SPEAKER_01 0:01

Welcome back everyone. Today is another special guest on the show, a good friend of mine from dental school, Dr. Lero Majority. Welcome Lero. Hi, Ash. Hello, hello. So if you're watching this on YouTube, you might notice something different. I'm not sitting in my usual spot. I'm in a creature, I'm I'm a creature of habit, right? And I and I like to have my spot. But today Lero insisted, he's like, no, this is my better side. I'm gonna sit there, and I acceded to his request. So that those who know me as a bit of a stubborn, hot uh hard-headed person will know it took a lot, but uh I did it for Lero. Thank you for calling the shots today. Such a gracious host and and Dr. Yak, whose studio is where we record it, has gone all out and given Lero fancy crockery and stuff. Welcome, Lero. He's my showrunner. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Thanks for joining me, man. You're welcome. Because you on the theme of calling the shots and you're gonna call the shots, I'm gonna ask you up front, is there anything out of bounds that I can't ask you about? Any T's and C's, or is it open canvas, carte blanche? Um, because I trust you.

SPEAKER_02 1:17

Yeah, I'm gonna make you sign an NDA. I'm kidding. No, um, you can ask me anything. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:23

Yeah, okay, cool. And anyway, um, if there's anything, we can always cut it out, right? If anything needs to be cut out. Yeah. So yeah, thanks for joining me. Also, here's another story for the viewers and listeners. I mean, you did it wasn't easy to get you on the show. You know, as surprising as it might sound, I've got people, a few people lined up. Yeah. And for you, I to send you an email, ask you, explain to you X, Y, and Z. What is it? I I expected this from most doctors. What is it about doctors that like they don't like to come out and talk about things? And what do you think?

SPEAKER_02 1:57

I I don't know about others, but like I'm very um the day and age that we live in with social media and all of that, it just becomes very tricky. Um, and I'm a very private person, so um I uh I get really nervous when I have to do interviews and stuff like that. So um yeah, that's why I did it's not because I didn't want to be on your show, it's just that I was kinda I was nervous.

SPEAKER_01 2:26

Okay. Yeah. So I'm gonna try and make it like we're just talking like old friends.

SPEAKER_04 2:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 2:30

I love the show because it gives me an opportunity to just talk to people that I know for a while and like never have conversations with. So yeah, I mean let's start off with a just something I was thinking of when we were driving to the studio. Yeah, what's your favorite thing to do? Just in general. Like what where where are you the most comfortable and the most happy?

SPEAKER_02 2:55

Is it in Oh my goodness, yeah. I'm the most comfortable and most happy. Actually in my house. Yeah. Yeah, I love being in my house and being my space. Um I'm a I'm an Aquarius, yeah, so we love our own company. Yeah. Um, but I love being in my house and my own space. But funny enough, what I also like is um traveling. Okay. Yeah, so that's something that I'm getting into and that I've discovered that is very therapeutic. And um, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 3:27

So it's two polar opposites, like being at home.

SPEAKER_02 3:29

Yeah, like being at home or traveling and being out of the country.

SPEAKER_01 3:32

Yeah, I would never have like just knowing you. Um, well, not if if I didn't know you as well as I do, yeah, I would have never believed that you're a house plant type that likes the house because you are I never used to be like that.

SPEAKER_02 3:45

Really? I think it's just growing up and stuff. Like before, like you know me, I'm a people's person, I like being the life of the party and all of that. But that that was me back then. But now um it's a totally different thing. I like my own space, I like peace and quiet. Yeah, um what so what's changed? I don't know. I just grew up. Okay, yeah, I just grew up and you know, people evolve and stuff. So yeah.

SPEAKER_01 4:08

That is so true. I mean when we were setting up just now, you're like, yeah, you're such a perfectionist, you're getting all that like I think we changed. Yeah, you've changed as well.

SPEAKER_02 4:17

Like you're no longer the same, yes, that I've known. Which is you are not a perfectionist. Okay, yeah, you just did everything to get it done, yeah, and then you moved on to whatever next, whatever task.

SPEAKER_01 4:29

Well, explain to to viewers, like you know me from dental school, right? What is it? First year, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 4:33

First yeah?

SPEAKER_01 4:34

Yeah. And what did what was your impression of me?

SPEAKER_02 4:37

Chilled.

SPEAKER_01 4:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 4:38

Um, like soccer, yeah, like PlayStation.

SPEAKER_01 4:41

Yeah, yeah. Um like dentistry?

SPEAKER_02 4:45

No. You know, I don't know what you like. You just like life, yeah. You know.

SPEAKER_01 4:51

Okay. So now it's like I'm this boring grumpy perfectionist.

SPEAKER_02 4:54

I won't say grumpy. You're not grumpy, you're just uh a perfectionist. And um you've become a dad now. Yeah, yeah. Literally and figuratively.

SPEAKER_01 5:03

And the bod. Last week Okay, if you watched last week's episode. With Gunther. With Gunther, yeah. Yeah. Our classmate. Yeah, yeah. We had the couch.

SPEAKER_02 5:11

Hi Gunther.

SPEAKER_01 5:12

I hope he's watching. We had the couch. And um somebody very close to me is like, oh, you know, the let me let me take it back a step. So I usually wear like black or dark colours. Right. And people, some people think I'm trying to be like Stephen Bartlett, who's got diary of a CEO podcast, you know, trying to copy the guy.

SPEAKER_02 5:30

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 5:31

But the real reason is that like dark colours, you know, help flattering. Yes. Flattering the figure. Yes. Literally and figuratively. But last week's uh show, somebody close to me was like, Yeah, sh, even though you're wearing a black shirt, like we can I can still see something there. So I was like, you know what? Why do I care? I'm a dad, I've got a dad, Bud. I'm literally and figuratively a dad. So today I'm wearing white, which is like the worst color to wear if you're trying to hide things.

SPEAKER_04 5:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 5:55

Um just own it. But yeah, okay, so you think now I'm just a dad and I've things change. But that's the thing, right? When we we knew each other what how many years ago? 20 before 2010, so 2006. Yeah. That's like 19 years ago. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 6:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 6:11

People change in 19 years. You grow, you grow, hopefully. Yeah. Grow for the better. Yeah, so the person you know in campus is not the same person um, you know, now, 19 years later. Absolutely not.

SPEAKER_02 6:24

Yeah. Absolutely not. People have grown up, they've changed. I won't say changed, but like evolved. Yeah. Yeah. And it's a part of growing up process. Like it's part of even a butterfly. It wasn't a butterfly when it started out. It was a, I don't know, a caterpillar or something like that. Yes. Then it evolved and it became part of life.

SPEAKER_01 6:43

Yes, and you watched the Gunther episode and you might remember Gunter.

SPEAKER_02 6:46

Yeah, that stage is. Yeah, he's totally different even now. He's still Gunter, but like he's totally different now. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 6:54

And people watching this might remember Lero from Oh gosh.

SPEAKER_02 6:58

I I wonder what they think of me now.

SPEAKER_01 7:00

And am I right? It's like, what's the last memory of a person is what what stays in your mind, right? So you might think that person's like that.

SPEAKER_02 7:11

Dr. Masha Maite. Dr. Masha Maite. Yeah. And she's totally different now. Yeah. But she's still Cerule. Yes. You know what I mean? Like she's a mother, she's grown up, she, you know, and she's uh evolved that way. But like um, she's totally different.

SPEAKER_01 7:24

So it's yeah, some some of my high school friends that that watched a couple of episodes, they're like, Yeah, she's too serious and things on the show. And I was like, They don't know you now, they still think of you as that's the thing, is it you'll remember a person from high school. Yeah. So, okay. Take me all the way back because somewhere along the show I want to try and figure out between you and me, like what made you get into dentistry. But I always personally think things go all the way back to childhood. Can we go all the way back? Where did you grow up? What did you want to be when you were growing up?

SPEAKER_02 7:57

So I grew up um in Durban, uh in a small town called Newlands East. Okay. Um, shout out to Newlands East. Yeah. And um, it was a very humble um uh beginning. Okay. Um, and um I went to primary school there, high school there, um, even crash and everything. I was I grew up in Newlands East. And um I was raised by my grandmother um in a one-bedroom flat on Masbankay Avenue. Okay. And um sorry, I got a cold. Yeah so my um my grandmother, uh, she unfortunately passed away when I was in grade 11. So excuse me. Yeah, feel free to call she um in grade 11, and then I was um taken in by my my best friend, um Melissa and her grandmother for the next two years. Okay. So that I didn't have to go into a new school and my auntie wanted to take over, but like she didn't want to change my school and everything. So what would happen is that on the weekends or sometimes um on weekends, but like usually school holidays, and I would go to um Richards Bay and then come back, and then it was like that. Um then um To your aunt, your aunt in Richard Bay, Richards Bay. Yes, my okay. That's far away from Durban. That's far away, it's like two hours away. Yeah, so I'd go once in a while, yeah. But like usually on um some weekends and and then uh school holidays. Yeah. Then from that, uh I think that's when I made a decision that I'd want a better life for myself. Like growing up in Newlands, it's not the nicest place to grow up. It's a it's it's um, you know, the the ghetto. Yeah. So you always strived to be better and you want to be better, you want to have a better life. So um one um I would say maybe my mother's sister, she had a coffee shop in Cape Town. She had moved back from the United States, and um she had a coffee shop in Cape Town, and then I would go occasionally to also go see her. Yeah, in Cape Town. In Cape Town. Your auntie. Okay. My auntie, my mother's sister.

SPEAKER_01 10:28

So not the one from Richards Bay. No. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 10:30

So I'd go to Richards Bay sometimes and then I'll go to Cape Town. Like there was a time when she was in Cape Town. And then uh maybe I went three times to Cape Town, to be honest. Yeah. Um, and then this other time I had a toothache. Yeah. So she decided to take me to a dentist. In Cape Town. In Cape Town. Yeah. And um, when I went to the dentist in Cape Town, um it was the first time I've been to a dentist. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. When was it and what you're talking about? I've never been to the dentist.

SPEAKER_01 10:58

What stage in your life is this?

SPEAKER_02 10:59

I was I think I was uh 16.

SPEAKER_01 11:01

Okay. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 11:02

16 or 15.

SPEAKER_01 11:03

Well, you did well to make it all the way to 16, 15 and not need a dentist.

SPEAKER_02 11:07

Yeah. Yeah. Okay. I mean, uh growing up in Ulens, really, you only go to the doctor when there's something wrong. Like you don't really But this is what I'm saying. You did well to not have toothache and No, I never really had a toothache until I was that age. And then he we went there and he um In Cape Town. In Cape Town. And um Were you scared or what? I wasn't scared. I was just like, oh, okay, we're gonna go to the dentist. And then we went there and this guy, I was greeted by this fabulous guy. Yeah, he smelt amazing, he looked really nice and soft, kind of like Yak, you know. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:42

Did he have the Whitney blowout? What do you call it?

SPEAKER_02 11:44

He didn't have the Heartbreak Hotel.

SPEAKER_01 11:48

For those of you that don't know, I mean, because I didn't get this. We were referring to the head. Oh my god.

SPEAKER_02 11:52

Anyway, yeah. So um he had a Rolex. I know this is like Yeah. Yes.

SPEAKER_01 11:59

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 11:59

And he had um like just amazing aura. Yeah. I'm like, now I want to be him, you know? Okay.

SPEAKER_01 12:07

This is probably grade your grade nine, grade 10 around there. Grade 11. Grade 11, okay.

SPEAKER_02 12:12

So um, and then I'm like, no, what do I do? And I asked him, like, when he's like, No, I want to be like you when I grow up.

SPEAKER_01 12:19

Wait, wait, can I stop you?

SPEAKER_02 12:20

Literally say that.

SPEAKER_01 12:20

Can I stop you? So all these thoughts are going through your mind before he even lays a hand on you. I didn't know what I wanted to do. No, no, before he lays a hand on you.

SPEAKER_02 12:27

Oh I was sitting on his chair and then he does all the stuff and then he's like talking to me in between and stuff. And you're observing. And then I'm observing and I'm looking at him. So I've noticed from the moment he came in. Exactly. Then I'm like, no, there's something nice about this guy. And I wasn't looking at him from like, you know, I was just looking at him as like uh like an inspiration. Yeah, yeah. Because I knew what I wanted, and that was to leave the ghetto. Okay, okay. I didn't want to be inults. Yeah, I didn't want to be in the ghetto. I wanted to have a better life, but I didn't know exactly what I wanted. Um, and and then when I did he fix your problem, yeah, he did. Okay. I think he did a class one. Class one is a filling.

SPEAKER_01 13:10

Remember, there's not only dentists watching this. Oh, well, okay. He did a fulling of me. He did a filling of me. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 13:15

And then um What was his name?

SPEAKER_01 13:16

Do you remember?

SPEAKER_02 13:17

I don't remember his name. Don't you tell me? I called my auntie and I asked him, um, well, this is now. Yeah. I'm like, what is that guy's name again? He was a colored.

SPEAKER_01 13:25

Okay. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 13:27

He was uh biracial.

SPEAKER_01 13:28

Yeah, yeah. Okay, well, I see you you you're catering to the US audience here. Because yeah, people don't know about colored, right? The term colored.

SPEAKER_02 13:36

No, outside of South Africa. Outside of South Africa, they think it's a derogatory term. In South Africa. In South Africa, yeah. So it's not derogatory in the Republic of South Africa, but like outside, particularly the United States, it's proud of it's so you don't call yourself. So he was a colored guy. For argument's sake, let's just say biracial. Yeah. Yeah. All right. Yeah. Um, he was a um, yeah. And um, I forgot. Did you speak to him on the day and I spoke to him and asked him, hey, um, I really want to be you. Then he's like, you need to go to university. I'm like, okay. Yeah. Okay. Then he's like, you can go to UC, you can go to uh not UCT, UWC or something. Yeah, that's where he graduated from. And uh Vitz, Pretoria, and he was mentioning Matunsa. Back in the days it was called Matounsa, now it's called SMU, Sefako Makato University. So um like, oh okay, cool. Yeah, interesting. And then um then the whole way back home, I was talking to Bart. I'm like, this guy's fabulous. I want to meet him. I want to and she was just laughing at me, and she was just like, but like I I had a goal from that moment. I I knew what I wanted to do, and I was gonna do whatever it takes to be that guy.

SPEAKER_01 14:51

So that's it. Grade 11, 15, 16 years old, your whole life growing up, Newlands East, raised by grandmom. Uh, what do you call her? Granny, what do you call it? My granny, yeah. Granny. Yeah. Um, and you're not you're not thinking about what you want to do. You have this toothache, you happen to be in Cape Town, yeah. Your aunt takes you to this fabulous guy wearing a Rolex and looking cool. He inspires you. He he takes time to tell you about how to get into it and tell you what you need to do and do it. So before then, were you ever thinking of any career or uh, you know, how you're gonna get yourself out of Newlands East? What were you thinking?

SPEAKER_02 15:26

I was thinking of um being an air pilot as well. Right. And where did that come from? Because um I've never been on a plane. That time I was not taking planes. Yeah. Um Greyhound was my thing. Okay. Like that's what we could afford. Okay. Greyhound, translights, road link. Yeah. Um, we knew even the Eagle line. When was the first time you you you caught a flight? Uh the first time I caught a flight was in 2020. Like what you picked me up from the airport, I think, when we were coming back. From campus? No, from America.

SPEAKER_01 16:00

Oh, really? So after you um, that was my first time going to the United States.

SPEAKER_02 16:05

And that was your first flight in university.

