Leadership Tea
The Leadership Tea podcast is where powerful leaders share their journeys, insights, and triumphs through informal conversations about what it takes to reach the executive level. Join us every other Wednesday to be inspired by the unvarnished stories of amazing executives who know what it's like to be "the only" at the table and who have succeeded regardless. They have proven leadership experience in their respective fields, from international affairs to the private sector to academia, and want to help others create their own success stories.
Leadership Tea
Returning to Our Roots: High Tea with Mom
Mother's Day brings varied emotions and reflections for many of us, and it takes on many different forms, as you will see reflected in the stories of today's guests. This special podcast episode takes a heartfelt look at motherhood's role in crafting leaders. We're joined by two extraordinary women, Cora and Gloria, our own mothers, who bring a rich tapestry of experiences and wisdom. Their stories demonstrate how the virtues they learned from the mothers and mother figures in their lives deeply impacted their leadership values and principles.
Many of these lessons were instilled in our childhood homes and have become the bedrock of our leadership philosophies. These include -
- Respecting others
- Giving people around us space to grow while nurturing development
- Seeing the potential in others that they don't see in themselves
- Making calculated risks
- Listening
- Allowing and encouraging questions
- Having faith
- Leaning on our villages
This list is by no means exhaustive, but it gives you a glimpse of the nuggets of wisdom you will glean from this episode.
Join us for this episode, not just to hear our stories but to find echoes of your own family's legacy and, perhaps, a renewed appreciation for the matriarchs and patriarchs who have helped pave your path.
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We publish new episodes every other Wednesday.
Follow us on Instagram @Leadership_Tea for more inspiration and insights.
Learn more about us and the podcast at www.stirringsuccess.com
Hey everyone, it's Shelby and Belinda. Hey everyone, we want to welcome you today to our episode Returning to Our Roots High Tea with Mom. And before we get into the context of why and give some background on our moms, we just want to acknowledge this Mother's Day that we understand that not everyone's relationship with their mother is a loving one or a safe place. A loving one or a safe place, and some of you may be grieving the loss of your mom today, and we just want to acknowledge that and give space for those of you for whom this episode might be difficult. Perhaps you can pick up with us at a later time on a different episode, or maybe listen to this one when you're in a better headspace.
Speaker 2:I agree. We always want to create a welcoming community and a place where everyone can feel comfortable and learn something. So we want to give that caveat because today our mothers are our guests and we both have strong relationships with them, and so we want to just give you that context before we start.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, Belinda. Do you want to elaborate a little bit more on why we chose to talk to our moms?
Speaker 2:Sure, I think one reason I would highlight is that we often get asked about how we blend our personal lives and our professional lives and how we try to make sense of everything, and I think that it's interesting to talk about the skills we've learned that we use at home that are also very relevant for the workplace, and I felt there was no better way to start that kind of conversation by talking to the people who taught us those skills initially and helped us learn how to make that transfer, whether it's thinking about how to organize complex issues or how to use your voice, or even something like taking measured risks and being innovative and creative. Those are skills that we learned at home and that we find to be important to the formula that we use at work.
Speaker 1:Right, 100%, 100% agree with everything you just said, and I think by talking to our moms, it also gives our audience another window into who we are Like. People ask about our leadership values, what they are, where they came from, and in talking to you, we thought what better way than to have our moms on an episode so that our listeners could can see and hear who gave us that foundation, where those leadership values were first planted in us, and so I'm really looking forward to having our audience hear directly from our moms, who've had such a profound impact on each of us. Yeah, no, definitely.
Speaker 2:And I think before we dive into the episode it's important just to offer a little context about their backgrounds. I would say that my mother was born in a Gullah community near Charleston but was raised by her paternal grandmother in the southern part of Texas like on kind of a family homestead property, and so her lessons in life and her experiences are very influenced by her grandmother and other relatives in that space who really embodied that idea of it takes a village to raise, not just in this case my mother as a child, but to raise her and her siblings and even some of her cousins, and so her experience is very rooted in that idea of family and also just really her grandmother was a very wise person who really imparted a lot of knowledge on them.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that sounds really fascinating. And just for context, about my mom she was born and raised in Richmond, virginia. My grandmother had her after she had already been married previously Her previous husband had passed away and she had three children by him and then years later married my grandfather. My mother's father and my grandfather helped raise my aunts and uncles, but my mother was his only biological child with my grandmother. My mom references the relationship that she had with them and it becomes clear how much of a positive influence my grandfather had on her, but I'll save some of those anecdotes for you all to hear directly, but we hope you will enjoy this episode Returning to Our Roots IT with Mom. So what do you say, belinda? Let's go ahead and get into it.
