- How did we end up on balls?
Oh yeah. My kids, oh yeah.
(upbeat music)
- When I talk about this stuff,
people are always like, "Oh, you got tiger parents.
Your parents don't love you."
I think our parents love us.
I think we have great fathers.
I just think our fathers
didn't download all the great dad software.
I mean, like, there's just a few apps they're missing.
Like, birthdays aren't their thing.
I mean, I feel like every immigrant father feels like
if they brought you to the United States--
happy birthday, you know what I mean?
Starbucks, wifi, freeways, happy birthday.
No more birthdays, go be president.
Like, that's their policy.
One time I was in an interview and this lady was like,
"Describe your earliest birthday memory."
I was like, "Do I have to?"
So I'm six, I'm turning seven, right?
Like, my dad wakes me up super early in the morning.
He's like, "Hasan, get up. Get in the Camry."
The immigrant car of choice.
Get in the Camry.
We're driving from Davis to Sacramento.
There's one mall in the entire area at the time,
Arden, right?
We get to this intersection (audience cheers)
and I look to my left
and it's the one place that every kid dreams about,
Toys R Us.
I said, "Oh shit!
Dad saw the Toys R Us Kids Catalog cutout on my wall.
He saw my vision board. (audience laughs)
He saw the blue BMX bike that I wanted.
He's here to surprise me.
Turn left.
Turn left."
Then he turns right and I'm like, "Home Depot?
No!"
We're walking through Home Depot, I'm like,
"Dad, why are we here? Do you know what day it is today?"
He's like, "Yeah, it's Saturday."
I'm like, "No, it's my birthday.
Did you forget that it's my birthday?"
He's like, "No, Hasan,
how could I forget that it's your birthday?
That's why I brought you here
so you could pick out the door handle for the bathroom."
(audience laughs)
And I was like,
"Why don't you have me pick out the toilet
because you are shitting all over my dreams?"
I didn't say that. I didn't say that.
I would have gotten slapped.
I wanted to say that, but that's when I realized,
oh, there's a generational gap between us
and our parents, right?
Like, you're gonna fight with your parents
and there's a finite number of hands you can play
with them over the course of your life.
You know about this, right?
Right. You're not gonna be a doctor?
Boom. That's a hand. (audience laughs)
You want to marry a white girl?
Boom, that's a big hand.
On that day, I could have wild out.
I could've been like, "I don't give a shit, Dad.
You slap me right here, right now. I want that bike."
But I was like, no, no, hang onto your cards.
You'll need them later.
Like, I had vision as a six-year-old.
- Are you guys raising your kids modern or traditional?
- As modern as possible. - As modern as possible.
Because I started hearing a lot of people complain about
things I never knew we're supposed to complain about.
I started hearing people come up, be like,
"My dad never played catch with me."
I tell them, "My dad, Iranian dad,"
I go, "Immigrant dads don't play catch with anybody."
I came to America at six years old.
If I went to my dad when I was six to ask him to play catch,
if I went, "Hey dad, let's play catch,"
he'd be like, "You're lucky you're in America.
You want play catch, I send you to Iran,
you can play catch with Khomeini and Saddam Hussein."
(audience applauds)
I guess we're not playing catch.
The things people will say.
People go, "My dad never said I love you."
I tell them, "My dad, Iranian dad,"
I go, "Immigrant dads don't even know what that means."
If I went to my Dad, "Dad, do you love me?"
"Eh...
I am growing used to you."
(audience laughs)
Immigrant dads don't say--
immigrant parents don't say I love you all the time.
In America, we have to tell our kids we love them
all day long.
In the morning, "I love you."
Lunchtime, "I still love you."
Afternoon, "I loved you more than lunch and breakfast.
I love you even more now."
Even when they get in trouble,
you got to tell them you love them.
My son gets in trouble, "Son, you didn't clean your room.
You're in big trouble. You did not clean your room.
But just know that I love you. I'm your father.
I will always be here for you.
I am the wind beneath your wings. I love you so much.
I don't want you to grow up and have issues with me.
I love you so much I'm gonna clean your room for you.
That's what I'm gonna do.
I love you more than your mother loves you.
She sent you to school on terrorist bomb day."
(audience laughs)
Immigrant parents don't say they love you.
My parents had sayings that indicated
that they might love us.
My dad always used to say, "You're the light of my eyes."
"You're the light of my eyes."
[speaking Farsi]
"You're the light of my eyes."
I'd be like, "Wow."
Yeah, don't clap. Don't clap.
Because I would be like, "Wow, does that mean you love me?"
He'd be like, "Eh...
That means I can see you in the dark.
(audience laughs)
Watch what you're doing."
Oh my God.
- Look, I get it. I need a therapist, I get it.
100%, 100% need one.
But I'm Middle Eastern.
I don't think you were allowed to,
like, you know what I mean?
Middle Eastern, you can't.
You can't.
Like, you can't tell your dad,
like, you know what I'm saying?
Like, you can't have feelings.
Your dad would be like, "What?" You know what I mean?
My dad is Lebanese, he'd be like, "What? Your feelings?"
Like that, kind of.
You gotta understand.
My parents were born in Lebanon and they moved to Windsor.
Right? I was born in Windsor, Canada.
