AY is your regular humour merchant, who makes audiences
crack their ribs as they quake in ecstasy. But he does more than
say funny things. To borrow his own words, AY is an all-encomp
I ’m assing show biz personality.
“I run a television show, I produce and am on
TV everyday. I have a platform on HiTV and we
have the AY TV, which runs on that platform
every day. It runs both in Nigeria and the UK.
Apart from that I produce, I direct, I act, I
package events for companies and individuals, I
consult with people and I am a writer, ” AY says,
reeling out his ‘CV.’
Now that is what you can safely describe as
jack of all aspects of entertainment business. Is
the master of all? Your guess is as good as
ours. In this interview, he let ’s us get a peek into
how he shows love to his family. Excerpts….
Are you a modern dad?
Yes I am and I have serious time for family. As
a matter of fact before now my office was
located somewhere else, but now my studio,
my office and house are located together. So I
have all the time for my home and this doesn ’t
stop me from traveling because I need to go
and make the money to take care of the family.
When I come back and see that there is
vacuum in the family circle I often come and
make it up to them. We could go out together
but in a way there is a strong balance.
There is more balance on my part as a
comedian than the man who is a banker out there because for
some of them, they wake up and leaves home before the child is
awake. By the time he comes back the child is already asleep. So
all what he does is just to go to his child ’s room and pat his back
and wait until Saturday or Sunday when such child would get to
see his parent. Sometimes there are some events that I go to that
are family oriented; so I always make sure I go along with my
family so that they would be able to see how daddy is doing his
thing out there.
While your daughter was younger did you help in changing her
diapers?
Well, my wife should answer that question but I think I did that
regularly. When we had our baby I simply told myself that she
had performed her duty for nine months by carrying the baby
and getting to the stage of delivery. When we had our baby
whenever she was asleep I would be awake; before sleeping, my
wife would tell me what I was supposed to do. She would say to
me - put three spoons of that and add so and so quantity of
water. Really, I was having fun because it was so easy for me.
Do you take her to school?
Of course I do that (laughs) although there are times we drop her
off at school and we go together to pick her. But sometimes we
shuttle, it ’s a duty routine between the two of us. But of recent we
employed the school bus to come and pick her. However, there
are times we go to pick her so that she would have a sense of
belonging like other children.
Have you started attending P.T.A meetings?
No, I haven’t started the PTA thing but I think I should leave that to
the mum to handle for now. If I’m free and the need comes up I
would but you know these things usually come up during
weekends and that is more like the peak of my own call to duty.
You never found it demeaning doing all that for your wife?
Not in the least because before I became a full-grown man, and
long before I got married, I was already doing things like that for
my younger ones. I did that for all my younger ones; it was
something I learnt from my mum early enough and for me to
transfer it into my own life wasn ’t so difficult.
Do you help in doing other house chores too?
Of course I help out with other chores, but when I can’t do so, I
look for ways to reduce the stress for her by getting her help or
having some other people in the house to help run things. But one
thing I know that I won ’t do for her is to get someone that would
cook for her because I love eating my wife’s food.
What is wrong in eating other people’s food?
Of course we all eat out and that food is made by some else but
there are times you really want to get that satisfaction because the
Bible says that two shall come together and become one. There
are times you want to feel that oneness and sometimes it would
come by way of eating your wife ’s food.
Do you cook for her too?
Oh, my God I can’t remember when last I cooked for her, but I’m
sure she would remind me in the toasting era. But after you had
succeeded you now take backstage but its fun if I have to do so.
Incidentally, recently she challenged me that I only talk about
making food for her and I never do it. But I was forced to prepare
a Niger Delta delicacy for her and blew out of proportion. We even
invited our friends to witness and testify that this man can cook
ogwueri, I know you can’t spell it but I call it oil soup. (Laughs).
Why does it seem like romance ends after courtship?