SPEAKER_01 16:07

First flight was in university. Yeah, when I was going to the United States. And it happened to be an international flight. And it happened to be an international fewer.

SPEAKER_02 16:12

Yeah, I was I was like, Yeah. Yeah, God was like, you know what, you you're not gonna do local.

SPEAKER_01 16:17

Don't do domestic, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 16:18

No, you're not that. Your first time you're going overseas. Yeah, so it's and then remember when I asked you to come pick me up, like when I came back, and then Robin wrote on the thingy, like with our pictures, like gone to the United States, okay, USA, USA. Like we remember we had like photos everywhere in all the departments.

SPEAKER_01 16:34

One thing people are gonna learn about with my memory is bad in the city. Because remember, I was talking to Gunther last week. With our studio.

SPEAKER_02 16:44

Dr. Robin Saunders. Dr. Robin Saunders. Yeah, your bestie. Yeah. So your first flight was in university. I didn't know that, eh? Yeah, that was my first flight. And uh Cassie, Cassie's mom took me to the airport like after the the after the because I'd didn't did we promote into ancestry? Because I I wasn't You could promote it first, yeah. I first yeah.

SPEAKER_01 17:04

First and second year, I can't remember. I don't know. But do we digress? Cassie takes you, so that's your first flight. Cassie. At the age of probably what, 20?

SPEAKER_02 17:11

Cassie?

SPEAKER_01 17:12

Yeah, Cassie left industry.

SPEAKER_02 17:13

She left dentistry, she um because her dad owned um restaurants, Greek restaurants. Yeah, yeah. Because you remember she was Greek. Yeah. Yeah, so she still is probably, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:26

Yeah. Hey Cassie.

SPEAKER_02 17:27

Yeah, so do you think she made the right choice? I think she made the best choice because I mean she was so much more happy and she did the the calorie stuff. Yeah, and um, she she did that, and um, she was like, Look, I'm gonna take you to the airport because I was hustling throughout my university. Yeah, I was hustling. You guys were from like the nice schools, remember?

SPEAKER_01 17:48

Yeah, which who's you guys? You youth. Yeah, who else?

SPEAKER_05 17:53

Cassie.

SPEAKER_01 17:53

Dropping names, yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 17:55

Um Karu.

SPEAKER_01 17:57

Calling out all these people, yeah. Gunther, Gunther! Gunter came from poverty, but did you watch last week's Yeah, I did. Yeah, I don't know. It's different for him. Yes.

SPEAKER_05 18:06

Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, it's different. Like, I don't know, maybe maybe they didn't have the latest Mercedes in the in in the in the in the in the dad had the one, the older models.

SPEAKER_01 18:16

I hope Gunther's watching. Because even if you look carefully at last week's episode with Gunther, I named it from poverty to whatever, and I put the poverty in inverted commas. I don't know if anybody noticed that. But that's why I'm hopping on this. So so you reckon we were the privileged ones and you were husband.

SPEAKER_02 18:33

Definitely, yes.

SPEAKER_01 18:34

Why?

SPEAKER_02 18:34

Yes, you grew up in um in Umgarocks.

SPEAKER_01 18:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 18:38

No, I'm at the Mercedes-Benz in second year. The polar bear.

SPEAKER_01 18:43

So I'm not denying this. I I I I agree with you. I come from Players.

SPEAKER_02 18:46

And and there's nothing wrong with that.

SPEAKER_01 18:49

No, you gotta I mean you gotta own it and accept it. Yeah, that's personal. My view.

SPEAKER_02 18:54

Yes. And I would want that for my kids as well.

SPEAKER_01 18:56

Let me tell you a story, right? Which which made me realize how privileged I was. Okay. I think it was first year, it must have been in registration on the first year of dental school. We were standing in some line, and and somehow we had our metric results with us. I don't know why. I don't I don't think I dreamt this. I think this really happened. Or maybe I was in the line talking to somebody with me. So I was the first black friend I ever made, and this is the this is i it's relevant to the story, was in university. It I I mean, even though I'm from Durban, KwaZulu-Natel, yeah, it was Kfus. Even though I'm from KwaZulu-Natal. Yeah, uh, the first black friend I had proper, like the black person that I brought to my house as a friend was Kfus. But this is so so uh this context is important, right? Because I was standing in that queue for registration and I was talking to a black guy. I think it might have been Ishmael Sadibe, Dr. Sadibe, who I'm hopefully also going to get on. And we were discussing how we how we did in Matric, because we just fresh out of Matrix, right? So they were like, yo, you got six A's. Ishmael was like, Yo, you got six A's, dude. Like, you're amazing. And I I didn't feel like I was amazing. And then I asked him, How did you do it? And it might have been Ishmael or somebody, but his their highest mark was like a C, right? And I thought, yo, how does this guy get? It's really hard to get into medicine and industry with even my six A's. I didn't get in. But he didn't have it, right? So I'm thinking, now this is a bit weird. How is that how is that fair? You know, in my privileged mind, growing up sheltered and not but what I then quickly learned in university is that it didn't matter how many A's you had in matrick or in high school.

SPEAKER_02 20:36

You just need to be dedicated.

SPEAKER_01 20:38

You need to work and you need to know to do it. And these guys that that that that that had like the highest mark is a C, when they were growing up, they didn't have parents taking them to school every day and picking them up and taking them to cricket and p picking them up and going on weekends and and mom is cooking meals uh you know at home and bringing it up while Yash is studying and having the softest life ever. They did it themselves. And as soon as they got into university, those guys thrived. They were I was the one scraping through every year, failing, even though I was the six A's and the trick guy. But those people were making it work. And that's it, it took me getting into first year and and seeing this to realize that and people are talking about it now. It's big on in US politics. We don't have to get into it. But people are talking about merit, the Kiffness, um, who's that that singer, the South African singer who remixes songs. Thank you for sunshine. Thank you. He always collaborates. He does cat. It's not a South African. So the kid is not South African, but he collaborated with him and made a song. Oh. But the point I want to make is that people talk about merit, right? Now, if you look at me, I had six A's. If you compare it to that guy who had the highest mark as a C, you you'll say on merit, Yash deserves it, right? Yes. But actually, I got through just chilled.

SPEAKER_02 21:56

I had everything on my plate. If the circumstances were the same. Yes. I think whoever the one that you said there was a C, whatever, whatever, you probably would have done the same.

SPEAKER_01 22:05

Exactly. And vice versa. If I was I would have probably actually done worse than that.

SPEAKER_02 22:10

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 22:11

So I think merit is is a very subjective thing and it depends on what you what you've got c growing up.

SPEAKER_02 22:17

It's also like saying, like, what makes a good doctor? Like, what does what makes a good doctor? That's a very subjective thing. Subjective thing. Because in this day and age, what makes a good doctor is how you treat a patient. When I say treat, I don't mean like um technically. Technically, like if they have a, I don't know, like a micro bacterium that you just you gave an antibiotic and they feel better. But like how did you like how did you manage that patient? How did you treat them? Were you kind? Were you loving? Were you the interaction with you? That's more important than the actual thing. This is a theme that's coming up in a lot of my interviews. Especially these days. It's because of the society that we live in and the world that we live in.

SPEAKER_01 23:05

No, but also like I totally agree with you. And I do this quite often, right? Like, my dad, for example, and I mentioned this in another show. He says, okay, that dentist is brilliant. And I said to him, Dad, how do you know he's brilliant? Like, how do you know he's brilliant? You don't know that he's cut your class two cavity and he's prescribed extra. You don't know the technicalities, right? How do we cut it the same way as that one? That one also cut it that way. Yes. But but what I want the point I'm making is that I think patients, patients, they judge you based on their experience with how you made them feel. I think we spoke about it with Yak in the first time.

SPEAKER_02 23:42

That's something they don't even teach us in university. They don't, yeah. It's so important.

SPEAKER_01 23:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 23:47

It's so important. It's so important.

SPEAKER_01 23:49

Like I But maybe, maybe look, we we were in university how many years ago now, 15 years ago. Maybe they started teaching that.

SPEAKER_02 23:59

No, they haven't. I got a comserv.

SPEAKER_01 24:00

Oh, you've got a community service dentist working with you. So from Pretoria. Um Okay, okay. But before we go forward, I want to still go back. So we on that, we were on that conversation of you wanted to be a pilot. Yes. Because of what?

SPEAKER_02 24:18

Because I wanted to be one. I wanted to drive a plane. But you'd never flip it. I was always fascinated by them, and I'll look it up. I'll look up in the sky and I'll see them. I'm like, how did this thing get there? Yeah. I want to be the person who drives it. I want to be the person in power who's in control. And I just wanted that. And I wanted the ability to fly and and go across the world and just have that type of lifestyle.

SPEAKER_01 24:42

Until you got to grade 11 and you met Dr. Dr. X. We have to call him Dr. X.

SPEAKER_02 24:46

Dr. X.

SPEAKER_01 24:47

We need to figure out who he is after this. We'll do some research. I can't believe you haven't found out by now.

SPEAKER_02 24:51

He was in Kale's Raphir.

SPEAKER_01 24:53

Kale's Raphir.

SPEAKER_02 24:54

In Cape Town.

SPEAKER_01 24:55

What was the practice name? I forgot. Maybe if viewers will know, can you describe him? Colored guy.

SPEAKER_05 25:00

Colored guy.

SPEAKER_01 25:01

Tall, light skinned. Light skinned, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 25:03

I don't, I don't, I can't remember. Water Rolex.

SPEAKER_01 25:06

Yeah. Okay.

SPEAKER_05 25:08

I think it was a day just.

SPEAKER_01 25:10

So the only Rolex I know is the Submariner. Oh, okay. Yeah. And that's probably like the cheap, cheap Rolex. It's like the entry level.

SPEAKER_02 25:20

All of them are nice.

SPEAKER_01 25:20

Okay, but describe him more say where's a Rolex? Tall, light skinned, colored guy, charming. Is he handsome?

SPEAKER_02 25:26

Yeah, that's subjective as well. But like in your opinion.

SPEAKER_01 25:29

In my opinion, he was. So if there's any viewer out there that can just join connect the dots first, Kales Raphir? Gail's Raphir. Okay. How old was he at that time?

SPEAKER_02 25:38

Who I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 25:38

Like around, probably like older than obviously much older than like our age group.

SPEAKER_02 25:42

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 25:42

Okay, so he in your mind is an old guy. He's in retirement now. Okay. Until you get to grade 11, you realize I want to be a dentist.

SPEAKER_06 25:51

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 25:52

Now, you mentioned your mom. Yeah. And you said your granny brought you up. You were brought up by her. So where was mom?

SPEAKER_02 25:59

My mother was in the United States. Since when my mother moved to the United States when I was in primary school. And the reason why she did that was because she wanted a better life for me. Okay. And my mother didn't have any qualifications and she she had an opportunity to go there. Unfortunately, when my mother moved to the United States, she didn't move legally. Okay. And um so she stayed there. She worked like three, four jobs. Um sending money back. You know the usual stuff. I don't know the usual stuff. Leroy American.

SPEAKER_01 26:40

As you said, I come from story. Okay, the to- the typical American type of American dream type of American dream. Immigrant, if this is correct. Yeah, but immigrant story. People go to the US for a better life. What was she doing here?

SPEAKER_02 26:55

She wasn't doing anything. Okay. My mother didn't have any qualifications.

SPEAKER_01 26:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 26:59

So Are you the only child? Yeah, I'm her only child. Okay. And dad? My father passed away when I was two years old. He was murdered on Christmas Day. Really? Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 27:11

What what was he? What was he? Uh He was a cop or something. No, he wasn't a cop.

SPEAKER_02 27:16

Uh my dad was actually an electrician. Yeah. Yeah, when I was two years old, he he uh he got murdered. I think he was coming to visit me and they mistaken him for somebody else.

SPEAKER_01 27:30

And then they So you never like met like really met your dad, know your dad? You got photos of him?

SPEAKER_02 27:35

Yeah, I do. And your mom tells you stories about him and my cousins, like Cindy tells me stories all the time. My cousins did because she grew up with him and um my other cousins that are older than me um tell me stories and stuff. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 27:52

So do they tell you like you would have you would have loved him or something? Yeah, I don't know, because you never know. Maybe they would have said, okay, that's you never know, right? Yeah. She that's I actually didn't know this. I knew your mom was in America, obviously.

SPEAKER_02 28:07

Yeah, I didn't tell you about my my my my biological dad. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 28:11

So you're raised by granny?

SPEAKER_02 28:12

My grandmother took me in. Yeah. Um after she was too, because my mother had me when she was 18. Okay. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 28:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 28:19

So she took me in because that was her son. So she took me in, and then my grandmother raised me in Newland East ever since.

SPEAKER_01 28:28

And then And did did was she like the disciplinarian type?

SPEAKER_02 28:32

My grandmother was very strict.

SPEAKER_01 28:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 28:34

Very, very strict. Like I had, oh gosh, I had like all programs set out for me. Like I was an altar server because I was Catholic. Yeah. What does that do? Altar boy.

SPEAKER_01 28:45

Oh yeah? Explain. Remember, look at that.

SPEAKER_02 28:46

Did you know what an altar boy is? I'm not Christian.

SPEAKER_01 28:48

I I I'm Hindu technically, but I don't even know you can't.

SPEAKER_02 28:50

Do you like facilitate the service with the pastor? So is that a very like with the elbow and the robes and the So it's quite an important role and dignified. Oh my god, it was one of the early things where I learned how to be accountable and you know it brought me closer to God and all of that.

SPEAKER_01 29:12

And and your and granny made you made sure he confirmed.

SPEAKER_02 29:15

Yeah. I did my first communion there. Where?

SPEAKER_01 29:21

Yeah. Yeah. And your grandmother made sure that you were.

SPEAKER_02 29:24

He passed away years ago.

SPEAKER_01 29:25

So you went a naughty job and guys? You were a good kid. You were like a very well behaved.

SPEAKER_02 29:29

Yes. And I did well in school as well. How come? Huh? How come? Why? Because my grandmother was always like doing all of that stuff.

SPEAKER_01 29:38

So you think it's because of her?

SPEAKER_02 29:42

Not just because you were naturally like I mean also that, but like I I I worked for it as well. But that's more important to go and and go work for something. But but you do acknowledge that she played a big role. She played a really big role in me. And I would also have like uh after school stuff. Like I was always in um a program, like I would go camping as well. Right.

SPEAKER_01 30:11

And Camping, you see, and you told me you come from what? Camping sounds very I mean yeah.

SPEAKER_05 30:20

Quite a creepy thing to do with church.

SPEAKER_01 30:24

Oh. It wasn't part of school. No.

SPEAKER_02 30:27

Okay, yeah, right. I think Fundale we did that. We went camping once to St. Lucia. This is your school, primary school. Yeah, primary school. With oh God, I forgot. I don't know, I don't know who it was. But we used to go, and then I think in New View we also went once. I'm not sure. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 30:46

I don't remember. So used to go camping. And so you you went to the Drocks Place. How did you go to school? How would you go to school?

SPEAKER_02 30:52

I took a taxi halfway. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 30:54

Like a proper taxi.

SPEAKER_02 31:00

No, like a minivan.

SPEAKER_01 31:03

A minivan. You used to take a taxi full-time to school back down. How does it work? I've never taken a taxi in my life. Oh my goodness, yes.

SPEAKER_02 31:11

I've never. I haven't been one in a long time, but like uh it was like 150 deck for halfway and going to town was like the end of 50. So you gotta get into this thing from your home. How do you how do you uh get into it? I said in Maspanka. You do it snow. I stayed in Maspanka Avenue. Okay. So all the roads in Newland's east are named after fish. Okay. You have Maspanka, which is a fish. You have Hake, which is a fish, you have uh Jondori, you have uh Snook Herring, the Snook. Is it Snook Play?