Speaker 2:Let's get into it. I'm excited to share it with everybody.
Speaker 1:So we want to begin by asking both of you a very simple question about motherhood and leadership, since this is the Leadership Tea, and Belinda and I are fortunate to be moms and wanted to start this conversation, thinking about leading at home and what that means, and so we wanted to ask both of you what lessons have you learned from being a mom that are applicable to leadership roles? And let's start with you, mom Cora. How would you respond?
Speaker 3:to that.
Speaker 3:Being a mom has been one of the greatest experiences that I've had, and I think it brings to light the things that you want for your kids.
Speaker 3:You want the best for them always, and I think it's a part of leadership as well. You want to make sure that everything that you're doing is done in the right vein, especially when your kids are growing up, that you're making sure that they have the right values, and it's the same thing in leadership. You want to make sure that, as you lead, you keep all of those things in mind, that I'm doing this from a place where I want to make sure that I'm getting the best, that I'm doing the best that I can to get out of my leadership role and the same thing as being a parent. You just want to make sure that everything is on a positive note so that your kids will see and understand that what it means being a mom, and that they will take these things and not take it for granted, but to model after it, so that, as they get older, they will understand exactly what it is being a mom and being in leadership.
Speaker 4:Great what about you, mom Gloria? How would you respond? Okay, I respect everything that you just said, exactly how I feel. I, when I became a mom, I knew from my history and from my past that the modeling and how I lived my life was going to be the template for her in the future. I wasn't. It wasn't. I didn't look at it like a burden. I look at it almost like a necessity. I, the one thing I knew, was that she was going to need these components to be successful and on a daily basis. I didn't do it every other year or wait until she was a teenager, going off to college.
Speaker 4:I started this process from birth and I continued it until she reached that stage where she could take over. She reached that stage where she could take over. I had put enough positives and then model enough things for her that I was actually able and blessed to sit back and just watch it, like like you would water a plant. I actually that two moms not too many moms can say that that they actually planted this seed, and then they saw the flower and I actually did, and it wasn't always easy, especially those teen years, but it was worth it. And then to see who she is today. There just isn't anything I would change. I and it wasn't from a book, it wasn't from the lady next door or any of that. It was what I had brought this person into the world, and this is what I wanted this person to look like At 18, I had to ask myself how do I do it?
Speaker 4:Not someone else, me. That was my responsibility, and so I took a deep breath and oh, but for the grace of God. I exhaled when she was 18. Thank you for that. She continues to come back from time to time. Thank you for that.
Speaker 2:So maybe that's a good lead in to our next question, which is asking yourself when we were younger, who did you think we would become versus who are we now? And maybe we go in the same order that we did for the last question How's that?
Speaker 3:As far as Shelby is concerned, we knew when she was younger that she was destined for greatness. Shelby left home when she was 14 because she went to boarding school and that was a really hard pill to swallow because she had to grow up really fast and she had to take care of everything. She didn't have anyone there to help her with making decisions about keeping a bank account, making sure that everything was done properly as far as her taking care of the monetary things. That would probably be a responsibility of a parent, be a responsibility of a parent. So she had to be a parent, along with everything else that she was going through at that particular time and I think because of the model that she was given, always felt like, whatever you want to do, go ahead and do it and we'll try to be there to support you as much as we possibly can. And there was never a time that we would say, no, you can't, we're not going to allow you to do this or do that. It was always what she wanted to do.
Speaker 3:We always felt like, whatever she wanted to be, wherever she wanted to go to school, we were going to try to support her as much as we possibly can, to never say that you can't do this, because we wouldn't want it to come back as a slap in the face saying, mom and dad, if you had let me do this, that or the other, I could have probably gone a little bit further.
Speaker 3:So it was never in our minds to say, no, you can't, you can't go to boarding school, even though my heart, our hearts, were breaking because she was so far away from us and we just knew that she would be destined to do great things. And as I sit today and look back and reflect, it's just been a blessing and we just thank God that we were able to steer that ship to be there for her at the particular time that when she went to Exeter we didn't get a chance to see her, except for on the special days because we didn't have the money. We didn't have the funds to be going back and forth like her little rich kids, that she was around where they would. Just parents would just provide for them whatever they wanted, not necessarily whatever they needed.
