United Arab Emirates w/ Mark Gagnon | You Be Trippin' with Ari Shaffir

Olivia loves a challenge.

It's why she lifts heavy weights

and likes complicated recipes.

But for booking her trip to Paris, Olivia chose the easy way with Expedia.

She bundled her flight with a hotel to save more.

Of course, she still climbed all 674 steps to the top of the Eiffel Tower.

You were made to take the easy route.

We were made to easily package your trip.

Expedia, made to travel.

Flight-inclusive packages are at all protected.

Hello, everybody.

Welcome to You Be Trippin'.

It's a travel podcast.

Me and a guest.

I'm trying to do the intro for the whole thing every time so people know what it is.

Me and a guest take you to someplace exotic or less exotic or fun or terrible in the world.

And they tell me everything they did there.

It's not a travel blog.

It's not a what are the restaurants and statues to say.

It's more like, what did they get into while they were there?

So today on the episode, I have Mark Gagnon.

He's the founder and leader of the Flagrant Two podcast.

Okay.

Yep.

Yes.

Yeah.

That is what I am.

He is the hair extraordinaire.

Yes.

Mark, how are you doing?

Thanks for coming.

I'm excellent, brother.

What do you think of the studio?

This is awesome.

Toby Manny.

It's so clean.

It's very beautiful.

You don't see anything over there.

That's why I said clean.

Why are you telling them?

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Extremely clean.

Cut out the part where I introduced Mark.

Yeah, exactly.

I thought the tunnel to get here was unnecessary, but I do think it's cool.

It's cold out.

Yeah, I like it.

That's why you have to go under.

Exactly.

They have them in Calgary.

They have tons of tunnels.

Is that really?

Yeah, they have like connected buildings connected through tunnels, the above-ground tunnels.

In Calgary?

Yeah, they're like, you shouldn't be outside.

Oh, interesting.

It's negative something always.

Oh, that's hilarious.

Yeah.

I mean, it's kind of a smart idea.

Keep you out of the elements.

Yeah.

It's like the catacombs of Calgary.

Yeah, exactly.

Have you ever been there?

The catacombs?

Where is that?

In Paris.

No, I went by it.

Where is it?

I don't even know which Aerodismo.

But

it's an insane thing.

That's not where Napoleon was buried.

No, no, no.

He's buried in his own little crypt.

Okay.

It's just like underground.

It's literally just an underground tunnel system that's vast.

It's basically the entire city of Paris, it seems like.

And it's thousands and thousands and thousands of bodies and bones

organized and stacked in like a very precise manner.

It's like femurs, radiuses, ulnas, and then skulls all in the top.

And it goes on for miles.

Whoa.

All deaths from like the Black Plague and like different overflow from like historical events.

It's insane.

They have the underground Edinburgh, but it's not like that.

They just kind of buried the city after the plague and started a new city.

Oh, wait, really?

Yeah.

So the old remnants of the city are underneath it.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Oh, I've never seen that.

And they're just like, let's build above.

Oh, interesting.

Yeah.

So if you go down there, what do you see?

But it's not like bones and stuff.

I think that's all cleared up.

It looks like old grain store.

They have like ghost tours.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And you can still hear young Margaret playing with her ball.

With an old

ugly Scottish accent.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Oh, look at that.

Boo.

Boo.

At the child gets window.

So where do you want to, where are you telling me about today?

There's a couple places.

Yeah, we'll be back a couple times.

So everybody on this podcast is going to come multiple times.

I'll do multiple people in different countries because people have different experiences.

The most recent one that I think is going to be

is the most funny.

I hope it's on here.

Yeah.

I mean, it might be blocked.

If it's not on here, we are going to have a way different conversation.

Now, we're going right here.

United Arab Emirates?

Abu Dhabi.

Abu Dhabi.

Abu Dhabi is a city.

Yeah, exactly.

That is, it is a actually, yeah, no, I think it's the capital of the United Arab Emirates.

A lot of people think it's Dubai.

Yeah, I always thought Dubai, UAE,

and Abu Dhabi were different places.

I always kept meaning to look it up, but now I just did.

You used to be right.

What do you mean?

So back in the day, like pre-1940s, this is basically British mandate.

Like British...

Yeah, this is like a British mandate over these Arab Emirates.

And so basically an Emirate is just like a city controlled by an Emir.

And an Emir is like the ruler of the city, right?

So back in the day, this was like

this was like 10 different emirates.

So

you had Abu Dhabi, you had Dubai, you had small little kingdoms.

Exactly.

RAC was like another one.

What's RAC?

It's like a

congressman from Oklahoma.

Yeah.

No, it's like another city, but I don't know what it stands for.

But it's like some Arab words.

Those are the only two I know.

But then like technically, like Bahrain.

Up here.

Yeah, Bahrain.

Qatar was another one.

I say Qatar, but you hang with enough.

They say Qatar also.

All the generals were just like, we go to Qatar.

We're going to Qatar.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Qatar is the way you're supposed to say it, I guess.

And then Saudi Arabia, which is another thing, but they also hate them.

They hate these people.

People are like, why are you doing shows in there?

Why are you doing?

Why is golf?

So this is where golf is?

Yeah, yeah, I believe UAE.

Yeah.

So UAE is a really fascinating place.

So it used to be all these different fucking empires.

And then this one guy, Sheikh Zayed, basically they had nothing.

Like they they had, it was a very small desert, okay?

And they didn't have any, they had ports and stuff, which was like valuable to the British at the time.

But it was like they were making their money from pearl diving.

They would literally like send people down the water, find oysters and clams and shit, get the pearls out and sell the pearls.

Like that was their industry.

And then they find trillions of dollars underneath their feet.

Of oil.

Yeah.

After they already had their own country.

No, that's the crazy thing.

So Sheikh Zaid finds all this oil.

He's the guy.

But he's still being ruled by England?

It's still like the mandate from england so basically what he's able to do is broker a deal with like the u.s and bp in england british petroleum and get independence for uae for like favorable oil rates for bp wow you'd think they'd be like no we're actually gonna just take all that bro it's like the most undervalued like masculine trait in my opinion is just like diplomacy you know what i mean like we put so much precedence on like fucking you know this guy's so strong and tough

to my face yeah he doesn't take shit from anyone's But, dude, this guy is smart enough to be able to be like, okay, I'm going to take this trillions of dollars.

He didn't say, because BP was like, yo, how about we get it out of the ground for you?

We'll give you some money.

And he was like, no, no, no, no.

We're going to put our own shit, our own derricks, our own drilling, and we're going to get it all out ourselves.

That's what Podcast Network's got.

We want 60%.

Just come in and talk for a little bit.

We'll give you some money.

So yeah, they tried to get him into like a fucking Barry Gordy, like Motown deal.

And he said, no.

And so he is able to unite all of these Emirates that have been fighting each other since the dawn of time.

All of these emirates have been at war, right?

Like you fight the people near you.

Yeah, right.

And so he basically went to Dubai.

He went to all these other people and they were like.

What did he say?

You got oil too?

Yeah.

He was like, hey guys, I have great news.

We found oil.

I think you guys have oil.

We all got oil.

Instead of fighting each other and killing each other over this oil, let's just all combine our forces and then become

a financing superpower.

United Arab Emirates.

Exactly.

Wow.

And it's truly remarkable.

And obviously, there's like some controversial elements of like what they've done, but it's fascinating as a country.

Wow.

Yeah, that is interesting.

I didn't know any of this.

I'm trying to do this in my stand-up now or just in general.

Just in general.

And then my stand-up fed from it is just focus on a positive instead of the negative.

So every time it's like, yeah, but they have human rights abuse.

I'm like, that's the negative part.

Can we just talk about some cool, like,

like, don't even think about it.

Who cares?

I'm not talking about that right now.

This is the thing.

Yeah.

Here's the thing.

When I went to Myanmar, they were like, well, I heard this same thing.

Human rights.

I heard they're killing the Rohingya.

I'm like, I didn't go to that part.

I'm just saying the tea leaf salads are really good.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

When I traveled to the bottom of the film,

why would you ask that?

Why would you say that?

Yeah.

Yeah, when I went there, I wasn't like, yo, where's the sex trafficking?

Great summer day.

You're like, oh, what a great day to go to Yankee games.

Like, you know, Arab, like, homeless people die in the season.

Thanks.

Yeah.

Jesus.

I'm going to do that anytime anyone goes anywhere.

Like, someone goes to France.

I'm like, do you know what they've done?

Do you know what happened in France?

You know the age of consent in France?

It's like 13.

You're going to go to that country?

What the fuck is wrong with that?

That's crazy.

I didn't know any of of that.

That is a good point.

We only do it with developing nations.

You know what you've done, bro?

We live in America.

I didn't vote for that.

You're like, shut up that.

Just shut it down.

Neither did they.

They did that exactly.

They didn't vote for this.

But

it's remarkable.

This dude, Sheikh Zaid, literally united all these emirates,

was diplomatic enough to gain independence.

Look at any of these other nations in the region that try to nationalize their resources.

They get fucking clipped immediately.

They get murdered.

And then the U.S.

sends in.

Jesus comes in and it's like, we'll help you.

We'll set it up for you.

We'll give you.

They put in a CIA asset as the president of the country.

They do a coup d'etat, and then they take it.

Remember hearing about all these?

This wars are all still going on all through here because

after World War II, let's split up this stuff into full countries.

And so they're like,

Israel's a good idea.

Or no, Iraq-Iran is a good idea.

They're like, okay, this will be the line.

You got off the first one.

You're like, all right.

Yeah, because I wasn't really from that.

And then they're like, all right, here's the border.

But then there's like,

then there's like cultural or whatever, like, there's like Shiites and there's Kurds or whatever.

Like, well, no, our area would be here and their area would be here.

Like, we've had both sides of that river.

Like, well, we made a border.

Like, well, now we're an ethnic minority and they hate us.

We had a group and you fucking fucked us up.

And so they're still fighting over what the borders should be.

But this is the insidiousness of British colonialism is that they were able to be like, okay, we're going to intentionally put ethnic minorities into these majority countries, and then we're going to give power to the minorities.

We are going to side with the minorities, either intentionally or just by virtue of them going to get slaughtered so the British had to come in and control it.

Pakistan, Afghanistan.

I mean, Pakistan, India happened.

They all drove the Pakistanis out.

Oh, it's insane.

Yeah.

I mean, have you heard of Churchill's hiccup?

No, what is that?

This is like a...

I don't know if it's like confirmed fact, but there's an interesting Wikipedia article on it.

