taking longer to pass through immigration than had been expected. Charles calculated that he would reach the hotel in Kuala Lumpur only just in time for the speakers’ briefing the evening before the conference opening.

At the briefing, the organisers explained that an important government minister was going to declare the conference open at 09:00 the next morning and that all the speakers needed to be in the hotel foyer at 08:30 sharp to be presented to the minister. Well seasoned in such matters, Charles unpacked his case, put his trousers in the press, ironed the creases out of his shirt, organised a morning call for 07:00 and fell into bed to catch up on some sleep.

He awoke with a start and consulted his wristwatch on the bedside table. He was appalled to see it was already ten minutes to nine. He leapt out of bed, cursing the hotel for failing to call him, and got into the shower without waiting for the water to run hot. As he stood there (the water was tepid by now) it slowly dawned on him that it was still dark outside, and very quiet. Puzzled and disoriented, he got out of the shower and looked at his watch again. This time it said twenty past three.

He realised that when he first consulted his watch it had been upside down. Twenty past three looks exactly like ten to nine if your watch is upside down – especially if it has dots and dashes rather than actual numbers.

After his cold shower, Charles couldn’t get back to sleep. He was on parade at 08:30 sharp ready to shake the minister’s hand and to be garlanded with orchids. He was amused to see that two of the other overseas speakers had overslept.