I don't think I will ever be able to really articulate how bizarre it was to hear my name at the Academy Awards. I'd watched in my pajamas the year before! I felt numb - dazed and confused. I remember feeling light - weightless. More like limbo than cloud nine. At first I was like, This is my statue; nobody gets to touch it. And by midnight I was like, Please, someone, take this statue; it's too heavy! So I gave it to my brother, and he went off with it.
Lupita Nyong'oGrowing up in Kenya, slum life was not far away. I had family that lived in slums, so I visited them often, and so I've seen and interacted with abject poverty. But I also know that because of that, poverty is not the definition of the people that live there.
Lupita Nyong'oI realized that beauty was not a thing that I could acquire or consume, it was something that I just had to be.
Lupita Nyong'oIt's in understanding yourself deeply that you can lend yourself to another person's circumstances and another person's experience.
Lupita Nyong'oI've had somebody say, "I want you at my wedding, but I don't want you to pull focus, so wear jeans!" Losing my anonymity is something that's proving to be very challenging.... It's good for your soul to walk around unnoticed; there's so much you can't do when everybody knows who you are. And I so miss those little things.
Lupita Nyong'o