But basically, some people speculate that Churchill literally, him and his boys were going through and they were like carving up all the Middle East and then there's like little pockets where it's like wait why is that included there's a mountain rage that should divide the region there's ethnic groups on either side that are would war with each other why is this part of it included in the country why and he go and I think the answer that he gave to the press at the time was like it must have been a hiccup or some shit like that Then people are like, no, it wasn't a hiccup.

You're trying to include ethnic groups in the same country that are going to war with each other so that you are always needed as a daddy.

That's interesting.

This is what I've heard.

I'm sure there's some British historian that's like, well, actually, that's not true.

But also, it's like they don't really care about them.

So they're just like, I don't know, divided here.

We're not going to do a lot of research.

Like, this should be about right.

They don't care, but they do want to have access to the resources.

They want to have access to all the things.

And if they're constantly at war, then they can be the daddy state that controls it.

But I mean, yeah, it's fucking interesting.

Okay.

That's history, though, which I never do on this.

But that was why are we talking about history?

That was very good.

Come on, dude.

So, why did you go?

When did you go?

I went, this is like November.

Yeah, I think it was November of 2023.

Okay.

So this is a couple months ago.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So I went with my good friend Andrew Schultz.

Okay.

He uh

is at this point one of the biggest comedians on the planet, which I didn't, I like, I didn't even realize that he could sell it at arena.

He sold on an arena in UAE?

Bro, that's what I said.

He's like, he told me a couple months ago.

He's like, yeah, they're going to do shows in UAE.

And I was like, oh, that's awesome.

We did shows in Russia.

I figured like a bar show.

I was like, yeah, we're going to be like, $500 in a hotel.

I was like, who even speaks English?

I was like, I don't even know what this could be.

We did a show in Russia a few years ago, and it was like a club.

It was a comedy club.

And I was like, oh, this is awesome.

A proper comedy club is like a couple hundred people.

This is great.

And I was expecting the same thing in UAE.

And then he releases

the show announcement.

And I was like, what?

And I looked it up.

It's a proper arena.

So this is the insane thing.

So funny what comedy's become.

Yeah.

UFC did a fight the night before in the same arena.

Oh, really?

I was like, this is crazy.

So long story short,

we go to Europe.

We do a bunch of shows there.

I always heard it's just a few kings, everyone else is in poverty.

But I'm like, they're filling up an arena, they're selling tickets.

No, it's not a few kings, everyone's in poverty.

It's every Emirati is taken care of forever.

What's an Emirati?

So an Emirati is a citizen of UAE.

But now what's interesting about the sort of cultural architecture of the country is that it's only one Emirati for every 10 expats.

Oh, I get it.

Oh, and that's when they have like, they bring the Filipinos over and steal their passports.

Primarily, like

Desi diaspora.

So it's like Indians, Bangladeshis,

Pakistanis, Afghanis.

Okay, so you go there.

So we fly down there.

We're going to go do this show, and we're going to be there for like three days.

We go to Dubai first.

Three days?

Yeah.

That's not enough time to go anywhere.

No, not at all.

Yeah.

So we go to Dubai first.

And Dubai, for me, it's fine.

It's just kind of like big buildings.

It's.

Is that the fake place where they did like fake islands that look like palm trees?

Yeah.

That's that.

Yeah.

People, I almost did a show there on this last European run.

They're like, they want you to do that too.

And I was like, okay.

And part of me is like, I don't want to go.

I just don't want to go.

It's like Vegas, it seems like.

Always to me, it is.

It is.

But then I was like, what's the offer?

Is it like 200 grand?

And they're like, no, like five grand.

I'm like, oh, no.

Yeah, it is.

Dubai is kind of fine.

Abu Dhabi was awesome.

Why?

What's the difference?

The difference.

Our experience was a little different.

And this is what I'll get into.

The time where there's a couple of things that happened.

I almost got arrested by police in Abu Dhabi.

And then I thought we were going to get beheaded by the head of the state.

I thought this is what was going to happen.

Really?

Genuinely, before we go on stage, I was like, this is going to be the end of it.

These guys are going to take us out.

I was afraid.

Come on.

For my life.

This is called foreshadowing.

Okay.

Good storytelling.

So, yeah, I guess where to start.

We get there, we go to Dubai, Dubai is whatever, and then we go to Abu Dhabi.

Dubai is a gem that is created by the state to appeal to Westerners.

So it doesn't really have a ton of like cultural merit, in my opinion.

Like it all just exists as like this capitalist shrine to bring like dumb British people over.

Yeah, it's a vacation spot.

Yeah.

Yeah, primarily.

So

you have people that go there, like want to buy like Chanel and stay in a nice place and have someone like put steak in your mouth.

I don't know.

Is it expensive?

Because so whatever I got from the, they have so much oil.

I'm like, why do you need my $200?

You know what I mean?

What's interesting is that Dubai, I think, is out of oil.

And so they've become this commerce center.

Interesting.

And that was like their whole pivot.

Now, Abu Dhabi is more of like a cultural hub.

It's more of like an actual, you can actually touch like Emirati culture in Abu Dhabi.

And what is that?

What's Emirati culture?

I mean, it's more typical to like any Arab nation.

Like there's just like proper like Arab food and kebabs and things like that.

Whereas like you go to this place.

They're food or like restaurants or whatever.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

They have stuff like that, which is awesome.

Cool.

Hey, guys, I'm going to break into the episode really quickly to tell you about the guest.

Mark Gagnon.

Gagnon.

I think it's Gagnon.

I think it's Gagnon.

He just doesn't know.

I think he says Gagnon, but I think it's Gagnon.

Right?

I mean, it has to be Gagnon.

These comics have no class.

That's their problem.

Even the Schultz ones, I know they're all doing well, but class is not just like,

you can't just get that.

You can't just inherit that.

No, you can't, you can

you inherit it, you don't attain it.

Yeah, anyways, a stand-up comedian.

He's uh doing his first big tour, and I'd like to tell you about it.

He's going to Bangor, Maine, this weekend, and Portland, Maine.

Then he'll be moving on to Charleston, South Carolina, Atlanta, Georgia, Stroudberg, Pennsylvania, Hoboken, New Jersey, Indianapolis, Indiana, Buffalo, Raleigh, Poughkeepsie, Portland, Oregon.

Oh, he's hitting both the Portlands.

Fort Worth,

cooler than Dallas, by the way.

Austin, Texas, in

April.

Stanford, Connecticut, Philadelphia, Lexington, Chandler, and San Diego.

You can get all tickets at markgagnonlive.com.

Mark is obviously spelled Mark.

Did you know if there's a Mark Gagnon

skater?

Like a pro speed skater.

Do you have pro speed skaters?

Who would pay for that?

It looks so slow.

Guys, I'm in the middle of recording my new storytelling series.

The end.

It's the final storytelling shows for me.

I still have shows left tonight, Monday, and tomorrow, Tuesday.

If shows, well, tickets are sold out, but come, maybe you can get standby tickets.

It'll probably be like 10 or 15 no-shows.

And we'll put people in the list.

If you want to see history in the making, the lineup show yesterday was fucking great.

And Monday and Tuesday are even better.

Every show is a surprise, but come on down.

Also, subscribe wherever you're listening or watching this podcast.

YouTube, Spotify, whatever.

Subscribe.

Do it.

Do me a favor and subscribe.

And I got merch on my website.

I got Go for a Hike shirts that I'm really loving.

I got Stay Positive shirts for my special, the Signed Grinder, Signed Vinyls, the Ari Cat shirt, and a ton more.

Go to AriShafir.com.

It's newly redesigned and is coming at you.

Guys, that's it.

Let's get back

to the United Arab Emirates.

New backdrop.

I'll show you next week.

All right.

Bye.

We go there, and I'm trying to think which thing to say first,

which story.

I guess how I almost got arrested.

This is so terrifying.

So the

strict as it is.

This has happened to me a couple places.

I just do things that are dumb.

Like, for example, we went to Marrakesh six months ago, and it was during the World Cup.

Oh, wow.

Maybe like a year ago.

During the World Cup, and all the Moroccan dudes are watching the film.

They went far, right?

Yeah, they went to the semifinals.

Oh, right.

They're watching the World Cup on their phones.

It's like all these like Moroccan guards and police.

They all have guns and shit and they're all in like a checkpoint, 10 of them watching a phone.

And I was like, oh, this is so funny.

It's like late at night.

We're walking around.

And I was like, this is so funny seeing these guys just like watching the game.

Like this is how beautiful and global soccer is.

So I took a picture.

Immediately the wrong idea.

Because they're like military?

Yeah.

Police.

Literally.

So I take a picture and then I start walking.

I immediately feel someone grab my arm, whip me around.

This dude, like giant diesel Muslim dude, Arab, fucking got the red beret like gun on his chest.

And he was like, what are you doing?

Is your first thought?

Like, what the fuck?

My first thought is, oh, I just took a picture of a bunch of guys not doing their job.

Immediately, I know what the deal is.

Right.

And he goes, what are you doing?

And I was like,

I was just walking by and he's like, why do you have your phone?

What'd you just do?

And I was like, I took a picture of you guys.

Like, immediately just come clean.

I was like, I take a picture.

Give me me your phone.

Takes my phone.

What?

Start opens it up.

He's like, fucking, look at it.

Like, does face ID.

Deletes the picture.

Goes into the.

I know this guy's a cheater.

This is how I know he's been cheating on his girl.

Goes into the deleted of the deleted and then deletes the deleted picture.

And he was like, that's it.

And I was like, yeah.

He's like, did anyone else take pictures?

And they're all ahead of me.

My whole group, they all left.

And so.

They didn't even look back?

They didn't even look back.

And so he was like, no more pictures.

And then sent me on my way.

Okay.

This was like a year ago in Morocco.

The funny thing is, what you really want to explain was like, hey, dude, the truth is, you guys are just like a zoo to me

and not full humans.

And I thought your behavior was interesting.

It was almost.

Yeah, exactly.

It's almost like what we would do.

Yeah, yeah, exactly.

You guys were acting like humans, which I thought was so cute.

No, I was like just terrified.

I was like, wow, I'm a fucking idiot.

So I have a propensity to do dumb things like this and to be overly comfortable in places I shouldn't be comfortable.

Okay.

So we go to UAE, we go to this UFC fight, which is awesome.

Oh, you went to the fights?

Yeah.

And they, bro, they stacked it up with like Muslim UFC fighters.

So they do a Brazil too.

It was like every, a Brazilian or every card.

No mustache in the whole fucking arena.

It was just all these dudes chinned up, just pummeling everyone.

They are the most intense, scary.

Oh, the mustache just goes on there.

