It's important to you that your kids know
where they're from, that they know about their lineage.
Yeah.
Ukrainian lineage, and I know Sona,
like this has been a big thing since I've known you.
Yeah.
You're Armenia and your connection
to Armenia is really important.
Yes. Yeah.
And it's harder for me to connect to say Ireland,
because we came here in the 19th century,
and it just is so long ago.
It doesn't have that same intensity when
someone's first generation.
Yeah.
Like where I feel like, I don't know, it's in your.
I guess the saying would be it's in your blood
but it's stronger than that even.
It is.
It just feels like it really is.
You have a very strong connection.
Yeah, you feel like you have to cause...
I'm sorry, my voice is a little, (laughing) it's gone.
That's why I sound like this.
She smoked a lot of pot,
I did. just before we came on.
Cocaine. Yeah
Lots of cocaine.
Cocaine, cocaine laced marijuana.
(Sona laughs) Yeah.
But also in our house, you know, we speak Armenian,
we speak English, and then my husband is from Armenia,
so he's also a Soviet. Yeah.
And so they speak a lot of Russian too.
Yeah.
So you probably know Russian, Ukrainian, and English.
I don't speak Ukrainian. Oh, okay.
Because I left in second grade and that's when
they start teaching Ukrainian.
So, when I was there, Russian was the main language.
Yeah.
Because I left the USSR,
so I left when everybody had to speak Russian.
Yeah. There was no,
everything else was secondary.
So I think it was first or second grade
you start learning Ukrainian.
But I left in second grade, so I never finished it up.
But if I heard Ukrainian
I attributed to like Spanish and Portuguese.
Like it's this, it's close enough
where I can pinpoint some words,
Right. and figure it out.
But I wouldn't be able to string a sentence together.
Yeah.
When I'm with her family, they just all aren't speaking.
No one,
No one understands anyone.
Yeah. (Matt laughs)
And there's very little English being spoken.
Their very, very little English.
That's good.
Yeah, it is good.
I don't know. It's great.
I mean, do your parents speak, U- (stuttering)
Russian? like with each other?
My parents with each other?
(laughing) Yeah. Yeah. Right?
Oh yeah, yeah. Yes.
I mean it's the language they're most comfortable with.
Yes. And they do to myself and my husband.
Until my husband points out, he's like, okay, you've.
Like he can understand enough and then once it gets
over a certain point of conversation, he's like, nope.
That, you gotta, you gotta flip that language.
And so if you remind them, they'll remember to flip.
But if they start
it always goes in naturally to Russian.
Yeah. What's really,
Sona's husband Tak, who grew up
in the Soviet Union. Yeah.
They have these beautiful one year old twin boys.
And he has some toys.
He has Soviet toys for them. Soviet toys.
I did too.
Like Vinni-Pukh and
(Mila speaking Russian) Vinni-Pukh.
Yeah I love Vinni-Pukh.
Yes and Pitachok and he has,
Pitachok!
My, my kids do too!
Wait, hold on.
(Sona and Mila talking in Russian excitedly)
What's happening? I'm scared.
So do my kids!
Corley help me. (Sona laughs)
I don't know. (Sona continues laughing)
My kids have Cheburashka, Krokodil Gena.
They watched Vinni-Pukh when we were little.
Yeah. Yeah, yeah. What is, what is this?
What's happening? What's Vinni-Pukh?
Is Vinni-Pukh, Russian for Winnie the Pooh?
Yeah. Yes but get this,
and I don't know if your husband had the same as,
experience that I did. But he's a good Soviet.
(Sona and Matt laugh)
He makes sure that everyone gets
an equal amount of honey.
(all laugh)
The honey must be shared equally among the collective.
Oh bother.
(laughing continues)
Okay. Wait, wait, wait.
So ask your husband this.
This is a little embarrassing, but I think, okay, whatever.
I was talking to Ashton,
maybe nine years ago.
And we were talking about
(laughing) Winnie the Pooh.
And I go,
like it's amazing that
they created Winnie the Pooh in Russia.
Yeah.
And then you guys picked it up here.
Like what? And he went-
Oh wow. No.
(Sona laughs)
Oh my God. Russia didn't create
Winnie the Pooh. And I was like,
Damn, no we did. We had, we had
Vinni Pukh.
(Sona and Conan laugh) What?
And he was like, baby, baby.
You also, You guys also (laughs)
Yeah but surely we- America!
created Elvis.
No, no. America stole Gilligan's Island,
(all laugh)
which was just again
a collective farming experiment on an island.
And Vinni-Pukh sounds, he's voiced
by an actor who sounds
like he's just been smoking
cigarette. Yes. A pack a day.
Maybe two packs. Yes.
What does he sound like?
(Mila imitates voice of Vinni-Pukh)
(everyone laughs)
Oh my God.
Who's Eeyore? Is there an Eeyore?
(everyone continues laughing)
I, You know what?
Oh my God!
Eeyore is a, is a, is a
Marxist-Leninist.