SPEAKER_05 31:44

Yes, there's Snook Place. Snook place cabble jow um sea best.

SPEAKER_02 31:52

The seabest road, shared the sea best road, sawfish, black tin. Um cabblejo?

SPEAKER_01 31:59

Uh barracuda.

SPEAKER_02 32:00

Barracuda? That's even a school named Barracuda. Primary school. In Newland's East. In Newland's East. Wow. All the roads, bizarrely, would be enough for fish. I don't know why.

SPEAKER_01 32:10

It's a bit fishy. I don't know. It's a it's very fishy. I was waiting for you to appreciate the fishy thing. That joke. Okay, so you you go from that fish road. You what tell me how you take a taxi?

SPEAKER_02 32:20

Okay, so I stayed at Masbanka and I forgot the name of the place where we stayed. Um, they there's a particular name of the place. Oh god, I forgot. It was next to say it. So I jump out, I'll leave my my my grandmother's flat and just halfway. Yeah. Not even taxis. Those days the taxis were like taxing. So you had like earthquake, you had corrupt, you had notorious, all these. It was part of Durban culture, like with the they do them up and then put sound systems in it. Look, look, into that.

SPEAKER_01 32:50

I'm trying to put on a non-durbanite hat when I'm listening to it. They don't understand it. You talk about earthquake and stuff. Let's explain names of taxis. Let's explain it to them like they've never been.

SPEAKER_02 33:00

It's like a culture. Like they stopped doing that. Ever since they moved from the high Ace taxis. What is that? I'm sounding like a taxi queen, but like it made me sad.

SPEAKER_01 33:08

Like they've moved. You're saying they stopped doing that. What are you talking about? The culture. What culture? Of taxis, yes. Explain it to people that don't know.

SPEAKER_05 33:15

Like Durban taxis were a vibe. Like they had like the they decorated them. They'd have themes. They'd have like stickers, like vinyls over it.

SPEAKER_02 33:24

Vinyls all over it. Each taxi was different. That one's called earthquake. That one's called corrupt. That one's called notorious. That one's called white earthquake?

SPEAKER_01 33:32

I mean, I can imagine already, but it's probably called Earthquake.

SPEAKER_02 33:35

And it would have loud, loud sounds.

SPEAKER_01 33:37

That's it. That's what I'm trying to get at. Like taxis used to have proper boo, boo, boo. As a non-taxi user, I know. Music was the most important thing back then. Who and and the drivers?

SPEAKER_02 33:49

Oh gosh, yeah. Like you'll have drivers, like different types of drivers, but I was not really.

SPEAKER_01 33:54

Like a diverse set of drivers. Somebody, somebody told me they were very shocked. Can't remember if it was KFS, but it was their first time in Durban, right?

SPEAKER_02 34:02

Oh, it was KFUS.

SPEAKER_01 34:03

What did he say? What did he say? I don't remember what he said. Okay. But like it was KFUS. But the person said this, they were like, yes, they are Indian taxi drivers. Can't believe that. He said that. Yeah, they couldn't believe that they were Indian taxi drivers.

SPEAKER_05 34:15

There's Indian taxi drivers, there's Kali taxi drivers.

SPEAKER_01 34:18

In Durban. In Durban. But people don't know this. It's a business. It's a serious human. No, no, but people don't know is because you know, when I and when I realized this was when I left Durban, right? People think that like Indian people all drive BMWs, and that's in their mind. Like you drive a BMW or Merck, you're well off. They don't know that in Durban there's all sorts.

SPEAKER_02 34:38

Okay. Yeah, Durban is different, bro.

SPEAKER_01 34:40

They were shocked to see car guards who are Indian, beggars who are Indian. What? Taxi drivers who are Indian. That was probably capable. So, okay, so okay, you you get in the taxi. I want to give this sense of how you get to school every day. Like how what's the journey like?

SPEAKER_02 34:56

Yeah, so I'll take a taxi outside my my grandmother's, I'll just walk down and stay like awake. As a young kid. They're always flowing around. They're always flowing around halfway, yes. Oh, you're going to school, okay, in your uniform nighting. Where are you going? Find out. Okay. And go, they go, they go out. From what age are you doing this? I leave my house at seven o'clock just to make sure I'm at I'm at school. From I think I started taking Texas alone. Um, because before my grandmother would organize like a lift club.

SPEAKER_01 35:23

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 35:24

I think it was with Zenda, teacher Zender or whatever. Yeah. And then as I grew older, then she was like, no, you can From what age? I don't remember, yes.

SPEAKER_01 35:32

But like when it was primary school primary school kid. Yeah. Yeah. You see, I'd never been alone on anything at that age. Like I'd never done that. The first time I was actually on my own proper was at the age of 17 when I got to first year.

SPEAKER_02 35:46

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 35:47

Like on my own proper. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 35:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 35:49

Like I would always have somebody picking me up, taking me.

SPEAKER_02 35:52

In like in a bubble. Yeah, in a bubble. In a bubble. Wow.

SPEAKER_01 35:56

You were on your own commuting to school.

SPEAKER_02 35:58

I'm home, going to school.

SPEAKER_01 36:00

Making sure you're ready, go there early. You see, this is the thing. This is what I'm telling you about. Like the day before my uniform needs to be ironed ready. You who would iron it and stuff? Me. Okay. I don't think I've still I still have I've ironed once or twice. I'm giving away too much.

SPEAKER_02 36:14

Bless your heart.

SPEAKER_01 36:15

Okay, so you get I and and so were you academically shooting the lights out from day one? From from from when I was younger, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 36:26

But like it need I needed to act on it. Like I can't just be like, oh okay. Like I needed to make sure I and it was the only way because my auntie always said it, like, if you wanna the only way to beat poverty is through an education. Yeah. So I made sure that is this the Cape Town auntie? She was a teacher. Ah, she was a teacher, like your mother.

SPEAKER_01 36:48

And yeah, and it's so true, I think. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 36:50

That's the only way. To beat poverty and to beat the only way to beat poverty is not only financial poverty in education. To beat No, like just any type of poverty, mental poverty. Like you think differently. You know what I mean?

SPEAKER_01 37:05

Yeah. Because they c they can't take away, somebody said it, they can take away your possessions and stuff, but they can't take away.

SPEAKER_02 37:11

No, they can't. And you talk differently, you act differently, you move differently. It's just different.

SPEAKER_01 37:16

Yeah. Okay, so you so you do well in grade 11 in Matrica, I'm guessing. You get must have gotten six A's and all that stuff.

SPEAKER_02 37:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 37:22

Yeah. What subjects did you do?

SPEAKER_02 37:24

The usual. The only thing that I regret doing was accounting because I I didn't like it. I didn't see the point in me doing that because I'd rather much rather have just done geography.

SPEAKER_01 37:35

Well, but it was- It's neither here nor there. Like you still you didn't you got the A's, you needed to get into what you got into.

SPEAKER_02 37:40

Yeah. It was um my problem that I had was that um they had packages. What?

SPEAKER_04 37:50

Yeah, this package, that package sold um maths, physics, biology, accounting. What am I saying? Account.

SPEAKER_02 38:05

Did I say accounting? If you'll forgot in English. Is that what you did? Yeah, that's what I did. Then the other one was maths uh then it was like weird. Yes, I know, geography and all that S7 and all these things. And then I'm like, but what if I want I don't want accounting and I want geography? You couldn't do like a spoke. You couldn't switch. Yeah. Yeah, because I would have much rather done geography. Why? I just found it more interesting than accounting. I didn't really care. I was never gonna do anything. Debit and credit. Debit and credit, and you got the A anyway. You got the A and then. Yeah, but like it was uh just like Okay, so you got six A's. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 38:38

And what do you apply for in matrix? I mean, or whatever. What um degrees do you apply for?

SPEAKER_02 38:45

I applied for um veterinarial sciences.

SPEAKER_01 38:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 38:51

And uh dentistry. Okay. I was not gonna do medicine.

SPEAKER_01 38:56

Oh, so you chose you decided not to I didn't want to do medicine. That was I wasn't reacting surprised in a surprise manner because you didn't.

SPEAKER_02 39:03

Can I just say the veterinarial sciences thing was because I just wanted to have DR in front of my name and I didn't want to do medicine. I didn't want to have the same thing that everyone was doing. I wanted to be different. Okay. That's what I was getting at. Like why the veterinary. I've always been different.

SPEAKER_01 39:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 39:19

Why do you want DR in front of your name? Because I wanted a title. For what? Just for me. No, what does the what does it give you? It doesn't give me anything.

SPEAKER_01 39:28

No, okay.

SPEAKER_02 39:29

It doesn't matter.

SPEAKER_01 39:29

What does the matrix student think it gives you? I don't know. Matrix.

SPEAKER_02 39:33

A level of um whatchamacallit? Like what do you call it? Respect. Respect, like a class. Status. Status. I thought it was gonna just do something. It doesn't. It doesn't do anything. You don't think it does anything? I don't know. For what things that matter to me, no, it doesn't. But maybe for others, they they assume whatever they want to assume. You know what?

SPEAKER_01 39:54

I'm gonna be honest here, right? So I think a lot of people do exactly that or dentistry or medicine because of that status. The DR, right? And then as you gr grow up, you you realize it's it means nothing, right? But actually I think I think it does in some places.

SPEAKER_02 40:13

We always joke, like people always joke. Maybe it's because it's something that you have and we've had it forever now. It's like, okay, and we um whatever. It's like, oh, okay, whatever. I think it's a perception thing because. I feel like it's kind of a prof. Sorry. Yeah. So all the profs that are upgraded from um doctor. From business class to first class. I'm happy for y'all.

SPEAKER_01 40:34

Yeah. But like But you don't think it makes sense. I think that's because you know it. Does it? You know you yeah, you're no longer a lay person. I I gen like if you call a restaurant to make a reservation, what do you what do you say?

SPEAKER_05 40:45

Oh my gosh, I don't, I'm not like that. I am not like that. I am not like that. Oh my god, no, it's so great. Like what? I don't know.

SPEAKER_02 40:54

I'm saying doctor majority is making a reservation. I'm just asking you a question. Okay. I only use my title at work.

SPEAKER_01 41:00

Why are you responding this way? I already know where I'm getting it.

SPEAKER_02 41:04

You know where I'm getting it. And it's not because they're not supposed to.

SPEAKER_01 41:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 41:08

It's their title.

SPEAKER_01 41:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 41:10

They didn't.

SPEAKER_01 41:11

But you know what they're doing. You know what they're doing when they do that.

SPEAKER_05 41:14

It's just like, for me, it's very cringe.

SPEAKER_01 41:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 41:18

It's like, why do you think why are you like this?

SPEAKER_01 41:20

Why is it cringe?

SPEAKER_05 41:21

Because it's like okay.

SPEAKER_01 41:24

But do you think that they take themselves too seriously?

SPEAKER_02 41:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 41:27

Calling them doctors.

SPEAKER_02 41:28

There's no need.

SPEAKER_01 41:29

So if somebody um sends you a message and says, hi, Mr. Majority, you don't have to do that. Yeah, I don't get upset.

SPEAKER_02 41:35

No, I don't. I don't.

SPEAKER_05 41:36

This other time, I live with my car.

SPEAKER_02 41:39

I didn't, I didn't, I didn't tell them to to use my title. And then when I'm think when I called, I had like I needed road cider centers or something. And then I'm like, hey, Dr. Majority.

SPEAKER_05 41:50

I'm like, what?

SPEAKER_01 41:52

Gosh. What? What's wrong with that? You are Dr. Majority.

SPEAKER_05 41:55

Yeah, I am, but like, it's like, oh.

SPEAKER_01 41:58

You can own it. I mean, it's not like you are telling the guys, call me that. They're calling me that, then they're calling you that. That's what you are. Okay, yeah, okay. But it's an interesting thing, right?

SPEAKER_02 42:07

I mean some people like it, some people don't. And I don't think people should be ostracized for that. If they feel like they want to be known as that and that's their title. That's their title. They can use it. When you when you it's okay.

SPEAKER_01 42:19

When you introduce yourself to patients?

SPEAKER_02 42:22

In a in a setup?

SPEAKER_01 42:23

Yeah, in a professional setting. Definitely. I'm Dr.

SPEAKER_02 42:26

Majority. You don't do the hardest. No, no, not when I'm at work. Why not? Um because some people do that, isn't it? No, I don't like that at work. I like to be professional. Um and I want to address my patients. I don't address my patients. I'm addressing them with Mr. or Sir or whatever. And even on our thing is now, we have um what you identify as. On your what? On our um files.

SPEAKER_01 42:49

Patient files? Yeah. So the you asked the patient what they identified as a child. Yes, and how they would want to be addressed. They, them. So that's Department of Health. Yeah. It's gotten woke. Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 43:00

Well, I wouldn't say woke. I would say uh Progressive.

SPEAKER_01 43:03

Progressive, yeah. Yeah. Well, look, woke is seen as a swear word by the doctor. Well, not everybody, but like wait now, wait, wait. I only get to that just now, but I want to stay on the doctor thing. Yeah. So you think that calling somebody by their title in a professional set scenario is is appropriate. That's appropriate. And and by implication, you are thinking doctor equals professional and mister equals professional in or miss or whatever in the in that setting. Let me tell you my my experience of this, right? Yeah. So I used to work in Standardton Hospital. Right, yeah. All of our colleagues we used to call one another Dr. Lowe, Dr. Chotlal. They used to call me Dr. Naidu, whatever. Even though we were like we knew each other's first names. It was and and where you work, do you do the same thing? Yeah, I just call them Doc. Say Doc. So your colleague doesn't call you Lero?

SPEAKER_02 43:53

I don't know. They don't really. But like if they do, I don't mind it. If it's like But it doesn't happen, right? It doesn't really happen. I I noticed that in in dentistry, especially in public. I don't mind it. Like if um Dr. Magagula Vimbi calls me. Hey, um she's never called me.

SPEAKER_01 44:09

By your first name.

SPEAKER_02 44:10

By my first name.

SPEAKER_01 44:11

This is this is the point I want to make, right? So when I was at Saniton, we did that, even though I know the first name. Right. Then I w I moved to Saniton. I moved to San Santini, the big building there that uh Norton knows Fulbright. Yes, that beautiful building opposite Santon City. Yes. And I started working in this global law firm. Yes. With like big, tall, high-powered lawyers wearing suits and boardrooms and things. And you know, uh it was a different world for me, right? Moving from dentistry in Standerton to Santon Law. And I used to work with senior lawyers, right? And they would insist you call them by their first name. And it was a culture shock for me. Like Michael Cronus, who's a senior, senior litigator, he's now a consultant. He does I uh he's probably still practicing. I I felt so bad to call him Michael. He's an old white guy that's like been around for decades. He's like he's my dad's age, basically. He's three years younger than my dad. And it's so weird for me to call an old man, senior person by their first name, but that's the culture that they insisted on. And it's a Joburg thing, or it's a corporate Joe Burg thing. Because when I started working in Pretoria, I realized that it doesn't work like that. And my dad, who's run a law firm for decades in KZN, they call him Mr. Naidu. They don't call each other by first name. Wow. So it's like a regional thing almost. It's a cultural thing.

SPEAKER_02 45:36

Well, maybe in law, like they're okay with it. Like, is it a law thing?