Yeah, the beard just fucking.

Dude, if there's no mustache, run.

Like, you do not want to fuck with these people.

So they were just.

They were training on a better.

They were fucking everyone up.

It was insane.

And so we do the fight, we leave, and then we're standing in the parking lot waiting to get our car cars everywhere we're just jammed up and so it's me schultz it's the whole gang regular cars nice cars yeah yeah so we had like a driver that was like assigned to us the whole time and uh we're waiting for that guy to come pick us up and then there's this guy who's sort of like a funny dude but he's like the guy that's running the parking lot and he's asking us where we're from and he's an emirati dude okay and he's asking us where we're from and he's asking you know what's going on and where what we're doing And we're explaining everything to him.

And we're having a great time.

He's talking about his wives.

He's like, yeah, you know, I got four wives.

I was like, What?

He's like, Yeah, I know.

I wish I had zero.

Yada, yada.

Just like goofy, fun, small talk combo.

Everything's great.

And then he walks away.

And at this point, in my mind, this is how dumb I am.

I go, oh, we're like boys now.

I just, I don't, like, we

said one joke.

That's legit, though.

I said a joke to you.

We are homies.

And so he walks away.

We're still waiting there.

We're waiting like another like five, 10 minutes, waiting for this car.

We're like, where the hell is the car?

And then the guy, I see him probably like 20 feet away and he has a walkie-talkie.

And all of a sudden, the walkie-talkie starts like doing feedback.

It's like super loud.

Just like going crazy.

He turns it off.

And he looks at me as he's turning it off.

And he's like, oh, my goodness, this thing is so annoying.

Like being silly again.

And I go, Habibi, what?

Habibi, is this your ex-wife?

Yeah.

Immediately his tone changed.

What?

What?

Putting him in his place?

I'm trying to think what the Arab culture I know.

Bro, I have no idea what I even did.

He go, like, so he told us about his ex-wives and his wives, yada, yada.

So I just made a joke.

I was was like, bro, is that your ex-wife on the phone?

Like, she's annoying.

It was a screeching noise.

Comedy.

And she was like, and he just walks over and he was stands like close, like in my space.

And he's like kind of a shorter dude, wearing regular street clothes.

And he goes, so, um, brother, um,

do you know who I am?

And I was like, you're my boy.

We are homies.

Like, we, dude, you just told me this story about your wife.

And he's like checking me.

And everyone is kind of standing around, like, staring at me, being like, oh, Mark, you fucking idiot.

And he's like, bro,

I'm going to show you something.

He lifts up his shirt, shows his police badge.

He goes, I'm Emirati Police.

Still, like, okay.

And I was like, all right.

And he goes, do you have your ID?

And I was like, bro, I don't.

I literally only have my passport.

I left at the hotel.

He's like, okay.

You know,

we can go together.

And I was like, what?

Over what?

What?

Over what?

And then he was like, do you want to spend the night with me?

We can go to prison.

We can go to the prison.

It's over here.

It's beautiful prison.

We can spend the night.

You and me spend the night in prison.

And I was like, at this point, I'm sweating.

Like, I'm feeling everyone staring at me.

Like, he's like in my space.

And I was like,

okay, don't escalate.

Yeah, yeah.

Don't cause a problem.

So I was just like,

I'm sorry, man.

I didn't, I don't, I, I didn't mean to like overstep.

And he goes, okay, okay.

And then he like kind of makes like a joke like getting out of it where he was like yeah anyway so my my my wife is really annoying like and gets out of the confrontation just like as quickly as he came into it and then he kind of starts talking with everyone else in the group and is kind of goofing off what and i was like oh my god

why i don't know what i did i think that i became too comfortable with him And I was like kind of treating him like an equal when he was like, hey, you know, not only are we not equal.

He was treating you like an equal.

He was like, no, no, I'm allowing you to joke.

Exactly.

Exactly.

Do you know who I am?

Not one.

I'm an MRI.

Manhood shit in that whole region is wild.

I don't know.

I don't know.

I think it's also like, this is the kind of guy that's like a cop.

You know what I mean?

Like he's already, he's already seeking like, yo, don't fuck with me, energy.

And then I went over there and was like, treating him like a buddy.

And he was like, wow, that was so fucking frightening when he's like, we could do it.

I'm like, please don't.

Yeah.

I don't know.

Any other country, too, you're like,

they always tell you, you don't get into a fight with anybody because the cops are going to take the local side.

And then he is the cop.

Yeah, exactly.

And there's stories from like in the region in Saudi Arabia where like someone will, you know, like push a bouncer or like be in TSA and like get mouthy with someone in TSA and then just go to prison for six months.

Yeah.

Or have like a seed of weed in your shoe.

Yeah.

And then yeah, you're out of here.

You're like, dude, that's a fucking old roach I had like stuck in my jacket.

Yeah, that's nothing.

You can have that.

Like, I don't want it.

You don't want it either.

You're fucked.

It's crazy, right?

Yeah.

So that was like super scary.

And so already I'm on high alert for like the whole weekend.

I was just like, okay, don't fuck with anyone.

You're not in your own country.

Like, stop trying to be friends with people.

Like, just shut your mouth.

Look around.

So I was like, I was on edge.

And then we go to do the show.

And

that's the biggest fear.

Is that I'm going to say something wrong?

Everyone's going to get my face and just like, I don't know how to do, I don't know what to do.

I'm not going to fight anybody.

Exactly.

And so now I have to go on stage the next day and do jokes.

And like,

hopefully I don't say the wrong thing again.

So we're going on stage and there's a woman that's helping us.

She's awesome.

Are the women allowed to be cool?

What's their deal?

Kind of.

So how did you find them, I mean, anyway?

Like Emirati women?

Yeah, like what were they like?

We didn't really see Emirati women.

Were they at the UFC?

These are dudes.

Not really.

It's primarily dudes and then like wives and girlfriends of like expats.

So like there's a British Indian guy or like a British Arab guy that moves down there.

Like obviously his wife is there and the women have full access and rice.

Do they got to be blanketed?

No.

They can be hair out.

Wow.

I think it's...

That's what I'm saying.

Wow.

What happened?

What happened?

This is what happens if you don't accept Allah.

That's what I'm saying, bro.

For real fucking Hester Prinz out here, dude.

It's fucking debaucherous.

But yeah, for the Emirati woman, I think there's like a different social standard, in my opinion.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

But I'm not positive.

I think, like, I've heard that, that it's like, it's only for ours that you got to do that.

If you're not from here, it's kind of like in French Canada.

Like, gotta speak French.

I'm like, I'm from

Ecuador.

Like, oh, you're cool.

Yeah, it's fine.

Yeah, exactly.

Type shit.

So, yeah, they were generally cool.

But the woman that was helping us was a Scottish woman, and she's basically like the English-speaking liaison to whatever talent is there.

And so, we're all hanging out.

We're about to go on stage.

The arena's filling up.

It's like half Emiratis, and you can tell that they're Emirati because they're all in the Kendora.

So, they're wearing the full white gown with the white headdress, the whole deal.

Which I didn't know this.

The headdress indicates which country or emirate you're from.

What do you mean?

Different colors, different shapes?

Different colors and shapes.

Isn't that interesting?

Wow.

So like Bahrain has its own Kandora.

And then Saudi Arabia is known for having like the red one.

The picnic blanket one.

Yeah.

And then,

yeah, all the other ones have different like collar, no collar.

I think Bahrain has no collar.

Where's Saudi Arabia?

Right, the big one.

Yeah, the big boy right there.

And so like Oman, Yem, I'm pretty sure they all have like their own Kandora, which is actually interesting.

You can tell where someone's from or like what style they're adopting.

You just started being able to pick out Sikhs in the cabs.

They wear that little metal bracelet.

They cut the.

Yeah.

Yeah, exactly.

And everyone's like, Are you this?

Are you that?

You're like, no.

They're like, dude, I'm fucking Punjabi.

Like, I'm not even in the, I'm not even close.

But yeah, so we are about to do the show.

We're about to go on stage.

And the woman that's been like our liaison the whole time is super nice, but all of a sudden now she looks terrified.

What?

And this is 10 minutes before we go on stage.

Are they giving you like what you can and can't say?

Anything like that?

They are.

No anti-government.

Basically what they said up front was, there's a couple of things they said.

They said, no, nothing sexually gratuitous.

So I was like,

be more specific.

Can you go over my act with me, actually?

Can I go into a private room and go over my act with me?

I'm doing like 15, 17 minutes.

I'm looking.

I was like, okay, nothing sexually gratuitous.

That's five minutes.

And then she was like, nothing insulting Islam.

I was like, okay, that's the rest of it.

She was like, nothing insulting Islam.

I was like, okay, that's fine.

She was like, nothing talking about the royal family in any any capacity.

I was like, makes sense.

Okay.

Because you might have gone there.

You might have done a riff.

I mean, imagine, like, even if you don't even know it.

Like, so, and then she was like,

no,

what was the other one?

It was no,

oh, nothing about, nothing about homosexuality.

And I was like, okay, that's a lot of it.

That's going to be mostly what I'm talking about.

So, yeah, can you be like, oh, you know, with long hair, you must think I'm gay.

So, like, yeah.

So, this is the weird thing.

So, this is what's coming from like the woman.

He's taking all this.

He's got to do an hour.

So he just, he was like, I don't care.

Shoes is just like that.

He's just like, I don't give a shit.

I'm going to do whatever I want.

Hi, guys.

I'm stand-up comedian Ari Shafir.

And unlike a lot of stand-up comedians, I know my parents, both parents.

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See you.

Let's get back to the episode.

Here's what's interesting is that these rules are coming from like the woman, and I'm sure, like, a board of people trying to keep things like safe type vibe.

And what's interesting is that the show we're about to go on.

And so the woman comes back up, she reiterates everything.

She's like, so you're not going to do this.

You're not going to do it.

Gay.

You're not.

She's like panicked at this point.

She's like white in the face.

I was like, like whiter than Scottish people normally are, like very white.

I was like, what?

And she was like, yeah,

I just want to make sure.

And then she even comes to me on the side.

She's like, you're not going to take your shirt off, right?

I was like, What?

My bird can't play that.

What's the problem with that?

Man can't have this shirt.

All right, yeah, fine.

She was like, Don't take your shirt off.

So, in the, we play a video before the show where I take my shirt off.

Oh, and like, I just have it off in like a random video from three years ago.

And she was like, You're not going to do that, right?

I was like, No, this is not a part of my act.

I don't take my clothes off.

And she was like, Okay, well, you start really examining who you are in the comics.

