Since getting into the University at age 16, the most notable question I have had to answer without giving an actual answer is
“how and why did you end up studying medicine?”
and quite frankly I do not blame anyone asking that question, for obvious reasons.
Obvious reason 1; I sing to a great extent, and as far as John Legend goes, my larynx follows suit. With my bathroom being my studio, my shower head volunteering to be my microphone and my neighbors being my audience against their will in the comfort of their apartments, I performed in the biggest imaginable arenas (my head). I have a song in which I was featured in “6 & the bag by Mūs ft. Swaggiy-p”. I sang in several events, both in English and Russian language and at some point mere singing became boring, and I needed something more spectacular, I made the decision to go electric by making my acts extremely performative with “obvious reason 2; dancing”.
I started dancing just before getting into high school, at about the same time I started singing, I was 10 years old. This career started off with dancing to slow songs by Westlife (here I learnt coordination), to Michael Jackson (here I learnt break dancing), to Usher (here I learnt composure), to Cyrus Glitch Spencer (here I tapped into dubstep), to Chris brown (this was the turning point where I added dancing to my singing), to afrobeats (I embraced the poco lee in me lol) etc . This quickly became my life and after certain displays, some teachers and school representatives looked at me completely aghast and would ask “why are you studying medicine if you can perform this well“?
https://www.instagram.com/swaggiy_p/p/BopANYEgffS/?utm_medium=copy_link
“ worthy of note that I got special treatment from a few teachers , haha... they believed I was special”
Also, I would be up there with Elon Musk financially if I got paid for talking. I mean my favourite character to play (in my personal arena; my mind) was Tony Stark. He had the wittiest replies even to alphabets or sounds which made his acting so seamless and admirable. This made people always tell me how much they relish and savor moments with me and these kind remarks ended with a chuckle and the never ending question of “why are you a Doctor when you could be a Nollywood or Hollywood actor?”. I loved to believe my story telling skills were good enough to write books or at least write songs, but to be honest I just never had it in me like that. But I’m happy to be introduced to this Hive platform where I can share these chronicles of mine.
Other videos I have could unfortunately not be uploaded, don’t know why.
Then came sports with full force to take over my life. I had always been a decent footballer, right footed, thin, with the tendency of being fancy with the ball every now and then before accepting the role of being a staunch defender. However my role quickly transcended beyond the defensive line. Soon after, everyone realized I could play any position except being the final striker (I had missed lots of goals, lol). My football prowess earned me the nicknames Asharvin, Ozil, Sanchez and Lacazette. It was safe to say in this aspect of sports, I walked on water. In 2016 I ventured into a teaching job in a camp where I was taught to play basketball by kids of 12-15 years age range, everyday with them felt like a sports festival, they taught me how to swim during the same camp (a period of 3 weeks), we played table tennis and I was exceptionally good, but then, I thrived because obviously I played against kids.
Getting out of the camp, I went back to the gym where I continued my usual 1 month workout and 3 months absence from the entrance. Truth be told, I struggled with diet and injuries hence I had these inadvertent breaks. Notwithstanding, when I get my rhythm going, I get so locked in that I go for morning and evening workout sessions, my clothes fitted better, and my pictures got more comments and the dopamine came in flowing at an optimum rate, it all felt good at that time.
Now came the best part of it all, photography, photoshop, acting, directing video shoots and video editing.
Photography was just photography, nothing out of this world, nonetheless acting on stage and in parodies , video directing and VIDEO EDITING brought me the most joy. Using YouTube, I learnt how to use Adobe Premiere Pro, I edited my parody videos. I started off posting my videos on vines, facebook and Instagram. My favourite edit was the one where I stayed >32 hrs without sleep editing a video for free, that was how much I loved editing. I made skits, clones of myself with green screen effect, made music videos for some friends, and a whole case history video presentation for my whole study group in 3rd year. Here are some of my works.
I cook!
Despite all of this, I was being a medical student by day. As perplexing as it was for a lot of people, there arose a new question of “How did you find balance between your social and academic life?” The answer was always simple; I never did! I had so much lapses and had to pause the social life entirely to get back on track and focus on graduating strong, which I did.
Okay now I’m typing too much but these events are just a half of things I can do and now I look myself in the mirror ask wonder “what can you not do young fella...” I guess I’d be answering that in my future posts.
Welcome to a part of my life, cheers.