They’re talking about my junk – CHAD In His Own Words

Chad talks about life in New Zealand, his new baby, and posing for bachelorette parties. Chad will pose for Men Drawing Men on June 5, 2021.

https://mdmjun5.eventbrite.com

Model Chad: https://www.instagram.com/lifeaschad/

Interviewer Shungaboy: https://www.instagram.com/shungaboy/

Music: "At The Shore" Kevin MacLeod (www.incomptech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 license http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0

LIFE IN NEW ZEALAND VS CANADA

It's pretty much the same as back home actually, except I mean, some of the small things like, here I can't get Cheerios, or Kraft dinner, or dill pickles, even. Though Auckland is actually, it's huge. The little town that I live in is called Glen Eden so it's essentially just like a big neighborhood within this really, really large city. More obvious culture around Maori people.

MAORI CULTURE

Maori is the indigenous population of New Zealand. One of the major differences here is the language-honoring. For example, child services here, at home, we would call it Ministry of Children and whatever, but here they call it Oranga Tamariki. So they're utilizing that language to honor and embrace the Maori culture. Here, I feel like it's more meaningful. My husband is Maori-Chinese-Scottish. I'm in this family that are historically Maori and there's some practices like doing the Haka. Haka is one of the bigger cultural flags from Maori. The rugby team that come up in the do the Haka.

BABY KORA

Oh, we moved here February 1st of 2020. So, um, just before things got challenging. Yeah. So we came here for the birth of Kora and we knew that our surrogate was pregnant in the fall of 2019 and then decided we were going to move here shortly after that. Oh gosh. Um, I mean she, she's a personality and a half already. She's a dream. Really. Sometimes she's a nightmare, but that's to be expected, I think. We try to prepare as much as you can and then the little human comes along and then it's kind of bumbly and you're learning your process through it. Blair's at home, I'm at home. While it's an awful time to be having a baby in a pandemic, it's actually also been kind of a blessing because we've really been in this situation where we can be present together for her and for each other. Legally has been a real challenge. It's not easy having a baby as two dads, just because of New Zealand law says that the surrogate and the surrogate spouse are the legal parents. After she was born, we had to go through an adoption process and it includes going to court and the lawyer and all that stuff, even though she's biologically my child. You have a new birth certificate and it says our names on it. Now we're just waiting on Canadian papers.

STEP AEROBICS

I teach step aerobics. I was doing it online through my Instagram @chaderobics, but now I'm teaching at the gym down the street.

SOCIAL WORK

At home professionally, I was a social worker. Still am. I'm registered as a social worker here and in Canada, it's just, I'm not actually doing any clinical work, but it's on the horizon. Particularly older adults is my area of interest.

TATTOOS

The sleeve one, it started with just this script and the stars. And the script says when skies are grey. And this is an homage to my mom, my birth mom who passed away when I was a kid, she would say, "you are my sunshine." So my sister has, “you are my sunshine” on her body. And I have "when skies are grey," which is another lyric in that song. I wanted to create a sleeve that was outer space, so you've got some alien stuff, and then at the bottom, we've got inner space. So we've got atoms and funnily enough, Corona viruses.

FIGURE MODELING

Yeah this figure modeling thing is new. I mean, doing with you last year was the first time. Before then, I had an understanding of lighting and holding your body a certain way because of photography modeling. I like it because, um, I am typically somebody who's artistically inclined, even though I can't draw for the life of me. It's interesting to see how people interpret what they're seeing and their skill in that short a time to come up with such a masterpiece. I think it's an interesting challenge to sit through the discomfort. And so it actually enhances this experience of mindfulness and breathing.

STRIKE A POSE

I actually do a pretty consistent gig with this company called Strike A Pose, where the tutor and myself, the model, go to bachelorette parties. But there was a gal who insisted in sitting right in front of me, almost like junk level. And she was talking about me being cut and she's like, wait, he's uncircumcised. And the girls were like, no, that means he's circumcised. Right? So they're talking about my junk while I'm standing there and they're drunk about it and it's a bit strange, but it's, it's good money and it's entertaining and easy to do with my daddy schedule.