I can't believe he did that.
Yeah. You know what, Carmen?
I'm done. I'm done with this.
You know what?
This is the last time
he pulls this on me,
'cause I'm not going
through this anymore.
I deserve so much better, right?
You're absolutely right.
I have to meet him.
Esther. Esther.
What?
You're still married.
Consider these bruises a divorce.
Esther, I'm gonna need you to push.
What the... Is that a cigar?
It's not lit. It's just
something I do for stress.
Hombre loco.
Why are you smoking a cigar, when you're
supposed to be delivering a baby?
That's the kind of stress
he's talking about, madam.
Have you been drinking?
If you want a sober white
doctor in this town,
it's going to cost you a fortune.
Ain't that the truth?
Man, that is going to be a big baby.
I just hope I can pull him
out before he pulls me in.
Is the father here?
Jesus!
Hey.
Hey.
Hey.
Hey!
Hey, sorry. I was just
in the bathroom, man.
I just ate some spicy chimichangas.
- Oh. Okay.
- Oh, man.
It just burned like
you wouldn't believe.
I'm sure. Okay, I got to get to work.
- Yeah.
- All right, Gabrielito, come on.
- Hurry up and pick a movie.
- Okay, Mom.
Hey, hey, hey, where you going?
You got to have hair down
there to go in there.
Huh?
I already have hair.
Where's your mom?
She's over there
talking with some old man.
Some old man? Where's your dad?
I don't have a dad.
- Gabriel, hurry up.
- Okay, Mom.
I can't let you rent this, kid.
It's an R-rated movie.
Well, my mom said it's okay.
- Great. Ask her again.
- Fine with me.
Hey, Mom, can I rent this?
Yes. Hijo, hurry up. We got to go.
Okay, thanks. Told you.
After your movie's over,
I want you to clean up and
do your homework, okay?
- Okay, Mom.
- All right.
And remember what we talked about.
I want you to think about what
you want to be when you grow up.
- Okay?
- Okay.
- For real.
- For real.
All right. Give me a kiss.
- I love you.
- Me, too.
- Have a good day.
- You, too.
Fluffy, Fluffy, Fluffy!
Ladies and gentlemen,
give it up for Gabriel Iglesias!
Fluffy! Fluffy!
Fluffy! Fluffy!
- Bay Area...
- Fluffy! Fluffy!
...I missed you.
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
Thank you. Thank you.
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
Section 215,
14, 13, 12,
11, 10,
nine, eight, seven,
six, five, four, three, two, and one.
They can hear you.
Oh, my God! I must look
tiny up there?
Estchiquito. Estchiquito.
"He's so little, yeah."
Before I say anything else, you guys,
a big hand for Bay Area legend,
Mr. Chuy Gomez!
The first man to ever put me
on the radio in the Bay Area.
Thank you, Chuy.
And, of course,
another big round of applause
for my friend, the man,
the myth, the legend.
Give it up for Martin!
This is so cool how now
you guys recognize him.
You see him, and you're like,
"That's him. That has to be Martin."
Seriously, with that crazy hair,
the tattoos, the goatee,
you know exactly who it is.
Now in this building,
there was people freaking out
over by the merchandise table.
I saw this girl lose it. She ran
over to Martin, screaming.
And then started hugging him.
And then Martin looks at me.
He's like, "Dude"
I'm like, "Hey, she's not pressing
charges. Hug her back."
That's rare.
So then the girl turns around,
and she sees me, and she goes, "Hey!"
And then I was like, "Hey!"
And she was like,
"Can you take our picture?"
"Yeah, all right.
"So that's what that feels like.
Yeah, here we go."
I'm getting ready
to snap the picture,
and she's hugging Martin,
and she's like,
"I cannot wait to tell my
friends that I met Machete."
I lost it. I was like,
"Smile, 'Machete'!
"Smile, 'Machete'!"
He was so sad.
He was like, "Bro, she recognized me,
"but she thought I was someone else."
I said, "Hey, get over it. I was
Operation Repo for three years, okay?
"Just be thankful you
got recognized."
So let me tell you what's happened
since the last time we've been
here in the Bay, you guys.
By the way, I hope you
like our decorations here.
Oh, yeah.
Since the last time we've been here,
a couple of things have changed,
one of which is I am
officially down 100 pounds.
Yeah.
I know some of you here in the front
are looking at me right now like,
"Well, how big were you?"
I know. "Hercules, Hercules."
Yeah...
Anyways, you guys,
let me tell you what happened.
Basically I found our
I was a little sick.
I was diagnosed about two
years ago, type 2 diabetic.
Now, I maxed out at 445 pounds.
Yeah, that's way past fluffy, okay?
Let's be honest.
That's not even, "Damn!"
445 pounds, that's borderline
Discovery Channel fat.
