B (2:40)

Well, I guess the next question. Should they be watching us right now?

A (2:44)

Well, why not? Why shouldn't they be watching you? I mean, you ask good questions. You have a great platform. So they should watch.

B (2:52)

Thank you.

A (2:53)

They should watch your show.

B (2:54)

So you spoke about being a curious kid.

A (2:57)

Yeah.

B (2:58)

Where did that start from?

A (2:59)

Well, I think from birth. I guess I'm just a very curious person. I always want to know what's behind something, why people do it, why they chose not to do it, and what would have been if they hadn't done it. And these are questions that I ask myself all the time. And I guess it's also because of the books that I. I read when I was growing up. I'm one of those children who never got a toy or a candy when they did something right or got a good grade when I was growing up, when I did something great, I was rewarded with a book. And so that's all I've always known. So the book is my place to go to. The book is my place to feel connected with my inner being. And books make you curious because as you flip through the pages, you want to know what happened next. Even though you have a certain idea of what is going to happen. The biggest relief and the best part about reading is when you are surprised it didn't go the way you expected it to go. And that's why I don't like movies, because the movies you can always tell how it's going to go. For storybooks, I know I'm going to be disappointed. And so when people disappoint me in real life, I'm really not disappointed because I've seen so many interesting tales. I've read stories of people getting disappointed and they survived. And so disappointments really don't get to me. I mean, what if you feel you've disappointed me and you think Nanaba is going to lash out because she's disappointed, then you're wrong, because I don't care.

B (4:39)

So who was a reader in your family between mom and dad?

A (4:42)

My dad. Huh? My dad. My dad is. My dad was a big reader and so he introduced me to books very early. And I wasn't even reading books for kids at some point, but from age 7 or 8, 7 or 8, I was reading adult books. I was reading Pilgrim's Progress. I read Animal Farm when I was very young. I read books, you know, I read Gorbachev's book for those who followed the Soviet Union. I read adult books and those books were pivotal for me. My mom would complain, the book is for, you know, 30 year olds. And I was reading because my father was Reading those books. And so I really didn't like the lady bird stories because I thought they were childish. They were too colorful. I wanted to be serious like my father, and so I preferred those.

B (5:35)

What about him did you admire so much?

A (5:38)

My father? What did I admire? Because my father was a very calm person. He was a good person. He was a proper human being. I saw him doing so many good things when I was growing up, and he made me understand that being kind was not an option. It's not something you consider. You've got to be a kind person.

B (6:02)

Right.

A (6:03)

You know, you don't sit down and say, should I be kind to this person? Should I help that person? It came to him so naturally, and he didn't have to know you. And those were things that inspired me. And so I come across people and I don't know them. I'm meeting them for the first time, and they go, oh, Nana, I like you so much. And then I start getting to know them because I'm curious, what do you do? You know, what? How did you end up doing that? And then you find out that they have challenges. And then at that particular moment, my mind is racing. How do I help? How do I help? You know, so that's something I got from my father.

B (6:47)

And, you know, you speak very much about your father, but in the interviews, I've watched very little about mom.

A (6:53)

Oh, I speak about my mom.

B (6:54)

Okay.

A (6:54)

I speak about my mom as well. But you're right, not as much as my dad, because all of those interviews are usually about my profession.

B (7:02)

Right.

A (7:03)

My father introduced me to Larry King Live.

B (7:06)

Okay.

A (7:06)

And I was a child. I was. I was very young. And so my father will be seated in his favorite sofa, and I sit right in front of my father, and we are watching Larry King Live together. And I was very young. My mom is not. My mom reads, but she reads just the Bible, right? Yes. My mom reads only the Bible or something very spiritual. Those are the things my mom would read. I'm not too much a big fan of those books, because then it's just one book. I read the Bible as well, but I want to read other things as well. And then my father also, because he would not allow me to go to the kitchen to help out. And so it was a hiding place for me. Yeah. My father would say things like, you've just come back from school. Why are you washing dishes? My dad didn't. And it was always a big issue between my dad and my mom, you know, because my dad felt that. And my father had only girls. We just have one brother. And my father felt that a girl could be anything, you know, she wanted to be. And my father said that if you grow up and you're able to read and understand, if you're going to prepare watchi and the recipe is there, you will read the recipe. And understanding you can make the watchi, you don't have to stay in the kitchen so many hours to learn how to.

B (8:30)

That was your father's view.

A (8:31)

That was my father's view. So my. The feminism in me is from my father, because my father was a feminist. My father believed in women. He. He believed women made the world go round, but my father believed women had an integral role to play in society, and he was not one who was going to sit down and allow his daughter to be cleaning, washing, and not learning and not reading.

B (8:57)

Is the first child of your father a girl?

A (9:01)

Yes.

B (9:02)

Okay.

A (9:02)

And she loves to read.

B (9:04)

Okay.

A (9:04)

My. My sisters all. They're all readers.

B (9:08)

I'm just trying to figure out how the home was because it looks like it's opposing views.

A (9:15)

Not necessarily. Okay. Not necessarily. No one was stopped from doing anything they wanted to do.

B (9:20)

Even mom.

A (9:21)

Well, she had to understand because she understood what my father was trying to do. She understood that my father wanted his girl children to be educated, to be liberated, to be free, to make their own choices and not to be conditioned by society, basically. And my mom understood because she had come from a society that conditioned her and made her believe certain things, things she had to unlearn. Once you married my father and realized that. Oh, Even though when I was growing up, it was like this. See my daughters do that connected minds podcast.