Speaker 3:The money was always there, and that was really.
Speaker 3:I wouldn't say it was a setback, but it was one of those things that was always in the back of our minds that we weren't able to be there for her as much as we possibly could, but we were there for the most important things that she was going through.
Speaker 3:Never any doubts in our minds that she would be destined to do the great things that she's doing now. We're just thankful to God that she was able to endure and that she was able to press on and to come out of Exeter to graduate and then to go on and to get her bachelor's. We tried to get her to maybe stop and take a break, but she says, mom, if I stop, I'll never go back. So I'm thankful that she went ahead to do the things that she felt was necessary for her to do. Like I said, there was never a time when we said, no, you can't do this, you can't do that. We want you to pursue everything that you possibly can so that your career, this is what we want. You always want your kids to do better than what you did, and so that was the most important thing to us and we're just thankful and blessed that she's come this far and I know that she will continue to do great things.
Speaker 2:I agree. I know it was a lot of sacrifice, but she has done and continues to do great things, so it was worth it. Okay, mom, we're gonna switch to you.
Speaker 4:I think for me and you and I have said this to each other often I observed you from birth, I would say, to about three years old, four years old. One day I just looked at you and I said to myself what does that mean? What does that look like for her future? And the only thing I could think of was what my grandmother told me it was. She only had one ticket and it was education. How am I going to do that? What approach am I going to take and what is that going to cost? We were one family income and she's going to need a good education so she could hire help, because the domestic thing I thought was real, it wasn't going away. I could go in her room. Her idea of cleaning her room was to just put everything under the bed, and so I had to respect that and so on.
Speaker 4:About three or four years, about four years old, her dad and I seriously, once we realized that our life was going to involve a lot of moving around and a lot of traveling and she was going to be away from family and in familiar places that we were going to have to. What do we need to do to fill that gap? So I started out, I thought the right education template was going to be it and it was instead of daycare me getting a part-time job doing daycare, or her going to public school. We started with a system called Montessori School where she went in with a focus on an area of strength. We put the right things in place for her. When she asked us to learn to swim, to learn to play an instrument, to go to Y camp. There was no money for Y camp, so I decided to have Y camp, employ me, hire, and then your kid went for free. So she got the exposure. We just figured things out as they were introduced to us because we didn't really have a template that we could pull from. So we stayed the course of the education.
Speaker 4:So her whole life. As far as her dad and myself, it was calculated, we planned it, we just, and there was good times and bad times, hard times during the year, christmas, birthday but we stayed focused on education and we wanted her to see the world and we wanted her to go as high as she could and for that sometimes we had to take a back seat. When I used the term take a back seat, maybe her things came from Macy's and mine came from Ross. That was real for us. It was important to put her in that place. I needed her to be healthy, not not just academically. I needed her emotionally to be healthy.
Speaker 1:What struck me from both of your responses is your ability to recognize our gifts at an early age and knowing the sacrifices that would be necessary to help us become everything that we could be. So, thank you. I just want to say thank you for the sacrifices. It means a lot and, as moms, I think Belinda and I definitely have an appreciation for all that you did for us.
Speaker 1:Not that we didn't know before becoming mothers, but I think with motherhood, it's not that we didn't know before becoming mothers, but I think with motherhood, you have a different appreciation for a lot of things, and especially right now, as we are trying to raise our own children Olivia being a preteen and Viola and Christian being teenagers it's not easy, like our generation, the things that they have to contend with social media, information overload.
Speaker 1:There are a lot of challenges that this generation of children and youth have to confront. That I think it's fair to say. When you all were raising us, you had your own challenges, of course, but they were a bit different than what we're facing right now, and so we wanted to ask you what is some advice that you have for us as we are trying to model motherhood in the way that you all mothered us in terms of making the sacrifices and giving us the space to grow and become who we are today, and letting us be and trusting your instincts. But as we are trying to raise our children in 2024, we would love to hear advice from you, and we're going to go in reverse order this time and start with Mom Gloria. If you could respond to that.