That was like, "I couldn't
leave the house." Yeah?
"He wants to go to the movies."
It was really bad, you guys,
and so I was waking up every
morning with a 300-plus sugar level.
Now, anyone who knows anything
about diabetes, that is super high.
And you do that enough times,
and eventually...
"Clear."
It's so hard
To say goodbye
"They buried him in frosting.
"It was the sweetest funeral ever.
"Everyone got a cupcake.
It was the shit. It was so nice."
Im at the doctor's office,
you guys, and the doctor tells me.
He says, "Listen, Gabriel,
you're 445 pounds.
"Your weight is out of control.
"Your diabetes is out of control.
"You're 35 years old.
"You will not live another
two years. I guarantee it."
And I got very emotional, you know,
I was like, "Are you serious?"
He goes, "Two years tops."
And I was like, "But I just
started making money."
"Well, it's going to
be a nice funeral."
I was like, "What an ass."
So it took a lot for me to finally
start doing something about it,
'cause it's not like this is the
first time I tried to lose weight.
This has been happening
for a long time,
but somebody tells you you're
gonna die, you actually wake up.
So what it took was it took the
support of my friends, my family,
and, you know, especially I got to
give credit where credit is due.
Martin, you guys,
helped me out so much,
because he's always encouraging
me to go to the gym.
"Let's go work out, bro.
"Let's go do something."
And more importantly than,
"Let's go work out, " is,
you know, we're on the road
together 46 weeks out of the year,
so we eat together a lot,
and he's always watching what I eat,
and if he sees me
reaching for something
I shouldn't mess with, he checks me.
Especially breakfast.
That's my favorite meal.
I love breakfast.
And they always put us
at these nice hotels,
where they give us this
continental breakfast
with the buffet, and, you know,
if I'm eating eggs and bacon
and sausage, that's fine.
Yes, some of it's fattening,
but guess what.
No sugar.
If Martin sees me reaching for muffins
or waffles, he makes a scene.
He waits for me to get
about 15 feet away,
and he starts yelling
in front of all the
people at the restaurant.
Oh, yeah. He's still ghetto.
I don't care if it's a Ritz-Carlton.
Guess what? "Machete" is here.
He starts yelling.
He waits for me to get 15 feet
away, and then he starts.
"Really, bro?
"You're going to put that
in your mouth, Fluffy?
"You know what that's
going to do to your body?
"Hey! Have some self-respect."
And he makes me cry at breakfast.
I'm sad. I'm like,
"I don't want the muffin.
"I don't want it.
I don't want the muffin.
"I'm not a little whore. I'm not.
"I'm not a little whore."
But, see, that is a real friend
who would check me and remind me,
"Hey, bro, get mad at me all you want.
I just want you to live."
And I got to respect that.
That's why I love
that dude, you know,
and, in turn, sometimes
I got to check Martin.
Yeah.
Believe me, you guys.
It goes both ways.
Sometimes I have to check him.
Not about his weight, but he
has his demons, too, you know.
Oh, believe that. Yes.
Sometimes there's limited space
at the hotels where we're staying at,
so sometimes we gotta
double up on a room.
And every now and then, Martin will
bring some random girl to the room
at 3:00 in the morning, wakes me up.
I got to look at him
and say, "Really, bro?
"You're going to put
that in your mouth?
"Do you know what that's
going to do to your body?
"Hey! Have some self-re..."
He doesn't. He really doesn't, so...
So let me tell you guys.
I'm in the doctor's office,
and he tells me.
He says, "Listen, Gabriel,
obviously working out isn't cutting it.
"I have a friend who
specializes in gastric bypass,
"and I think it would
benefit you greatly
"to at least listen to what the
guy has to say. It couldn't hurt."
So he hands me a card.
The card says, "BH Surgical Center."
I make an appointment.
I show up to this place.
I get to the door.
The door doesn't say,
"BH Surgical Center."
It actually says,
"Center for the Morbidly Obese."
Yeah. That shit's not cure.
So I figure I'm there, I might as
well check it out, so I walk in.
I go over to the receptionist,
and I ask, "Um, right spot?"
And she was cool. She was like,
"Yes, sir, you're in
the right location."
"Can I ask you something?"
"Absolutely."
"Why does it say,
"Center for the Morbidly
Obese' on the door?"
"The doctors prefer it that way."
"Why don't you have
that on the card?"
"'Cause then you won't come in.
"First time?"
"Yeah, first time."
So she hands me a clipboard,
and she goes,
"Please take this clipboard,
and have a seat.
"They'll call you in a few minutes."
So I turn around, and I
sit down on this couch,
and I start filling
out the paperwork.
And it wasn't like insurance
forms and stuff like that.
It was actually more of
like a questionnaire.
They ask you a bunch of questions,
and you have to answer from one to 10
how unhealthy you think you are,
and it's not going good. It's not.
