Personal Life
Snipes began training in martial arts when he was 12 years old. He has a 5th degree black belt in Shotokan karate and a 2nd degree black belt in Hapkido. He also practices some different styles of kung fu, capoeira, eskrima, and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu
Snipes has been romantically linked to a number of women, including Jada Pinkett Smith, Sanaa Lathan, Halle Berry and Jennifer Lopez. He has been married twice, first to April Snipes, with whom he has a son, Jelani Asar Snipes, born in 1988. Jelani had a cameo role in Snipes' 1990 film Mo' Better Blues. In 2003, Snipes married painter Nakyung "Nikki" Park, with whom he has four children: son Akhenaten Kihwa-T Snipes, daughter Iset Jua-T Snipes (born July 31, 2001), son Alaafia Jehu-T Snipes (born May 26, 2004), and son Alimayu Moa-T Snipes (born March 26, 2007). Snipes spends a lot of time in Park's home country of South Korea, which he calls his "second home."
Snipes, who was raised a Christian, converted to Islam in 1978, but left Islam in 1988. During a 1991 interview, Snipes said " me more conscious of what African people have accomplished, of my self-worth, me some self-dignity."
Snipes' apartment was destroyed by the collapse of the World Trade Center's Twin Towers during the September 11 attacks. He was on the West Coast at the time. During his time in New York, Snipes was trained in fighting by his friend and mentor Brooke Ellis.
Read more about this topic: Wesley Snipes
Famous quotes containing the words personal and/or life:
“Children’s lives are not shaped solely by their families or immediate surroundings at large. That is why we must avoid the false dichotomy that says only government or only family is responsible. . . . Personal values and national policies must both play a role.”
—Hillary Rodham Clinton (20th century)
“Women are taught that their main goal in life is to serve others—first men, and later, children. This prescription leads to enormous problems, for it is supposed to be carried out as if women did not have needs of their own, as if one could serve others without simultaneously attending to one’s own interests and desires. Carried to its “perfection,” it produces the martyr syndrome or the smothering wife and mother.”
—Jean Baker Miller (20th century)