What does dating look like when you’ve spent years hiding who you are and how you love?

In this special episode of Odejuma, Harry is in conversation with Uche, Kachi, and Obinna, two who moved to the United States as adults and one who grew up in Houston, about dating as gay Nigerian men in America. They share how they came to accept themselves and what it has taken to let someone else in.

They talk about growing up in the church, the pressure to marry and have children, and what it means to find love with another Nigerian. Moving somewhere new doesn’t automatically erase old fears. Sometimes they show up in a glance around the room before a kiss, or in the distance between wanting a relationship and feeling ready for one.

They don’t agree on everything, including how much patience to give someone still finding their way, but they all want the same thing: to love openly, build a life with someone, and feel at home with each other.

Connect with Uche on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/uche_onwa/

Learn about Uche’s organization here: https://www.bdlinitiative.org/

Connect with Obinna on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/igwe_obinna1/

Obinna’s DJ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/djanniboglobal/

Connect with Kachi on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kachinna_/

Connect with Harry on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/harryitie

For more information on Harry, visit: https://www.harryitie.com/

Get Odejuma delivered straight to your inbox, alongside personal reflections on the episode, by subscribing to the Substack here: https://odejuma.substack.com/

Support my work: https://buymeacoffee.com/harryitie

In this episode of Odejuma, Harry speaks with Lamont White, better known as the Gay Dating Coach. A former therapist turned matchmaker and the founder of Better Way to Meet, Lamont has spent over a decade helping gay men navigate dating, relationships, and the search for meaningful connection. They push back on the idea that Black gay men aren't interested in lasting love, and explore what it means to date with intention, move beyond the fear of rejection, and find someone who embraces you exactly as you are.

Lamont also opens up about his own journey to marriage, a love story that unfolded on its own timeline and taught him a few things about readiness, trust, and choosing love. Honest and funny, Lamont challenges the stories we tell ourselves about love and reminds us that we get to write our own.

Connect with Lamont on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thegaydatingcoach/

Learn about Better Way To Meet here: https://betterwaytomeet.com/

Connect with Harry on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/harryitie

For more information on Harry, visit: https://www.harryitie.com/

Get Odejuma delivered straight to your inbox, alongside personal reflections on the episode, by subscribing to the Substack here: https://odejuma.substack.com/

Support my work: https://buymeacoffee.com/harryitie

In this episode of Odejuma, Harry speaks with Rian-Louis, host of the RIANOUTLOUD! Podcast. In this conversation, he delves into how he started the podcast in 2020 to spotlight independent Black LGBTQ+ artists and what he has learned over six years and more than a hundred conversations. He talks about the voice note that told him it mattered, the friend who talked him out of quitting, the cost of keeping a creative life running alongside a nine-to-five, and curating a new black space in Pittsburgh called Good Company. It is a conversation about how much it takes to keep showing up and the importance of archiving and documenting black queer art.

Connect with Rian on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ratedrian/

Follow the RIANOUTLOUD! Podcast : https://www.instagram.com/rianoutloudpodcast/

Listen to the RIANOUTLOUD! Podcast: https://creators.spotify.com/pod/profile/rianoutloud/

Connect with Harry on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/harryitie

For more information on Harry, visit: https://www.harryitie.com/

Get Odejuma delivered straight to your inbox, alongside personal reflections on the episode, by subscribing to the Substack here: https://odejuma.substack.com/

Support my work: https://buymeacoffee.com/harryitie

In this episode of Odejuma, Harry chats with Will Rhem Jr., a dancer, choreographer, poet, and teacher raised in the Gullah Geechee culture of South Carolina. Will has danced on Broadway and taught at Columbia, but this conversation lives somewhere quieter. He talks about tending the self like a garden, the parts of him left untended that kept growing anyway, and the childhood he had to walk back through to write his poetry collection, ‘Abandoned Gardens Still Grow.’ He reflects on Gullah Geechee identity, truth-telling as his first calling, and turning healing into a short film called ‘Bloom.’ It is an unhurried conversation about resilience, self-love, and what it means to grow in the dark. He closes the episode with a reading of one of his poems, and it is worth hearing in his own voice and will definitely leave you with something to sit with.