I'm like, "Uh, frigging eight,
eight, nine, nine, nine, nine,
"10, nine, nine, 10, nine,
"10,10,10,10,10,10,10."
And as I'm filling our the paperwork,
outside the door, I hear...
All of a sudden, the door opens up,
and this dude walks in...
I was like, "Oh, my God!
You're morbid."
Immediately, my score got better.
I'm like, "Shoot.
"I'm a four, four, three,
three, three, two, two, two,
"one, one, one, one,
one, one, one, one, one.
"I'm healthy by default."
He makes his way over
to the receptionist,
and she's like,
"Are you here for the 8:30?"
"Is this your first time here?"
"Because the doctors
prefer it that way."
"'Cause then you won't
come in. Oh, God!
"Take this clipboard,
and have a seat.
"They'll call you in a few minutes."
So he turns around,
and he looks at me and my sofa,
and he's like...
I swear it was like the opening
scene to the movie Pacific Rim.
He's like...
I was like...
"No! No one's sitting here!"
"Yeah. It's all you, bro."
He turns around,
and he lines himself
up with the sofa,
and he starts doing this
little shuffle backwards.
Now keep in mind I see this
coming towards me, right?
He's like...
All of a sudden,
the back of his knees
hit the edge of the couch,
and you hear the click.
And then free fall.
And he hit. And I was like, "Whoa!"
And at that moment,
they call me in, you know.
"Mr. Iglesias." "Hey, wish me luck."
So I walk into the office.
I'm greeted by a nurse.
The nurse is really nice.
In addition to being nice,
she's actually a fan,
which made it so much better for me.
She comes over, and she's like,
"Mr. Iglesias, this is such an honor.
"I'm such a huge fan.
"I am going to make this
as painless as possible.
"I have to weigh you."
I'm like, "You know what? I'm good.
I weighed myself at the house.
"I'm 445 pounds. I'm good."
"I have to confirm that."
And in my head, I'm like,
"Why would I make that up?"
You know what I mean?
Like, if you're 200 pounds
and you lie and say
you're 195, I get it,
but once you achieve
a certain level of...
It's pretty clear.
So I said, "Fine. Where's it at?"
"Excuse me?" "Where's it at?
Where's the scale?"
Because I want to
walk up to the scale,
so I can grab the stupid brick,
pick it up, slide it all the way
to the end, and put it down.
You know the scale I'm
talking about, right?
The one that has that heavy arm,
where you get on, and it's loud?
I call it the "Scale Nazi."
You get on, and
it's like, "Sieg Heil!"
She starts laughing.
She goes, "Mr. Iglesias,
you are so silly.
"Actually, our scale is industrial."
Any time someone uses
the word "industrial"
and you're in the sentence,
ho-ho, you messed up.
She goes, "Mr. Iglesias,
it's built directly into the floor.
"Stand on the little X."
I'm like, "Oh, my God! I'm a semi."
And then she gives me instructions.
She goes, "Yeah, Mr. Iglesias,
listen. Stand still.
"I'm going to press the
little button on the wall.
"It's going to make a sound,
"and then your weight is going
to appear in the little window."
And I'm like, "Make a sound?"
In my head, I'm like,
"I hope it's not, you know..."
So I'm bracing myself. I'm waiting.
I'm like... And as she presses
it and it was actually cute.
It was like a casino sound.
It was like...
"Hold on! My shoes!"
You're laughing.
It's three pounds, bro.
So then she walks me
into the doctor's office.
I sit down. Doctor walks in,
and we spoke for an hour.
In a nutshell, what he says is
that he wants to take my stomach,
which, in his opinion, is the
size of an NFL football,
and he wants to cut it and make
it the size of a hard-boiled egg.
Therefore, you only eat this much,
and you lose weight with time.
Problem with gastric bypass is that
if you don't stick to their
program religiously,
not only will you not lose weight,
you will gain weight,
and you'll have a series
of complications.
And then he asked,
"Do you travel a lot?"
I'm like, "I'm on the road
46 weeks out of the year."
He goes, "This is not
going to work for you."
I'm like, "I agree. I like two eggs."
I said, "Well, what should I do?"
He goes, "I don't know,
but this isn't going to work."
So I left the office.
I was bummed out, you guys.
I get in my car.
I was so depressed, because I'm like,
"Someone told me I
got two years to live.
"Surgery is my last hope."
And so I started crying.
I was sad. I was in
the car. I'm crying.
I'm like, "What the
hell am I going to do?"
And the only thing that could
cheer me up was a drive-through.
And I know that sounds crazy.
Some of you are like,
"Isn't that what got you
"in that position to begin with?"
Yes! But it's the only
thing that made sense.
There's a reason why it's called
"comfort food." Think about that.