I can't, I can't, I can't handle it.
It's so, and there's smoke (Russian) Gena smokes.
He like (roars) and like they smoke.
(all laugh)
They don't know what Cheburashka is
What is Cheburashka?
They don't know what animal.
He doesn't even know what he is.
Cheburashka. What is Cheburashka?
My parents told me,
and I already forgot what it was.
Is this an animated character
It's like a chipmunk looking thing.
Yes.
But it has like, it looks a little bit like
What's that? What was that?
People in Deep Space Nine.
The F, um. Ferengis?
That's right, he looks like a Ferengi.
Oh my God.
Corley! He looks like that Ferengi.
It's only because she said F Yes!
Corley do I?
Do I congratulate you or my
Yes he looks a Ferengi.
Oh my God, look at that!
Yeah.
Eduardo just pulled up,
what's his name? Cheburashka.
Cheburashka! Do you actually have a Cheburashka doll?
Yes, of course I do.
Mine has PJ's on.
Yeah, do you realize it has a camera in it?
It's watching everything you do.
(All laugh)
Cheburashka sees all.
Do you realize there's somebody in a van
in like Minsk?
Yeah.
Watching a, watching a screen
monitoring you and Ashton.
Everything you do, Okay.
to Cheburashka.
Every now and then his head turn slightly.
Cheburashka is most displeased.
I'm gonna find you Cheburashka.
I'm gonna get one for you.
Oh my God. I have to see these toys.
Yeah, me too.
Yeah, yeah. Oh they're fantastic.
They're really funny. And you squeeze them.
And one thing you have to be careful is.
Oh yeah, they sing. They sing yeah.
Yeah. They sing. They sing.
Like what?
Like, I forgot the (Russian) song.
But it's just their theme songs.
They sing their theme songs.
(Mila and Sona hum the song)
The great thing is that's the people's songs.
So they don't have to pay rights.
Yeah. You know, we don't have to pay anybody. Exactly.
It's absolutely fantastic.
Yeah. Yeah.
I love it that and also in American toys they say like,
watch out could be a choking hazard.
Yeah. No not Russian Toys.
But these toys they say, watch out,
these toys are prone to depression.
(all laugh)
I am sad, I must drink.
Oh man.
Oh my god. That's hilarious. That's fantastic.
I can listen to you two go on about Cheburashka
No, no, seriously, this is a whole other thing
you guys going off about.
Wait, do you have the Russian toy,
my parents got it for 'em.
but talk about like, this is hazardous
it's metal with like sharp plastic
and then you push it on top and it spins.
It's like a giant spinning like
Oh no, we have
we have like a plastic version of that,
but not the legit version.
The OG one, oh yeah, no ours metal!
Like the tin top we, yeah. That used to be here.
No, but with it but it has like spikes.
No, it doesn't have spikes.
Rotor voice.
It will detonate if you hit it too hard.
No, I mean it is crazy how
we're so safety conscious with our toys.
Yeah.
And when we had kids and I would go and see the toys
everything is, they've thought a million different ways.
And the minute there's any hint that some little thing
might be slightly hazardous, the toy is recalled.
And then whenever you're over in Europe
you'll see like, oh, it's spiky, the iron spike.
Or the slides?
Yes, the slides.
The slides is like a, I mean it was a, it's a death trap.
They're metal.
They're very steep.
They hurt you.
And I kept putting my kids on them.
We were in Budapest and so we would take him
to these parks and they was like steel communist parks.
And, Ashton was like, 'you want me to put
my baby on that slide?'
And I was like, 'well, I went on them'.
I went on them, I'm okay.
If you don't, I will.
Yeah. None of these would pass muster.
There's, it's just a different attitude.
Yeah.
Which kind sometimes it's like a little refreshing.
Yeah.
Like you get on a boat and it's like, yeah
maybe we have a couple of life jackets.
Shut up!
Get on the boat.
What's the worst that could happen?
You know?
It's a very different idea.
It's different, yeah.
There's definitely, I mean, having married a Soviet
there is a definitely just like that
very distinct difference. Yeah.
In how he was raised and how I was raised.
Yeah. Yeah.
Well not how we were raised, I mean where, how we grew up.
But also it talks about when you were raised
because my father's a doctor and I said to him once
you know this peanut allergy thing, is this new, like
because I read history a lot
and never heard about it growing up at all
about peanut allergy.
I said, Is this something that developed later?
And my father went,
' Oh no, no. There was always peanut allergies.
Always. They always existed.'
Cause you know, this is a scientist and he knows this stuff
and, and I said, 'Really? Well, what did people do then?'
He went, 'Oh, a lot of people died.'
(all laugh)
Just like there was a different time.
There were other priorities.
Yeah yeah, there were other priorities.
Like, well we got nine kids.
Well two of them just ate some peanuts and died. Well,
Oh shit.
the other ones seem to not have the allergy.
Let's keep moving.
Let's get that burrow out of the mud and get going.