Ella Al-Shamahi

kind of oh my god i feel i'm raising kids right now and i'm not raising them in the mosque that i grew up in and it's like it's sad it's i i i yearn it's so difficult it was like it was like i i didn't know who i was anymore and the people that were around me that would normally love me and and knew who i was they were all new to

I think it is no surprise that having gone through what I've gone through, that when I look at our story, the science of our story, that I feel something.

Like I feel something.

We know that everybody from outside of sub-Saharan Africa, and even some people within sub-Saharan Africa, have some Neanderthal DNA in them.

And that can only be explained by, basically, one of our great-great-great-great-grandparents having sex with a Neanderthal.

So there's a scandal in the family, basically.

Now, usually, the way this would be presented is, oh, there's some Neanderthal DNA, so that means that there was some kind of intercourse, blah, blah, blah.

We take a moment

And instead it's like, hold on a second, right?

That means that one of our ancestors, not like a theoretical, one of my and your ancestors was half-half.

And I'm not mixed race, but I'm mixed heritage.

So I'm a British Arab, right?

Let me tell you, that was confusing growing up at times, right?

At times I was like, it's a bit weird.

I'm like, what would it be like to not just be mixed heritage, don't be mixed race, but mixed species?

Like, what would that have been like?

And what would...

the mother have felt like how would she have felt would she have been sitting there hoping that the child would look more homo sapiens than neanderthal because you know she doesn't want them to get ostracized she doesn't want them to get wow like pregnant like like that mom is sitting there pregnant like thinking about what her baby whether her baby's gonna have a brow ridge or a chin or something seriously

Yeah, so we were the new kid on the block.

And for example, when we entered into Neanderthal territory, Neanderthal territory being kind of Europe and Northern Asia, we would not have had immunities to local diseases.