When asked if he prefers Kim or Khloé [Kardashian] the fomer President, who has met both of separate occasions at the White house, said: "this one I have to defer on". He didn't have a problem, however, choosing between his former residence, the White House, or Buckingham Palace, noting: "White House, just because Buckingham Palace looks like it would take a really long time to mow. Lot of up keep." However, Barack does prefer the Queen to the classic rock band Queen. When it comes to his choice of Harry or William, the former President quipped: "William right now." Perhaps the most important question that the Prince asked was if Barack prefers Meghan Markle's former show Suits or The Good Wife. "Suits, obviously," he said, to which Harry replied: "Good answer. Good answer."
The pair, who built a relationship during Barack's eight-year term in the White House, spoke about Barack's leading lady Michelle. He couldn't help but to reflect on the love he had for his wife when the 33-year-old royal asked him what was going through his mind as he left D.C. on 20 January 2017. "The first thing that went through my mind was sitting across from Michelle, how thankful I was that she had been my partner through that whole process," he said. "You've gotten to know Michelle quite well and she is a spectacular, funny, warm person. She's not someone who was naturally inclined to politics. So in some ways despite the fact that she was, I think as good of a First Lady as there has ever been, she did this largely in support of my decision to run. And for us to be able to come out of that intact, that our marriage was strong."
He continued: "We're still each other's best friends. Our daughters are turning into amazing young women. You know, the sense that there was a completion and that we had done the work in a way that preserved our integrity and left us whole and that we hadn't fundamentally changed." Barack also compared his and Michelle's time in the spotlight to his daughters, noting that they were able to experience their youth under the radar, allowing them to become the adults they are now. "I always said to Michelle, and I think she would agree with this, that it was some strange good fortune on our part that we didn’t become famous or in the public eye in any significant way until we were in our forties," he noted.
"And so despite this whirlwind that you just described by the time I was elected to the US Senate and I was a national figure I was a grown man, I was settled, I was a parent, I changed diapers or nappies as you call them apparently. I had struggled with figuring out we were going to pay the bills. We had made sacrifices." Adding: "Michele and I had had the arguments that married couples have. And so in some ways I think, although the process was in some ways surreal because it happened so quickly, we were fairly steady in knowing who we were and what we believed in and what was important."
A year after his presidency, Barack told Harry that although he plans to work with him to champion the next generation of leaders, one of the perks of living in post-presidential world is doing things on his own time. "The fact that I can wake up and if I want to spend an extra 45 minutes talking to Michelle and take a long breakfast I can do it," he shared. "That feels great and I also think that it allows me to focus on how do I transmit whatever knowledge or experience that I have gained to others, to help them become more effective and more powerful and I'm really obsessed now with training the next generation of leaders to be able to make their mark on the world."
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