What It’s Really Like Growing Up Asian American

you know it's tough when kids call you names it's always worse when they just use your name i knew she was about to get to my name because she had that like ethnic pause my life now is just a never-ending guessing game of where are you really from i don't know how my mom did it you know i mean my mom's amazing you know i mean she had two kids that were living at home at the time when she was you know when she was single you know and she raised both of us really well she was amazing she became the mother and the father and the reason why i tell you that is because she reminded us every [ __ ] day there wasn't a day that my mom didn't tell us that just me and my sister just playing in the room and playing around and then my mom would just come into the room and go i just want your kids to know one thing i'm the mother and the brother i bring home the bacon and i cook that [ __ ] my mom was tough as [ __ ] i dare anybody to [ __ ] with my mom's kids dare anybody my mom was 4 10. she'll fight anybody she didn't give a [ __ ] that's how tough my mom was i remember one time i was at a shoe store and i was [ __ ] up the shoe wall you know the shoe display wall [ __ ] up just putting shoes all over the place right and the salesman saw me he was like hey get the [ __ ] out of here [ __ ] up the shoe i'll get the [ __ ] out he's cursing at me right he didn't know my mom was in the back of the store he couldn't see her she's 4 10. my mom parked around the corner she was like hey who are you talking to you don't talk to my children like that who are you huh i want to speak to the manager and the guy started making fun of my mom's accent oh you want to expect the manager and my mom goes oh that's funny you're making fun of my accent i live in your country and i speak two languages tagalog and english you live here how many do you speak one you're stupid so the guy started cursing at my mom right he's like you know what i don't need to hear this [ __ ] get the [ __ ] out of my store take your kid and get the [ __ ] out of my store right so my mom started cursing back right and i've seen my mom curse before but we never seen her get into a cursed fight and when you curse certain words go together but my mom takes whatever curse word she knows and throws him at you he's like get the [ __ ] out of my store my mom goes oh yeah you son of a [ __ ] [ __ ] your [ __ ] has a dick with a cheat in it and you're [ __ ] like a mother mother she is [ __ ] your [ __ ] yeah i looked at my sister did mom just say mother [ __ ] if i lost something i lost it my mom would never help us find [ __ ] right normal parents normal parents help their [ __ ] kids right normal parents it's like okay did you lose something your keys what was it in your pants well what jeans were you wearing jeans well let's look for those jeans that's how you [ __ ] help your kids find [ __ ] not my mom if i lost something i can guarantee my mom's right behind me [ __ ] with me right she enjoys that [ __ ] if i'm looking under the couch i guarantee my mom's right behind me like oh what what what what's under what's under the couch yourself is it your keys did you lose your kids again well maybe they walk under the couch like that [Applause] now i gotta ask my mom for help that's the worst mistake i can make mom i'm late for work do you know where my kids are jose did you just ask me where your kids are isn't that a stupid question that is a stupid question joseph excuse me person that does not drive my car do you know where my keys are that is stupid jose why don't you ask me where my keys are i'll know the answer to that go ahead joseph ask me come on ask me right now do you know where your keys are of course i do of course i do jose i know where my kids are all the time you know why joseph because i put them in the same place that i always put my keys i hang them over here oh on this wooden plaque that says keys [Applause] joseph when you lose something do you use your eyes to look for him or do you use your mouth because every time you lose something joseph you use your mouth to find something you can't find anything like that jose you just walk around has anybody seen my kids i don't know where my kids are i made my way up in your eyes [Music] my name is tien but my full name is actually han tien which is spelled h-a-n-h-t-i-e-n remember that uh i once had a teacher in high school hawaii teacher who was reading through roll call and i knew she was about to get to my name because she had that like ethnic pause and before i could say anything she looked at those letters h-a-n-h-t-i-e-n and said out loud is there a hank tina in the room hank tina is there hank tina here that means this grown-ass adult who's been given the power to mold young minds looked at those letters h-a-n-h-t-i-n and thought to herself this is unfamiliar to me you know what i'm just gonna combine the nicknames of my favorite two american names henry and christina hank tina hank tina hank tina's not a name anywhere that's not a name that exists anywhere in the world unless you're like the child of progressive parents from small town missouri and they're like get on out there hank tina come on scoot find the gender expression that fits you scoot hank tina scoot you love it when i say scoot scoot hang tina surprise shane wang is chinese [Applause] what's up everybody thank you so much for being here my name is chang wang sometimes uh when i tell people that they're like wow that is perfect for pursuing stand-up comedy i'm like yeah but first i was trying to pursue childhood you know it's tough when kids call you names it's always worse when they just use your name even recently i was making a reservation for this hotel in arkansas i gave the guy information it was all good i told him my name is shane wayne he said that's funny you don't sound like that i was like my bad i'm sorry if i don't meet your racist expectations i'm sorry if i don't sound like a complete stereotype arkansas you on the other hand doing a really good job so uh i was hanging out with my younger brother recently and we got into a conversation about how great an older brother i am i brought up the topic um and he was being sarcastic because he had remembered a game that i had invented when i was six and he was four called the belt game um you see i found my dad's belt and invented a game where the rules were you had to hit each other with the belt and uh that's as far as i'd gotten at that point now i'm the older brother right so i got to go first so i took the belt and i whipped him in the eye and he started screaming and crying like a four-year-old and then my mom walked in and to my surprise she also knew how to play the belt game i was like mom how do you know how to play the belt game i just made it up i mean apparently she was an old pro because she would take the belt and she would hit me across the back with it and she