#nk)

nobokuda reunion pov

...So it took me only like 8 years to be dragged into warframe stuff. Sigh. Thanks @alopex26.

But you’re almost living together. You [and Lewis] have engineering meetings together, you’re in the garage together, you’re at media day together— So as you can imagine, it’s maybe not the most comfortable environment.  So would you just not talk? No talk. But how would you prepare for that ? Because you’re not—that’s not you, though. That’s not me, no. So what would you do before you were walking into what could be a contentious meeting? How would you prepare to be able to be the battle-ready? I’m not good at that, that’s the problem. I was not good at that.  And I didn’t have anybody to help me, because my dad was not there at the track because we agreed that was better, ‘cause I put a lot more pressure on my shoulders when my dad was there, ‘cause it’s so important for me—I want him to be proud and I want to impress him. I want—I need his recognition. So when he was there, I always got a little bit extra pressure. And we kind of realized that and so that’s why he then stayed back and didn’t come so much to races anymore which is great.  Yeah, so it’s never really a strength of mine to know exactly what the right thing to say, the right version of the truth. You know, remember, Lando can say ‘perfect lap’ or ‘I messed up turn 10,’ Both is the truth. And I was not good at that.  And Lewis was very, very good at that—like in meetings, saying the right thing. So that, and it’s a battle off the track, it’s a huge battle, ‘cause it’s—do you have the team on your side or not, and if you say the right thing, then you got the team on your side. If you say— Did you feel the team was on his side? No, it was divided. Some, some people were camp Lewis and some people were my side, which was important and helpful of course, but it remains tough when you have—when you’re up against the people who are camp Lewis.  One of the things that I felt most difficult about was Paddy—because Paddy Lowe was…our team principle I think it was called at the time? He won the championship with Lewis at McLaren. So they had an existing very deep relationship. I generally felt that Paddy would, if in doubt, he would be on Lewis’s side.  And that was one of—for me personally, subjectively, yeah, maybe it’s—you don’t know if it’s true or not, but it subjectively felt like one of the most difficult things for me to deal with. Because Paddy was then most of the time the one discussing—the first person to discuss any incidents with us was him. Before any other senior people like Toto or Niki got involved, we would do a lot of the incidents just with him first, and that generally was difficult for me. Felt difficult.  By the way, I’m fascinated what Niki Lauda was like in this situation like this.  Niki Lauda said, ‘Right. Tomorrow morning, Monday, I want both of you at my house in Ibiza. We are going to make a discussion around this.’ He was the mediator.  He did a great job with mediating, ‘cause what he did as a mediator was, he pushed us each to take ownership of what happened. So to get to a point where you say ‘Okay, yes, that I actually could have done better. Yes, I understand. That was part of what caused our crash.’ Whereas going into the conversation with Niki, it’s 100% the other guy’s fault. And then at the end of the conversation it’s ‘Okay, yes, I understand that part. Maybe yes, I could have done better and that is my fault actually.’ And Lewis the same. And so that then, that’s the— Who conceded first? No, you don’t go together, it’s one by one. So he goes into the house first, comes out, I go into the house.  And you’re both outside not talking to each other. It’s like naughty schoolkids going to the headmaster.  And then most of the time, it would be though, not putting us together, but just getting us to a point where we’re calmed, because when we accept that we actually had part of the blame. And then sometimes it’s also then sitting us together and getting to a point where you kind of make a little bit of progress, just take a bit of the tension out, the air out.

I have a good friend who is trans (ftm) , and the other day he told me that he tries to mimic me because the way I act is how he wants to present to others. When I tell you I damn near teared up