 I've always felt like, you know, the more you try to control people in a borderline oppressive way, the more you're likely to create a rebel. It's as simple as that. The more you tell people they can't do something without any logical explanation as to why they cannot, the more they're curious to find out why. See, the thing is we're allowed to make our own decisions and live with it, with the exception of, you know, deliberate self-harm or harming somebody else. And I think that's what happened with a lot of people growing up, especially in these parts of the world, living a much rebellious life because most of the things that we're told we couldn't do either made us really curious or didn't make sense to us so we decided to find out for ourselves. My childhood and upbringing, that's a long one. I don't know if I should make it short or summarize it in a way. Okay, so growing up was a very, should I say average, traditional Ghanaian home. I was brought up in a Christian home. My parents are both Presbyterians so that's what I grew up knowing. I'm the second of three children, so a big brother and a little sister. I think for most people, probably watching this video, who grew up in late 80s, 90s, I'm not that old, late 80s, 90s coming. Your parents kind of instilled fear in you with some of the things you couldn't do and places you couldn't go. And they did this without, sorry, they did this without a lot of allowance for questioning and conversations around it because well, children were supposed to be spoken at actually, not to at. And so you couldn't question some of these things and for me, that made me much more curious and it made me yearn a bit more to grow faster and do the things that I was told I couldn't do. So that was what growing up was like for me and I think that's what's created the kind of person that I am now because I was the kind of child who would always think for himself and want to do things his own way. That's how come, for example, I decided to get my hair locked. I have earrings, I have a couple of tattoos. Yeah, I think it contributed. Growing up in an African home, most parents would, I would say, chose respect over love. And even with the respect, I would say the respect was much more influenced by instilling fear than, you know, allowing your children to be humans or treating them as, you know, humans who also had things to say and had ideas of their own and having conversations together. So it was more of fear than respect. And between my parents, I think I was much more afraid, yeah, afraid of my dad than my mom. So in the respect spectrum, I think I respected my mom more but I was afraid more of my dad. And that made me find ways, most of the time, to counter, you know, these emotions that would, you know, come up when you think of maybe what would happen to you if you did this and what would your dad do to you if it went wrong and all these things. So you're not able to explore, you're not able to challenge things that don't make sense to you because conversations don't happen around them. Yeah, see, I told you, it might be a long, but that's what growing up for me was like. And it made me the kind of person I am. My siblings are quite different from I am. I am much more rebellious, I would say. I'm much more rebellious than my siblings. My siblings are much more laid back. They have their own rebellion in their own way, but they are much, much more laid back than I am. And I think it's a weird thing as well because for me, I'm a weird balance of, you know, being pedantic and also being free spirit. There are some things that I stopped myself from doing because I don't think I want to explore because I don't think it will serve me anyway or I think I'll be breaking a certain rule. So in that sense, you know, I'm a bit pedantic that way. But some of the things are also there, especially when it comes to things that I want for myself that I'm able to decide and do things in a certain way. If it's only quote-unquote harming me or affecting me, I'm able to decide for myself and do it and live with the consequences. That's what I would say about my upbringing. Do I have a favourite parent? If we're being honest, I think everybody has a favourite someone between two people, especially your parents or guardians, unless you have two parents who are, I don't know, equal in every sense of your emotional needs and whatever you needed them to be, that you knew that you could go to mum for this and it works for you and you could go to dad for this and it works for you. But either way, we're humans. I think we have preferences. And children, I think it's easier for children to actually say who they prefer. Yeah, if you've seen those TikTok videos where parents or people would run different directions and expect their kids to follow them or whatever it is, children never lie. And I think it's one of the things that it's easy for kids to decide. So yes, I sure do have a favourite parent. It's really unfortunate that parents can't say they are favourite kids. Although some, I mean the brave ones do, but parents also do have favourite kids and they're allowed to have favourite kids because for them, some kids listen to them and do as they say and make them proud and yadda yadda yadda. So yeah, I do have a favourite parent and I'm a mama's boy. So a favourite parent would be mom because like I was saying, I had much more fear for my dad growing up than, you know, a much more softer love and respect for him. It was more fear and we didn't really agree on a lot of things because I was very opinionated as well and I still am. So we clashed a lot on a lot of ideas. And so yeah, I preferred my mom also mainly because my mom for me also made us feel that we deserved certain things that my dad would traditionally halted from happening or think wasn't necessary. My mom always made us feel that we deserve these things or we deserve the good too. So growing up, I saw a lot of sacrifice on her side. I don't mean that my dad didn't sacrifice a lot. I'm just saying that I felt it more. She was more lenient and she was more accommodating of some of these things that we wanted to explore and achieve for ourselves. So yeah, that's yeah. Do I want to be a parent? Of course I want to be a parent. I'm not going to say I love kids, but I do want to have kids of my own, especially because especially also that my partner has the same feelings. So it's a mutual thing that we both want to raise children together. So I do want to be a parent and have that experience for myself and possibly see... I think parenting is such a weird thing if you think about it. Besides, you know, procreation, it's much more experimental. So I think, yes, I do want to be a parent, but then thinking back on how I was raised and how I feel towards some of the decisions my parents made, although I didn't like most of it, I think I can empathize with