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KT edit: Kudos to the Afghan national for saving a stranger's life

Doing what you want to do without fearing the humiliations or opinions of the society is a sign of bravery.

The most mystifying part of the red badge of courage is that you never know if you have it and how much of it will express itself when the chips are down. The spontaneous rush to save a drowning individual by an Afghan resident in Umm Al Quwain who did not know how to swim exemplifies just that intriguing part of the human experience. Can we rise to the occasion? Soldiers in a war zone face this dilemma every day. It is not the absence of cowardice and fear but the ability to handle its presence and still march on and do what has to be done. The Afghan national displayed just that sort of mental state. He moved forward and he went to the rescue.
Doing what you want to do without fearing the humiliations or opinions of the society is a sign of bravery. While doing something you don't want to do but do just to please others and to save yourself from humiliation is a sign of cowardice. That is what decides your conduct on a day to day basis not just in the workplace but also in the home and at play. It sculpts your ethical parameters. This is apart from the action and direction one takes when faced with the threat to one's life for doing the right thing. We all know that fear spawns danger and courage comes into play to control it. In a Dustin  Hoffman film called Hero, he saves lives from a crashed airliner and then refuses to take the credit and goes incognito.
The plot so vividly describes the fact that when common men and women do uncommon things we can safely call it an act of courage. The most inexplicable part of courage is that one does not know if one has it. It is only when faced with a situation that the human being looks into himself and asks if he has the guts to risk his life for a stranger. If you are asked to rush into a building on fire to save someone or perform a dangerous rescue act for someone at risk from a flash flood you would theoretically give a response but no one can guarantee how you would behave if there was a call for help. Ironically, courage is not just physical even though we are trained to respond to stimuli in that fashion. Courage also has a mental and moral value largely bedrocked in telling the truth and being honest regardless of the consequences.