Like, I mean, that's not all of me.

I did it once, but I stand by it.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

You know,

it was a, it was funny the moment.

Yeah, I was riffing.

And she reiterates a couple more times that she's very anxious at this point.

And I look at her and I was like, why are you so nervous?

And she was like, okay,

look, don't tell anyone else this.

But there's a royal at the show that's a much higher ranking royal than any of us expected to come.

Oh.

And I was like, what?

And she was like, yeah, like a big or like a really big kind of person.

And I was like, okay, one to 10 if you had to like rank them, like one being like the biggest guy.

She was like,

he's probably a three.

Wow, and I was like, Oh, God.

I almost got arrested the day before for being like too friendly with the guy.

Yeah, but now you got to worry about your whole fucking act.

And now you don't notice till you're halfway through.

Whenever they say clean, you're like, That's gonna be a clean joke.

And then halfway through, like, oh, it does end with me

having sex with a bunch of children.

That's just one little part.

No, there's a dog blowjob.

Yeah, right.

I didn't think about it.

There's no cursing.

Yeah,

I'm so desensitized.

So I'm like going through my whole act, like trying to like filter.

I'm like, gay, like, is sucking your own dick gay?

You know what I mean?

I'm like, trying to decipher shit.

I was like, I don't know.

It's more sexually gratuitous.

I was like, just in a spin cycle.

I had no idea.

And then from her, I even get it.

She's like, I don't know.

I'm not doing what's best for the show right now.

I don't want to lose my job.

I don't want to get beheaded.

Yeah.

Like setting this up wrong.

That's what I'm saying.

So like you guys are not the calmest.

Yeah.

And then, and for anyone that doesn't know, there was no risk of getting beheaded.

People actually think that that's probably the thing.

I don't think there's any risk of getting beheaded, but you could go to prison for a a little or maybe get deported.

I bet that's what they would do.

Like, this is an insult.

Get the fuck out.

Yeah, yeah.

What are they going to do?

International incident?

Yeah.

Yeah, exactly.

So, worst case scenario, genuinely, I'm like, okay, but still, we don't want to risk it.

A couple nights in prison, you get deported.

Who knows what that's?

So I was like, oh, fuck.

So we go on some.

I'm sure Brittany Griner said, like, worst-case scenario, they put you in jail for like a day.

Yeah, right?

Yeah, it gave you like a thousand dollar ticket.

What are they going to do?

Yeah.

You know what I mean?

I'm Brittany Griner.

Yeah.

But yeah, dude, we go there.

We We do the show.

I hear Derek, who does the shows with us.

He's an awesome comic.

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, you know, Derek.

Yeah, he's all of a sudden it sounds really good.

Okay.

Sounds like amazing.

And we had just been to his shows in Europe where like those shows were.

This man's skin, it's different.

Wow.

He's burned by the sun.

He didn't say any jokes.

You did hijab.

Yeah.

He said no jokes at all.

And they were just like, and he was like,

he showed his ankle.

No!

Yeah, they were going, do the lips again, do the lips.

It's crazy.

He pulled his dick out to close, and they were just fucking, it was like Def James.

They were like, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh.

I don't like that last part.

This is insulting.

But,

dude, he goes up.

He does good.

It sounds great from where I'm standing, like kind of behind the stage.

And then I went up.

It was the best show of the whole thing.

Really?

By a mile, the best show.

Like, just so fun.

They were so excited to have like Westerners there.

They were excited to have like real comedy, like people telling jokes.

They loved every moment of it.

Yeah, those guys like comedy.

They started like Russell and then they kept liking it.

They have no sensitivity towards anything.

What's going to happen to them?

That's what I'm saying.

Like they don't, they don't have the same like university level like cultural sensitivity that comes into American culture.

So like you could go up there.

I didn't really change any of my act, I'll be honest.

Really?

Yeah, yeah.

Like there's one or two things that I thought were like over the line that I like it was like a tag that I pulled off but everything else I kept the exact same and it was just ripping

they were so great genuinely and like got all the references they understood really they understood everything they get American or British TV what do they get I mean they watch American movies a lot of the Emiratis because of the way the country's set up they study in America yeah they come over here to study to get education so like All these guys were like, yeah, I lived in Cookville, Tennessee for three years.

Yeah, I lived in Orlando, Florida for four years.

And that's where I learned sick English.

Yeah, I'm amazing at English.

I know all the customs.

I know all the shit.

And

the show was genuinely probably one of the best shows we've done on the tour.

Damn.

Yeah.

And it's the other part that's kind of sick is like, only dudes, really.

At the show.

Like, there's like a handful of women.

So no drunk idiot messing up the show.

I don't like that.

Yeah, no white girls being like...

I saw the cell yesterday.

I was like, it's fine.

I like crass, but it's like sexually demeaning.

And I just like

talking to Napoleon.

I was like, oh, I I want to hear this for a second.

Yeah, that was not going to happen.

And you, a rock would have hit her in the head.

Yeah.

It was just.

I'll show you demeaning.

Yeah.

It was just like up.

It was genuinely a perfect show.

It was so funny.

Wow.

And they were just, like I said, fucking.

So this is the crazy thing.

Okay.

So Schultz goes up and he does like 20 minutes of like brand new material local shit that he's never said before.

Wow.

Like just like riffing talk and just like standing on patient and like 10 minutes in.

I was like, what the hell is that?

In the the middle of it, it's insane.

Wow.

And then we all get off stage and we're all kind of looking at each other, like, no one's gonna get arrested, right?

Like, we're good.

Like, I might have just always saved each other.

It's a good moment.

I did, like, kind of like a 9-11 joke.

I was like, I'm fine for the 9-11 joke.

And the woman was like, you know, they didn't do 9-11.

And I was like, all right, fair.

Good point.

But, like,

there's a rumor it was the Saudis.

That's not even here.

It's not the same.

Like, but it's, you guys all look the same to me?

I was like, yeah, but it's all the same, right?

Like,

and

you you know, they didn't do it.

They just asked some coach about

how do you feel for the Tambay Bucks?

Like, how do you feel going to Droit?

You know, it's cold weather stadiums.

Like, you know, like, are you guys prepared?

Are you going to go early?

And he was like, some female reporter, and he's like,

you know, it's an indoor stadium, though, right?

And then he's like, checked himself.

He's like,

no, we're not doing much preparation.

Yeah.

He just wanted to go, you stupid motherfucker.

You know, I got to talk to these people who don't do their research.

That's a high-level it was that exact thing i was the idiot though i was like the 9-11 stuff might have been too far right like they probably still feel guilty about it she was like no

they feel bad if they see a video yeah they probably feel sad for humanity that they weren't there and when you get a what do you mean you're like i don't you know nothing what yeah no i don't know it's like you saw him you said look at what they got on their heads come on this is crazy no they uh The show was just awesome.

We get off stage.

We're all like, dude, this was so cool.

Like, we go in the green room.

We're all hanging.

All the UFC guys that that went to the show the night before, they all came.

Like, it was so cool.

It was just like one of the coolest shows I've done.

And then the woman comes in, she taps us, she goes, The Sheikh would like to meet you.

No.

And now, at this point, we're like, oh, shit.

How's this going to shake out?

Guys,

guys.

You need to have a button.

You need a confetti button.

I do.

Okay, Toby, let's get a confetti button here for fucking pun moments.

We can hide it just with like a right under the rug.

No, dude, it would fucking shock a guest.

After you do a pun and there's an explosion,

and just like stone face, like, how's this gonna shake out?

You can do it during the saddest part.

And I had to tell her goodbye.

Yeah, that was me the last time.

I put my father's urn in the ground.

You're like, well, you did earn it.

He's crying.

Tears in his eyes.

That's it.

So anyway.

No, so we finished the show.

The woman's like, yo, the sheikh wants to meet you.

And we're like,

okay.

And at this point, we're still a little like, what if he's pissed?

Like, what if there's a problem?

And so.

Yeah, you just met a fucking no-humor guy a minute ago.

Yeah, the cop

was being a dickhead.

So of course.

We can go sleep together.

Also, what are you trying?

You're saying you're going to fuck me?

That's what, dude.

Or are you saying, like, you're going to make me sleep overnight in a jail?

I thought the same thing.

I was like, do you know what happens in prison in America?

Do you know what the stereotype is?

Like, we're going to bang.

Same same, but different.

We're going to bang, dude.

Yeah.

Yeah, we're going to bang.

It's going to be both ways here, though.

Yeah.

I was like, I didn't know you hate your wife that much.

You're trying to fuck me.

Dude.

So you met him, so he came in.

So we walked back there.

We opened the door.

Oh, he just calls you to him.

He doesn't go to you.

Come on, Ari.

Right.

What are you talking about here?

I had a rabbi once I really liked in grade school.

And I was sitting in the front seat.

My dad picked me up for Carpool.

And there was a big, I think, crack hour.

And I was like, oh, there's that rabbit.

He's so cool and young.

He was like a cool hip one.

I was like, Rabbit, Crack Hour.

Can I want to meet my dad?

He's like, Come here.

And I just fucking hit it.

Smack.

He's like, You don't call over a rabbi.

You go over there.

And I was like, Oh, I don't understand these fucking.

I got like the eight toots.

Yeah, I got fucking.

Let me look at you.

Yeah.

But yeah, no, he calls us over.

He hates hoods to us.

And so

we walk in, and there's just 10 giant Nigerian dudes just fucking standing there, diesel, selling weed.

Yeah, cocaine, cocaine.

Dude, whenever you see a Nigerian in like a place where there are none,

that's who you ask for.

It is crazy that no matter what country you're in, a giant Nigerian guy is the scariest person.

No matter where on earth you are,

America, over here, UFC, a diesel Nigerian is scary.

So they're all standing there just like staring at us.

And then the woman comes in and she's like, they're here to see the shake.

And like they separate.

Wow.

And they part like a movie.

We walk into the next layer.

And then it's like 10 giant Emirati dudes that are like more guards.

And they're like,

and the woman's like, they're here to see the shake.

And then they part.

And I'm expecting

Game of Thrones.

Literally, dude, it's like rings.

It's like layers.

And I'm expecting by the time we get to the inside, it's going to be like an old, like Jafar-looking motherfucker.

Like,

yeah.

I would expect.

Who's that in that short song?

The head comes out of the fucking chest.

Hello.

That's quite a show you had today.

Bro, I was like, I thought he was going to be like a like a like i thought it was gonna be like gaddafi yeah he's gonna be like hello boo boo wonderful show like that's what i expect and so we get through we open all the people separate and then we walk back there and it's just a like a 19 year old kid

wow and he goes makes sense what's up guys

i was like what

you're the guy Wow he was like, yeah, what's up?