Connect with Will on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/willrhemjr/

Buy his book here: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/abandoned-gardens-still-grow-will-rhem-jr/1147522239

Connect with Harry on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/harryitie

For more information on Harry, visit: https://www.harryitie.com/

Get Odejuma delivered straight to your inbox, alongside personal reflections on the episode, by subscribing to the Substack here: https://odejuma.substack.com/

Support my work: https://buymeacoffee.com/harryitie

In this episode of Odejuma, Harry sits down with Ozoz Sokoh, the culinary anthropologist and food explorer known to many as Kitchen Butterfly. Her debut cookbook, Chop Chop: Cooking the Food of Nigeria, is the first Nigerian cookbook to win a James Beard Award. Ozoz talks about being a geologist in the Netherlands and how food not only became the thing that held her far from home but also started a decades-long career archiving Nigerian food as a heritage worth keeping. It is a conversation about documenting history in real time and the power of food to bridge cultures.

Connect with Ozoz on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kitchenbutterfly/

Buy Chop Chop here: https://ozozsokoh.com/book

Watch the Zamari interview here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lgr_iA9HAVE

Connect with Harry on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/harryitie

For more information on Harry, visit: https://www.harryitie.com/

Get Odejuma delivered straight to your inbox, alongside personal reflections on the episode by subscribing to the Substack here: https://odejuma.substack.com/

Support my work: https://buymeacoffee.com/harryitie

In this episode of Odejuma, Harry speaks with Keith Parris, known online as Icy, the beauty influencer, model, and writer whose book ‘Amputee Story’ went viral overnight when he was still in middle school. Keith traces his path from a Caribbean household where the art he loved was never the plan, to building a career with no manager and no team, to the fierce self-love he protects now. He gets real about relapse, about the night an ex's words landed like the bullies he'd carried since childhood, and about what it actually took to heal his inner child. It's a conversation about being Black, queer, and disabled online, the difference between being seen and being understood, and the tender work of holding little Keith and telling him he made it.

Connect with Keith on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/icyparris/

Connect with Harry on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/harryitie

For more information on Harry, visit: https://www.harryitie.com/

Get Odejuma delivered straight to your inbox, alongside personal reflections on the episode by subscribing to the Substack here: https://odejuma.substack.com/

Support my work: https://buymeacoffee.com/harryitie

In this episode of Odejuma, Harry is in conversation with Zola Dee, a playwright, screenwriter, and performer whose work [Home] going is the recipient of this year's Kesselring Prize for Playwriting. Zola grew up in Winston-Salem, moved through Los Angeles and Berlin, and landed in Minneapolis, and home has never been a fixed place for her so much as a question she keeps writing toward. She talks about what belonging costs, how African diasporic spiritual traditions and Black Americana live inside her plays, and the people who choose to dream a better world into being. This is a conversation about identity, displacement, and the stories we inherit and remake. Sit with it. You may hear your own longing for home somewhere in hers.

Connect with Zola on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/iamzoladee/

For more information on Zola, visit: https://www.zoladee.com/

Connect with Harry on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/harryitie/

For more information on Harry, visit: https://www.harryitie.com/

Get Odejuma delivered straight to your inbox, alongside personal reflections on the episode by subscribing to the Substack here: https://odejuma.substack.com/

In this episode of Odejuma, Harry speaks with filmmaker Ashton Legadoé, whose path runs from a Cape Verdean family in New Bedford, Massachusetts, to telling some of the most tender Black queer stories on screen. This is a conversation about legacy. What it means to build something that outlasts you, in your work, in your community, and even in the name you carry.

Ashton talks about Nana's Boys, his feature about two Black men whose love is tested when life stops cooperating, and why he stopped waiting for permission to make it. Along the way, he reflects on his immigrant roots, the responsibility of representation, and giving the next generation of storytellers the resources he had to find on his own. It is a conversation about creating without apology, and the quiet conviction that the stories of everyday people are worth keeping.

Connect with Ashton on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ashtonsdreams/

Connect with Harry on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/harryitie/

Watch Nana's Boys: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n-bTK8K10Tg

For more information on Harry, visit: https://www.harryitie.com/

Get Odejuma delivered straight to your inbox, alongside personal reflections on the episode by subscribing to the Substack here: https://odejuma.substack.com/