- When I was in grade school
I was bullied for being Asian American,
and the biggest problem with that,
is that I am not Asian American.
(audience laughs)
But when I was younger and this is absolutely true,
people thought that I might be Asian American.
I have pretty thin eyes.
I had very thin eyes when I was a little kid
and I had straight black hair that I wore in a bowl cut,
and from the ages of three to eight people thought
that I might be a young Chinese person.
(audience laughs)
On the first day that he met me,
the guy that is now my best friend,
he met me the first day of kindergarten,
he went home that night and said,
"Papa, today I met a boy with no eyes."
(audience laughs)
And that was me.
Kids would make fun of me in middle School.
Kids would call me a Chinaman,
which of the racial slurs has gotta be the laziest.
That is just pushing two words together.
No work was done there.
(audience laughs)
It was very confusing to me 'cause I'm not Chinese.
No one in my family is remotely Asian.
I mean, we take our shoes off when we come inside
but that was more of a carpeting thing than anything else.
(audience laughs)
Here's how bad it got though.
I remember when I was in junior high we had
this music appreciation class that we never appreciated.
And they took us to hear some classical music once
at a symphony orchestra.
So we go to a symphony orchestra.
In one of these classical pieces,
there's a moment where they bang a gong
and every time they banged the gong,
all the kids sitting in front of me would stand up,
turn to me and bow like that.
(audience laughs) (audience applauding)
Which is some racist ass bullshit,
but also incredibly well coordinated,
for a group of 13 year olds.
13 year olds are the meanest people in the world.
(audience laughs)
They terrify me to this day.
If I'm on the street on like a Friday
at three p.m. and I see a group
of eighth graders on one side of the street,
I will cross to the other side of the street
because eighth graders will make fun
of you but in an accurate way.
They will get to the thing that you don't like about you.
(audience laughs)
They don't even need to look at you for long.
They'll just be like, "Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha.
"Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha.
"Hey look at that high waisted man.
"He got feminine hips."
And I'm like no, that's the thing I'm sensitive about!
(audience laughs) (audience applauding)
When I was a boy I was also confused
with a woman sometimes over the phone
because before I went through puberty
I had a voice like a little flute.
(audience laughs)
I was once on the telephone with Blockbuster Video
which is a very old fashioned sentence.
(audience laughs)
It is.
I was on the telephone with Blockbuster Video.
That's like when your grandma would be like,
"We'd all go play jacks down at the soda fountain."
You're like no one knows
what you're talking about you idiot.
(audience laughs) (audience applauding)
You know how you talk to your grandma?
So--
(audience laughs)
I was on the phone with Blockbuster.
I'd called them a couple of times in one day
to ask about a movie and I called for a third time.
I said, hey yeah.
I was just callin' to see if you
had "Addams Family Values" yet?
And the guy at Blockbuster went,
"Hey lady?
"I'll tell ya when we get "Addams Family Values."
But look, I wasn't offended as
a boy being confused with a lady.
I was offended as a lady who was gettin' pushed around
by this chauvinist asshole that works
at Blockbuster Video talkin' to me like I'm some floozy.
I am a proud Asian American woman,
and you will treat me with respect.
(audience laughs) (audience applauding)
I am a tiger mom.
(audience laughs) (upbeat music)