SPEAKER_01 45:40

No, no, it's not a law thing. That's what I'm saying. It's a it's a regional thing because I know that the lawyers in Pretoria that I deal with, they call one another by Mr. Miss Ms. whatever. They don't call each other by first names. So it was a very like a Joe Burg type of thing. Okay, which was unusual for me. And I had this conversation with Mike Cronus. I'm like, Mike, you know, like it feels wrong to me. I have to like go against my culture to call you by your first name. Because even in a non-professional setting, we don't call older people by their first name. Call them uncle, whatever.

SPEAKER_02 46:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 46:09

Or mister. Okay, so that's the doctor thing. Um where were we? How did we stop that? How did we we were talking about oh the doctor? Oh yes, I remember now. Because I asked you what you applied for. Vet science, dentistry. Yes. And you wanted the vet science because you wanted the DR title, and we've unpacked that quite a bit. I put dentistry as first. But what did you what if you got into vet science?

SPEAKER_02 46:35

I did get into vet science. Okay. What if you only got into vet science? Let me tell you what happened. Yeah. So um I got they called me first. Who who? The school of Under the Port. Under the port is the vet school. Yes, they called me. I had res and everything was sorted. But like so accommodation was sorted. I forgot the name of the rays in in Understood. I forgot the name. Yeah, yeah. My word. It's probably some kennel. Sorry. And then uh they told me to go to um main campus and meet the uh guy there who's like thinging, ushering new students in there. And legit, I was the only black person there. Yeah. Oh, so you went? I went. I because dentistry hasn't said anything to me. I went and I wrote the exams and I did all those other things. When is this grade 11 or what? Grade Matric.

SPEAKER_01 47:30

Matric. So you go you have to go there before you you get accepted in.

SPEAKER_02 47:34

Dentistry, didn't we write uh exam? I don't know. Can't remember. Yeah, we wrote like two an English exam or something like that. An entry exam. Maybe Didn't you forget?

SPEAKER_01 47:46

Maybe we did, maybe we didn't. I don't know. Okay, but when is this? Okay, just when is this? Is this before getting in?

SPEAKER_02 47:51

We wrote the exam.

SPEAKER_01 47:52

Probably, yeah. We went to some high school somewhere in Durban.

SPEAKER_02 47:54

Victoria.

SPEAKER_01 47:55

Oh no, I didn't I don't remember that. I don't think I did that. I don't think I did that.

SPEAKER_02 47:59

Wait, maybe I'm mistaken.

SPEAKER_01 48:01

Okay, but don't worry about the details. The point is before you get into vet school, you go there and so now veterinary school.

SPEAKER_02 48:09

Wait, wait, they vet you. They vet you. Okay, carry on. They told me that I got in. Yeah. Congratulations. Blah, blah, blah. I'm like, oh, okay. I'm waiting for the industry. I'm like I boo. Yeah. Okay. Nothing. I'm like, should I go knock on the door? Maybe they forgot to call me. Okay. Because I applied at Madunsa. I got in. I applied at um UWC. No, K Zident doesn't have data stores. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. UWC, right? I got that one. And Vitz. I got all of them.

SPEAKER_01 48:44

So every school you applied to, you got it.

SPEAKER_02 48:46

Yeah. But I didn't want to go to schools. I wanted to go to to um Pretoria. Why? Because my cousin was already there and my family was countable for me to go there anyway. Oh, your cousin Green and them? No, they they came after me.

SPEAKER_01 48:59

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 49:00

Cindy was already there.

SPEAKER_01 49:01

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 49:01

So anyway.

SPEAKER_01 49:03

So you went there because the family is nearby.

SPEAKER_02 49:05

Yeah, and then they didn't want me to go to Witz.

SPEAKER_01 49:09

Gives you the edge. I don't know. They said it was ghetto. Okay, you're saying controversial things here.

SPEAKER_02 49:15

Very controversial things.

SPEAKER_01 49:17

Because you know, Wits.

SPEAKER_02 49:19

I'm like, it's a university for me, and I grew up in the ghetto.

SPEAKER_01 49:22

Wits dental school, the graduates from there, you know, they are super proud of their heritage of being Witz. But okay, okay. Let's get into that just take me through this this this vets. So you're waiting for dentals for Pretoria.

SPEAKER_02 49:34

I go to, and then I'm like, okay, let me just go. I go to Pretoria and then I'm registering to be a vet. Wow. And like black guys like, I'm so proud of you. You're the only black guy with that view. The guy who was like the the the rendezvous, whatever person with the admin or whatever is gonna like um assist the students and show us, okay, go there, sign that, come here, come with us, because it was busy.

SPEAKER_01 50:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 50:01

The the build the there was students everywhere. It was ramp. Main campus. Main campus. Everyone's running around milling around, trying to get raises, trying to get the secure, that, that. Then you need it today. Okay, now we've registered. Now you need to sign. Now you need to go and deposit this in the Absa account, then come back with the receipt, then do this, then do that. So in the midst of all of that, there was a time when I'm on the line. I was in a long line, and it was all the the snakes around the corner, yeah? Yeah, there was there were, and we were just waiting, we were waiting. Um But all of you are waiting for different things. No, no, we're waiting for veterinarial, then this one is signing, and everyone is signing, and then you go and what are the demographics of that line? It's just me. I'm just the only person of colour. And the rest is white people. Yeah. Shoutouts to all the whites, white South Africans. And so and so wait, wait. This must be very close to the interesting for me. For me, growing up where I grew up, it wasn't the case. Like it I grew up in a very diverse um government, like you know how it is, it's blacks, whites, Indians, mixed, we all mix coloured, everything, yeah, biracials, whatever. So it was all like that. And um, from that point to to going to Pretoria, it was like a shocker. And you're on your own in that line and you're not talking to anybody. Anybody are they all speaking Africans? Speaking to themselves, they all graduated from Saint Mary, saying this and that, that school. Are they speaking English to one another or Afrikaans? Africans. And how's your Afrikaans? Uh it's like uh You got an A in my chick, but you know Africa. Africans, you know we do different Africans. Yeah, well, that doesn't mean Yesha doesn't mean if you got an A in Afrikaans, that means you can speak Afrikaans. No.

SPEAKER_01 51:40

Really? I mean I do Zulu on Duolingo. No, joking. Yeah, I I the point you're making is just because you know how to do it uh on paper. Anyway, um So you're in that line, but wait. I want context here. Uh time-wise. Okay, yeah. This is shortly before first year starts, surely.

SPEAKER_02 52:00

Yeah, it's like around about now. What we are in, Jen. It was around around about now.

SPEAKER_01 52:04

It's in the year that you're gonna be starting.

SPEAKER_02 52:06

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 52:07

So you're not a you're not a dental student. I'm not-I wasn't called. As far as it's concerned, you could. It's gonna be a VAT. I'm thinking now this is this whole process is about like the year before sometime. No. So yours was secured before. Yeah, yeah, yeah. A whole year before. Probably, yeah. Jesus. I got in. I think grade 11 I got in. I think so, yeah. And then I got UWC, and my dad said there's no way you're going to Cape Town because you'll fail partying too much. So at least job work is closer. Pretoria, they'll, you know, they'll they'll they're on a tight ship. They that's what he thinks. Oh God.

SPEAKER_02 52:40

What is it with them? With the whole Pretoria thing that you're gonna be better there, safe, you're gonna study, and then this is the ghetto, it's a party house, Cape Town is too far, like you're going to another country.

SPEAKER_01 52:51

They probably think that Pretoria, you know, Pretoria was like the I feels like they have a group chat. Pretoria was like the seat of of the old regime. Yeah. Very yeah, yeah. So they probably associate it with like strict, being strict. And it kind of is. And it was, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 53:07

Now it's not like that anymore. It's woke now.

SPEAKER_01 53:09

They don't even have reg and all of that. It's all relative because we had a we had a good time. But if you speak to my sister and if you speak to Yak when they tell you about how they studied in Mauritius and they had school uniforms. Yak studied in Mauritius. Yeah. They had uniforms. They had uniforms. For what university? Watch my sister's interview. They had uniforms. The girls weren't allowed to mix with the boys. No. So it's more sickness. It's all relative. But that is just crazy to me. University. Yeah. University. Grown adults. Curfew. All that stuff. Speak to my sister. Watch the episode with my sister. Okay. Wow. But you're in that line. So you actually now, you're thinking I'm gonna be a vet. This is my life. Yeah, and then the phone rang. While you're in the line, no, come on.

SPEAKER_05 53:53

While I'm in the line. Yes. Yes, I cannot make this.

SPEAKER_02 53:57

Ah, bruh, for real. The phone rang. Yeah. And that time I still had my um 3310.

SPEAKER_01 54:04

Nokia, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 54:05

Yeah. I'm sure you had the iPhone. Yeah, the iPhone.

SPEAKER_01 54:09

No, no. The first one? This was 2006. Yeah. No, I had a 6110.

SPEAKER_02 54:16

So the phone rang. So I picked up a call and it was Mrs. Something from administration in um University of Victoria for uh School of Dentistry. And she was like, Congratulations, you being selected as one of our students for the academic year of 2020. 2005. 2006. 2006. 2006. And I'm like, wait, what? Yeah. This is I'm I'm in the line right now. I'm gonna sign. Yeah. I haven't deposited the money yet. I'm still registering. Like to say we're here, we're ready. And this guy is like looking at me like you're the only black guy.

SPEAKER_05 54:56

We're rooting for you. We're about to let him down. We're gonna have a bursary set up. Wow. Everything, take your res.

SPEAKER_01 55:04

We got you. Yeah, yeah. And you're about to let him down. No, how does this call go? I'm just like I'm like, hello. You're telling the line, hold the line once.

SPEAKER_02 55:18

No, I didn't hold the line. The line is moving, and I'm like, what? It's like, can you please um come to the it's we're on at Med Campus, blah blah blah. She's explaining, come. And um, when can you come? And the sooner the better. And I'm like, whoa. Then I call my auntie and I'm like, hey, this is what she's like, you are are you serious? I'm like, yes. Then I'm like, um, but like, this is the situation. There's this man that's yeah, he's uh but he's like two disopy dreams into me becoming a vet because I'm the only black one, yeah. And I'm like, I have to go. Yeah, this was not my first choice. Yeah, I'm sorry to all the dogs and the cats, the literal dogs, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 56:06

The way you sound like a rapper, too. Sorry, my dogs. Yeah, yeah. And um and then you just jump out the line.

SPEAKER_02 56:15

I told them that uh I need to go somewhere real quick. I'm coming back.

SPEAKER_01 56:19

BRB, and you blue ticked him.

SPEAKER_02 56:21

And I blue ticked in and I left.

SPEAKER_01 56:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 56:24

And then they were trying to call me. They sent me emails apparently. Oh my gosh. Lero. That, that, and little did they know that I was already in medical school. I was already in raise, and you ghosted them. Shame, man. I did not know what to say. You do feel bad for the book. I felt bad for the guy because he was really putting his opening dreams into me. And I'm uh that was not my first choice, and uh I wanted to get into Pretoria.

SPEAKER_01 56:52

Yeah, yeah. So you just uh so you you you jumped out of the line and you went to another line.

SPEAKER_02 56:57

No, I jumped out of the line, uh, went out the gate, took a taxi from Hatfield and went to Sunnyside, then walked all the way down on the same day. Down on or in town from sunny side. Walked to campus to med school. Up the road, up the road to med school. Yeah, this district, 20 district, and then um BMW is the site, remember? Basic medical sciences. Then I met the lady that called me. Yeah, she gave me my things, all my files and my folder. Yeah, my name was on the list. Yeah. Yeah, Ash was also there. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 57:28

But you didn't know. I didn't know you that is, yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 57:30

Yeah. And I'm like, oh, okay. Then I signed, she gave me my things, and then she registered me, and then I needed to go pay and then send a proof of payment. And Bob was your uncle. And res and accommodation, all that stuff? Yes, um, they tell me to pick a res. I picked uh Ulinotes, I don't know why. I didn't know. Oh, you had to pick a main campus res? I I picked whatever raise. They didn't tell me which raises are where. I don't know, nothing. So I picked uh Uly Notes. I don't know why I did that, and then I for the first six months, remember we were still a main campus. Right? So we we we did that. Um for the first six months we did that. And then um after six months, and we had the bus that was picking us up and dropping us off. And then after that, second year, I moved to Hippo.

SPEAKER_01 58:18

Hippocratus, Hippocrates or Hippocratus, as they say in North of the Yukescale River. So I'm I'm uh and my mind is wandering, but I'm already thinking of the title for this episode. The the the dentist who almost became a vet. Like I ne I I genuinely did not know this about you, Leo. You never told me about it.

SPEAKER_00 58:35

I don't tell you, I didn't feel like there wasn't.

SPEAKER_01 58:38

There was no time. You see, this is why I love this show, man. We get to talk about things I'll never have spoken about. Yeah, well. This is an amazing story. Okay, so do you regret not becoming a vet? No.

SPEAKER_02 58:48

But I don't know where the man is right now.

SPEAKER_01 58:50

Think about how many dogs have been saved and how many uh where is that man? Horses you could have bred and are ghosted. Yeah, well, that that was the wrong thing to do. Come on, Nero.

SPEAKER_02 59:01

You could have at least had the No, I think he was gonna try to pressurize me to stay.

SPEAKER_01 59:05

Yeah, but I think you owe it to me.

SPEAKER_02 59:06

And I didn't I didn't want to do that.

SPEAKER_01 59:08

Yeah, but also how old were you? 17. 17, yeah, okay. Look, it's we can forgive a 17-year-old kid for uh not being courteous to say, you know. Not being professional. Yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_02 59:25

Yeah, it was that.

SPEAKER_01 59:26

It's an amazing story, man.

SPEAKER_02 59:27

Yeah, so that's what happened.

SPEAKER_01 59:29

And then um, yeah, and then we Well, I'm glad you got into something you wanted to do. But weren't you a bit annoyed with Pretoria? I mean, all the other universities are giving you uh advanced acceptance, and here's these people calling you as like.

