Working as assistant editor on this project was a great opportunity to collaborate with a talented and hardworking team of people that are passionate about making a difference within the Irish literary and cultural scene. In the midst of everything going on within Irish society today, so many important voices and opinions are lost, unheard and swept under the radar. I’m proud to be a part of Unapologetic as we provide an inclusive and supportive space for often unheard or disregarded voices to speak up and share opinions about engaging issues. It was a privilege to engage first hand with these voices in Ireland and assisting in the editing process was both enlightening and inspiring. I look forward to the magazine being published and the fantastic work being showcased and hope that it makes the impact that it deserves to.

The graphic entitled the missing piece is an honest depiction of my internal struggle with my dual identity. Having had both Irish and Nigerian cultural upbringing, it is extremely difficult to navigate between who I am and what my true identity is. It is reminiscent of a jigsaw puzzle, not knowing which piece would fit where. Within the context of my family home, I am a Nigerian girl, obeying the customs and native traditions that have been passed down from generations. Yet, in University, I am a girl that understands her surroundings and adopts a culture by osmosis, as it enables me to blend in with the masses. It is a comfortable position to be in as no one questions anything. Upon self-reflection, I smile at the naivety I possessed. I had this preconceived notion that by separating my two worlds, my authentic Nigerian self, and my Authentic Irish self, there would be no conflict and I could continue being ‘’me for whoever asked. Yet the emotional toil lingered on. Many nights of deep contemplation lead me to believe that trying to live two authentic truths is exhausting, your true self-identity is an amalgamation of your ethnic culture and the culture that encompasses you, they live in symbiosis. Being Nigerian is the majority of my puzzle, but being Irish is the missing piece.

Writing for Unapologetic has been a joy. As somebody who has been on journal editorial teams in the past, I know the struggle of managing the peer review and feedback process in a timely manner for dozens of pieces on a wide variety of topics, and I was pleasantly surprised by the incredibly rapid feedback and peer review responses from the Unapologetic team, with clear and helpful feedback being delivered in a very brief timeframe. This was particularly impressive given the subjective nature of much of the content they were reviewing, which leads me on to another positive of writing for the magazine. It was intellectually invigorating and frankly just plain fun to get to jump outside my academic comfort zone and write something that – while researched and cited where appropriate – was much more opinion-based and personal in its scope. Being able to get work of that nature peer-reviewed was a new experience and was of great benefit to my writing.