I'm Zayed.

Great to meet you.

Wow.

And I was like, what?

Oh.

and then he's standing there with like...

He's just some fucking rich spoil kid who's like, I like comedy.

He's genuinely a great guy.

Wow.

And he's like, I want to go to the show.

Yeah, he's like,

I'm 19.

I'm into comedy.

Yeah.

Yeah, why would a 48-year-old go to this?

And he's there at three of his boys.

It's Andrew Schultz.

He used the word mid.

My dad's never going to get this.

He's there with three of his friends.

Wow.

And they're all standing there and they're like, yeah, what's up?

So we're like, literally, I'm just dapping up a prince.

I'm like, what's up, dude?

And he's like, what does his hand feel like

so soft i sniffed it i should have sniffed it but i wanted to he's like

i wiped out my face that's why i look better i look so young and dude it was just like such a surreal thing and he was just like man you guys are great love the podcast like you know wow

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And then, yeah, we just like chopped it up and then we like talked for 10 minutes and he's like, so anyway, you guys want to go eat?

And we're like, yeah, I mean, it's like 11.30 now.

I think a lot of places are closed.

And he was like, nothing's closed.

I was like, what?

He's like, nothing's closed.

And then we went to.

I wonder if these guys understand in those moments, privilege is a bad word, but that they're in the good way.

Like, oh, yeah, because you guys don't get that there.

Yeah, I can just open anything.

Yeah, like, I don't even know.

Or if he's like, I don't understand what you're talking about.

I don't know what the equivalent is.

It's like, it's like, I don't know.

If you let's say you come from a place where it's like, they don't have Uber.

Yeah.

Let's just go home.

It's like, it's going to be like an hour to get home.

You have to to walk.

And you're like, no, no, you just call it like, what?

Yeah.

Oh, right.

And you'd have to take a second, like, right.

You don't have that.

Yeah, exactly.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

You could just call.

Yeah, exactly.

You don't have to pay a cab anymore.

Yeah.

It's like right when I graduated college, I would like to go back and visit, like, you know, see all my friends, and there'd be like a 20-year-old kid.

Yeah.

And he's like, what do you guys want to do tonight?

We're like, oh, we're going to go to the bar.

He's like, I don't, I can't go to the.

And I was like, oh, yeah, you're young.

You don't have the same.

But you didn't think twice about it.

You're not like,

oh, when I'm 21, you can just go to bars.

Right.

So maybe that's what he is i was just like yeah dude you just don't have the same thing as me as a you know 21 year old but uh yeah it was just insane he's like no nothing's closed let's go eat wow and so we went to this place we all sat around the table we ate i was a restaurant yeah just a regular restaurant but they reopened it for us they called and said that someone called and we showed up at a restaurant this is how dana white is in vegas oh really or actually almost anywhere on the road when we get into a car and the old it's that's probably different now because there's been other places too, where it's like, Vegas is different because he owns Vegas, pretty much.

Like, he's tipped so much everywhere that it's like

anywhere he might go, it gets the warning ahead of time.

But it's like, what do you want to feel like eating?

It's like steak, like, okay.

He's like, oh, actually, Chinese.

Like, okay.

No, and so they're like, sweet.

They make a call as they're driving.

And it's like, yeah, yeah, yeah.

They talk to the dog.

It's like, all right, they'll open it up again.

It's just like, hey, money's coming.

Crazy.

Tell all the cooks, like, I'll pay you for a week.

Whatever it is.

Yeah.

Just, it's worth it.

And it's still worth it to them.

Yeah, exactly.

An extra two hours.

You get cash.

Turn all the friars back on.

We'll be there in a little bit.

So I'm sure it's the same shit where it's like, hey, the shake's coming.

He's going to take care of you.

And you guys just got to stay open another hour.

It's not chic.

It's shake.

That's what they say.

That's what they say.

You don't trust them.

Yeah, I guess.

But they also say Qatar.

I'm like, I know it's Qatar.

I know it's Qatar.

So why the fuck are you messing with me, dude?

And so we walk in and go to the restaurant.

Food's amazing.

We're like talking about finger foods.

Yeah, it's actually just like kind of like casual dips and shit.

Yeah, it's just like casual dining.

It's like, it was like an Asian fusion spot.

that's so funny too you expect everything to be completely authentic that's what i'm saying or traditional yeah there's a difference i figured out between traditional and authentic what's that traditional is what they ate always there authentic is what they eat now so like authentic in thailand is 7-eleven.

Oh, that's funny.

Yeah.

Authentic is Pad Thai.

That's invented in the 70s.

That wasn't around forever.

That's really funny.

But that's what everybody eats.

So like, what?

Like, you know what I mean?

They wear t-shirts in India.

They don't wear fucking grass fucking hoop skirts or whatever.

That's great.

That's actually a great distinction.

Yeah.

So they're like, yeah, we have Asian Fusion here.

Don't you have that?

Like, oh, yeah, right.

Of course you would do that.

Yeah.

Yeah, right.

It's not a restaurant.

Yeah, it's not fake.

We're not like punking you.

Yeah, we actually just eat burgers and like steaks every day.

Yeah, yeah.

You know, so we go there.

It's like awesome food.

It's kind of like, it's not like the most fancy spot.

It's kind of like a chiller spot, but it was really good.

And then we're talking, and I'm like, small talking with this prince.

I'm like, what am I saying?

What am I to say?

And so he starts talking about falconing.

He's like, I have a couple falcons.

No way.

They're a couple million dollars each.

And I love them.

A couple million dollars each.

Ryan O'Neill's dad is a falconer.

Really?

He looked it up on YouTube and started doing it on his own.

Probably not as good.

I don't think they're a million dollars each.

I mean, but like, you know, you can buy a cheaper falcon for like 10 grand.

What?

Yeah, maybe.

You just trap one.

You just trap one.

You got it.

Yeah, you get them for free, actually.

So we're sitting at the dinner.

He's talking about falconing.

We're having a great time.

And then,

dude, by the end of the dinner, I was like,

yo, we get on the topic of FIFA.

And at this point, it's probably like one in the morning.

And I was like, dude, I will bust your ass in FIFA.

No way.

I love it.

I swear to God.

I'm not going to challenge this guy.

I don't talk shit at all.

I'm not that kind of person.

But when it comes to FIFA, I will, I will put it on the line.

I was like, I will fuck you up in FIFA.

That's great.

And he was like, I mean, that's the attitude you have to have.

And he was like, no, you're not.

And I was like, dude, give me your gamer tag.

We'll play.

When I get back to the States, we'll line it up.

We will play.

And he was like, let's just play right now.

I was like,

where?

Okay, exactly.

He goes, here, jump in the car.

So we all leave and we get into like four different like supercars.

Like the the video that you're going to pull up that's in the in the message Yeah, is me riding with this dude safe who's one of Zayat's friends safe is the man.

He's like

He was the nicest dude of the whole thing.

This guy.

No.

So that was actually at the UFC fight.

That was when I met Zlatzin.

Zlatsin Ibrahimovich.

The soccer player.

One of the all-time most legendary soccer players ever.

Did you Photoshop his head to be extra small?

What the fuck?

It looks like somebody pinched him when he was being born.

What the fuck happened to his head?

He looks like a pinhead.

Yeah, there might be a parallax thing going on here.

Talk to Apple.

All right.

I'm not going to disrespect Zlatsin, okay?

Wow.

This guy is an all-time great.

He's just an insane dude.

Have you ever heard some of the stories about Zlatsin?

No.

He went and played.

He played all over Europe, played for the AC Milan, played for a bunch of people.

Ended up going to LA Galaxy.

Oh, yeah.

He's in LA.

And

I remember how the story goes.

LeBron James sends him a jersey.

Yeah.

As like, hey, welcome to LA.

That's cool.

And then Zlatsen signs it and then sends it back to him.

He's so big.

Unreal.

He's way bigger.

Zlatin goes, you're welcome.

I'm not going to try to do anything.

That's like his character.

Like, his whole shtick.

His whole energy is just like,

oh, you got to meet Zlatan today.

How does it feel?

Okay, what am I looking at?

I'm crazy.

So,

oh, this is actually right before we left to go play FIFA.

Yeah.

We, here, scroll the next one.

Oops.

What is that?

What drug is that?

That's a drug.

Yeah, it was one of the tobacco.

So they start talking about this tobacco called medois.

Yeah.

And it's like a pipe where you put like this little tobacco thing in, and it's like eight cigarettes at once.

Oh.

So you like light it, you go, oh, that's Derek doing it.

And that's Derek doing it right here.

And Derek, like, smokes weed regularly.

Like, this guy is a seasoned smoker.

Yeah.

These guys are just having a blast.

These guys are just dogs.

What drug is it?

It's tobacco?

It's tobacco.

So it gives you like this insane head rush and then makes you like your fingers tingle.

Really?

And then like it's just like, it's like literally eight cigarettes at once.

Wow.

That's the only way to describe it.

So you just like get this shot and you're just like floating for the next like four minutes.

Did you guys do hookah while you're out there?

Not really, no.

Do they do that a lot?

I didn't really see it.

I'm assuming they.

Black Americans.

Yeah, Dominicans.

Yeah, it's mostly Dominicans.

No.

So if you go to the one before it.

Okay.

So this is us after after we get in the car leaving the restaurant and they're like, yeah, let's go play FIFA.

At just his place?

Literally, we don't know where we're going.

So are you able to play it?

Yeah.

Are you dry?

Oh, it's the opposite side.

They know the word to every Travis Scott song.

Really?

Just like...

Wait, what's...

Does he have a TV in the back?

Probably on it.

Where is is it the back of your head?

No, I mean, like.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

That's like a screen.

It's like a big TV.

Wow.

In the Audi.

Is that dude driving?

Yeah.

Wow.

And he's a legend, safe as a mint.

And they were all super nice.

They were like, so cool.

And yeah, it was just insane.

So we pulled up.

It's cool, they don't have to worry about fashion.

Like, I'm dressed the same as my boy.

We're not shouting out to each other.

And what's interesting is that I'm pretty sure they don't wear underwear.

Really?

Isn't that funny?

Nice.

freeball hunter.

I love it, actually.

They just have that dress.

You get why they all have bidets and shit.

They're like, yeah, we can't be walking around with raw assholes.

Yeah.

Stained up fucking foot.

Wow, that's so cool.

So you're going over there.

And then literally we go, we pull up, and we pull up to the biggest house I've ever seen in my life.

And I was like, what is this?