Any time you see someone
eating a burger,
they never look sad.
They always look happy.
You might look sad walking in,
you might look sad walking out,
but when the actual event of
eating a burger is happening,
life couldn't be better.
That's right.
My girl told me that I make
sounds when I eat burgers.
I didn't know. Apparently I do.
I'm eating a burger, and I'm like...
She was like, "Are you eating that,
or are you eating that?"
Think about it. Who's sad when
they're eating fast food?
I'll tell you who's sad,
the person eating a salad,
watching someone eat fast food.
That's who's sad. You know?
So I pull up to this fast-food
restaurant with a big "M" on it.
And the guy on the speaker's like,
you know, "May I help you?"
And I'm crying. I'm like,
"You have no idea."
What I eventually wound up doing,
you guys, is I started low-carbing.
Now, I am not eating
healthy by no means, okay?
I still eat fast food every single day,
and people question it.
"How do you eat fast food
and lose 100 pounds?"
I'll give you an example.
I'll go to a burger place,
and I'll order a double cheeseburger.
I won't eat the bread.
I won't eat the onions,
the tomato, the ketchup.
I'll eat the meat, the cheese,
the mayo, the mustard,
and I'll order up to three with,
like, three diet sodas.
And people go, "That's unhealthy.
"The cholesterol's gonna kill you."
I agree. But guess what?
Cholesterol's gonna take
10 years to kill me.
Diabetes is going to do it in two.
Right now, I'm winning by eight.
Hell, yeah. That's called
"Fluffy math," bro.
There's a lot of people
mad in here right now.
"Fluffy found a loophole." Yes.
So I started low-carbing.
I started doing yoga and I know
that sounds like a joke right there.
Yeah, some of you are like,
"He means yogurt."
No, yoga. Frigging DDP, help me.
And then, I started lifting weights.
And it's kind of hard
for me, you guys,
because now I have people
at my shows telling me,
"We're noticing there's
a little difference.
"You're a little less fluffy.
"What's going to happen
if you keep losing weight?
"What are we going to call you?
"What are we going to call you?"
I lift weights. Call me
"Buffy." I don't care.
The point is, is that I'm not trying
to lose weight for vanity's sake.
I'm very secure.
The point is that I'm
trying to lose weight
so I can be around for my family,
so I can be around for my friends,
and so I can be around for you.
I'm not trying to preach to nobody.
"This is what you got
to do with your life."
Hell, no. Shoot,
you like burgers? Kill it.
I'm just saying that's what I'm
going through. And then people think,
"Oh, he's trying to lose weight,
because he's doing movies.
"He wants to look better.
He wants to be accepted.
"He wants to be accep..."
No, no, no, no.
Don't get it twisted, you guys.
Don't even think that.
At my highest weight of 445 pounds,
the level of acceptance I
had was amazing, okay?
To put it to you like this...
To put it to you like this,
at 445 pounds,
there was women throwing
themselves at me.
At 445 pounds,
there was men.
Oh, and, Bay Area, let me tell
you something about gay men.
I know you're in here.
I saw the line.
I'm going to tell you
something about gay men.
Gay men are very creative.
They're very persistent,
and they're very opportunistic
when they want to
achieve the mission.
They're just as calculated
as straight men are.
I'll give you an example.
I'll tell you a story, right?
So one night, Martin and I are at
a bar, and we're having drinks,
and that should come as no surprise.
"Really? They were drinking?"
Yeah. We killed it. So...
As we're drinking,
Martin is paying attention,
and he's listening in to a
conversation that's happening
about 15 feet away
between these two girls.
They're going back and forth,
and one of 'em was like,
"I don't believe we
finished the whole bottle.
"How the hell are we
supposed to get home?"
Martin stands up,
looks at me, and says,
"Bro, I'll be back."
And then it began, the hunt.
You know, freaking...
Gay men are the exact same way.
They listen. They focus.
They pay attention.
They wait for one of the cows to
get away from the rest of the herd,
so they can corner it and strike.
Four hours later,
Martin and I are at the bar,
and I'm 16 shots of tequila in.
Whoo!
Oh, yeah, and I feel fantastic!
And I tell Martin,
"Bro, I don't remember
"the last time I had this
many shots of tequila."
And Martin goes,
"Bro, you're crazy, Fluffy.
"You're crazy. Wait right here.
I got to pee."
And so he leaves to the restroom,
and I'm leaning against the bar.
The bar is the only thing
keeping me standing.
And from across the room,
this guy stands up,
looks at his friends,
and says, "I'll be back."
And then it began, the hunt.
And he gets in my face,
and he tells me,
"I just have to say I am
such a huge fan of yours.
"Oh, my God!"
Any time someone says
they're a huge fan of mine,
it automatically makes me smile,
even more so if I've been drinking.