SPEAKER_02 59:42

I was on the verge of actually saying, you know what, I'm gonna go to one of the universities, but like time was running out, and I mean, you know, people are being called, and you know, I'm thinking maybe they took me in because somebody cancelled on them. Could be to be best. Yeah. Yeah, because it was very bizarre, it was very last minute. Literally, I was in line to go become a vet. And we're to know sizes is seven years. Seven years, yeah. Very difficult. Each animal.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:12

I had a friend that was really battling to get into vet science.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:14

Oh god, I could have given him my my my token.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:17

And he he he passed away while we were students, man. Eurasian governor. You I don't think you met it because he was on main campus trying to get in. And then he on his birthday he died in a car accident. He was such a great guy. But he it's weird, hey, there are people that are desperate to get into something.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:34

No, and that course had like legit, like I think there was like 30 people, like 20, 30 people, it's a small crowd. It's harder to get into bed science and medicine. I I got into it. Yeah, that's brilliant. They took me in. No, that's that that's an elite uh. And I was I was the only one of color. I don't know if I was gonna make it. I'm thinking, how would my life would have been different? I probably would have made it, but like I would have had a horrible experience. Why? I just feel I don't know. So do you love dentistry? Do you love being a dentist? Uh look, I'm grateful for dentistry and the opportunities that it has given me and what it has done for me and my life. Um, and I will always love it for that. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:20

Yeah, let me just say that. That that's a very that's a very diplomatic way of saying that you don't love dentistry.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:26

It's I mean, I'm the practice of dentistry. I mean, I'm I'm a decent dentist.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:31

Yeah, but that's not what I'm asking. That's not what I'm asking. I I'm I already good. I assume that you're at least a decent dentist. I'm asking you, do you love dentistry? Like you can be a really great whatever, but you might not love it.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:45

When I came here to YAX practice, it reminded me what dentistry really is about.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:49

But Yak's practice, I'm telling you, is the best practice.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:52

It's the best practice I've ever seen. Uh and I've been to a lot of them, even in America.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:57

Oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:58

I'm not saying this because I've been to many practices. I'm not saying it's because he's my cousin.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:02

No.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:02

I'll tell you why I understand.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:03

For real. For real, for real. Even the colours, the themes, the vibes, he thought of every little thing, and it makes sense.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:13

Let's plug it. So shout out to Bedford View Dental Care. Yes. 17 Willow Cress. Yak. It's weird.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:18

And they take all forms of payment. Well, not all forms of payment. They don't take medical aid.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:23

They don't take medical aid. I only say it's a best practice because I know somebody who visits lots of dental practices in Joeburg, and they posted recently that this is the best practice in Joburg. So look, there are great practices, but this is this is one up there. Okay. So you don't love dentistry. Yeah. I'm putting words in your mouth. You didn't say it. You said you love the opportunities. I won't say I don't love it. Why? What's wrong with no what's wrong with saying you don't love it? It's okay not to love it. It's okay not to love something. It's like, let's just say your job was let's just say your job was um a uh packing uh packing things in a in a store. And if I come and ask you, do you love packing things in the store? I wouldn't you wouldn't judge the person if they say no, I don't love it. It's a it's a means to an end. So I'm asking you do you love practicing dentistry? Okay. And if you're hesitating to say to me yes, let me tell you, yesterday I was at a wedding. I was at a wedding, right? How many doctors were there? No, no, they weren't so the person that was getting married was a dentist. Yeah. And so there wasn't a lot of doctors there. No, there was hardly any.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:28

No, no. And and but the person the people that I was when I went to when I went sorry to cut you off, but when I went to um Lisa, you know Lisa, Lisa Laty. Yes, she she had a beautiful wedding. Yeah. Um, this was before COVID, and it was it was doctors from there to there.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:45

Full of what medical dogs? Yeah, yeah. Did she marry a medical? No, well, dentists. Okay, yeah, yeah, dentist. That's you know that you know the doctor. Glenn was there. Um prof Buchanan. He features it. Yes, he had a special mention last week.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:00

Oh, congratulations to him! I'm so proud of him.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:03

Oh, yeah, because he's he's a prof and everything. I'm saying we gave him a special mention in in Gunther's episode just because we were talking about him, not because he achieved. We were talking about how great he is, but he's an amazing, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:15

He's an amazing guy. Yeah. Not only that, like he's a he's a good, well, a good doctor. No, no, he's a good top man.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:23

Top man. It's a pity he's leaving us for for down under. You know that, right?

SPEAKER_02 1:04:27

Now they always come back. Okay, let's see if Glenn comes back.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:30

But but so I was at this wedding yesterday. Yeah. And I was with a dentist, another dentist who studied a few years after me. Yeah. Fine finished a few years after me. Yeah. And unprovoked, the guy tells me, his top man, Dr. Tato Molefi, he tells me he I love what I'm doing. Like, wow. He tells me that you feel that.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:50

I've never ever met a dentist that said that to me in my life. Even in America, I've never ever met them. They'll always say, I I um I'm I'm cool with it. That's about this. Well, that's what you said. You're cool. I'm cool with it. Or they'll say it's it's uh I'm grateful, or I'm this, that, that. But they'll never say, I'm love it. I love it. Um another one that I would say is um that loves dentistry. Who would I say loves dentistry that we both know?

SPEAKER_01 1:05:23

Oh man. I can think of a handful of people that I know that love dentistry. Yeah. But maybe some people just But you never know until you interview them. They probably just Yes. And some people say they don't love it, but actually deep down they actually do love it. They just don't want to say it. They wanna they don't want to they feel like it's not humble to say I love what I'm doing because it's like you you you're boasting or you're not being humble. Yeah, you know what I mean?

SPEAKER_02 1:05:47

Like it's not the right thing to say. You're not grateful.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:50

So that's why it takes conversation and uncover.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:52

And then people just start like chipping at it.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:55

But this is why I'm not even though you haven't said you love it, I'm not I'm still not sure whether you love it or not. Um, maybe you also just subconsciously are.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:03

Honestly, if I could give another opportunity, I would definitely would take like to be an air pilot. And it's something that I wanna try, even if I just get the papers and I don't do anything with it.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:16

Okay. So you've already preempted a question because I was going to ask a friend of mine was um she um Dr.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:25

Harilala, her husband, is uh air pilot.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:29

Uh commercial or commercial. Wow. Yeah, he flies SA.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:33

So she probably doesn't see him much. See, that's okay, because I was going to ask you if you could go back and pick something else, would you? And you've already answered you would. You wouldn't do dentistry again. Yeah, I wouldn't. Very interesting.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:50

You probably wouldn't have never met me.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:52

Yeah, no, so I'm grateful that you did. You got out of that line at vet school. You got into the school.

SPEAKER_05 1:06:57

I made a move, picked up my 3310.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:00

Yes. And uh dialed star 140 star. Please call me. Tell us about dental school now. So you get in this thing that you wanted to do, and you get into dental school. Oh my god. In Pretoria. It's not it's not any old dental school.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:19

Oh, that was a Pretoria was a culture shock for me. Yeah. Because remember, I was in main campus at the beginning. No way, like that side. I was in main campus, so I had to do everything. I had to um do rag.

SPEAKER_04 1:07:36

Right?

SPEAKER_01 1:07:38

What's rag? Rag. You didn't do rag. Uh uh look, I know what rag is, but I'm asking for the benefit of viewers and people that don't know University of Pretoria. Oh, welcome to the life of a podcast host.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:51

A rag is basically this. Is it a festival? I think so.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:57

Like an annual festival. I think it stands for reach out and give. It's like a fundraiser type. It's a fundraiser thing. University students get together. And we have these floats and floats, and then we walk around. They don't do it anymore.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:10

I think in the US they'll probably call it a parade. Like a parade, yeah. They don't do it anymore. Yeah, it was just as big as. I don't think so.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:17

They told me they stopped doing all of that. Oh, okay. They've become so you did all that, you you you you are assimilating into Praetoria culture. You're starting to learn Afrikaans and I had a uniform. I think I just broke this wall. Like a piece of thick fill.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:33

I had a uniform. Um what? The ink mel ink uniform. Ink melodink. Ink melodink, we did that. You sing and dance and sing Afrikaans. And we had like this culture thing that we were doing in um in umotes. And we had to address all of our seniors as um. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:00

But like old Oli Note man. Is Olynote like an all boys thing? Yeah, all boys. All boys. Yo, and how was it? Book a note next door.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:10

What was it? Book a note. Yeah, next door. Our mascot was a rhinoceros. Yeah. So in the mornings we had to go and greet it. Greeted, I know. And oh my goodness. No, no, no, no. And then we they had all these weird ass rules that we needed to do. We can't eat when they were there. Uh when who was there? The seniors. The seniors, and then we had to do a what was blitzkirting? What is that? Like when we go on Saturdays, we needed to go and raise money for rag. Blitzketting. Oh my god, that just popped out of my head like that. What do you do? Uh we go, they'll leave us on the sides of the road and we're dressed up in our uniform and we'll be asking for money for rag. So you go from when they'll come and pick us up later on. Hold on, hold on, hold on. And then we we give them the money and then they con they they take it to the for the rag, which I don't give.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:02

So you go from Newland East to that, to that, to that. And then what's the demographics like? There were a couple of blacks. Okay, so you went-it wasn't like vet school. No.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:11

Vet school line. No, no, no, no, no, no. No, no, no, no, no. So we had all of the And did you fit in? Yeah, and like every day we would go to the female razors and start singing to them. Singing for what? It's part of their culture, like Dinercha, Doc Shalmanta, don't know, still gaffees, fandy replique, vanolinot.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:31

I don't know what you're saying. There's Afrikaans. I had to cram it.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:37

Sorry.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:38

Yeah, what? I had to cram it. Yes. Like study just uh off by heart. Off by heart. Okay, so that that's not even dental school.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:45

I never had this experience. And I had to do dentistry well while I'm doing that and pass. Make sure I pass. So it was a lot for me.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:52

Yeah, but I feel like because you knew how to study independently from school.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:58

Yeah, I wasn't, it wasn't too much. That part wasn't the case. I was just like, oh, okay. Yeah, because I I knew how to like make sure I pressured. Yes. Like I I knew the pr I felt the pressure. I I was like, oh, okay, here we go again. Like and you weren't partying and stuff? No, I didn't have I didn't have time for that. Yeah. I didn't have time for that. So I was only there for like uh and money? Uh I had a bursary.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:23

Uh because you did well in school. Yeah. So. So what a full full bursary? Full bursary. From who? From where? Department of Health. Okay. In which province? Kaiseran. Does that mean that they'll pay for you, but you've got to go work for them? Yeah. And does that happen? Like, did you go and work for it? Yeah, I did. Okay, let's not get ahead of ourselves. So that's first year now. It's it's Pretoria culture. Proper universe. This is proper, proper proper Pretoria culture. You're singing African songs. You're dressing up.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:51

I think this picture you are, are you wearing like short khaki pants or something?

SPEAKER_01 1:11:54

Short really black pants. Or black. Okay, I was just making a joke. Not khaki.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:57

Yeah, but just short short pants.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:58

Yeah, short short.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:59

Because this is our uniform. Our uniform was black and grey. See, you had a uniform also. This is like Mauritius. No, but I can't not for the university. It was for the Rays. Even the one who wore it because I was ink for first year. Ink means? Uh first year. First yesteryara. Oh, you're a yester yara.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:20

Hey, you're proud ink. I don't know why it's Afrikaans. I don't even know why. It's like as soon as you step onto soil. Yeah, I'm just like, oh it's like that trauma from the past. It's like now you just prod Afrikaans. Okay. Yeah, it's amazing, eh?

SPEAKER_00 1:12:39

And I was just like I changed back to my normal self again.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:43

They jumped it into you. You were indoctrinated there.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:46

Can I just say I'm grateful for that experience?

SPEAKER_01 1:12:49

Yeah, we're making light of it.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:51

I am, though. Because it taught me so much about discipline and other cultures. And I wish they didn't stop. Apparently they did. Oh, allegedly.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:01

Oh, you think they stop all that?

SPEAKER_02 1:13:02

Yes, they don't do all of that. It's just a normal one.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:04

Oh, okay. Yeah, Gunther was mentioning something like that recently. But was it not like abusive and stuff?

SPEAKER_02 1:13:13

At the time, how did you feel about it? I felt like they were doing too much. What do you mean? But like doing too much. Like they wanted us to go and do this and do that, greet the statues.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:22

Was it belittling and demeaning?

SPEAKER_02 1:13:24

And when you when you when sorry, when you when you think you have to eat your chess when you're greeting uh an orm. So you can add minister whatever, host Dark Minister this, dark minister that.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:36

I'm sorry to laugh, but it's just it's just mind-boggling.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:39

Yeah, and um guess what? Uh uh You still think that's great.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:44

I mean, you still think they should have maintained that. Interesting. In hindsight, I guess, but in the moment where you're not like, uh, this is terrible. Not really. I had moments of that.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:57

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:58

Yeah. And how long does that last?

SPEAKER_02 1:14:00

Six the whole year, first yeah. Yeah, I would say the whole year, first year, but like it's intense at the beginning.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:08

So the first three months. And and how did you adapt to like this is the first time you're being away from home, right? I thought this was crazy.

unknown 1:14:16

What?

SPEAKER_02 1:14:17

What the culture in Pretoria. I thought it was crazy. And um, I thought it was like so strange to me, like um coming from Dublin and stuff. I thought it was crazy. And uh yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:32

But you were fine with like you could adapt to type of music, like you could adapt to being like on your own and and things like that. Yeah, there's no more T. Oh gosh, okay. I thought maybe you needed something. Yeah, I do. Yeah. Um But you managed. Yeah, I managed. So the studying part was fine for you. It's just like basically what you had to adapt to was all the different culture. And you pass first year, you do well. You shoot, do you shoot out the lights and things? Like, are you doing really well in school? You passed even. It wasn't uh an achievement.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:08

Yeah, it wasn't like anything special.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:10

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:11

I I made sure I got the 60 so that I can promote.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:14

Promote means you don't have to write the exam because you you've done so well in the so well means 60%. No, that's yeah, but that's university beings. Yeah. It's different to school, right? So you've done enough for them to say, okay, we don't need to make you sit for an exam at the end of the year. I never had any of those in my five years at Tux. You didn't promote? I never promoted a single thing. Oh my gosh. Yeah. I feel so bad for you. Uh because I well, you shouldn't feel bad for me. I was not the only thing I didn't promote for was block two. I was not working. I did anti-semester in first year because I failed chemistry. I got 27 for chemistry. 27%. Yeah. First yeah. The person that, yeah, the person that called me and told me my chemistry mark was is now a neurologist, Dr. Raven Kisten. Called me from campus because I was sleeping at Jez. Kisten. Yeah. Sounds very familiar. Raven Kiston.

SPEAKER_02 1:16:06

The BMW doctors? Yeah. You see.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:09

Yeah, yeah. They used to drive all done BMW. Yes. So Raven was in our class. And why did he call you? Because you see, Raven was a diligent guy who ends up becoming a neurologist. I was like, other guy who's at Reason probably still um recovering from the night before, and I was asleep in bed. I won't forget because he called me and he woke me up and he said, The marks are out. Do you want to know what you got? And I said, Yes. And then he asked me, Are you sure you want to know? Oh I said, Yeah. And then he said, Okay, you got 27. That's how I found out I failed K. Oh my goodness, no. So that was me. You were the opposite. You were promoting your yeah. But I knew this. I knew this because I can even even if I didn't know you based on what you just told me.

SPEAKER_02 1:16:49

Yes, I didn't even meet you until What did we mean? Until second year. Yeah, second year. I didn't even know you were in my class. Yeah. Oh my goodness. I don't even know you were main class.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:11

Second year, because this is what happens, right? First year you're on main campus. You you're in a a crowd of hundreds, thousands.

SPEAKER_02 1:17:18

And there's other people there in our classes. Remember, we did sociology as well? Yes. So you're thousands of people. So some people are doing sociology and they're not in our program. They are doing sociology and they are doing environmental sciences or something like that. So even with chemistry, we I think it was Prof. Yeah. Was it chemistry or physio? Physio. Yeah, I forgot we did chemistry and physics.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:48

Hold on, I want to get you. You had to get your water. Okay. So that's first year. Like, I it's no surprise to me that you were fine academically. And that's not really the industry. I don't think first year or second year you can really call it industry. It's not dental school. Even second year. You're still with the medics? Even second years. You're still sitting in lectures, you're not touching patients.

SPEAKER_02 1:18:12

That's the nice thing about Pretoria is that um I don't know if they still do that. Like if you want to go back to do medicine, they'll start you from third year. I don't know if they do that now. Because remember we're doing blocks. I don't know now. Okay, okay. Things are different nowadays. Remember we were doing blocks. So we did block one, block two, block three, block four. Yes. Then we stopped there. Yes. Then we went into dentistry. So if you were to go back, right, and say, hey, I want to do medicine now, for whatever reasons, they'll start you from third year. I don't know if it if it still is like that. Maybe the syllabus is different now. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:18:46

Yeah, but like that was so we so we so we're not really in dental school. I can't find, I can't believe that it's dental school proper. And if you're watching this, you can see me signaling to Dr. Yak Lindy, who look at the service that we were talking about. You're getting spoilt here. You can come onto the shot. He doesn't want to come on the shot, but he's bringing water for Lero. Lero really needed it. You don't have a noop slip. So this is this is the kind of service you get at Bedford View Dental Care. The owner actually brings you the drinking. Thank you, Yak. Thanks, Yak. Okay, sorry for that interruption. Lero is having a sip of water because he needed it badly. Oh my god, I thought so much better.

