- So, I came up with three ways how I was gonna be cool.
I'm like an alien studying human behavior, you know?
Alright, this is what they prefer.
(audience laughs)
(deep bass music)
- Welcome to This Is Not Happening Presents Fisticuffs.
If you've never been to the show before,
this is a bunch of comics
telling fun stories about real shit that happened.
Ladies and gentlemen, my friend and yours,
Mr. Kumail Nanjiani, everybody.
(audience applauds)
- Hey.
Okay, so I'm gonna tell this story,
but there's a couple caveats.
One, it's not actually,
there's no actual fisticuffs that happen.
So, don't look for a physical confrontation,
it's not gonna come. (audience laughs)
'Cause I'm physically very weak,
and I'm super good at apologizing.
(audience laughs)
So, I'll bring it right to the point
where it's gonna happen, then I'm like,
I'm so sorry, you're right.
I'm a fucking asshole. (audience laughs)
Two, there a point in this story
where you're gonna get really sad
and you're gonna feel really bad for me.
Don't.
(audience laughs)
We're gonna get through it together, okay?
Are we okay with that?
Alright. (audience cheers)
Okay.
So, I grew up in Pakistan.
That's not the sad part of the story.
(audience laughs)
Ha ha ha.
(audience laughs)
So, when I was a kid in Pakistan
all I wanted to do was be cool, you know?
I wanted to be one of the cool kids, and I just wasn't.
I didn't have it, at school I didn't have it.
I went to British schooling and how it works
is you do 11 grades in one school,
then last two years you can go to a different school,
depending on your grades, go to a different school.
And I got really good grades
so I got to go to the best school.
Like the rich kids' school, the cool kids school, you know.
And I remember being like, oh, I could be,
they don't know I'm not cool.
I could pretend to be cool. (audience laughs)
And they're gonna think I'm cool, this is gonna great,
this is the best fucking thing that's ever happened to me.
(audience laughs)
So I came up with three ways how I was gonna be cool, okay.
Way one, I was gonna walk way slower.
(audience laughs)
'Cause in my head, cool people walked really slow
and I remember once seeing LL Cool J walking.
(audience laughs)
And being like, he has the word cool in his name.
And he doesn't, he's probably never run in his life.
So that'll work. (audience laughs)
I'm like an alien studying human behavior, you know.
Alright, this is what hey prefer.
(audience laughs)
That's one.
Two, I was gonna change my laugh
to be like way smaller.
It was just gonna be like barely a laugh.
Like, say something to me sir, say anything and I'm gonna.
Say anything.
- [Man] You're from Pakistan.
- Ha.
(audience laughs)
Heh. (audience laughs)
Right, super cool, right?
(audience laughs)
Super weird response to what you just said.
(audience laughs)
Ha.
Three, I was gonna be like the insult guy.
I was gonna like insult people
and I was gonna be really good at it,
and they'll think I'm cool.
That could go either way. (audience laughs)
so, I get to the school and the cool kids at the school
are like way cooler than any kids I've seen.
They're like the fucking coolest!
They have like great hair. (audience laughs)
The dudes wear these chains that look awesome.
And they all sit under this tree.
They all sit under this one tree
and it's the greenest tree you've ever seen.
(audience laughs)
I bet if you did like math, it would be right
in the center of the school, you know.
And they would sing all day. (chuckles)
They would sit there and they would sing.
And the song they would sing was,
do you remember Informer by Snow?
(audience laughs)
You guys remember that song?
♪ Informer
That song. (audience laughs)
By the way, that song was a hit here
but it hit us super hard in Pakistan.
It was the best fucking song we had ever heard.
It changed our lives.
'Cause this was years after the song came out
and it was still the best fucking song.
It was like the heavens opened, the angels sang to us.
♪ Informer
We were like, that's the best song of all time.
So they would sit there, if you guys don't know,
he's this white guy from Canada
who sings like a black guy from Jamaica.
(audience laughs)
And then on top of that,
also put little Pakistani kids singing that, so.
Like, so many appropriations happening.
(audience laughs)
So it was, and then I found out also,
the school, the coolness hierarchy was based on insults.
The better you are insults, the cooler you were.
I was like, that's fucking great,
that's exactly what my whole plan was.
That's great. (audience laughs)
Are you guys also into walking really slow,
'cause I'm gonna be king.
(audience laughs)
And the highest insult you could do,
if you could twist someone's,
take someone's words, twist them and call them gay.
(audience laughs)
That was the king of insults.
And listen, I know it's horrible, I'm homophobic,
I didn't start it. (audience laughs)
But when I first heard about it, I did nothing to stop it.
(audience laughs)
I'm not trying to change the world, I just wanna be cool.
(audience laughs)
So, I remember one time, one of the cool kids
was making fun of me and he went by J.
His last name started with J, he went by J.
And I was like, heh, more like gay.
(audience laughs)
And he looked at me and was like, you're cool.
(audience laughs)
The other thing at the school was, all the new kids,
they called us newcomers and newcomers were,
but I remember him walking up to his friend, his cool friend
being like, "Hey, some of these newcomers are pretty cool."
That's me, I'm one of the cool kids!
I'm almost there, alright. (audience laughs)
So, I'm sort of enjoying, and then,
somehow they figured out I wasn't cool.
Like, it just happened.
(audience laughs)
Like, one day I got to school
and everybody looked at me differently.