Speaker 4:I think if I could say one thing for me, looking back to answer your question, it was family first and it remains that to this day. That was so important to me. Based on my own personal history, family was everything. My own personal history, the family was everything. I brought her into this world and I had little knowledge, but what I had was good modeling, and that came from my grandmother, watching the sacrifices that she made. When I made decisions. As it relates to Belinda, I had prior knowledge from my grandmother. I honored the things that she shared with me and I just took those things and, through good times and bad times the next 18 years of her life, I applied those things because my grandmother used them and they worked and I had no reason to change the formula at this point. But, unlike what's going on in society today, it was none. Family was non-negotiable. It wasn't. I wasn't going to sacrifice, it wasn't going to be second or anything. It was family first and when I did that and I stayed focused on that, my kids thrived when they came to us with ideas and with wants that we just couldn't even comprehend. How we're going to accomplish this? Are we going to accomplish this? We did, and I think we did because we saw a level of worth in them that sometimes they didn't even see in themselves and we put them in position to be successful. We didn't put them in situations where it may or may not happen. We had to cushion them and surrounded them in such a way that it was a done deal, it was going to happen. We just took stages of life that birth, toddler, teenager. We took all of those stages.
Speaker 4:I could say anything to a young mom today is if you do it right in each stage, it's going to, it's going to be okay. But skip one of those steps and think you can let a preteen be, do whatever, be out of control. You're going to get a struggling adult. And so we respected she didn't get to when she was five. She was five, she wasn't five and acted like she was 15. There was an order. My grandmother taught me that to order my steps, there's an order in life and when you step out of that order order in life and when you step out of that order, things could go wrong. And so I thank God every day for my grandmother. I lived the life that she taught me, raised me to and I pass it on to my daughter and I had the opportunity over and over to see it in my granddaughter. Not too many people can say that, that they've seen that. That same conversation pass for generations and it's still working. If I can say anything, it's family. Family matters to me.
Speaker 1:Thank you, mom Cora. What about you?
Speaker 3:you. You all have the models that you know that you have have been given to you, but I would like to share that. Make sure that you keep God first in everything that you do and make sure that your, your kids, know who God is and what it means to have him in their lives. And also to not to make any comparisons of the kids, because each kid has their own individual personality, individual talents, and not to compare one with the other, but to also just to embrace the differences that they have between each one of them. And also to make sure that you're listening to what they're telling you, to always have that time that you're listening. Sometimes we say we're listening but we're not actually hearing what is being said to us.
Speaker 3:So put on those listening ears and make sure that you're paying attention and give them the space to ask questions of you and what was it like when you came up and how did you handle this? And without being let it be an offense to you, and to just be honest and to share openly the things that you went through, even the bad things, so that they'll be well-rounded to know that you can do this too, because pretty soon what Viola has another year and she'll be going off to college and you want to make sure that she's grounded, which I feel that she is. But you want to always be there and have an open mind and not be critical. Even if she's sharing something that you don't agree with, you still want to be open-minded about it and allow them to share so that you will know and if you don't have the answer, let them know. I might not have the answer for this right now, but I'll find the answer and I'll get back to you. And don't put it off and don't ever put them off, but just to be there and it is true, it takes a village.
Speaker 3:You want everybody to be involved, to share and to understand. And if they can't come to you, then make sure that they have other members of the family that they can go to to share, because sometimes it's hard to share with mom and dad. There's always grandparents and there's always aunts and uncles, good friends. But just make sure they have those outlets where they can turn to and won't ever say I never got the opportunity to understand what was going on because my parents didn't really understand what I was trying to say, and you never want that to happen. You always want to be open-minded, like I said, even if you don't agree with them and they get on your last nerve. But still you have to remember you're the parent and whatever you say or do, it might not appear to you that they're modeling, but they're modeling after the things that they're being taught. So I think you all are great moms and you have great kids and you want that to always continue. So just always keep that open mindedness and always be there for them.
Speaker 2:Thank you, and I think our best to take that advice and implement it, and I think we definitely are beginning to see the results of that with Olivia and Viola and Christian. So those are all good points, thank you. So this is probably, then, a good moment to get a sense from you about I think we're interested in knowing who helped to shape the person that you are today. Is there someone who's helped to lay that foundation that you just described for you? Could you tell us a little bit about who that person is? Maybe we will. Maybe, mom, we'll start with you.
Speaker 4:For me it was. That person was and I speak for her I know often. That person was first and foremost my grandmother and then an aunt who had married into the family, the family. She, my grandmother just taught me how I represented the family when I walked out into the community every day. And those two people my grandmother and my Aunt Eunice and my Aunt Eunice they laid a foundation that I didn't even know was. They were laying until I needed it.
