Journalist Dayo Olopade is the author of The Bright Continent: Breaking Rules and Making Change in Modern Africa. She is currently a Knight Law and Media Scholar at Yale University, where she is in the JD/MBA program. Before talking about homegrown innovation in Africa, she explained why it would be better to be the bassist in U2 than Barack Obama in the Zócalo green room.
What’s the ugliest piece of furniture you own?
A hexagonal coffee table with two drawers—and it’s not ugly so much as not functional. It doesn’t fit in any corners. It’s got a lamp on it now. But it’s never flush with any particular corner.
If you could be anyone in history, who would you be?
Barack Obama. Actually, no—he’s got kind of a tough job. You want to be someone who’s living today—today’s always the best day to be alive. I’d want to be someone who had power but wasn’t too famous—could go to a Starbucks and still have some privacy. I’d want to be like the bassist in U2, because no one really knows who he is, but he’s still accomplished and influential. Something like that.
What does it take to get you out on a dance floor?
Very little. The friend who brought me here broke her elbow because we were running to get onto the dance floor to dance to a song called “Pony” by Ginuwine. The first few chords, once they hit, you can’t resist.
What’s the strangest thing you’ve learned in law school?
There was a really robust intellectual property regime around alcohol. We get the vestiges of it—we have Prosecco and Cava and Champagne because you can’t call any sparkling wine not made in France Champagne. You can’t call anything tequila not made in Mexico.
Describe yourself in five words or less.
Who no know go know. It’s pidgin English—a Fela Kuti lyric, and it’s a sort of call for information: He who does not know will soon know.
What’s your specialty in the kitchen?
Frittata. I can make a frittata out of anything—I’ve made a frittata more than once out of a vegetable platter from a party.
What’s your favorite Nollywood movie?
2 Rats. Oldie but a goodie—it’s kind of like a buddy film about tricksters, two little kids, who are just adults who are small people, who get into all kinds of trouble.
What was your worst subject in school?
I don’t want to say geometry because I kind of liked it and I didn’t do poorly in it, but I’m not a very visual thinker or learner. Questions like, “Will this be a cube if you fold it up?”—I struggle with those kind of things. I just never know.
What book have you reread the most?
I don’t generally as a practice do that, but I really like Another Country by James Baldwin. I’ve read that a couple of times. I think there’s something really magical about reading a book for the first time, and you can never replicate it, unfortunately, so I try to get to the next one rather than reread.
What’s your biggest vice?
Being late. I’m late to everything.