Oh, yeah, if I'm drinking,
I'm like, "Thank you. Thank you."
Bro, I was so loaded,
I bowed. "Thank you."
The guy puts his hand on my shoulder,
and he says, "I just have to say
"you have gotten me
through some difficult..."
And he stops talking,
and he squeezes,
and he goes, "Oh, my God!
"Do you work out?"
I was so drunk, I said, "A little.
"You're the first person to notice!"
And he's like,
"Oh, you can totally tell."
And he squeezed again,
and I said... "Ahh."
"I'm sorry. Am I overstepping?"
"No, bro, you don't understand.
"I'm stressed out.
That felt pretty good."
"Want me to rub both your shoulders
"and your back and scratch it?
'Cause I will."
"Hey, go for it."
He grabs me by
the shoulders, you guys.
He grabs me by the shoulders,
and he turns me around.
Now I'm facing the bartender,
and the bar-tender
is trying to warn me.
The bartender's like, "Hello!
"Hello!
"Hello!
"Hello!"
I'm so drunk, I'm like...
This guy is working my
neck well. I'm like...
It feels so good, I push off the bar.
At that moment,
Martin returns from the restroom.
He sees what's going on.
He doesn't stop it.
He doesn't say a word.
As far as I know,
"Machete" is taking notes.
The guy turns me back
around, and he says,
"I just have to say,
if you were mine,
"I would cook for you every
single day of your life."
At that moment,
Martin cuts into the conversation
like a referee at the
end of a bad fight,
and he hugs me, and he holds me,
and he goes, "Dude,"
and I go, "Dude,"
and then I looked at the guy.
"Hey, what can you cook?"
And Martin shook me.
"Gabriel." "What?"
And he drags me away, and I go,
"Martin, what are you doing, bro?
"You can't do that. That's rude."
He goes, "Dude, that guy was
trying to hook up with you."
"No, Martin. No.
"He was trying to feed me.
"Why are you always
food-blocking, bro?"
"I'm your friend,
I'm your friend, Gabriel."
"You're not my friend!
You're not my friend!
"When's the last time you
rubbed my shoulders, huh?
"When's the last time you said,
'Fluffy, I'll cook for you'?
"You don't cook for me!
You made me throw away muffins!"
We're arguing so hard, you guys,
now this guy thinks we're gay.
He's like, "Oh, my God.
I'm such a home-wrecker."
And then he ran.
The point to that story is,
I started losing weight
for health reasons.
Some of you are like,
"He went a little far for that."
Poquito.
What I think is funny is that now
people are questioning my shows.
They're like, "Well, what is
Gabriel going to talk about
"if he continues to lose weight?
"What's he going to talk about?"
I'm like, seriously,
between the amount
of crazy friends that I have
and the amount of alcohol
I drink on a regular basis
and the amount of crazy,
random places we visit,
I will always have
stories for you guys.
Random stories.
Stories no one else has.
Stories like Martin and I
just got back from India.
Yeah.
So let me tell you, I started
posting on Facebook and Twitter
that we were going to go
out there to do these shows,
and then people started
sending me messages,
questioning what I was going to do.
First of all, "Are they gonna
understand you in India?
"Will they understand English okay?
"Will they be able to follow
along with your stories?"
Once we got there, I come to find out
that more people speak
English in India
than in all of the US and
Canada put together.
Might as well throw Mexico
in there for extra credit.
Because there's that many people,
and, yes, they have the Internet.
They got the Internet.
They got Bollywood. They got Hollywood.
They understand American culture
so much more than we
understand theirs.
Second thing, people tried to
warn me about going over there.
"Gabriel, be careful.
India is a Third World country,
"Don't drink the water in India.
"It contains parasites that'll
make you really sick.
"Don't eat the food from the street
people, especially the street meat.
"It contains a parasite
that'll make you really sick.
"And most importantly,
there's a lot of crime over there.
"Don't stay out late.
When the sun goes down,
"you go down."
I'm like, "Is it that bad?"
"Parasites."
So I'm like, "Let me
get this straight.
"There's a lot of crime.
Don't stay out late.
"Don't eat any of the food
from the street vendors,
"and don't drink the water.
"Why does that sound familiar?
"That's Mexico!"
When Martin and I got over there,
we found out that Indian
people and Mexican people
have so much in common, you guys.
I'm telling you it's insane how
similar we are, especially the food.
The food is so similar.
For example, Mexicans love tortillas.
Indian people love naan bread,
which is a fluffier
form of a tortilla.
Mexicans love chicken.
Indians love chicken.
Mexicans love hot and spicy.
Indians invented hot and spicy.
Most popular drink
in Mexico is Fanta.
Most popular drink in India is Fanta.
Indian people worship cows.
Mexicans love barbecues.
Lot of similarities.