Speaker 4:And when I went out into the world on my own, that's when I started to pull on it. Before, often, some of the things they said and did, I thought they had lost their mind. But then when I went to college and I saw other girls, then I thought, oh okay, that's what she meant when she said that or she did that. But I am so grateful that those two women was a part of my life. I would not be who I am today because I still, to this day, pull on some of those lessons.
Speaker 4:I even have to laugh at myself because people don't do it often in today's world, but my grandmother used to have a coffee table in the living room and on the table was a family Bible, and then that was all kinds of notes, so important papers were stuffed in there and then after her death, when I read those, it wasn't all about the Bible. Sometimes it was about goals and just general things that she had to do in life and we call it a journal in today's world. But that Bible was like everything to her. I spoke a certain way. I surrounded myself with other females who had the same mindset, because I couldn't afford to do anything but that, and I think it all came from the teachings of my grandmother and my Aunt Eunice.
Speaker 2:Okay, thank you for that. We'll switch to Mom Cora.
Speaker 3:Okay, the person that influenced me the most in my life was my dad. My dad was a very hard worker. That my dad was a very hard worker and he instilled in me that in order to have anything or to be anything, you have to be prepared, you have to work and not give up at the least little sign of there's trouble. And an only child. My mom had been married previously and she had two other children and my dad married her with three small kids and then, of course, I came along. I guess maybe about five or six years after they had been married, after they had been married. But he worked hard, like I said, and he instilled in me that, hey, I'm doing all this hard work. He worked two jobs he was a chauffeur, he worked for this witch family and he also in his I'm going to say his later years, because he died at a very young age. He was only 57 when he passed, at a very young age. He was only 57 when he passed, but he was determined that he wanted us to be better, to live better, because when we were growing up, of course all of us were poor we didn't realize that we were poor at the time and he wanted there to be a better place for us. We lived in my grandmother's house that was left to my mom and her siblings, but we lived there for a while and then, as I got older, when I got ready to graduate from high school, we moved in what we call the north side of Richmond and he made sure that that house was there for us. He worked, like I said, those two jobs and I think it was possibly because he worked so hard that he died at an early age. But he just sacrificed to make sure that my mom and I had a decent place to live and he was content and we moved. I believe it was in 68. So he only saw two years that we were together in this new home because he died in 1970. And he just always left that with me. You just have to do what you can, do the best that you can, and make sure that God is in your life and that you can, and make sure that God is in your life and that you continue to work hard at it and whatever you have it'll come.
Speaker 3:As a result of that, and also in my later years, I had an aunt, my aunt Sarah, who was like a second mom to me. She was my dad's brother's wife and she was always there. I would call her what you would call the model woman that we speak of in the Bible in Proverbs, and she was always there to counsel, to guide, to show the way, and she just lived the life which caused me to say I want to just be like Aunt Sarah. I want to be that type of mom, that type of woman that when people look at me, that they will see God in me. So they were the two most important factors, persons in my life and I thank God for them in my life and I thank God for them.
Speaker 3:My only regret was we know God knows best, but my dad didn't get a chance to be a part of all of those wonderful things that you look for Dad being there giving you a way of seeing your grandchildren and seeing your great-grandchildren. But I know that he's smiling down and now that home that he fought so hard for us to have it's become now a legacy to Shelby. That home has been turned over to her and that's the blessing part of it, and I can see him smiling down, saying how grateful he is that his legacy will continue to live on in that home that he provided for my mom and for me. So I'm thankful for those two persons.
Speaker 1:Thank you for sharing that. I didn't think I was going to get emotional, but I appreciate the sacrifices and the legacy of my grandfather and everything that both of you just shared in terms of the legacy that you're both trying to build for us, for your children, for your grandchildren. Hearing you both speak about your aunts and the impact that they had on you was really quite moving, and the impact that they had on you was really quite moving. And, mom, you reminded me of something that granny used to say to me when you know better, do better. And I hope that Belinda and I are modeling the values that both of you have instilled in us and that we're making you proud. So with that, we're going to shift to a more lighthearted part of the conversation, which we call our special lightning round, where we ask our guests some easy questions that will provoke the first thing that comes to your mind when we ask the questions. So I will start by asking you both what is your favorite tea. Mom, cora, we'll start with you what's your favorite tea?
Speaker 3:I am really not a tea drinker, and I think it's because of with all the allergies that I have to be very careful with the different types of teas. But I do. I'm able to drink. Oh gosh, I can't even think of what it is now.
Speaker 1:Is it from a Veda? Because I know we've drank it.
Speaker 3:It's like a Veda tea. Yes, I don't know what the name of it is.