It depends on individuals. I can only talk for myself. I always have
cause to show love to wife everyday; I always have cause to think
of something new to do to spark up the relationship, to keep it
alive. Especially when I know that a lot of people don ’t believe in
celebrity marriage and having their marriage intact. I’m not daft,
the day I pick up Encomium or City People and I read one headline
that something happened to a celebrity, it gingers me to fall back
home to do something that would sustain romance between me
and my wife. There is always something that keeps me going;
you know the same zeal and attitude I put into show-business is
what I also put into my marriage to sustain it.
What are your tips for making celebrity marriages work?
The simple thing is to get your partner to have full confidence
in you. There are ways you can do this – it is not about having
all the money in the world to give to her or by giving her all
the jewellery. The thing is to be there for her – no matter what
you are doing, just create time for the family.
Just when somebody is thinking to come and penetrate your
family and bring in rumour and say something like ‘we see
your husband here, we see your husband there’. But your
wife would say ‘my husband wey you see there na him an me
dey since o. You need to fill up that space and you need to
attend to her needs as well. When you are doing all of these
together you will know that there is a spark in the relationship.
I can say all other private things but these are just the peripheral.
What makes her unique?
I didn’t I just told you about her food and you were wondering
why it has to be her. Well, nobody does it better! As far as I’m
concerned no one does it better, but it also goes beyond cooking
because she has a good heart; she is a young woman with the
strong attributes of a mother. I ’m a young man without a mum
so sometimes I see my wife as my mum because she fills the
vacuum completely. There are times when I am mismanaging
myself and I always have her on my side to say to me – baby this
is wrong, I think your action should have been this. And when I
do things she asks me to do, it usually points towards positive
directions.
Was it love at first sight when you met your wife?
No, it was business at first sight because back then I was
organizing the Delta State beauty pageant and when I was leaving
that what was when she was coming in. So I needed to put my
last solid beauty pageant together, I needed it to be grand. Then I
spotted her and I was like wow, this girl should be a part of what
we are doing. She turned me down when I told her she had what
it takes to be in the beauty pageant. But she said she was not cut
out for it. I did everything to convince her but she refused. She
even refused to give me her name.
Then we forgot about getting her involved in the pageant. After I
left Abraka as a graduate, once in a while I would go there to
supervise what the other guys were doing. But each time I went
there I still saw this same girl always in the classroom, clutching
one folder or the other. Then the interest became different now
but she still refused to be friends with me in the first place. You
know when you enter a system and you have been cautioned
from home that it is about getting the degree and not get
distracted. But when my distraction started it was heavy on her
because I was consistently trying to see if I could win her over.
And then when I wasn ’t making any effort at all that was when
she came onboard because I had cause to be in Delta State
University longer than I should because I suffered from a major
priority problem.
NIGERIAWORLD | NIGERIAWEB | MESSAGEBOARD | ANNOUNCE STORY | NAIJANET | STATE NEWS | SEARCH
Good Morning! Wednesday May 26, 2010
advertisement
Services
Front Page
Back Page
Advert Rates
Subscription
News
Home
National
International
Business News
Abuja Reports
Sports
Politics
Sun Girl
Editorial
Editorial Issues
Letters
Opinion
Columnists
Community
Standard Guestbook
View Guestbook
Sun Chatroom
Features
Apettit
Arts
BlockBuster
CEO Magazine
Celebrity Fashion
City Sun
Crime Watch
Covert Choice
CyberSun
Enterprise
Everyday Heroes
Exquisite Property
Fashion & Celebrity
Fashion & Beauty
Favourite File
Health Magazine
How I write
Life Style
Living
Mafia Series
Man in the street
Man in the pulpit
Managing a Law Firm
Me & My God
Media People
Money
Motoring
Power Game
Romance
Romantic Faction
Senior Citizen
Showtime
Smoking Guns
Sun Splash
Sunlight of Islam
Travels
Window of the world
Window on widows
Woman of the Sun
Women in Business
Women & Me
Videoscope
Weekend Sun
Saturday Sun
Sunday Sun
Weekend Sports
Weekend Cartoons
Company Profile
About Us
Management
Contact Us
No comments:
Post a Comment