what they experienced and transferred onto us as kids. So that's empathy there because they were also, of course, they've not been parents before, you know, having us. So it was also very experimental and doing what you know or what you think is right for your child based on your experiences and what the world was like at the time. So yeah, I can empathize in that way and I do also want to be a parent because it's going to be completely different times and completely different experiences. Am I going to be like them as in my kids' grandparents or I'm going to be different? I don't know. But I would like to find out. Yeah, that's what I want to say. Do I think I would be a good father or parent? I guess we'll have to find out because I can't say here that I would be a good parent. I don't know what's going to happen when I have my child. So for me, I guess I would say I would try my best with a lot of things that I have learned now with how the world is going and how I see the world and the kind of opportunities especially that are available to us and how for the most part we wish our parents had given us more in terms of the freedom of choice, freedom of exploration, freedom of failure, exploring and failing and doing things a certain way and getting support for those things. The world is changing and there's a lot of no you can't or there was a lot of no you can't do this and this is what needs to be done or this is the only thing that needs to be done especially with your career choices and the school and the subjects that you learn and all these things and talking to your kids, listening to them as humans as well and engaging them. I'm not necessarily going to sit here and say that I'm not going to be the perfect dad or parent but I think I'll learn from how I was raised and how the world is going now and hopefully I'll be able to find a fair balance that suits my children. So will I be a good father? I just really hope that I can be present. I think that's one of the things that is really important to me. Present enough to be in their lives, present enough to support their growth and be part of their journey to exploring this life and becoming full and independent humans on their own. I just hope that I will be there and be a part of that. Will I be happy if my child takes after me? I don't know if I will be happy, happy if my child takes after me. That's a bit of narcissistic to want your child to be like you or exactly like you. I don't think I want my child to be exactly like me and it's inevitable that they will pick things from you. You're raising them. They're experiencing you. They're looking at you and kids do look or pick a lot by seeing what's around them or the people that they are guardians. They pick a lot from the people that are teaching them what to know about this world and everything. They will pick things from me but would I want my kids to be exactly like me or no, I don't think so. I don't want that. If they would pick anything from me I'd want that ability to want things for themselves and take up space and decide for themselves and be able to talk about these things when they do decide for themselves or try to explore to be able to balance these ideas and if they choose a completely different path it's the only thing I can do, support. I don't want my kids to be a mini version of me. No, that will be there. I mean biologically in the DNA, whatever and in raising them what they are exposed to, yes but I don't think I want to have my kids taking after me like religiously, that's what they want to be. I mean if you want to be like daddy, cool. But I don't think that's where I want things to be in a restricted sense. Do I consider myself a rebel? Hell yeah. I consider myself a rebel because like I was saying when you tell people tell people they can't do something me especially I want to know why I can't do that thing especially if it's something that for example I thought of or I may have been inspired by something I saw and I want to try something like that for myself and if I'm not self-harming or if I'm not doing something terrible to another person and I think it's a creative thing I want to do when you tell me I can't do it I will find my way of doing it you can't tell me I can't do it I want to do it and know how the experience of myself I am, yes, I am a rebel I think rebellion or everybody has their own level of rebellion in them I think it's something that's innately us so yeah it's what has made me who I am or yeah it's what has made me who I am because for example growing up I'd always been fascinated by the hairstyle which is locks I've always been fascinated by body arts like tattoos and I would actually those plants that had this white liquid in it that were sticky yeah white liquid it's kind of like glue I would use it to draw things on my body and let it dry out and then grind charcoal and sprinkle on it and that gluey part will catch the pattern of the design and then you wash it off and it stays on your skin for a few hours so I've always been interested in tattooing myself for example I've always been interested in having earrings I think looks are looks I mean it doesn't mean anything it doesn't take away from who I am and also in a way despite the person who said I couldn't do it yes so it's a bit of both I wanted to do it you said I can't do it because it will bring for example shame to your Christian family and people will look at my family a certain way because my son has dreads or whatever it is I don't care what people think so first of all I'll do it because I want to have that look and secondly I'll do it because you don't like it so yeah I'm a rebel in that sense yeah choosing love or respect I've always said I would choose respect over love and I think what I mentioned before that we have a very here in these parts of the world our idea or definition of respect is much more fear of somebody doing what they say it's authoritarian than nurturing because respect is being inspired by someone's examples enough and being heard by the person and being tolerated by the person enough to agree with them or disagree even in the most humane way you get it so I would choose respect here in the sense that you may not like me you don't have to like me but at least you wouldn't treat me like a lesser human you wouldn't infringe upon my right to exist you wouldn't think me that I don't deserve to be in a certain space or deserve certain things you're liking me doesn't matter you don't have to love me you don't have to like me but you have to respect that I want to do things this way or I want to exist and I deserve to exist so I would choose respect in its yeah, entirety over love I've always said this love love is I don't want to even go there it's a complex thing and it's one of the choices people make you can't force somebody to like you or love you so I would choose respect over love