And Safe leans over.

He's like, oh, this is the palace.

What?

I was like, what?

He was like, yeah, this is the palace.

This is he was like, well, technically, this is the side wing of the palace.

He's like, the front of the palace is actually over there, but this is is just sort of like where we get to hang out and be loud at two in the morning.

Whoa.

So we pull up to the palace and we walk in, and there's like six Emirati dudes all standing in there with like teas.

They're all have like fine teas and candies.

Yeah.

And like we walk in, they give all of us teas.

And I was like, what is going on?

And so, and they're all standing there.

They're all like just very kind and just like, hello, welcome to the palace.

And this is impromptu.

This is two in the morning.

This was not planned.

So these guys are just there on call, ready to give teas to fucking me.

And so we walk in and then we're all hanging out.

Schultz plays one of the guys in FIFA.

Yeah.

Goes to like penalty kicks.

No.

The most

good.

Bro, like it's the thing.

Is Schultz good or are you just good?

Schultz claims that he's never been beaten.

Okay.

And did he win?

He lost in penalties.

This is his first loss publicly.

Ever.

Ever.

Ever.

Now, he like he played a lot growing up, actually.

So he's like decent, but he just hasn't played in like 10 years.

But

he plays the dude.

I played the dude.

I ended up winning.

1-0.

Come on, bro.

Come on.

You beat him.

How did he take it?

He took it well.

What's crazy is that I picked.

He kind of looks like Andrew.

Yeah, a little bit.

He's got that vibe.

I picked a team.

That's why you got to wear the Kendor.

You got to cover it.

I picked a team.

I picked Manchester City.

And the guy goes, oh, that's funny.

Why?

I was like, why is that funny?

Oh, they own.

He literally goes, his uncle owns it.

I was like, what?

Dude, it's so funny because everyone in Manchester Manchester was very

pro.

Like, they're kind of not woke, but,

you know,

woke adjacent.

And,

yeah, whatever.

But then they bought the team and they were like, oh, UA Human Rights Abuses.

Like, oh, we're getting free agents.

And they didn't give a shit about any of that.

They're like, we're winning.

We're winning.

And yeah, we played FIFA.

We hung out there until like 2-3 in the morning.

Wow.

And then we went back and I was just like, yo, I just played FIFA with

a bunch of princes, dude.

FC Barcelona lost after

Man City took him down.

It was insane.

It was genuinely awesome.

And all the guys were incredibly nice, super hospitable.

Not spoiled.

Like, you mentioned that before.

Like, oh, these are like spoiled.

Like, of course, yeah, they are.

He posted for you?

Yeah, yeah, he posted it.

Wow.

Like, of course, they are, you know, they have money.

You just kept beating them?

I was running through these kids.

All right, come on.

Each one's a different guy.

I'm just looking at at the score.

You racist.

I wasn't looking at it.

You're like, dude, you beat the same thing.

Yeah, my God.

Again, one-nothing.

Why are you bullying this kid?

No, no, no.

It was four different Emiratis, and it was so fun.

Wow.

And they were all so nice.

They were genuinely good guys.

Wow.

And

yeah, it was just like one of the most fun things ever.

So it was like an awesome show, awesome dinner.

Learned about Falconing.

Took a sick car ride going like 120 through Abu Dhabi.

What are the streets like there?

Giant.

Eight-lane highways.

Modern highways.

Brand new, pristine, beautiful, perfect highways.

Was there an area of town where it was like wealthy and nice and another area of town where it's like, oh, more like, just like,

it's fine.

Yeah.

So like, there's obviously the nice parts where like these guys are, where like the royal family is.

But then like there's levels of Emirati, but there's a floor.

So if you're an Emirati citizen, you get like money to start a business.

You get money when you get married.

You get money to go to school.

Like you're, you're taken care of.

You have, like, a threshold that you can't really go below.

There's no drugs.

There's no alcohol.

So there's no like addiction problems.

And so yeah.

So Emiratis are not.

Tobacco's the worst they got.

Yeah, exactly.

It's hard to get strung out on tobacco.

You know what I mean?

Like no one's throwing their life away for tobacco.

Right.

So there's no like destitute Emiratis.

And that's the part that is impressive is that this guy finds a trillion dollars under his feet and takes care of

all of his people.

Don't overthrow him.

All of his people forever.

Wow.

Like, that's really impressive.

Like, imagine you find a trillion dollars.

What are you doing with it?

I'm quiet about this deal.

I don't tell them.

I don't do a troll or something.

That's what everyone would do.

Yeah.

And this guy.

It's a fun game is go, okay, you won the lottery.

Yeah.

You are looking at the numbers.

They're going off.

You won

$500 million.

Something crazy.

What's your first move?

I'm an attorney.

What?

You probably got to get an attorney.

That's what my move is.

Yeah.

Tell no one, immediately go, wow.

Some people go like, oh, I'd buy everybody of of this.

I'm like, no, no, how do you even collect it?

You're two steps ahead.

Yeah.

Who do you tell?

Who do you hire an attorney?

Yeah.

And then like, have that.

Yeah, it's like, okay, I need to be quiet.

I call the richest guy I know and be like, hey, man, I'm hoping to make this.

It's a friend of mine.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I'm going to make some money this year.

I have a project coming up and I just want to talk to like an attorney about it.

Right.

And then connect with his attorney.

Yeah.

And then be like, hey, look, I just.

Just sign some NDAs and then be like, yeah, this is what happened.

Yeah, I need to do this off the books.

I don't want anybody coming at me.

Yeah, and then later it's like, Take care of your mom.

That's like 12.

Yeah, 12.

Because she's fine right now.

She'll be like, Go on a vacation.

I'm like, You're so what's just your ticket?

Uncashed ticket, you're going on a vacation.

Idiot.

There's no question for real.

My mom is fine.

Like, take care of your mom.

I'm like, It's not like she's homeless.

So this guy took care of everybody.

Yeah, exactly.

She's fine.

She's already eating.

Her fridge is full.

Every time I go home, her fridge is full.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It's, yeah.

So literally, this guy finds all his money and takes care of everyone forever.

And that's really impressive to me.

And they all were so nice and kind.

And literally, I linked up with one of them just the other day.

They came to New York, really.

And he was like, I want to try New York street food.

And I was like, You actually don't.

I was like, This is the tricky thing.

He was like,

He was like, I wash suits.

I love suits.

So he's like, I was like, Do you want fine dining?

Like, there's a lot of nice restaurants.

He's like, No, I want like authentic New York food.

So I was like, Okay, we're not going to do street food, but we will do like an authentic New York experience.

Where do we go?

They do define dining or they do street food.

Yeah, of course, they do fine dining.

Like all of their food, they're royals, they're like really wealthy Emiratis.

Everything they eat is like amazing.

So I was like, please don't open the porn.

DC, bro, that's fine.

I have a story.

Go ahead.

So we go to Cass's Deli.

Okay, great.

That's a good one.

I was like, where else?

There's a line.

He goes, what is this line?

What does this mean?

I was like, where else is this guy going to get like a

Jewish New York diner?

Yeah.

And so we went there and he tried matzo ball soup, disgusted.

He was disgusted by it?

He's like, what is this?

What?

Hated matzo ball soup.

But then he had the pastrami sandwich.

Was like, this is amazing.

He went back the next day.

I got it again?

Yeah.

Because they don't have shit like that everywhere.

Wow.

Made me happy.

Made me happy.

I was in Guatemala at some, like, I don't know.

I found out anywhere you go in South America, there's going to be a festival within a 10-hour drive or less

in every month.

Every indigenous tribe has their thing.

I found one while I was there.

It was crazy fireworks, everything, and there's also some ritual stuff going on where they have like a baby and there's candles all around it.

Nothing's going to happen, but all these people weird dancing up in like weird outfits and stuff and like goat heads and like bullheads and they're all playing Torah with each other.

It was fun and just fireworks all the time.

I'm with my friend from

Australia.

northeastern Australia.

And we're sitting there looking and he goes, hey, do you watch Suits?

And I'm like, no.

And he goes, I think that's the guy from Suits.

And I'm like, okay.

I mean, I don't watch it.

He's like, that guy.

And I'm like, yeah, I don't know.

I've never seen it.

He goes, I think that's the guy from Suits.

And he goes, I'm going to go talk to him.

And I'm like, dude, if it's the guy from Suits, I guarantee you he doesn't want you talking to him.

It was this guy in the right,

100%

now.

I looked it up later.

It was definitely this guy.

And he was there with his family or something in a crazy foreign place.

I'm like, he wants to be gone.

He goes, I'll just call him by his character name.

Guarantee you, he doesn't want you to do that.

The last thing he wants.

He doesn't want you to be, he won't be seen.

He's in Guada Mala in a not big city.

He just wants to observe this.

And he didn't.

And then the next day he was like, I wish I should have said something.

I'm like, you did it right.

Hey, you nailed it.

There's zero.

You want me to know something?

You nailed it.

That's so.

I think you were telling me this on the last time.

And

you guys were on drugs, right?

I don't.

I think you said he was on like show.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

No, no we definitely had weed okay he was great at finding weed we were definitely high for that also all crazy like whatever that's what i'm saying it's hard to recognize someone when you're on drugs because you're like

is that you yeah or am i high as hell

how was the food overall there you just went for three days it was good like i wish we did more like

i don't know traditional i guess but everything was amazing the food's excellent the alcohol culture is funny because they don't really have any alcohol culture like so they have bars and stuff but like if you ask for like, oh, can I get a mezcal margarita?

They're like, you're out of your mind.

They're like, what is that?

Yeah, what is that?

Like, Coke and Rum?

Like, you know what I mean?

So it's like very rudimentary drinking culture.

When Yoshi went to Kabul, during the occupation,

he was like, there's a period, that's a period is done, where it was a weird city full of people

building up stuff, whatever they're called, hired help, not military, but like whatever the term is.

And he was like, can I bring anything?

They're like, bring alcohol.

We can't get it.

If you bring us two bottles of Jack, we can have our bar open for like a few weeks.

Bring alcohol.

And it was like, okay.

He's like, we don't want anything else.

Oh, that's crazy.

Yeah.

Yeah.

You don't think about that.

There's a lot of places where just there's no alcohol culture, no booze culture.

Like I was with one of the guys and he was like, what is it like to be drunk?

I was like, dude, wow.

I don't even know how to explain it.

I was like, awesome.

I don't know.

Imagine feeling awesome and then feeling really sad.

Yeah.

That's basically what it is.