Most of the people
that I met over there
were very hardworking and humble,
and I got to tell you,
every time I talked to someone,
I was always greeted the same way.
They'd look at me,
they'd put their hands together,
they'd do a little bow,
and they say, "Namaste,"
which is an endearing hello.
It's really nice and sweet.
And then I noticed that Indian people,
when you're talking to them,
do this thing with their head,
where it will begin to move side
to side as they're speaking.
Now, at first, when you
notice it, you think,
"Oh, he slept wrong.
"He just got a kink in his neck.
Get a Tempur-Pedic!"
Now, when they start speaking,
their head starts moving,
and I noticed this.
The guy is checking us in to
the hotel, and he's really cool.
He's like, "Listen, if you have
any problems at all, okay,
"you call the front desk,
you press zero.
"We will send somebody to
your room to help you.
"Whatever you need, we got it for you
"right here, okay? It's very good."
Now, one thing I notice
is the more they talk
and the more excited
Indian people get,
the more the head
starts to move around.
Somebody at the hotel
yelled out to the clerk,
"That's Fluffy."
And the guy was like,
"Oh, my God! I don't believe it.
"I knew it. I thought it was you.
I thought it was you.
"Oh, my God! I cannot believe it.
This is so crazy.
"Oh, my God, Fluffy. Fluffy! Fluffy!"
Even crazier than that is that the
mouth is actually connected to the neck.
When the mouth stops moving,
the head stops wherever
the mouth left off.
And when you see Indian people
talking to each other, you can see it.
"Okay, let me tell you something.
Okay. Correct.
"Oh, okay. Hold up. Wait. Wait. Wait.
Wait. Wait. Hold on. Wait. Okay."
Like, if you're Indian, and you
stutter, you are so screwed.
"I... I... I..."
"Somebody stop him!"
I'm not going to lie, you guys.
When I first saw this happen,
I thought it was hysterical.
I thought it was funny.
But then I started thinking about it.
Head movement is just
a form of expression.
No matter where you
live in this world,
people express themselves
in their own unique way,
whether through facial expressions,
hand gestures,
body movement, extra words.
Everywhere you go,
things are different,
and that's just how they
express themselves in India.
Now back to the whole
Indians-Mexican thing.
That is something else that we
share in common with Indian people.
Head movement.
Now, some of you in the
building tonight are like,
"Stupid. We don't
have head movement."
Yes, we do. It's a little different.
See, with Indian people,
the head movement is side to side.
Mexicans, our head
movement is front to back.
The difference between that is that with
Mexicans, we have to be very, very upset
in order for you to see
the head movement.
Otherwise, you can't tell.
With Indians, it's all the time.
"Oh, today is such a nice day.
"It is such a beautiful day today.
"I am so happy.
It's very nice, very good.
"Oh, my God. I can't believe it's
so nice. It's such a pretty..."
Mexicans, when we're mad,
that's when it comes out.
For non-Latinos, hey, trust me.
You cut off a Mexican in traffic,
see what happens.
That's funny. I don't know why
the black people are laughing.
You guys take it all.
"Oh, no, you didn't. Oh, hell, no!
"I know he ain't talkin' 'bout me!
"Uh-Uh. I hear the bell!
I hear the bell!"
I made myself dizzy doing that.
So let me tell you guys.
If you ever get the opportunity
to travel to India,
I encourage you to check it out.
You are going to see
some beautiful things.
You are going to see
some amazing things.
You are going to see some sad,
depressing things
and some real horrible things.
Overall, it's a well-balanced trip.
But when you get back home
here to the United States,
you will have a whole different
appreciation for your life.
Believe that.
I guarantee this, you guys.
There's a lot of people in India,
and with a lot of people
comes a lot of traffic.
First things first.
American traffic and Indian traffic,
very different.
Here, whatever happens on the freeway
will stop the whole freeway.
In India, there's 10 times
the traffic, but it moves.
See, the problem is Americans,
we're fascinated by accidents.
We're fascinated by the idea
of seeing potential death.
That's why we slow
down on the freeways.
We say we don't want to see it,
but what happens in traffic?
You know...
"What's going on over there?"
There doesn't even
have to be a collision.
You could be on the 101 freeway
and a car has a tire
blowout, and it spins.
Doesn't hit anything.
It's now facing oncoming traffic.
You know what happens to
the rest of the freeway?
Even on the other freeway,
where there's no accident.
And again, "Why? What's going on?
What's going on?"
"I'm sorry. Hey, somebody might
be dead. Sorry. Oh."
In India, if there's an accident
in the middle of the street,
you know what they do?
They drive right around it.
They don't stop.
And it's not that they're not
sensitive to the situation.
They are. It's just that
there's so much chaos
that happens on a regular basis,
they just need to get to work.
They do see what's happening,
and, believe me,
they're heartfelt, you know.
They'll drive around, you know.