Like some bulletin went out,
like Kumail is not cool.
And I think at this school, I think more schools,
cool is like a very specific thing.
Like you're either cool or you're not cool.
It's very specific groups.
And I was not cool, suddenly. (audience laughs)
And it fucking sucked 'cause I tasted cool, you know.
I'd gotten invited to one cool party.
I got like my cousin's cool shirt.
I called someone gay, I was doing great.
(audience laughs)
I never got sing Informer with them, you know.
I went back to being not cool.
I became friends with this guy, his name's Walid,
so you know, I'm not lying about this happening in Pakistan.
(audience laughs)
That's a fucking O-G name.
His name's Walid and he's one of those kids,
you know how you have some kids who would like,
come back from summer and suddenly they were like hot?
Like this guy came back from a summer
and he became like super handsome.
(audience laughs)
Like he stepped into the Captain America machine.
(audience laughs)
And came out and was like, I am ready to be cool.
But he wasn't cool so now, but the girls had crushes on him.
The cool girls had crushes on him, he could be cool.
So I was like, alright, I'll maybe use him to get cool.
(audience laughs)
He used to like help me,
I used to help him with his homework,
he used to come over to my house, all this stuff.
One day, I'm at home alone, bell rings.
I look out the window, it's Walid.
He's like, hey, come down.
I go down there and he's like,
hey, come to the end of the driveway.
I'm like that's kinda weird, I go to the end of the driveway
(audience laughs)
this car pulls up and all the coolest kids
in the school jump out.
And I'm like, oh my god,
they came to get me. (audience laughs)
I'm one of them, we're gonna go to a party.
And while I'm thinking that is when the first egg hits me.
(audience groans)
And I don't, it smells so bad, I don't even register it.
The second one hits me and I'm like,
I realize what the fuck is going on, you know.
And then I look over at Walid,
'cause I think he's gonna look like guilty
or feel regret but he's fucking laughing!
(audience laughs) He's laughing!
Even Walid, even his name sounds evil, doesn't it?
Walid, like it sounds like Warrio, you know.
(audience laughs)
Like there's a good version of him somewhere called Malid
but this isn't him.
(audience laughs)
This is Walid.
So I turn around and I start running
and the eggs are hitting me in the back
and as I'm running, I turn around,
one last-ditch effort, I go,
"Hey, eggs backward is gay, are you guys gay?"
(audience laughs)
As if there gonna be like, wait, did he just call us gay?
(audience laughs)
Stop it, you're cool, let's go!
You know the lyrics to Informer?
(audience laughs)
That doesn't happen.
I run back in, they leave,
I have to come up and then I have to clean the eggs
before my parents get home.
Yeah, 'cause what am I gonna tell my parents?
I go, I was working one of my uh...
Patented driveway cakes (audience laughs)
and shit got out of control, you know.
Oh, why am I crying?
'Cause the cake fucked up. (audience laughs)
I was really excited about the driveway cake.
Fucked up. (audience laughs)
I went back to school and there were two things.
One, Walid is sitting under the tree
and he's fucking singing Informer with these guys.
He got cool.
I was gonna use him to get cool,
he used me to get even cooler.
But I would look at him and he knew I knew his secret.
The other thing, they knew immediately.
Everyone knew that I'd gotten egged.
Somehow the word had gotten out, I'd gotten egged.
And I dealt with it very sophisticated way,
they would ask me, they would be like,
hey, you got egged?
I'd be like, no.
I just denied it. (audience laughs)
That's what I did.
Then after a little while, they were like,
oh, he's just mentally ill, (audience laughs)
let's not fuck with him anymore.
So then I wasn't cool
and I started having friends and they were good,
they weren't cool, I was not cool.
So this all happens years ago.
I thought of this, I hadn't thought about this in years.
But I was on Facebook last week
and I get a friend request.
And it's fucking Walid. (audience laughs)
And all the details came flooding back, you know.
Like Captain America, Donatello, eggs.
Fucking eggs!
(audience laughs)
So I click on his picture, I'm like,
oh he's gonna be fat and bald.
He's not, very handsome. (audience laughs)
He looks great. (audience laughs)
And then I realized, I was like,
this guy taught me a very important lesson.
He taught me that it doesn't matter if other people
think you're cool, you know.
What matters is, if you think you're cool.
Be yourself, don't walk differently.
Walk like you.
Don't be Snow and pretend to be someone else,
be yourself. (audience laughs)
That was a very important lesson he taught me.
So I looked at his request and I hit decline,
'cause fuck that guy.
(audience laughs) (audience applauds)
Thank you, that's the story.
(deep bass music)
- Kumail Nanjiani, everybody.
One of the best comics in Los Angeles.
He's done this show a couple times, once in Montreal,
obliterated off alcohol and he was awesome.
Another time, pretty sober in Los Angeles.
Ask you to leave me the best stories
as comments on YouTube section and you guys did.
Best pranks and here are some really good ones.
There's a lot we had to leave off
'cause of (chuckles) legal reasons.
Next week, based on Kumail's story,
why don't you tell me about stuff you can do to be cool.
Like walking slow
or laughing short.
Whatever it is.
Leave me your tips on how to be cool.
I'll post the best ones on my second story from this series
that's coming out next week.
It'll be the last story of the run.
Thank you guys for tuning in so far.
And that's it everybody, until next week,
the final week, I will see you next Tuesday.
(electronic music)