Feeling awesome, feeling sad then high anxiety for about a week

yeah and then regret and then you do you have any yeah do you have any regrets for this trip anything like i wish i'd done that not nothing nothing major regrets a big word but you know just like i wish i'd done well i guess you said like more like regular stuff yeah i think like but your experience is pretty rad yeah i mean it's insane i actually had a friend that i went to college with that lives in dubai that i saw while i was there but i would have loved to like hung with him and like kind of been like okay how does regular life on the ground yeah exactly my friend that lives there like obviously he's lives in dubai so things are good but like lives a pretty traditional life yeah and i would love to i would love to look at that or just even see like the real culture i would have gone to a different emirate because all the emirates kind of are known for a different thing

so there's like a religious emirate that is like the like the burbs of new york yeah

type and each different like little borough has like a different energy and i wish i went to one of the ones there's one that's like like a nature like Emirate where it's like we have the sickest dunes, we have like sick mountains, we have the sickest trees, we have like animals that only only exist here.

It's like Max.

Yeah, type shit.

And all of them have buggies and like dirt bikes and shit.

So I was like, if I could have gone back, I would have tried to do something like that.

Wow.

But yeah, that one was like one of the coolest trips slash experiences slash anything we ever did.

I'll tell you, I just realized this now, but like, or remember now, but like when you start touring on your own and you go to like foreign places like Hong Kong or wherever.

Find the local comics.

They'll show you where everything is.

Yeah, that's awesome.

You know?

Yeah, yeah.

That's just, I think that's good advice for anyone in general.

Like what boots on the ground for you?

Anytime you're going somewhere, find whatever your hobby is, find the place where people do that hobby.

You do jiu-jitsu, go to the jiu-jitsu gym in any country.

Wow, because you can make friends that way.

You could connect someplay.

Automatic chemistry.

And then you have automatic stuff that you can like, there's mutual respect.

And then you have people that can actually show you their real life.

Everywhere I went, I played soccer my whole life.

Because everyone plays it, and immediately you can kind of get respect and then get actual.

If you're a white guy with long hair going to anywhere in Southeast Asia, I feel like I play with you guys.

If you can hold your own, bro, it's amazing.

They love it.

They could tell all their friends about it.

I played in Honduras for a little bit.

I spent like a week there every summer

in high school.

Really?

Yeah, yeah.

We were doing medical mission trips down there.

Next episode.

And literally, I'd play soccer, and they'll be like, yo, David Beckham.

Yo, David Beckham.

That's what they call me, though.

I'm not careful if you're trying to insult me.

It's actually good.

Where I'm from, that's nice.

Like, yo, I got David Beckham.

You want to play with me, bro?

Like, it was fire.

I always got screeched.

That's Jordan.

No, it's not Jordan.

That's someone upstairs.

What does it mean?

What?

What does it all mean?

What does it all mean?

That's awesome.

Yeah, it was a great time.

It was really, really fun.

Where else?

Okay, I asked everybody this two things before we go.

Where else do you want to go?

Mm-hmm.

And then if you have any overall travel tips.

Anywhere that I want to go, I'm trying to go to the mind.

I want to go to the stands.

Me too.

I'm trying to go to places that I don't know about.

So like, yeah, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Ubekistan, Turkmenistan.

I heard one of them is terribly dangerous and the rest are lovely.

Yeah, I think.

I think it might be Turkmenistan that's the dangerous one, but I might be way wrong.

Yeah, I'm not sure.

But I'm just like, I don't really know anything about it.

I got a friend from Georgia.

Yeah, I know someone who lived here.

And he talks about how beautiful it is.

And he's like, dude, it's insane.

And then I just saw a video video of Mongolia that I thought was crazy.

There's a gig in Mongolia.

Tom Rhodes knows about it.

Ulan Batar?

Yeah.

That's fire.

Summertime.

I want to go there.

That seems amazing.

Yeah, it seems amazing.

They play fucking fucking archery on horseback and they're playing all these crazy fucking horseback games, horseback soccer.

It seems like the coolest shit ever.

I love that.

I got to look into that, actually.

Maybe that's a summer trip.

Yeah.

And then I just think like travel advice in general.

Yeah.

There's a couple things.

One,

I mean, it depends what you're trying to do.

You know what I mean?

Like if you're if you're one of these guys speak for yourself i've heard this i've seen people do this which is actually very clever if you're ever like trying to like meet women go find a nice restaurant in whatever place you're going to and then just go to the instagram page and then go to tags and then you'll find all the girls that tag the restaurant yeah and then you can like hit them up i've seen people do this and it actually works they're like what do you mean just be like literally be like oh hi i'm traveling from out of town like i saw you were at this restaurant is it good and then

if you're like an american going to a lot of these and then it's on there and be like oh yeah wait what are you doing here or if they just ignore it whatever whatever yeah exactly but like they'd be like that's a good one they'd be like wait an american is hitting me up like i live in belarus or whatever like that's crazy and then they'll respond and be like yeah it's really good and they'd be like oh you should come join me and i've seen people i'm gonna put chirons on that that'll be like creep on chicks who went to restaurants yeah exactly um wow that's small so i was like yeah that's also where you find weed oh right waiters

in america mostly that's interesting because they don't care if you ask it's not going to get offended and then probably someone in the back does smoke yeah and then I just think in general, trying to go to resorts.

Yeah.

That's my personal advice.

Some people love resorts.

I would stay as far away as possible.

Yeah.

I have been in Hawaii or something like that.

But like,

I think the general

focus of travel for me is to not experience more America.

I don't want like a little floating America in whatever country I go to.

Like, I'm trying to have like a real, genuine, authentic experience with like the actual people.

See what the culture is like.

See what the people talk like.

Find out they play FIFA.

Yeah, and they like rap music and like they're like me like that's really cool so not to seek out what's familiar but trying to seek out what's genuinely uncomfortable that would kind of develop your worldview yeah no resorts i like that too yeah exactly and then meeting a girl is a good way to see the place too like if you get like a one-week girlfriend kind of thing like you know you both know it's temporal yeah i've never been on that vibe but i know people that do it and they say it's awesome where they're like dude i went to paris for a week and like i met this parisian girl we had like this little four times four times yeah we had this little soiree and it was like hot and fun and then she showed me around i met all her friends and i left that's like hostile life where it's like well we're you know we're going like this around the world it's like maybe we'll come in contact again but it's like it's not like should we hang out it's like it's it that's our trip we both knew wednesday was the last day yeah and then another

travel thing is don't do too much if you have a week go to one place love that I always tell people to take that down when they're like, I'm going to these four countries in a month.

I'm like, no, no, one country, multiple cities.

cities.

Stay a place longer if you like it.

Yeah.

Over-itinerizing is a bad idea.

Yeah.

Is that a word?

Itinerizing?

Sounds good.

No, it is.

Now it is.

That's

the joy of America.

Yeah.

We're Shakespearean.

We're spoken language.

Yeah, we're Shakespearean, dude.

But yeah, just leave it open.

Yeah.

Leave it open.

Like, if you're going, pick one spot.

If you want to go to Scotland, be like, yo, I'm spending all the time in Edinburgh.

Yeah, be like, I'm going to Sky and spend all the time in Scotland.

Okay, then shift from your plan and go like, okay, I'm going up to there for a day or two.

Yeah.

If it comes up.

But like, don't try to do all this and get flights ahead of time.

I think the depth of an experience is more impactful than the width.

So I have this thing.

It's like, you've got to see the statues wherever you're going, which means the best restaurants or the actual statues or this park or natural, like a crater, you know, whatever.

And then after you've seen the statues, when you go back to a city a bunch of times, like European tours, it's like you've been there a few times.

You've seen those statues.

And now it's like, well, what are the restaurants I like to go back to?

I like hanging out in this part of town.

It's cool.

A lot of coffee shops.

That's when you're like, I go back to this coffee.

You go back to a cafe.

That's when you're like, I like this area.

You know, you're having fun.

Yeah, exactly.

You've already seen the Louvre.

I don't have to see it again.

Exactly.

That's the nice thing about going back to places multiple times.

And then you get that out of the way.

And if you're in a place for two weeks, you get that out of the way in three days.

Yeah, exactly.

And then you're just free to now actually delve into the culture and actually feel like the fabric of who lives there.

And then something that Schultz always does that I think is really cool, just like get a sense of like who lives there.

He always asks what people are bothered by.

Oh, like

he does it for like stand-up but like he'll just ask someone like

yeah like yeah what are you like mad about like what are what are people in insert country or insert city like what's frustrating you wow and it's like the roads suck the construction's annoying like right uh there's uh foreign interests that are buying up all the apartments so the rent is really high and you can kind of get a sense of like what is what bothers people.

When we went to that island, we were talking about before, I don't want to say it, or ruined places, but like

we were talking to like a driver taking us to the,

into town, I think.

Maybe it was a bus, whatever it was.

And was like, hey, they're trying to build a rail connecting a lot of this.

The government's doing whatever.

And I was like, oh, no, he was talking about the government.

He's like, oh, does he suck?

I'm like, no, he's great.

He's doing this rail, connecting all these people.

He's like, yeah, he's amazing.

And we're like, oh, I was just trying to relate to you, like, he sucks, right?

Not at all.

We all actually, he made a stipend for old people.

Yeah.

They automatically get a bunch of money every year.

Some countries love their government.

Yeah.

And they're like doing it right.

Like, oh.

Yeah.

That's weird.

Yeah.

And you just get that from talking.

Yeah.

Exactly.

And yeah, people just, people will tell you if you can understand what frustrates people and you can kind of get a sense of like who they are.

And I just thought that was like a really interesting thing to like get a sense of the culture.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I really like that.

What travel advice do you like?

I feel like this is actually.

Travel light is something I get a lot from people, and that's really is right.

You can build up more than down.

You can always find underwear.

Yeah.

You know, if you didn't pack enough or socks or whatever.

Yeah, yeah.

But it's hard to jettison the second pair of jeans when you're like, damn, it's so hot.

I don't even need the one.

Yeah, it's good.

Like, what if I need this?

Like, then buy something a cool souvenir that you'll wear forever.

If you've got a sweater in fucking Nepal, you're going to wear it back here.

Yeah.

You know, if it was like if it's colder than I thought it would be.

And the pictures are cooler when you get to look at a picture and be like, oh, dude, I was wearing those dumb sweatpants.

Here's one you just reminded me of.

An Israeli girl gave me this in Myanmar.

Be in a picture of things with someone you met out there.

Or with someone you're with.

Don't take a picture of the place or of just you.

And this guy, I remember, we hung out for four days.

We were, you know,

or this waiter was so funny.

Yeah, he's in there with him.

