{"id":8322,"date":"2016-03-21T10:20:36","date_gmt":"2016-03-21T10:20:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/?p=8322"},"modified":"2016-03-21T10:20:36","modified_gmt":"2016-03-21T10:20:36","slug":"why-i-stop-smoking-yeni-fela-anikulapo-kuti","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/?p=8322","title":{"rendered":"Why I stop smoking – Yeni Fela Anikulapo Kuti"},"content":{"rendered":"


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Yeni Kuti , the first child and daughter of late Afro beat king, Fela Anikulapo Kuti turned 50 years last Tuesday. She relives memories of her active years as a dancer, life after the death of her father and her desire to re-marry if she has the opportunity to do so, amongst other issues raised by Showtime Celebrity. Enjoy.<\/p>\n

How does it feel to be fifty? Laughs. I\u2019m excited to be fifty. What\u2019s the excitement in turning fifty?<\/p>\n

When I was younger and I saw people who turned fifty, I used to think they were very old. But now, that I\u2019m also there, I feel older but not very old. Looking back, do you have any regret in life? I don\u2019t dwell on regrets. Life gives you what it would but I don\u2019t dwell on it. I believe in being positive. So, I don\u2019t even think of any regret. All I do is work.<\/p>\n

You keep talking about work, what kind of work do you do? Well, it\u2019s in the shrine. How do you run the Shrine?<\/p>\n

Shoe week<\/strong>
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Ah! I don\u2019t know. There are different things to do there. You have to do your books, balance the sheets, make sure there\u2019s diesel for the generator. Like now, people are waiting for me- there are so many things to do there.<\/p>\n

So what are some of the challenges?<\/p>\n

I think electricity is the most challenging. We use all the profit we make in purchasing diesel to run our generating set. You are a veteran dancer\u2026 Yes, I\u2019m retired but not tired.<\/p>\n

What could bring you out of the Shrine?<\/p>\n

If someone offers me millions of Naira .<\/p>\n

What passes through your mind whenever you are on stage?<\/p>\n

I just love to dance. So whenever they sing, I just translate their songs into dance and I enjoy it. Dancing is my passion. It makes you shake your back side\u2026 That\u2019s Afro beat for you, it\u2019s a sensual dance. I\u2019m even thinking of a reconciliation so that we can join the band.<\/p>\n

Where there times you wanted to give up?<\/p>\n

Many times, especially when you have to dance for like five to six hours in a row, and you don\u2019t get to rest and eat well. And when you finally get few hours of rest, you think it should all end right there. It\u2019s hard to leave what you have passion for.<\/p>\n

Do you sometimes miss dancing?<\/p>\n

Definitely I do miss it.<\/p>\n

And when that happens, what do you do?<\/p>\n

I get the dancers and we start rehearsing.<\/p>\n

Do you wish your father, Fela is still alive to celebrate your achievements as the first child?<\/p>\n

I wish Fela was here for different reasons, not to assess me but I missed his company. Especially the way we shared our gists.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s the beautiful thing you still remember him for?<\/p>\n

There are so many beautiful things to remember him for. I miss sitting and sharing gist with him, his lectures, going to his shows, listening and dancing to his music, him coming to our shows and playing guitar with Femi. So many things that I can\u2019t remember. Fela was full of life.<\/p>\n

Aside Femi and Seun, are you happy that many artistes are not playing Afro beat?<\/p>\n

No, I\u2019m not happy. Afro beat is hard, it\u2019s not an easy to play music, it takes a lot of dedication. And in the whole of Lagos, there are only about three Afro beat bands and I always try to host them during Felabration. I wish more people are taking up the mantle. We must see Afro beat as ours in Nigeria before foreigners take it away from us.<\/p>\n

When you heard about the Broad Way show, how did you feel?<\/p>\n

I was proud that my father made an impact on people\u2019s lives and that a show was staged in honour of him. I remember the first time I ever travelled to New York to see the show and I saw Fela\u2019s mimic live-I was so proud. But I was again sad because Fela wasn\u2019t there to see it. He never saw that in his life time. I loved the show and watched it several times. And there were young guys and ladies who heard about Fela and appreciated him for what he stood for. Hopefully, this will inspire the Nigerian youths to stop running away from his music and who Fela was. And when it finally came to Lagos\u2026 Yes, I remember when it was first staged in the Shrine-it was fantastic. Every one in the Shrine loved the show and the casts loved the Shrine. And when the casts got to Eko Hotel, they just loved the fact that when they were singing the song, Nigerians sang along . But the reverse was the case in New York because they couldn\u2019t sing Fela\u2019s songs there-they loved it and didn\u2019t want to leave.<\/p>\n

Do you have admirers?<\/p>\n

Yes<\/p>\n

And you have a man\u2026<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t have anybody<\/p>\n

How do you mean?<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve answered that. I don\u2019t have anybody who wants to marry me<\/p>\n

Or are you in a relationship?<\/p>\n

Yes, I am<\/p>\n

Don\u2019t you wish to be married someday?<\/p>\n

I\u2019m happy the way I am and I\u2019m in a very nice relationship with someone I love.<\/p>\n

You\u2019re not thinking about marriage?<\/p>\n

I have nothing against marriage. I\u2019m just happy where I am.At fifty, you\u2019re set in your way and not sure whether you\u2019ll make a good wife material anymore. I\u2019m a career woman, I face my career which is my life and it takes my time. I traveled a lot too. But for now, my life is in the Shrine. And like I said, I\u2019m in a relationship and we\u2019re both happy together. If it ends in marriage so be it and if it doesn\u2019t, I\u2019m happy.<\/p>\n

What has motherhood done to you? It gave me a daughter whom I love very much, She\u2019s the most important thing to me. I remember that I used to smoke before she gained admission into the university. But then, I realised that if I should die as a result of my smoking habit, there would be no one to take care of her. And as much as I enjoyed smoking, I had to stop it. I want to live to see my grand children<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.vanguardngr.com<\/p>\n

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Yeni Kuti , the first child and daughter of late Afro beat king, Fela Anikulapo Kuti turned 50 years last Tuesday. She relives memories of her active years as a dancer, life after the death of her father and her desire to re-marry if she has the opportunity to do so, amongst other issues raised […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8323,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"spay_email":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[9],"tags":[1644],"class_list":["post-8322","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-entertainment","tag-yeni-fela-anikulapo-kuti"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/yeni-kuti-and-Fela.jpg","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4oswh-2ae","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8322","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8322"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8322\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8324,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8322\/revisions\/8324"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/8323"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8322"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8322"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8322"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}