SPEAKER_02 1:19:22

No, water yeah, it's even better.

SPEAKER_01 1:19:23

It tastes better, it tastes so much something. Something in the water.

SPEAKER_02 1:19:26

Something in the water.

SPEAKER_01 1:19:26

We're overdoing it. Now we're overplugging. I think Yak needs to start to keep it.

SPEAKER_02 1:19:29

Yeah, he needs to pay us.

SPEAKER_01 1:19:30

Yeah. Okay, so it's not really dental school. I want to go to dental school second year. And I want to know your experience. I spoke about it with Gunther last week.

SPEAKER_02 1:19:38

Second year, I was getting into my my power. It's blank. I was comfortable. I was no longer young. I was no longer this, that, that. Well, you're 18. You surely. Yeah, I mean now I'm in Praetoria. Now I know. Oh, yeah. I know exactly who I am. I know what they're gonna do and all of that. But then I'd already moved to um HIPAA. I had my own room.

SPEAKER_01 1:20:00

It's a it's a senior race.

SPEAKER_02 1:20:01

It's a senior race. You get your own room, own bath. Everything. Own kitchen. And you had a nice room though. Yeah. Caifus and I had good rooms, yeah. Uh with the balcony and everything. Yes, yes. I think yours was the only ones with balconies. Yes. Yeah, you and Cafus were like this. Yeah. Twenty. Anyway. So uh shout out to Hippo.

SPEAKER_01 1:20:20

Um so you're in your element in second year, you're starting to switch gears now. You yeah? I was more focused.

SPEAKER_02 1:20:28

Right. And I was I was starting to do way better than than I was in first year. Okay. And I kind of knew what I needed to do to survive in Pretoria and UP.

SPEAKER_01 1:20:38

Oh, okay, okay.

SPEAKER_02 1:20:39

You mean from like a from an academic um Oh, you're doing better academically? First year I was doing okay. Yeah, you're doing well. If you promote, you do promote. But like I was doing really well in um Why did you do that? Did you want to do I I think I I didn't know what to do. I was I was I was in first year, yes. No, I'm saying did you want to do well? Like I was focused. I was like, now I'm going to study. Why? Why?

SPEAKER_04 1:21:04

Because I just wanted to do better. For what?

SPEAKER_02 1:21:08

Just okay Yeah, just I wanted to to be a better student of a better um academia. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:21:16

Just so tell me about second year, right? Because remember anatomy is the second year we still second year we're still in in um theory with all the medics and everybody. We're not touching patients or putting our hands on patients. I think third year is when it starts, right? Yeah. So I I can totally understand that anatomy use and everything, you shoot the lights out, you pass, you promote and do everything. But tell me about dental school now. Proper dental school. Because that's when it it it things change, right? Or not really, that's when it changed for me.

SPEAKER_02 1:21:50

Proper dental school for me was uh an experience. Um then I knew okay, this one is starting to history and it's not and it got smaller and um for me the whole English Afrikaans classes that was weird. Elaborate? What do you mean? They had an English class and an Afrikaans class. English group, Afrikaans group.

SPEAKER_01 1:22:27

Remember? But not officially. It wasn't official. Not like there's a there's a class to teach Afrikaans students in the class. It wasn't. Yeah. It was just like a divide.

SPEAKER_02 1:22:35

Yeah. And but like it was clear though. It was not English. No, the yeah, it was optics. No, obvious. Obvious. Obvious.

SPEAKER_03 1:22:44

It was it's like, oh. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 1:22:50

Um, some of the white people that were in the office the English class were just like, hmm, okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:22:55

We're getting discriminated against. You're not, you're not, um, you see, you know that I know about Shout out to Valentina. You know that I know about this. You know that I know about this. But but you're not elaborating for the listeners.

SPEAKER_02 1:23:07

So let me let me uh- I don't I don't want to No, no, I don't want to put it cause problems, but like it was this is what happened.

SPEAKER_01 1:23:15

This is not about causing problems. We're talking about our experience. Yes. So let me just give you my experience. I'm not putting words in your mouth, but this is what happened. When you'd walk into class, yeah. So after you're in the clinic, in the ward, you walk into class for lectures. Yeah. Every day, right? After at about midday. You got after you see patients there. When you walk into the class, as soon as you enter that door, you look at the people sitting there. If you're a lecturer, let's say the lecturer's eye view, there's literally a staircase in the middle of the lecture hall, and on the one side, it's all white students. Yes. On the other side It was legit like that. That's what I'm like exaggerating. And on the other side, it was all the non-white. Non-white. I don't know, you know, that term, you know what? We're using it to explain that it was white and then everything else on the other side. And they were also, but it was it goes deeper than that because as you just mentioned, you said shout out to Dr. Valentina.

SPEAKER_02 1:24:10

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:24:10

There were also on the on that side, there was white, but like English speaking, white people would. So it was just like Afrikaans on one side.

SPEAKER_02 1:24:18

Yeah, why why I said shout out to um Valentina, uh, that's one of them, um, she was uh in in the non-Afrikaans class and she was white.

SPEAKER_01 1:24:33

Don't call it class, though, the group, because we're all in the same class. Okay. I don't want people to think that there were separate classes. It was we were all in the same class.

SPEAKER_02 1:24:41

I felt bad for a little bit. Like, I'm like, you're stuck with us because you don't speak Afrikaans. I probably spoke better Afrikaans than she did.

SPEAKER_01 1:24:48

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 1:24:48

But like it was just it was unnecessary, you know.

SPEAKER_01 1:24:53

But I don't I I didn't feel like it personally, I didn't feel like it was done in like a malicious or a racist or anything way. I I genuinely think that the people just gravitated towards people that if they they were comfortable with and that they, you know, knew.

SPEAKER_05 1:25:08

Guntza was actually wait, Gunza Gunza was in the Afrikaans. He was the English, yeah. But like he used to speak Afrikaans.

SPEAKER_01 1:25:16

Yeah. But if you watch different. No, no, if you watched last week's episode, he said he felt like a third wheel because in the side and the side. Yeah, he said he always felt like a third wheel in dentistry because he's a Namibian, so he felt like he didn't sit in any way. Um but he used to always sit with us. But yeah, it it was a thing. We're not imagining this. Anybody, you even ask anybody in our class, that happened. It was like that. Okay? How do we even get to this now? This quality compensation. Yeah, so you're talking about the the class dynamics, but actual work? I enjoyed second year. No, third year. I'm talking about third year.

SPEAKER_02 1:25:52

Because this is when we get into dental seconds. Oh god, I didn't really like it.

SPEAKER_04 1:25:57

Um why?

SPEAKER_02 1:25:59

Because of the um I struggled with uh prostor.

SPEAKER_01 1:26:05

Prostodontics, which is like making a denture basically. Making a denture from scratch.

SPEAKER_02 1:26:10

I felt like I was just not good at that. Okay. And um I struggled. I struggled with that, and then I then some of the the doctors in that department were not the nicest people on the planet.

SPEAKER_01 1:26:26

Alright, so you didn't enjoy some of the experiences then with the lecturer. So it wasn't the actual work.

SPEAKER_02 1:26:36

It was a lumber board, like it was like a double homicide for me. Yeah. Like prosto is not my favorite thing. I'm good at it now because I do it all the time. But like I just like just bad experience.

SPEAKER_01 1:26:49

Okay. And did it get better? In dental school, I mean, not just postodontics.

SPEAKER_02 1:26:55

When I graduated, I was so grateful that I didn't need to deal with that. With the lecturers and stuff? Not lecturers per se, just the subject. I didn't need to like stress myself over it and making a data from scratch and all of that stuff that I had to deal with. You mean like studying and like Postodontics um academically was not a difficult subject. Hold on, you're talking about Prosto. You're just talking about prostitutes. I'm just talking about this thing haunted you the whole from 30 year to find out. Max Fact Yeah, I was good at probably most of the subjects, but like but Prosto, man, Prosto kicked my ass, and then the practical side of it when we had that exam. We have to like put teeth on a piece of But dental, but doing the actual work, did you like it?

SPEAKER_01 1:27:53

You're fine with that. That's not an issue. Like seeing patients every day and um yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:28:00

Okay with it, like um prostel? You talking about prostil? No, just dental in general. I was I was excelling. Yeah. Yeah. I was doing really well. Um my feelings, I did uh indoors, endorsed, I did that.

SPEAKER_01 1:28:13

So were you waiting to get out of dental school and start working? Yeah, I was ready to go. Ready to go? Ready to go. And were you looking forward to working? Yes. As a dentist. Yes. Why?

SPEAKER_02 1:28:26

Um, I just wanted to be outside of school, been there for a long time. And I wanted to be independent. I wanted to have my own thing, and I wanted to earn money, I wanted to do all of that.

SPEAKER_01 1:28:41

So you weren't actually looking forward to dentistry. You're looking forward to all the freedom, the things that come with being a non-student.

SPEAKER_02 1:28:48

Yeah, yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:28:50

It's not like I can't wait to open my practice and I'm asking, I don't know. Um what were your plans after dental school? Just working. Just working. Yeah, just working. So then did you go and work for the Department of Health Kidding for that five years? Five years.

SPEAKER_02 1:29:04

Where in I worked in in Pageti. Okay, that's Natal. In Maltmouth. And then I moved to um Northwest.

SPEAKER_01 1:29:16

Northwest province. That's another province. After those five years you moved to uh also the state hospital in the Northwest.

SPEAKER_02 1:29:24

I worked in a place called uh Itsuang and uh was close to Mafikane.

SPEAKER_01 1:29:30

Okay. And now?

SPEAKER_02 1:29:32

Then I moved the side. Got a job in a Kuruleni.

SPEAKER_01 1:29:37

That's in like near Joburg. Yeah. Yeah. And uh what's the place called?

SPEAKER_02 1:29:44

It's all over Kuruleni, but like I'm based in Tembisa for now. So do you move around? Well, it's a white thing because sometimes they wanna relieve in a clinic. Yeah. And then you go and you work there. And how is it working in government? I think it's the first. It's a lot, yeah. It's a lot. Um we're really under-resourced. Yeah. And we're not growing.

SPEAKER_03 1:30:12

Under resourced how you'll have one dictators that are servicing the community that is so big. Um yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:30:30

How many patients do you see like a day and things like that?

SPEAKER_02 1:30:32

Forty to sixty sometimes a day. You one person. Um there's two of us with my com serve.

SPEAKER_01 1:30:39

And what are you doing there? Like everything. Not everything.

SPEAKER_02 1:30:42

We do extractions, surgicals, we do biopsies also. We do SAPs, fillings. Um scale and polish fillings.

SPEAKER_01 1:30:55

So what don't you do? Endor. Root canals. We don't do eight or I'm using the the later. We don't do root canals. Don't do root canals. You don't do braces. Don't do um orthodoxonics. Like is there anything you look forward to doing? Right now I'd say no. In dentistry, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:31:17

Yeah. I don't know.

SPEAKER_02 1:31:18

It's just in government, it's just taken away a lot of like hope for me. We're really under resourced. What hope? Hope for what? Like better quality of services. Um we're not growing yesh.

SPEAKER_01 1:31:36

If you needed the dentist, would you go to your facility?

SPEAKER_02 1:31:40

If I had no options. Yeah. No, no. If I had options, no.

SPEAKER_01 1:31:44

You do have options, so that's what I'm asking you specifically. Yeah. No. I'll come here. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 1:31:50

Why? I have my medical aid and can.

SPEAKER_01 1:31:53

No, but why would you come here? Just more better environment. Okay, so like the the ambience and everything.

SPEAKER_02 1:32:02

Everything. I'm not saying it should be like this, but there's a lot of things that we can do that is better. Like hire more doctors. We need more doctors, we need more dentists. And I don't know what's going on with the government.

SPEAKER_01 1:32:13

No, but like here, there are only three dentists, right? But they pro I guess they work an appointment and they see f they don't have to see 60 patients a day.

SPEAKER_02 1:32:23

I can't even tell you. Like, even when we're seeing that amount, we still get complaints. That's how bad it is. Because the population is growing.

SPEAKER_01 1:32:32

So they're waiting a long time.

SPEAKER_02 1:32:33

They're waiting a long time.

SPEAKER_01 1:32:35

Sitting in hot, stuffy waiting rooms, coming early in the morning.

SPEAKER_02 1:32:38

By the time you get to the 60-year patient, you are finished.

SPEAKER_01 1:32:42

Okay, okay. I I'm starting to understand now.

SPEAKER_02 1:32:45

It's not ideally, you'd want to see like 10.

SPEAKER_01 1:32:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:32:48

Then you can be more comprehensive. Now it's just like, what you're just dealing with main complaints. You don't even have. Then it's gonna be like that doctor is good. This one is not good. What makes a good doctor?

SPEAKER_01 1:33:00

Okay. Okay, I get you. So there's no time to like actually connect with the patient. It's just sausage factory.

SPEAKER_02 1:33:07

I remember this other time when I I was relieving at Edenvale and they only see a less amount, like maybe 10 or 15 people on that day. And I was able to have a conversation with the patient. I had a nice day. And I was talking to them and they're like, you're such a nice person. Look yeah. You know, you talk to them and you you fix whatever you they want, and then they go on them. Now, when you're working in a an environment that is like that, it it just It's not conducive to it's it's exhausting.

SPEAKER_01 1:33:38

It's exhausting. It's exhausting for you and for the patient. Nobody wins, right? You're burnt out. I get you.

SPEAKER_02 1:33:44

I get you. Now I just better.

SPEAKER_01 1:33:46

So that's why I mean so let's it's not about the actual facility that you've got a problem with or the quality of care that's being given there. It's just the experience. Experience. The user experience and amount of if I I feel like if we were more, it would be better. Yeah, for everybody here. Yeah, because if you're talking about this place, you'd rather come here. But let's just say they had the exact same patient load here. Then it was it would just be the same.

SPEAKER_02 1:34:14

It would be the same. It doesn't matter. Yeah. Then you don't So what I'm saying is it's we're not growing. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. You can't have one dentist with a growing community. You can't accommodate load. Yeah. So how do you change how do you fix this? Everyone needs your your attention, everyone needs help. How do you fix this?

SPEAKER_01 1:34:38

You need more doctors. But who do you go to and say I need more doctors? Like how do you fix it? And government? Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:34:46

We have to go through the channels of districts and department of health and all of that.

SPEAKER_01 1:34:54

So you're gonna try and do that or we've tried. Okay. You think we haven't? Um that's I don't know, yeah. Maybe you haven't.

SPEAKER_02 1:35:01

So you've tried all that. They just tell us there's no budget for that. And it's it's sad. It's sad because you'll have like my situation, there's one clinic here. Then there's multiple clinics around, right? And I know with doctors are similar as well. Medical doctors. Medical doctors, they have the same issues as well. But my clinic will have dentistry. Oh, guess what? Oh, they're just going there. Now, what about that clinic and that clinic and that clinic? Why can you not furnish those clinics with dentistry as well to make services otherwise? Distributed. Yeah, distribute the services. Distribute the services and it's more flowing, then you can treat patients. Then you can you can holistically manage. So you're telling me there are the facilities, it's just that if with a little bit of a little bit of a There's even a mobile unit. But Dentistry is not prioritized. Well, they say it's a budget thing.

