Last night, Lil Wayne was honoured with the “I am Hip-Hop Award” at the 2018 BET Hip-Hop Awards.
While accepting the award, the rap icon got emotional while spoking about his near-death experience, the challenges he had faced, and also thanked those who stood by his side all through his persecutions, especially Uncle Bob who helped him when he attempted suicide years ago.
He said:
“I must give this award to the people who refused. What I mean by that [is] the people who refused to stop supporting me during all the…you already know. The people who refused to see me as haven’t put an album out in six years, four years. You guys respected me, you guys supported me. You came to every show. You respected every album, every feature. My family. My family refused, refused to stop motivating me. To stop treating me as if I am not the man. As if I am not the father who I am. As if I am not the person who I am. They refused to let me feel anything less. Please give it up to my family.”
“When I say, ‘refuse,’ there’s a man in New Orleans, his name is Uncle Bob,” Weezy begins in the early stages of a memorable anecdote. “He came into an apartment one day. He bust in the door, guns drawn—he saw nobody. He saw legs on the floor. It was my legs. He saw blood everywhere. Bunch of police hopped over me. He refused to do so. I never knew, I talked to him the other day, I never knew EMS was on the scene. He said EMS tried twice and they told him, ‘There’s nothing.’ He refused to let that die.”
“He told his somebody, ‘Come drive this car. Forget a ambulance.’ He brought me to the hospital himself. He refused to wait, he kicked in the doors. He said, ‘You get whatever you gotta do and you make sure this child make it.’ Not only that, that day, Uncle Bob was a homicide detective. He was off on detail. He just heard the call and came. Not only did he refuse to sit, not only [didn’t] he give me to the doctors and leave, he refused to leave, he stayed and made sure that I made it.”
Watch the speech below:
.@LilTunechi emotional anecdote about his near-death experience puts his love and legacy into perspective. #HipHopAwardshttps://t.co/T9UzXkTc8M
— BET (@BET) October 17, 2018