"I am so sorry for you."
Nothing stops the flow
of traffic in India.
They need to get from point A to
point B, and so they go. They go.
If there's an accident,
they drive around.
If there's something
blocking the street,
they get on the
sidewalk to go around.
It's amazing, the way they drive.
And here's something else.
No one uses turn signals over there.
No one uses turn signals.
They use a horn.
Now, if you go to India tomorrow,
from the time you get there
to the time you leave,
you're constantly
going to hear a horn.
It's an actual language
when people are driving.
I'll show you. You're driving.
Car on your right. Car on
your left. Light up ahead.
They talk to each other
while they're driving,
and they barely miss each
other every single time.
Also, you'll be on the
101 freeway here,
and there'll be six lanes.
In India, you'll see six lanes,
but guess what?
You'll see 12 cars across.
Yes, they have lines, but they're
basically there to let you know
more or less the direction
you might want to go in.
They're this close to each other,
and even at the light,
they communicate.
You see everything,
cars, trucks, vans,
motorcycles, pedestrians,
cows, children,
all waiting for the light.
And they talk at the
light with the horn.
"Very good. You can go. You can go."
"Welcome. You're welcome. Go, go."
Nothing stops the flow
of traffic over there.
Indian people drive... Think of ants.
You know how ants travel
in a straight line,
and if there's something in the way,
like a rock, ants will split up,
go around the rock, and reunite,
or climb over the rock.
Worst-case scenario, they dig
a hole and go under the rock.
That's the mentality
of driving in India.
A man can get shot in
the middle of the street.
People just look at each other.
"Somebody pick him up."
And they'll drag his
ass onto the sidewalk,
and if there's an accident
and they need to get around,
guess what's going to happen
to that guy on the sidewalk.
Nothing stops the flow
of traffic in India,
except a cow.
Now, I know we've always heard
the stories and the jokes about,
"Oh, Indian people
don't eat hamburgers."
I asked the question,
and I found out.
It's believed that cows
are people who have died,
and they've been reincarnated,
and their new life is now the cow,
which is why they don't eat them
and why they give 'em all the love
and respect in the world over there.
I saw this firsthand.
There's a cow crossing the
street while we're driving.
And the cows know. They're cocky.
They know that they can cross.
Frigging... All the cars...
And the cow's out there all cocky.
No one honks at the cows.
No one yells at the cows.
No one touches the cows.
They wait for the cows
to finish crossing.
The cow that we had laid down.
The driver just shut off the car.
Started tweeting.
"There is a cow
"in the middle of the street.
"#moomoo."
I asked the driver,
"What's going on?"
"Sir, there is a cow."
"I see that there's a cow.
"Are you going to honk at it, go around?
What's going to happen?"
"We cannot...
We cannot honk at the cow.
"We must wait for the cow to move."
"You're kidding."
"I am not kidding.
We must wait for the cow,"
"We drove past a dead
body 15 minutes ago."
"That is probably him."
Like, seriously, the driving
situation over there
is so intense, you guys.
One morning, one morning
while we're there,
I needed to get to the airport fast,
because I overslept,
and so I get in the cab,
and I hand the driver a $50 bill,
and I go, "Sir,
I am running very late.
"I need to get to the
airport as soon as possible.
"Whatever side street
you have to take
"or back road, I'm all for it.
"Whatever you have
to do, let's do it."
And I hand him the money,
and he goes,
"Very good. Let'sgo,"
and we take off.
The guy is hitting anywhere from
50 to 70 miles an hour on the street.
We are making incredible time.
I notice that we're heading in
the direction of a red light.
Have you ever been
in a car with someone,
and you're paying attention
to what's going on,
and you notice that you're
about to hit a red light?
And you know how you start
to mentally and physically
prepare yourself for the
deceleration of the car
and you start anticipating
the pressure from the brake?
And if you don't get the sensation
of slowing down by a certain point,
all alarms go off in your head,
and you sock the driver in the chest.
"Hey!"
Not only did I not get the sensation
of slowing down, I got the opposite.
He gunned it towards the light,
and it caught me off-guard.
I couldn't even scream. I was like...
And then... And then I got air.
"Hey! Pull over! Pull over!"
He didn't even know what he did.
He looks at me. He goes,
- "What is wrong?"
- "What do you mean, 'What is wrong?'
"Dude, didn't you see the red light?"
As calm as can be,
"Didn't you see there
was no one there?
"You told me, 'Whatever
you have to do,' okay?
"Whatever you have to do, you do.'
"Do you want to yell,
or do you want to make plane?"
He made a good point.
I sounded like a third-grader.
"I want to make plane."
Like, seriously, that's a
video game I want to see.
I want to see Grand Theft Auto India.
It was so crazy, you guys.
And this is just us being there.
I haven't even gotten to
the part of us performing.