SPEAKER_01 1:36:02

Okay. But it seems to be more like a logistical admin type of thing. If it was just shifted around, yeah, everybody comes to my clinic for data stream.

SPEAKER_02 1:36:11

Yeah. I'm the only one who offers data stream in my clinic. Well, from that particular area.

SPEAKER_01 1:36:17

Okay, you're painting a like five. This is a very five. Five clinics. It sounds like it's It sounds gloomy. Yeah. But maybe there's yeah, uh is there any optimism for like improvement? I will always be optimistic. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 1:36:34

Always. So you're gonna keep pushing and keeping. But um one thing I know for sure is that um our manager is doing the best he can. Okay. Yeah, but like, what can you do? But like our my problem is that we are not growing and the population is growing. Okay. Each household has about four people, an average of four people. You must know we're catering not only to South Africans, we're catering to um immigrants and everybody.

SPEAKER_01 1:37:07

Yeah, yeah. All right, so what do you look forward to then? Not if in not work-wise, what do you do? Like I mean, I okay. If you're to ask me, if somebody came to me and said, what does Lero like love doing? I had to guess. I'd be like, okay, traveling, going to New York specifically. Um, fashion. Like I know you in my mind, I don't know, maybe I'm wrong. You begin to like fashion and like uh clothing and luxury stuff. Like, you know, you always laugh at me and say, Yesh, all you want is like a new iPhone and a new gadget and you're happy in life. Uh you're not too far off.

SPEAKER_02 1:37:47

I mean, I need to say that sometimes just to like piss you off. Yeah. Because I really need to.

SPEAKER_01 1:37:52

No, I know you have it's a bit of banter, but I want to keep it. And I say to you, yeah, all you all you need is a new this.

SPEAKER_05 1:37:59

I like that.

SPEAKER_01 1:37:59

Like I'm like, all you need is a new bucket or new Ms or LV, and you're learning new words now. I read things Hermes. I even pronounced it right. Not Hermes.

SPEAKER_02 1:38:14

No, it's Ms.

SPEAKER_01 1:38:15

Ms. Yeah. All those things. And this is what this is Macosta, right? Yeah. How did you know? I know this because I I'm clued up, boss. It's not I'm not only iPhone and this and that.

SPEAKER_02 1:38:25

Oh, that's so cute.

SPEAKER_01 1:38:29

Look at me. Look at me. Can't you see I'm dripping?

SPEAKER_00 1:38:31

Yo, with your AMX. Okay, yes. And this shirt? Look at this shit. What shirt is that? What is this?

SPEAKER_01 1:38:38

LC. ULC. You know what this is? What? So we've got a WhatsApp group full of friends, right? God. Uh it's it's called uh what is it called? It's called the No Invite Crew. I don't know if you saw the interview with the engineer, Amit. So he's one of the guys that are on there. Yeah. And they all play golf. I mean, if they have an annual thing, they call themselves the UL. I don't know what it means, but the C stands for crew. They call themselves this.

SPEAKER_04 1:39:01

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:39:02

And whenever they have a golf day, like annually, they'll make new shirts and belts and stuff, right? And now you know I don't play golf, right? Yeah. I still need to learn. So whenever they're organizing and say who wants a shirt, whatever, I just I say, yeah, give me one also. And this is the shout out to Dr. Dustin Ramdes, who organized all this stuff. He's a physician in in Durban. I'm gonna get on the show. But yeah, I'm dripping. Look at me, but MX's and Woolworth's socks, I think, and Mr. Price. Anyway, back to you. So I I would think that fashion, all that kind of stuff, luxury.

SPEAKER_02 1:39:35

I mean, I just like nice things. I like things that will last and things that don't go out of style and things that I can wear over and over again. I don't like buying in bulk. Yeah. I don't like uh I like to have the same stuff over and over again, and I love things that I can pass out. So you must take my advice and pick and pay clothing.

SPEAKER_01 1:39:56

Pick and pay is clothing? Stop it. Okay, so what do you enjoy? Like, what really what are you into? Like, what's your passion? If you're to say, I'm passionate about something.

SPEAKER_02 1:40:07

Passion? I'm passionate about life.

SPEAKER_01 1:40:10

Yeah?

SPEAKER_02 1:40:10

What about life? Yeah, I just love being happy and just living my life and being free.

SPEAKER_01 1:40:16

So what makes you happy? And you already said being at home, so you can't give me that answer. I love cooking. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:40:24

Um if you had to be around people, who would you choose to be with?

SPEAKER_01 1:40:36

I don't need people to be happy. Yeah. That's a good I mean, I like that answer. It's an honest answer, so you can be around be happy with yourself. Yeah. And what like reading a book or watching TV or what I love reading.

SPEAKER_02 1:40:51

I I never I used to have a bad connotation with it because it's academia.

SPEAKER_01 1:40:59

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:41:00

It's associated with that.

SPEAKER_01 1:41:01

So you're reading stuff a lot now, what? Right now I'm reading The Subtle Art of Not Okay, I know that one. It's a big orange book. Yes. Yeah. And it's got a big F-word in it. Yes. Or short F word. Yes. So you enjoy all that stuff.

SPEAKER_02 1:41:16

Yeah, I love reading books. There's a book that I want to get. Um, my friend is launching a book on dating. Um well, one of my cousins' friends, do do um on dating. Curious to read that.

SPEAKER_01 1:41:32

She's like a dating coach. Dating coach? Okay, well then you must let us know about it when it comes up.

SPEAKER_02 1:41:38

Yeah, um, I'm going to a book launch next month.

SPEAKER_01 1:41:41

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 1:41:43

I have a my social life has actually become more flamboyant lately. Um, but I choose when where I want to go. I'm not going to everything. So what are you going to? Yesterday I was supposed to attend um Gordon's um annual party, like a brunch. What's that? Like I was so sick. Uh he has like themes, he just throws parties. Is Gordon some friend of yours? Yeah. Okay. Uh Gordon is um a larger-than-life kind of guy. Um, yeah, I love him to bits though. Uh he had a party yesterday. Uh I was supposed to go to that. I didn't go. I was very sick yesterday, so unfortunately I couldn't make it. And then um, there's something that I'm going to next week. Oh I I don't remember what it is, but there's something that I'm attending next week as well. So you're going to events? I don't go to a lot of them.

SPEAKER_01 1:42:43

I'm very choosy. What type of event? Uh, first I look at the age group. Mm-hmm. Oh, so you mean it's just a party, it's a gathering. It's not like I'm going to like some sort of art museum type of thing.

SPEAKER_02 1:42:57

I like those things actually. Actually, I love art. Yeah. I never had appreciation for that. But now I love it. Yeah. And New York, New York, you're going there again? I don't go a lot anymore. Last day I went to Thailand.

SPEAKER_01 1:43:13

Yeah. Remember? Yes, I remember you telling me you went to Thailand. Yeah. How was that? A friend group and I travel with now. So traveling is a thing for you, a big thing. One of the things? I've made a budget for it. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 1:43:27

It brings me so much joy to be in a foreign country and not know anybody and just be like enjoying the culture there. This year we're planning on going to um Turkey.

SPEAKER_01 1:43:41

Okay. And any other bucket list like travel destinations? Uh definitely I want to go to the Far East Japan. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Japan. Yeah, Yak has been there. Yak with a recent. That's why I'm obsessed. Yak was in an earthquake in Japan. In Tokyo. He was in a uh it was December last year or year before. What happened to his hand? Was it the Watch the first episode? Was it the Everest timing up? Yes, he went to Everest and he lost fingers. Long story short, yes. Watch the first episode. It's only two hours. It's only two hours. That is That is brutal. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's why he's he's not practicing. Okay, so you went to Japan. You always sending me, I don't know, maybe it's because I'm Indian, but you are always sending me videos and memes about Indians.

SPEAKER_02 1:44:26

Yes. I'm like, are you obsessed with Indians? No, you are not an Indian. Who said you were Indian?

unknown 1:44:31

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 1:44:32

You are a Zulu stuck in an Indian body.

SPEAKER_01 1:44:35

And you know it. Oh, this is definitely going in the trailers. In the trailers. You who said it? Why am I why why do you say this?

SPEAKER_05 1:44:43

Yes. You're the most un-Indian person in the Indian community. I don't even know. What do you do there? Like, you don't even do you even attend anything?

SPEAKER_01 1:44:56

But why are you saying I'm Zulu? Like this specific.

SPEAKER_02 1:45:01

I don't know. It's growing up case it in. I don't know. You say you were growing up case.

SPEAKER_01 1:45:06

You have to elaborate, man. The way you are, the decision is a good thing. For the benefit of my mother who I think watches this. Like what the way you think. Give me one example.

SPEAKER_02 1:45:17

Sense of humor.

SPEAKER_01 1:45:17

Yeah, yeah. Okay. Okay, don't.

unknown 1:45:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:45:20

Yeah. It's Zulu.

SPEAKER_02 1:45:22

Yeah. Like, even when you're taking a joke and it's all.

SPEAKER_01 1:45:27

But like Okay, well, actually, uh never thought what are you? What do you identify as? What are you? Are you colored? No, I'm black. You're black? Yes. Zulu. Zulu. Okay. So you would know.

SPEAKER_02 1:45:41

I would know. You would know. I have every right to say that to you.

SPEAKER_01 1:45:45

Okay, okay, good.

SPEAKER_02 1:45:46

And I'm sure it's not the first time you've heard that.

SPEAKER_01 1:45:48

It is the first time that somebody's told me I'm I'm a Zulu trapped in a first time. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:45:53

In an Indian body.

SPEAKER_01 1:45:54

I think so, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:45:55

Nobody has ever said that. Nobody said that. But I can't I I don't disagree with you. Have you not heard like instant Undos, like people just making this little commentary in the background?

SPEAKER_01 1:46:04

I can understand some Zulu, and I've heard I've overheard some people talk about me, and they were embarrassed when I said, Oh, you know, like when I indicated that I understood. But nobody has said to me that. And I take it as a compliment. I take it as a compliment. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. It's not a bad thing. It's cool. I think it's super cool. Um there was something we were gonna say. Can't remember now. But I'm gonna take that.

SPEAKER_02 1:46:28

You said that I like to travel Japan and all of that.

SPEAKER_01 1:46:30

No, on the Zulu thing. Look, maybe you know, we've we've been around for generations, right? I'm South African. I I agree with you, I'm not Indian. I don't have any family in India. I don't have any roots there. I think my, you know, the ancestors, obviously, we all come from there. So obviously along the line, there might be some actual Zulu DNA in me. You never know. Yeah, you never know. Of course. It would be actually surprising if there isn't.

SPEAKER_02 1:46:55

You've been to India, right? I've been to India twice, yeah. I really want to go. And I keep telling you this. And and I always tell you when you go, I want to go with you.

SPEAKER_01 1:47:02

But that's why I think you're obsessed with Indians. I'm telling you, you're always sending me Indian things. And now it makes less sense because if you're saying that I'm not Indian, why are you sending me all these Indian memes and jokes?

SPEAKER_00 1:47:12

Because you're the closest Indian person I know. Like, what are you sending me stuff on Canada?

SPEAKER_01 1:47:19

But Indians in Canada. Can we not talk about it? Okay, we're fine. Why? I mean, I think it's funny. Shout out to Puration. Yeah, Puration's an Indian in Canada, South African in Canada.

SPEAKER_00 1:47:28

Yeah, let's say that. Okay. Because he's probably also like, yo, I don't know what the hell is going on here.

SPEAKER_01 1:47:35

So you want to go to India? Why? Fascinating country.

SPEAKER_02 1:47:38

I feel like it's very fascinating, very interesting, and I'm obsessed with the food. I cook like an Indian. Yeah, okay. Yes, I cook like an Indian. Where do you get that from? You think it's everybody.

SPEAKER_01 1:47:48

You think it's cake? No, I mean, like, where does this this come from?

SPEAKER_02 1:47:51

Like I grew up in Durban. Yeah. I put curry in everything, even in my breakfast. Like, I have mango with curry powder.

SPEAKER_01 1:47:57

Did you have lots of Indian friends growing up? Or how did uh what did your grandma influence the cooking?

SPEAKER_02 1:48:02

I don't have a lot of Indian friends. So how does this how we grew up? The Durban culture. Weird, huh? It's just normal. It was in infused in everything. Like, even the bus was called the minor.

SPEAKER_01 1:48:14

Remember? Yeah, okay. People won't get that. Some people get it. Because there's a bird in India that I've been calling Indian minor minor. Which is actually it's an alien species, you know, it comes from um it's not that native to here. I think it's a good idea. It's got from India, yeah. I think it took over. Oh my god, that is so crazy.

SPEAKER_02 1:48:29

It's all over. Even in Joe Book, there's Indian miners. I'm like, ah, just like that bus. They even had like a little picture of the minor. It's almost like Silicon Valley, you know, like Can I just say growing up in Durban Growing Up in Durban is a vibe, yes. You think so? We wouldn't trade it for the world. Durban is I loved it.

SPEAKER_05 1:48:47

I don't know now. Now it's different. It's just no, but we always hear Durban. But like back back then, in our era, yeah, Durban was the vibe.

SPEAKER_02 1:48:56

I think it's still. We had a nice transportation.

SPEAKER_01 1:48:59

You still think it is? I think it still is. I just think a lot of us ex-Durbanites don't give it the credit it deserves. I'm glad you're giving it its credit. Durban is a is it you know, people love going there like for holidays. It's got the best weather in winter. It doesn't feel like winter. The warm ocean, the lovely food.

SPEAKER_02 1:49:17

Doctor, do you think the vibes are still the same?

SPEAKER_01 1:49:19

Probably. Probably not. Like it depends what vibe you're talking about. Like, but after COVID, a lot of things changed, right? Yeah. But Durban, I think, has a lot of potential. And from what I'm reading and seeing, it's turning around like you won't believe. I want the old back. I want the old Durban back. Oh, well, we can make that happen. Just don't go to New York and emigrate. Have you ever thought of emigrating? No. Your mom's been there for for her whole life. She's moving back. She's moving back? Yeah. That's a good thing. Yeah, I'm happy. Awesome. You want to elaborate? You want to talk about that?

SPEAKER_02 1:49:52

Well, it's got nothing to do with Donald Trump. She was planning to move back. Let me just say that. Okay. Yeah, she's not deported. She's an American. Citizen.

SPEAKER_01 1:50:01

Okay. Yeah. That was then. This is now people evolve. But you what is she could don't tell me she's going and moving to like Camps Bay or Clifton. No, no, no, no. She's gonna be living here in Johannes. Dollar money in North Riding. Okay. Yeah. So she's gonna have that dollars, those dollars, they they're powerful here. So you're looking forward to it? Oh yeah, of course. That's awesome. When is she moving?

SPEAKER_02 1:50:24

This year? I think maybe in two years. But she's trying to set everything up. Then they slowly and slowly, not just like boom, you know.

SPEAKER_01 1:50:33

That's so cool, man. I'm looking forward to meeting you. It's a privilege to have that. I'm looking forward to meeting her. Because you always send her.

SPEAKER_02 1:50:40

Every time she comes, we're always like busy. She left last week.

SPEAKER_01 1:50:43

Will she watch this? Probably.

SPEAKER_02 1:50:45

I'll send it to her.

SPEAKER_01 1:50:46

Yeah, send it to her. Tell her to watch it. Tell her it's that other Zulu guy that you always talk about.

SPEAKER_02 1:50:51

Actually, we try to organize. Look at me assuming that you talk about me. Does she know? Yeah, yeah. I've spoken to you about her. Spoken to her about you.

