This spring, TED headed on the road, visiting 14 cities across six continents on the hunt for untapped talent. The idea behind the sweeping search: to let you, the TED community, weigh in and vote on which speakers you’d like to see ascend the stage at TED2013. After holding one-night salons in Amsterdam, Bangalore, Doha, Johannesburg, London, Nairobi, New York, São Paulo, Seoul, Shanghai, Sydney, Tokyo, Tunis and Vancouver, we couldn’t help but notice that every city’s event had its own unique flavor. And so we’ve asked one audience member from each stop along on the tour to share their memories.

Today, we asked audience member Fatene Ben-Hamza of Marseille, France, to tell us about her experience at TED@Tunis, which took place on May 8.

Fatene, what three adjectives would you use to describe the event?

Surprising. Also “mind refreshing,” in the Tunisian context, compared to the stuff we hear every day!

Who were the must-see speakers of the night, who you hope TED fans will watch on the TED Talent Search website?

Ihsan Fethi: Iraq’s destroyed cultural heritage
His talk was extremely passionate; he shared the importance of saving what’s left from his country’s culture, a topic that is highly important to my opinion in countries where culture tends to disappear into obscurity.

Mocke J Van Veuren: Art and science interact
He showed an experimental audio and time-lapse video. I like the way he made art and science work together.

Riadh Guerfali (Astrubal): Beware the loss of Internet freedom
Riadh stressed that internet freedom might disappear someday, and that we should not take the freedom we have for granted. This topic appealed strongly to people in Tunisia, who lived under censorship for years.

Boushra and Line Dalile: Our homemade curriculum
Scarily clever girls. Perfect examples for their generation.

Rym Baouendi: Learning ecodesign from ancient civilizations
This is a subject that I’d like to hear more about in Tunisia, where the environment is definitely not a priority to people and corporations.

Which speaker from the night do you want to be your new best friend? 

Neziha Gouider Khouja. A neuroscientist, she gave a very personal talk about the power of addressing human beings’ most basic needs in refugee camps.

What was the best moment of the night? 

James Duncan Davidson (below) gave a really good introduction.

Stayed tuned for more audience impressions of TED Talent Search events, coming at you over the next month.

The Stage at TED@Tunis

As the TED team travels around the world hosting salons in 14 cities, we’re collecting great local stories. Here’s a quick report from TED@Tunis, held May 8, 2012, at Cité des Sciences de Tunis, and locally hosted by Houssem Aoudi of the TEDxCarthage team.

Start with attendee Atef Zayati‘s Picasa album of the event, here or on his blog.

Event organizer Houssem Aoudi tweeted:

producing the TED talent search in tunisia in less then a week with @natemook @maroo_king and @walidhached ... Just after TEDxSummit :s

—
Houssem Aoudi (@nayzek) April 27, 2012

Then, peel your eyes away (if you can) and read one TED photographer’s story of giving his first TEDTalk, at TED@Tunis, on his blog: DuncanDavidson.com.

Finally, check out the Break Point Blog wrapup video of the event below:

And don’t forget to check back on the TED Talent Search site in a few weeks for full versions of talks given at each salon.

Research: Larissa D. Green
Photo: Atef Zayati