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, that's, so I actually read that on like Reddit somewhere where like this guy was going through old footage of like that his dad took at the Grand Canyon after he passed away.

And yeah, he didn't want to see the Grand Canyon.

He didn't want to see his dad.

Isn't that so poetic?

Like he kept on pausing it anytime like the camera accidentally went in front of his dad's face.

Wow.

And so he's filming the whole thing and then it'll just pan to his mom.

And the mom would be like, stop filming me.

And you're like, wow, in the moment, you're saying to not film me, but 20 years later, all I want to see is you.

Wow.

And so I'm like, yeah, I think that's a good lesson in general.

If you're going to go to a place or like take photos, try to put something or a person in the photos that's meaningful.

Yeah.

Even if it's just someone you met that day.

Actually having like a genuine experience with the people is going to be the most important thing.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Even that day it was like a temporary.

I go to old journals and I'm like, oh, that guy, I forgot about that guy completely.

Yeah.

Or that place you went.

It was like, yeah, it's like parts of it just drop out.

Yeah, exactly.

And so like a photo is a good like memorizer.

And it's also a good one to like, oh, this looks awesome.

Yeah.

Empire State Building, but like, no, us in front of it.

Yeah.

And it's also an excuse to do stuff with someone.

Like literally, like, I'll do that sometimes.

I'll be like, like, with my wife and I, we'll go someplace.

I'll be like, hey, can you take a picture of us?

And then they'll take a picture of us.

And then I'll grab the phone and be like, okay, now you get in the picture.

And then all three of us will take it.

And it's like, like, I'll go through my camera and be like, who the hell is this?

Who was that?

But it's like, just, I don't know.

It's a fun excuse to like bump into people.

Ultimately, any type of traveling is not an exploration of the geography.

Most of the time, in my opinion, it's an exploration of the people that live there.

So, like, obviously, you're going to see cool geography and whatever, but ultimately, I think the thing that makes traveling so fun is like, yo, get in touch with the folks.

Yeah.

Connect with humans.

You're awesome.

Yeah, exactly.

When I was in Austria, my friend took us to Austrian took us to like the cool new burrito place.

I'm like, no, I want some spitzel or something.

She's like, this is where everybody goes.

I'm like, right, that, right, awesome.

Connect with the people.

All right, buddy.

Thank you very much.

Thank you, bro.

Where can people find you on Instagram?

Hit me up, Marky Gagnon on Instagram,

Camp Gagnon on YouTube, Flagrant Podcast.

Yeah, the new podcast.

I should have said that one too.

No, that's fine.

They just heard it.

Yeah.

Yeah, fair.

Okay.

They'll find it.

If they're meant to find it, they'll find it.

Yeah.

Buddy, thank you.

You're definitely coming back.

Thank you, brother.

I can't wait.

Well, everybody, that was the episode.

UAE.

UI.

Why?

Why?

Anyway, thank you, Mark Agnon,

for coming in.

Honestly, just like Sean Aber

and

Rob Mayhew.

I don't care how you pronounce it.

I'm going to pronounce it the right way.

Go to Mark Agnon Live, Mark Gagnon Live for the internet purposes.

For all his tickets to this upcoming show, Bangor, Portland, Charleston, Atlanta, Stroudsburg, Hoboken, Indianapolis, Buffalo, Raleigh, Poughkeepsie, Portland, the other Portland, Fort Worth, Austin, Stanford, Philadelphia, Levittown, Chandler, and San Diego.

All tickets are at markgagnonlive.com.

Can I also say this?

Let's.

So Fort Worth is the better of the two,

you know, Dallas, the FW cities.

Austin has a saying, keep Austin weird, but I contend that it is no longer weird.

Millionaires and billionaires live there.

Tech bros have moved in.

It's no longer weird at all.

It's strange in a very boring way.

So I propose to stay in the positive.

That's right.

You can get a stay positive t-shirt right now at RISHAFIR.com for not much, plus a little bit of shipping.

I propose we make a new slogan.

Make Austin weird again.

It used to be one of the coolest cities in the world, and now it's a bunch of influencers and rich people just succeeding.

I do like it there.

My friend built a comedy club.

It's one of the best comedy clubs in the country.

Denver Comedy Works, no disrespect, you're obviously number one.

But it's not weird.

He's dated a girl there, and you could put a pill in her hand behind her back, and she would tell you, just by feeling it, what kind of drug it was, and oftentimes, she'd get the dosage.

She was crazy.

She was fun.

Really interesting lady.

Yeah, really interesting lady.

I tried to go down at her once while I had

either chlamydia or genital wart.

I forget.

And she was like, chill.

Anyway, the point is: go see markgognonlife.com with a K.

Also, I'm appearing nowhere.

Oh, I got one more gig in Alaska.

And one in Charleston, Charlestown, West Virginia.

I added a last, last, last minute gig, July 12th, Charlestown, West Virginia, July 12th.

Alaska, June 18th, Anchorage.

Damn, UAE seems interesting.

So this is the second episode we've had now.

Cool pictures in this one for sure.

Better than the Tucker episode.

Still,

I'm not

pressed to go.

Even their experience of like hanging out with a chic,

if you take away, like, if you take away someone's status, right?

then like

then like you can analyze like okay let's say uh flavor flave you didn't know who he was right and you're like oh my god look at the cool guy with the clock around if you didn't know who he was that's just a homeless guy wearing a clock

you know i mean you take away status and analyze it as a stranger

Sometimes it happens when like you see a fat person lose a bunch of weight, you know, and like, oh, they look weird now.

Like, but if you just saw him for the first time now, they might not look weird.

Dave Chappelle's a good example.

He wears his own merch.

Sure, it's Dave Chappelle doing it.

It seems cool.

Am I recording?

I am.

But if there was some nobody, if it was some mid-level, like, like, regional, like, headliner wearing his own merch out, like a big fucking logo of a C as a mask on his own chest, you'd be like, you're such a dork.

But since it's Dave Chappelle, since it's Flavor Flav, somebody pull it off.

Status is part of analysis.

Why did I say this?

Oh, right.

So, but if you take that away sometimes, and you can really see how I'd feel being with them, and if you took away the chicness of a chic and you told me some stranger, pretty much an Armenian, I mean, all those UAE guys are pretty much Armenians with money.

They're cashed up Armos.

Yeah, all you chic,

you are pretty much just cashed up Armos.

So if you took away their chicness, their fucking status, and you go, and some Armo goes, hey, you want to drive in my Lamborghini and play, we can play Xbox, I'd be like, no,

I have no interest in doing that.

That's just not my vibe.

It's some people's vibe.

It's not my vibe.

It's just not my vibe.

You know, like, I don't want to be a fucking, you know, posse.

What time?

Me and Atel.

We're like upstairs at the comedy cellar.

And Chappelle came out and he goes, and we're, me and Natale were about to go eat at a diner.

And Chappelle's like, you guys want to go eat?

We're like, oh, yeah, actually, we're about to go eat.

Sure, absolutely.

This would be cool.

It'd be very cool.

And then then, like, 15 more people come up.

Like, yeah, we're all going.

I mean,

like, that's not my vibe.

That's not what I'm looking for.

There's just some of us who just want quiet dive bars.

Not even like Irish bars.

We just want like regular bars so we can sit quiet, listen to music at a normal level and just hang.

And driving in a Lamborghini or fucking.

My Maybach is not my vibe.

Remember when Justin Timberlake was getting chased by the paparazzi?

He was calling 911.

And he goes, goes, I'm in a Maybach.

And they're like, what?

He goes, I'm Maybach.

They're like,

what are you driving?

He goes, I just said I'm Maybach.

They're like, no, what's your car?

He goes, it's a standard automobile.

And I want one person.

I had no idea what a fucking Maybach was.

They make $18,000 a year and fuck up their job.

Maybach.

Shut up.

By the way, can I just say this, too?

We'll wrap up the episode right now.

Remember Justin Timberlake got in so much...

Not Justin Timberlake.

The other one.

The fucking younger one.

Bieber.

Got in so much trouble.

Both of these are Bieber.

got in so much trouble for pissing in a fucking remember that he pissed into a

like a mop like bucket thing

some janitor's mop thing

and they're they all got mad at him but it was like oh what a fucking rambunctious kid he's got no respect but first of all he was like 20.

second of all Yeah, that's better than pissing on the floor, which I've done, which you've done.

Don't act like you haven't pissed on the floor in a corner, drunk.

He pissed into a container that could be easily emptied with a mop already in it.

I mean, you got to wash it out and put new water in, but you just take the whole thing and dump it right into a drain.

He actually did the respectful thing.

Reminds me when I was in Edinburgh and I was smoking weed outside this fucking outdoor area.

It was an outdoor area and then a bar and it was an outdoor area.

I smoked weed outside the outdoor area.

I mean, not even through the, and then I come in.

The guy's like, hey, you can't come in.

I was like, why?

He goes, I saw what you did.

I'm like,

what?

What did I do?

He goes, you're smoking weed.

I'm like, yeah.

He goes, you've got to be respectful.

I'm like, I was respectful.

I smoked it outside your establishment.

And they go, you're not coming in.

I was like, I can't.

I'm legitimately still mad about it.

I'm legitimately still mad about it.

Well, I should get over it.

I mean, that guy doesn't remember.

I'm not over it.

I can't just get over it.

Anyway, guys, the point is, I don't want to go to the UAE.

It doesn't seem that fun.

There's no like small villages to go to and like, you know, get lost in.

But I bet I'd have a good time if I went with Schultz and fucking,

you know,

Schultz and Gagnon.

Anyway, seems like a fun trip.

Today's episode is edited by Alan Caffey.

It's produced by your mom's house network that is also producing my storytelling show, The End.

Filming tonight and tomorrow at the Boxer of New York City.

And

that's it.

Come by, get in the standby line.

Next week's episode is a me episode.

Yeah, two long-haired former fucking helpers on podcasts in a row.

Toby McMullen is coming in to interview me, Ari Shafir, about a full moon party in Thailand.

One of the most fun times in the world I've ever had.

Toby is really into parties, specific weird parties around the world.

And so he interviewed me about this place.

And it was such a fucking blast.

It took me back.

Please subscribe so you're notified of that and click it on like the favorites or whatever so you're actually notified.

We got up to 120,000 subscribers.

I love it.

Next week, full moon party in Thailand, which is almost like no Thai people at all.

What a fucking wild trip.

God, I'm remembering it now.

Oh, you can't wait for next week.

Guys, until next Monday.

Assalamu alaikum.

Oh, I burped during that.

Bye, you cashed up Armos.