Speaker 1:It's like a peppermint herbal something. Yes, yes.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's it, and I haven't had it in quite some time and I need to get back to my tea drinking, because you even gave me a pot, do you remember? I do Columbia, where I could brew my own tea, and I haven't really gotten back into that. But I'm going to, I'm really going to. I'm more of a coffee drinker.
Speaker 2:Oh, you got me up here doing searches for Aveda because I used to love Aveda tea. Really, I'm like, oh my goodness, I used to go to Aveda at the Lenox Mall in Atlanta. I'm like I need that.
Speaker 1:Yes, we used to go to Pentagon City, yes, there was one at Pentagon City.
Speaker 3:Yes, and the last time we were at Pentagon City we had some they. Yeah, that is the best tea and I have?
Speaker 1:yeah, we'll have to do something about that. All right, gloria, what about you?
Speaker 4:yeah, I'm a big tea drinker and even wait to see. When Belinda first came to DC, she always could find these little boutiques or little places with the tea. And then she would come out to the house and she was like mom, you haven't opened it, you need to open and drink it. And I'm like what if I never get it again or I never see it again? I would hold on to it. But, yeah, a tea drinker, I'm a big tea drinker, and black tea in particular, and it's just sometimes I don't give it the respect that it's due, because when I actually sit down and brew a nice hot pot of tea, it really relaxes me.
Speaker 2:That's good, so we'll shift to our next question, which is what is your favorite flower or plant, and how about? I don't remember where we started before.
Speaker 4:I'll start with you, ma. I like an ivory because I don't kill it, and when the seasons change or it looks like it needs some support, I can always pinch off, put it in water, say early spring, and it gets a root, and then I can plant it back in the dirt. And I pride myself on the fact that the granddaughters come over and they have blossomed all over the window and they're just going everywhere, and so that's, I guess that's. My favorite is that in retirement I have prided myself on how tall I can grow a plant.
Speaker 1:Mom Cora.
Speaker 3:I love plants, but plants don't love me too well. I don't have a green thumb. I think Shelby inherited that from her grandmother. I just have a couple of plants. But I really love roses and I like tulips and I have to say I got some beautiful tulips for Mother's Day from Cheryl and Beth, but roses are my favorite.
Speaker 1:All right, cool. So our last question, since you both have traveled with us domestically and abroad.
Speaker 3:What's your favorite memory of a trip that you took with us? You want me to start? Sure, okay, but you're in Spain, Love it. We talk about it. Dad and I talk about it all the time, and especially since the kids have gotten older and we had more fun being there with them. And I love that shopping center Zalo Is that the name of it?
Speaker 1:Zalo, the name of it, the A-Lo.
Speaker 3:The A-Lo and we would go there all the time and it was just such a shopping center and also the restaurant where we always went for breakfast. I can't think of the name of it. Help me.
Speaker 1:I'm having a senior moment too, but I know exactly what you're talking about. It's a diner. Buters in spain are like on a different level. The food was really good and I'm not remembering the name of it, but it's like a chain in spain.
Speaker 3:But anyway, yes, I remember that too fondly yeah, but madrid has always been our favorite place to be in and I'm like chris, I'm ready to go back to Spain. It was just a fun time it really was and it was great, a great adventure and just seeing the kids and also, of course, being there with you and Vince. But yeah, madrid, spain, is our favorite.
Speaker 1:All right. What about you, Mom, Gloria I?
Speaker 4:think by far my favorite was Rwanda and Mr P. He was the cook in the home and we just hit it off right away. He would make this cup of tea and he'd bring it onto the patio and we'd sit and we'd talk and we'd wait for Belinda to leave so we could do some little shopping. He'd take me into the marketplace and he was like Mama, I got this and said we're going to do this, this is what we're going to do. Like mama, I got this and said we're going to do this, this is what we're going to do. But the one thing that I loved about him the most is that he taught me so much about Rwanda and his culture and everything he had gone through.
Speaker 1:I love it, mr P, in Rwanda, that's awesome.
Speaker 2:All right On that note. That kind of concludes our episode. We want to thank you both for joining us. We want to say happy Mother's Day, and I think Happy Mother's Day to you.
Speaker 3:Yeah, same to you all. Thank you for having us. It's nice to meet you too, and I hope you have a wonderful Mother's Day.
Speaker 1:Same to you, thank you, wishing you both a happy Mother's Day, and thank you so much for sharing your wisdom with us today.