SPEAKER_06 1:51:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:51:00

But like I don't know if she remembers. She only remembers Cerule. Okay. And that's because Cerule is like Cerule. Like she's different. You know? I miss her. Yeah. When was the last time you saw her? The last time I spoke to Cerule was on Facebook. Yeah, but in real life? I haven't seen her in years. I would love to see her and just hang out with her. I miss her.

SPEAKER_01 1:51:23

I think we, you know, we could end up talking for like four hours. And I don't mind. I think I've got enough space on the memory card. Okay. Um but I I must put in this question that I always put in. Like every show. Like if somebody comes to you, somebody that respects you, okay, let's just put it this way. Let's put it this way. Let's just say you're the t the light-skinned tall colored dentist in Cape Town with the Rolex. With the Rolex that's doing her thing. And a young Lero majority, Lero majority patient comes to, wow. And okay, let's just say you are you, not even that guy. You are the you're wearing, you're dripping in Matposa and all this stuff. Or you don't mean scrubs. Okay, but let's just say their eyes you're dripping. Yeah. And they say to you, Doc, this is amazing. I want to be.

SPEAKER_02 1:52:20

I've had a lot of um people that have come and shadowed. Last day, I think I've had about six. Who are these people? Um Vit apparently has this program when you want to study medicine or dentistry. I don't know about the other subjects. If you want to do those, you have to go and shadow a doctor for like two days or something like that. And they always come. I didn't notice to me. Yeah. That's cool. So I always get the the new um, and it brings me so much joy. Yeah. So much joy. How come? Because they're young and they just I'm just like, wow, you guys really are much more mature than how we were with at your age group, and it and they focused. And some of them come back and tell me, hey, I got in. Um, thank you. Blah, blah, blah.

SPEAKER_01 1:53:08

Did you did you just did I just hear you right? So are you saying that these youngsters are probably much more mature than we were at our age? I think so. That's a good thing. Every generation says talks badly about the low genetics.

SPEAKER_00 1:53:20

No.

SPEAKER_01 1:53:21

Yeah. They grow up way faster than us. And and you're saying they're mature and they know their stuff and they've got their heads screwed up. Yeah. I'm glad that to hear We were so immature, yes. I'm glad to hear this. Because just we always talk about the new generation is gone to the, you know, into the past. I mean, Gen Z, we had millennials, right? Millennials, yeah. I think we're now on Gen Alpha or Beta. Oh God. Yeah, the new generation is Gen beta, beta. Anyway. Okay, so these these people come shadow you and it brings you joy. I love it.

SPEAKER_02 1:53:52

So they ask you questions, they just everything, and I try to um and they actually talk to each other. I didn't even know that. They're like, oh, wait, did you? Oh, yeah, he's really good. I'm like, there we go with that word. Wait, uh you lost people. Explain. They talk to each other. Some of them um are like, oh, okay, go. Then they will recommend, like, oh, go to him. He's pretty good.

SPEAKER_01 1:54:12

You know. Oh, the students among themselves. Yeah, they've got WhatsApp and all these groups and everything. And they communicate and they communicate.

SPEAKER_02 1:54:19

Even the patients, they communicate, they're like, go to that doctor, he does well. They do their research. Yes. Oh, try this one. Oh, you I get a lot of referrals, not referrals. Well, yes, referrals from private doctors that don't want to do surgical. Private practice, they come to the state. You see. So they don't want to do surgicals in private. The litigations and all of that.

SPEAKER_01 1:54:41

Oh, you mean the private doctors are reluctant to do surgical procedures.

SPEAKER_02 1:54:47

Surgical procedures. Surgical procedures in their post. Or they'll do it right? Yeah. And then something goes wrong. So they actually refer to the state. Okay. All the time. I don't know how many.

SPEAKER_01 1:54:57

I think I have like a box full of referral it's like that. Oh.

unknown 1:55:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:55:00

Okay, so these students come to you and then what do you like encourage them or what do you say to them? No, don't go do vet sites. Go do vet sites. No. I don't even talk about that.

SPEAKER_02 1:55:09

Yeah, yeah. I don't even talk about that. Um I just like no, why data stream? Why not this? Why not that? And then I always ask them, don't you want to do medicine? Like as a bait? Just to suss them out. Suss them out if they really know I don't want to do it.

SPEAKER_01 1:55:26

That's really I'm I'm I'm encouraged by this, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:55:29

And then there's others that are um there's different backgrounds. Some are from lesser, you know, and others are from like privileged. Like this other one is in high school and he he drives and he came in. I'm like, hey, you're driving a master in in high school. SUV. Yeah. And his mother's a doctor, his dad is a dentist. I'm just like, wow. I think it's cool that Vitz has this program.

SPEAKER_01 1:55:59

Didn't know I don't know if Pretoria also does it. We never heard that. No. We were in Yes. No, this is promising for me. I'll tell you what. I I genuinely believe that a lot of issues can be changed if people just get into healthcare for the right reasons and knowing what they're getting into. Not just saying, uh, any mini mini mo, let me do vet science and then get into anything, yes.

SPEAKER_02 1:56:20

You need to be pre you need to be uh passionate about whatever it is that you're doing.

SPEAKER_01 1:56:26

But how do you know you're passionate about it? If you are uh, I don't know, security guard. No, I I disagree with you. How do you know you're passionate about something? Like you even got into dentistry.

SPEAKER_02 1:56:35

Until you do it. Are you passionate about dentistry?

SPEAKER_01 1:56:38

No.

SPEAKER_02 1:56:38

So they can even do it. They can even do it at um they can do this thing, go into dentistry, and then when they start working, then it changes.

SPEAKER_01 1:56:49

That's what I'm that's what I'm saying.

SPEAKER_02 1:56:50

At the beginning they were.

SPEAKER_01 1:56:52

No, but it's it's still at least it's giving them an opportunity to have a taste of what it's like. We went in there, remember, the first time you went to the dentist. I would have gone back to Kale's refer and I've been like, with it with the Yes, the first time you went to the dentist was at that age, uh, you didn't know what it was like. You got into it not knowing. Am I right? Yeah. And do you think that it's not a good one?

SPEAKER_02 1:57:13

You didn't have the luxury because I didn't know anybody.

SPEAKER_01 1:57:18

But listen to this. I was not dead. If you had the opportunity to do what wit people are doing now. I would have enjoyed it. I would have appreciated it. No, but do you think you would have gotten into dentistry?

SPEAKER_02 1:57:27

You would have you would have decided to do dentistry.

SPEAKER_01 1:57:29

I would have done it.

SPEAKER_02 1:57:30

I would have done it.

SPEAKER_01 1:57:31

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 1:57:31

Because that would have given me enough exposure to it to make a a sound.

SPEAKER_01 1:57:39

You're only gonna know with time. So the answer to my question, which I had in mind, is if you could do dentistry, if you had to go back and if you would could choose it again, you'd still choose it. You'd still choose the industry. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:57:55

Um, another thing to point out is that a lot of my colleagues, because I get a lot of comms. Um, and then a lot of my colleagues they they always say, oh, Dr. Majority. You're such a good teacher. You're good at educating and training people and stuff like that. Okay. And I didn't even know that. And it brings me a lot of joy. That's interesting. I didn't even know that. Maybe I'm evolving, I don't know. And I was never really maybe I was a little bit. I don't know. And I'm like, oh, I actually like this because even now I have a cop serve, right? And I'm pouring it to her so that she can get better, you know. She comes in, you know, when you come in, you don't know really much. You've done like maybe 20 extractions for the year or something like that. And you done one endo and blah, blah, blah. But like um, then you start teaching them, and then the other comers are like, oh, can we please go to the auto majority's um clinic? Then maybe we can teach us all together and stuff like that. I love it.

SPEAKER_01 1:59:05

It brings you joy. Brings me joy. And you when did you discover this? Only recently. Only recently. So we never know. Maybe university lecturer might be on the card sometime. Maybe. Maybe. I don't know. But like uh Please look into it. If you if it brings you joy, there's nothing better to do because you put your heart into it. And I think students will benefit. I love seeing somebody grow. Students will benefit.

SPEAKER_02 1:59:26

You know what I mean? Especially young people, and they grow and they become better and they they get more skills.

SPEAKER_01 1:59:32

Okay, so the next time you're on, we're gonna be talking about what it's like to be a lecturer at the University of Pretoria. Oh my word. Why were you saying Pretoria? You've got to go back and and and transform. Maybe it is transformed. Look, I don't know what it's like now. I think it is. I mean, I enjoy it.

SPEAKER_02 1:59:49

One of my assistants um works there now. She moved from um for my clinic and she now works there. Shout out to Malta. She is working with Professor Ngabule.

SPEAKER_01 2:00:03

Oh, Gambule, yeah. We she used to be our supervisor.

SPEAKER_02 2:00:07

What who said that? She said, What? She said, Professor Naboule. I'm like, that was Dr. Gamule. Like back in the day. I was like, oh wow, that is so nice. Like everyone's like growing and stuff, you know what I mean? And let me tell you. And she even went to the top floor. Oh, wow. And she took a picture of um our photo, our class photo for 2010.

SPEAKER_01 2:00:28

10. 10. Oh god. Listen, I go and I give um presentations there every year. Yeah. On ethics and stuff. Yeah. And um I'm telling you, the class is not like how it was when we were there. It's it's it's mixed scattered. That's my experience. Really? My my my a few touch points that we had really noticed. So would you say we were that the last? We might have been. We might have been quick.

SPEAKER_02 2:00:51

Because there's no more rag, there's no more nothing.

SPEAKER_01 2:00:53

There's no more Actually, now that I talk about it, I mention it, um, because YFTI was two years below us, right? Yeah. Their class is much different to ours. The dynamics. They were more integrated. So I think holding on to the last remnants of the old the old regime. Stop it. Yeah, okay. Still alive and kicking, maybe. But we we had uh we had a good class, we had good people. I believe that. I just I genuinely I don't think it was a malicious thing. It was my first thing. You can you you might disagree with me. It was a system. It was just circumstances and upbringing. Um but maybe I'm being too generous and too uh yeah, generous. Yeah. Okay. All right, Lero. Anything else you want to talk about? Anything else before we wrap up? Oh. Any questions for me? Any questions you want me to ask you that I haven't asked you?

SPEAKER_02 2:01:49

We can talk about um LBGT, um with relations to the medical field. Yeah, please tell me. Um I get a lot of um patients that are LBGT in my clinic, and they always feel kind of like intimidated or sad or scared to come. And I love how I'm not speaking from my clinic's perspective, how open we are. Like I said, even on our files, we we ask like what do you identify as and all of that. And um I've had a lot of them come and say, Hey, you are such an inspiration. Me? Yeah. So growing up in Newlands, I like to say I was not bullied for for my sexuality, yeah. Even though I didn't know what it was.

SPEAKER_04 2:02:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 2:02:50

You're not bullied? No, I wasn't. Okay. I wasn't maybe I was lucky, but I never really was bullied. Maybe once or twice, like random, but it wasn't like um, and I'm grateful for that in a way. But like um, I would say growing up in growing up in Newland, being LBGT, being black, being all of those things made me who I am today. All of those things. The collective experience. Collective experience, yeah. And then also going to America and all of that. All of those things have made me who I am, and I wouldn't change it for the world, and I am grateful for that. If I had to go back and look, I wouldn't change my life for the world. I'm so grateful. Uh, and I'm so privileged to have lived a life like that. Yeah. Even if it was not necessarily perfect.

SPEAKER_01 2:03:46

Yes. It's so good to hear this, man. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 2:03:49

I I always reflect. Yeah. Um, but I'm also looking at all my friends as well. I'm looking at you, I'm looking at Yofty. You guys, man, I'm just so proud of you all. Like, everybody is just doing their thing. We're all not like necessarily the same, you know, but like we're all doing our thing. And um, yeah, and I'm glad I took the call. Yeah. Wow. I'm glad I took that call because then I wouldn't have met you. I wouldn't have been in the space of dentistry. Um, as much as I'm not as passionate as I would like to be. I think you found a passion. But like, in a way, I'm grateful because I found something that I actually like. Yes. You know? And who knows um what tomorrow holds, but like um, shout out to University of Pretoria, man. Those tests, those um multiple choice thingies that we're doing on the computer where we had to click CBTs, those CBTs were killers, yeah, and we had them on Mondays for anatomy. They'll pull a string. What nervousness.

SPEAKER_01 2:05:07

So you're grateful for all of this experience. Yeah, I'm grateful. Yeah, I'm so grateful. So, so the one message to people watching is take the call. Take the call, give it a wall.

SPEAKER_02 2:05:20

Yeah, you never know. And I'm so glad that there's so many young ones who are more focused than us and who really want this. And they're all from different backgrounds. There's so many of them that not all people who look like me are from the ghetto. Some are living a very privileged life, and then some are not. Some are living with their grandmothers like me, you know, and it's interesting. And they're all the same, they're all what this. And that's what I love.

SPEAKER_01 2:05:54

I love that too. Yeah. It it it'll only benefit the society if the healthcare workers that are in there are there because they want to be there, not because they just landed there. Of course. So take the call. Dentistry was a literal calling for you, not a figurative one.

SPEAKER_00 2:06:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 2:06:10

And uh yeah. Take the call. It might be a literal call, like in your case.

SPEAKER_02 2:06:15

Take the call, give it a while. You're still young. Uh, dentistry needs more doctors. Um and guys, please, can we just stop this thing of getting our degrees and leaving and going to furnish another country with our resources and our resources have been living in it? I also want to say, government, can you please take care of yours healthcare professionals?

SPEAKER_01 2:06:41

Okay. Please. I thought you were attacking me there, because you said, like, don't get at your degree and change change careers and things. Because I don't practice. That's too. Yeah. That's too. You know how I feel about you with all of that. Yeah, I don't know, but I can imagine. And also, like, it pissed me off. I agree that five years of resources spent on me, and I'm not even doing what the university You have all of these skills.

SPEAKER_02 2:07:02

You're walking around with all of these skills, and you know, you're mising us of the services.

SPEAKER_01 2:07:07

Well, I'm le at least I'm giving uh my colleagues an opportunity to talk about these things and uh uh hopefully inspire. Definitely. If you I think people watching this will be inspired by your story. I told you this that you're gonna inspire people and I sent you that email, and I know it will happen.

SPEAKER_02 2:07:23

God, it was such a journey to come here. I am a very nervous person and I'm an introvert. And um Well, do you regret doing this now? No, I don't. Okay, cool. Yeah, it wasn't what I thought it was gonna be.

SPEAKER_01 2:07:37

Yeah. In a good way or in a bad way? In a good way. Thank you. Let's leave it at that. Thank you so much, man, for coming on. Let's go. Uh I'll in in five years' time we'll talk about your uh experience as a leader into a teacher and a lecturer.

SPEAKER_02 2:07:52

Oh my god, maybe I can get my prof title. Since we're talking about titles, I can move from business class to first class.

SPEAKER_01 2:07:59

And there will be students that you know send you uh testimonials and say, you know, thank you for holding me through the thing. And I'm telling you, yeah, you never know. I'm sure that'll happen.

SPEAKER_02 2:08:09

I'm literally gang when they came to me. This other one, she's doing her final year now. She was like, by me.

SPEAKER_01 2:08:15

Like, I see a million people, yeah, every day. Then she explained. I'm like, oh my God. God bless you. Wow. It's a nice feeling, huh? Yeah. Okay, cool. Yeah, we'll talk about lecturing next. Yeah. Thanks, Lero. And thank you all for listening. Thanks. Cheers.