That's where I was born.
They taught me only how to speak Arabic
and sent me to school.
You know how crazy that--?
That's psychotic.
I knew-- I was like, I went to kindergarten.
Didn't know-- no English.
My dad dropped me off and he goes, "Okay man,
have a good day," and drove off.
That's the first time I heard English.
Do you know how crazy that is?
I'm like, "Come back with that language!"
He sent me inside,
the teacher showed me a picture of an apple.
I didn't know how to say it in English. I don't know.
So I answered in Arabic.
I go (speaks in Arabic)
That's what I said, scared her.
She's like, "What is that?"
She looked at me weird, right?
And you know, when you're bombing, you just get louder.
So I go (speaks in Arabic)
I just kept saying it and scaring all the other kids.
And this is the eighties,
when immigrants weren't cool at all.
So I just looked like a weirdo.
This teacher calls my dad and she goes, "Mr. Merheje,
we think your son is deaf and blind."
That's the fucking school system that I was brought up in.
My dad one-upped her crazy and goes, "Who told you?"
And hung up the phone.
- I didn't grow up with this type of environment,
like a lot of American families.
You know, when the school sent something home,
your parents signed it
and that gave you permission to do the field trip
or whatever, right?
That didn't happen in my house.
I would come to the school and my whole class wasn't there.
They went to Washington, D.C.,
to look at The White House.
I'm like, "Where is everybody?"
They're like, "Your parents never handed in
the permission slip, so...
You, Javier, and Athenos
are gonna be in the lunchroom for three days
writing a paper about how immigrant parents
don't sign permission slips.
Sorry." (audience laughs)
- Kids are running the world now, man, they run the world.
You know how I know?
'Cause when I was a kid, I used to have to play
with the kids of my parents' friends.
Now I have to play with the parents of my kids' friends.
Yeah.
When I was, like, I'd be five years old.
As soon as we entered the party with my dad, five years old,
we show up. My dad, "Go, go play with Amir.
Go play with Amir."
"I don't want to play with Amir!"
"Go play with Amir!"
"Amir's 29 years old!" (audience laughs)
"That's not my problem, that's his problem.
Till he finds good wife, he's their son.
Go play with him."
I was five, I'd run in the room,
"Hi Amir. You have any Legos?"
"No dude, I have weed." (audience laughs)
Here's another way I know that kids are running the world.
You know how many parties my wife and I have left
because the kids need to go home and unwind
and rewind and wound down?
You know how many parties we've been at
that's been happening?
"Guys, what a great party.
Oh my God. It was just getting started,
but we got to go home.
The kids got to unwind and rewind and wound down.
And I know you just brought out the best tequila
and we were gonna party. It was gonna be great.
But we got to go home.
The kids got to unwind and rewind and wound dow--
I know, we were just about to have an orgy,
but we got to go home.
The kids got to unwind, rewind, and wound down."
My parents did not leave one party
for us to go home and unwind and rewind and wound down.
(audience cheers)
Not one.
If we got tired at a party, they'd be like,
"You want to sleep? Okay.
Go find a pile of coats.
Fall asleep on the coats.
Make sure one of the coats is my coat so I don't forget you
when I'm going home." (audience laughs)
You would constantly be asleep on a coats,
on a pile of coats,
and they would come.
They wouldn't wake you up.
They would just throw you over their shoulders.
You'd be half asleep.
Every time, you think you're being kidnapped every night.
They just throw you over their shoulders
and take you, and you go, "Oh my God,
this is the fifth time this week they kidnapped me again."
And they thought they were doing good parenting.
They didn't know any better.
They go, "Look, Hosain, look what a good father I am.
I put my son to sleep on a pile of coats,
what a good father.
Hosain, give me a shot of vodka.
I want to celebrate. Shot of vodka, he's asleep, I wanna.
Hosain, I'm driving home.
Give me a shot of vodka, I want to celebrate, driving home."
We didn't have drunk driving when I was a kid in Iran.
We didn't have seat belts when I was a kid in Iran!
You'd be in the back of the car,
every turn you just end up on a different side.
(audience laughs)
Your dad in the front, "Hold onto your sister.
You're her seatbelt.
I love her.
You are the light of my eyes."
(audience cheers)
- My dad, you know,
it was her first birthday in the United States.
She's turning five.
So for her first birthday,
he really wanted it to be really special.
I can imagine being a father,
like, missing your daughter's first steps,
her first time saying "dada," like, that's a hard thing.
So for her fifth birthday,
he brings everybody in the living room.
He drags in this big brown box.
He goes, "Ayesha, open the box."
She cuts open the box and unfurls one of the flaps,
and I see Toys R Us emblazoned on one of the flaps.
And he reaches in and pulls out a beautiful
blue BMX bike. (audience gasps)
He goes, "Here you go, Ayesha."
Looks at me. "Happy birthday." (audience laughs)
Savage, right? I'm livid.
I'm like, yo, when did Home Depot Dad become Danny Tanner?
This is bullshit. Really?
I'm livid. And Ayesha senses it.
She's like, "Hasan, why don't you take it out
for the first try? (speaks in Hindi)
You take it out."
And I'll be honest, as an elder brother,
I felt very entitled to that bike.
Thank you, that's my bike. Thank you.