said now now you know how your brother feels and i look back at her and i said no i don't i hit him in the eye that was the end of belt game and a much needed return to nerf i grew up in a predominantly white suburb and when you're one of the few asian american kids people say some pretty weird stuff to you and by weird i mean like entertainingly racist not like oh my god that was so bad but oh my god that was so creative how did you come up with that so i was in high school shopping for tankini's at the local tj maxx yes ladies tankinis because i wanted to be modest but flirty you know show an inch of my skin so people are like what's the rest of her stomach look like and so i was shopping for tankinis and i felt a tap on my shoulder and i turned around and this white woman goes are you michelle kwan and i love picturing this woman seeing me across the way thumbing through tankini's and she's like oh my god oh my god is that is that two-time olympian five-time world figure skating champion michelle quan in my favorite tj maxx oh my god no one else in the store knows no one else in the store knows okay i'm gonna go talk to her i'm gonna go talk to her i didn't say anything right away because that's never happened to me before and so in my hesitation she goes are you michelle quan i don't want to speak for michelle but i feel like i'd know my own name if it was michelle you wouldn't have to slow it down for me when i look back on that moment though i really can't i can't blame her because i was shopping for tankinis like this for all the quenetics out there that's what we call ourselves it was weird growing up in the midwest uh with my situation because like i find that my life now is just a never-ending guessing game of where are you really from you know um it's just exhausting to get it all the time like i was at a party recently and a guy i did not even know approached me from across the party and without even knowing my name the first words out of his lips were i'm sorry but what um what kind are you like i'm some sort of unmarked dessert on a buffet bar you know like it was just that casual and it's so fresh it's like fine i don't mind having the conversation i don't mind answering the questions it just never turns into an interesting conversation you know like every single day it's just like oh i'm from south korea and they're like oh cool i taught english in south korea for a year and i'm like awesome i knew some d students in high school who needed to escape too you know like we all know okay good some of you knew some people who needed to flee um that's good it's just frustrating i don't know it was never worse i worked at the olive garden for two years um hold for applause okay um wow some of you think you're too good to clap for the olive garden well have i got something to tell you you're not um no i love the olive gar i worked there for a while and i remember this one time i approached this table it was like three elderly white guys and you know we you know exchanged pleasantries and then at one point one of the guys at the table was like say son are you korean and i was like oh my god that's an amazing gas and how did you know that and he was like well i fought in the korean war so i know a thing or two about this and i was like what does this mean for our relationship now do you need a new server are you going to have a flashback or something like what's going on like it's almost worse when people guess correctly like i met this guy on a dating app and we exchanged numbers and we were texting back and forth and out of the blue at one point he was like so you're korean right and i was like yeah it's amazing like how did you guess that and he was like your eye shape and i was like oh like are you gonna measure my skull next like what where are we going with this and the weirdest thing is is that i hadn't sent him any pictures of my face i'd only sent him pictures of my butthole so i don't know what eye shape he was talking about very confusing very confusing deal with a lot of questions about my race but one question i get a lot um and it's sort of like a jokey question um i you you probably get it too do you get like a jokey question that bugs you okay so on the count of three we're going to say the question that we get at the same time and hopefully it's the same question because this is on tv okay this is a big life moment for me so if you mess this up just think about have that weight on your shoulders um as i count down from three okay one two three do you eat dog okay you didn't say anything um that's outrageous um no that's the question people think they're so clever like they're the first person to ever like ask me this question do you eat dog and he used to piss me off and like upset me because i get it like i know why you're asking the question but at this point in my life i'm like yeah i would [ __ ] eat a dog why not i eat all the other meats uh it doesn't seem like an issue okay i'm losing you um i can sense that but but but bear with me there's a point do i have any dog owners in the audience tonight make some noise if you're a dog owner okay you guys have dogs here's the thing i would eat your dog side unseen i would um you don't even have to show me a picture i just know that i would eat it uh if it were presented to me if it were cooked nicely you know um but the thing is is that's the line for me like there's all these ads in new york right now that peta has that has like a spectrum of animals and it's got like a pig on one side and a dog on the other and it's like why would you eat this pig but you won't eat that dog and it's like because i've never met that pig okay if i knew its first name that might change things that's the message of charlotte's web it really is you can eat any old pick you want as long as it doesn't have an inner life you know and that's where things get really dicey like what they need to do is do what they do with cigarette packs uh in europe you know they put like blackened lungs on the outside of the packs if they would just put facts about the cows on the burger patties i'd never eat another goddamn burger you know it was just like this is daisy her favorite color is blue and i'd be like i can't eat daisy she likes magnolia i love that movie we have too much in common i can't do it

Channel: Comedy Central Stand-Up

Views: 661,611

Keywords: stand up, stand up comedy, comedy central stand up, comedy, comedian, comedians, Asian American, Asian, American, growing up, growing up Asian American, Filipino, Chinese, Korea, Korean, childhood, children, family, mom, mother, parents, kid, kids, school, teachers, games, brothers, siblings, racism, jo koy, tien tran, sheng wang, hari kondabolu, joel kim booster, funny, funny video, comedy videos, jokes, funny jokes, funny clips, laugh, best comedy, best stand up, best comedians

Id: uXjQAtBEuds

Length: 16min 49sec (1009 seconds)

Published: Thu May 06 2021