We were in Mumbai,
Bangalore and Delhi, okay?
These three places is
where we went to perform.
Mumbai and Bangalore, the shows
went over very, very well.
Okay, there were about 1,500 to
2,000 people, which is amazing.
Going over there,
I was, like, excited, "Yes!"
And then we get to Delhi.
And when we got to Delhi,
you guys, it got a little crazy.
Martin walks out on stage,
and the crowd recognized him
and they started chanting, "Martin!"
Any time I hear that, I'm like,
"They know him,
it's gonna be a good show."
So, Martin starts cracking jokes.
The crowd starts laughing.
He's cracking more jokes,
the crowd keeps laughing.
All of a sudden, I hear this...
Martin doesn't say a word to them.
He gets off stage,
next comedian comes out,
and then Martin comes
over to me and he says,
"Bro, I don't know
what's going on, man.
"I don't know what's
going on out there.
"There's these three
guys in the front row,
"they're laughing like
Klingons from Star Trek.
"I'm not gonna address them.
I'm gonna save them for you."
I was like, "Oh, thank you."
So then, Martin goes back out there
onstage and he introduces me,
"Ladies and gentlemen,
Gabriel Iglesias!"
And then I run out onstage and
the crowd started chanting,
"Fluffy! Fluffy!"
And I was like, "Whoo!
What's up, Delhi!"
And I start cracking jokes,
start getting laughs.
Start cracking more jokes,
start getting more laughs.
And then it happened.
Now, see, me, I can't avoid things,
especially when it's
front row center.
So, I addressed it. I came right
out and I said, "Well, hello!"
I said, "What do we have here?"
I said, "So, where are you guys from?"
And the guy in the middle
looks at me and he goes,
"We are from Germany!"
I said, "Cool! We have
Germans in the house!"
And the whole crowd got
really weird. You could hear them.
They freaked out because they thought
I was gonna start making
fun of the German people.
And one guy even stood up.
"Don't do it!
Don't do it! Don't do it!"
I go, "Relax, bro!
Have a seat." "Don't do it!"
I'm not gonna make fun
of the German people.
That's the last thing I
wanna do, is offend them.
I don't wanna end up outside in an
alley somewhere freakin' in two hours.
"Und this is the last time
we are going to tell you!
"Do not make fun of German people!"
As I'm doing this joke about a German
kicking me on the floor
with the accent,
here's where it gets crazy.
I get hit in the side
of the head by a bat.
Listen to what I just
told you, Bay Area.
I get hit in the side
of the head by a bat.
Not Major League Baseball,
I'm talking about,
"I wanna suck your blood."
In India, there are millions and
millions and millions of fruit bats.
And one of them, actually six of them,
made it inside of the building,
and they're flying around and
they're hanging out in the rafters
and one of them decides to fly down,
and basically, when I
was doing the kicks,
I stepped into the line of flight of
the bat and he caught me right here.
I'm like, "What the hell?"
And I look up
and you see it and you can hear it.
The Indian people saw that
and they freaked out.
They were yelling,
"They did it! They did it!
"We told you, don't do it!
They told you, don't do it!
"They are evil!
They are evil!" I'm like,
"Dude, I don't care how evil
you think the Germans are,
"they don't have control over bats!"
It wasn't like the guy
got offended and said,
"Oh, really? Und release the bat!"
So now, the crowd is weird.
These guys are laughing...
And there's freakin' bats
flying around the theater.
First two minutes of my show.
I gotta do an hour.
And now, I've already lost the crowd.
They're freaking out.
These guys are laughing weird.
I'm nervous. It's my first time there.
I don't know how to get out of this.
So I literally walked over to
the other side of the stage
and I started just performing
for this side of the room.
Trying to redirect the
focus right here.
And I'm so nervous, I'm stuttering.
I don't even have a segue. I'm like,
"You know what's crazy? In America...
"Everybody in America likes drinking,
you know, it's real crazy.
"Like, for example, Mexicans.
Most Mexicans like drinking tequila. Um...
"Most black people like Hennessy.
Most white people like Jger.
"Here in India, you guys like Fanta."
And when I said Fanta,
the crowd went crazy,
because it was such a
local reference, they freaked out.
They were, like, screaming,
"Oh, my God! He knows! He knows!"
They started singing.
"Fanta, Fanta! Don't you
want a Fanta, Fanta!
"Don't you want a Fanta, Fanta!"
The roar was so big, it allowed
me to restart my show.
So I started cracking new jokes and more
jokes and these jokes and those jokes.
Five minutes go by.
Five minutes go by.
All of a sudden,
the Germans got offended
at the fact that I left them
out of my drinking joke.
The one in the middle stands up
and he approaches the stage.
Now, this stage has
gotta be about 5 feet tall.
The guy's head was about
this high. He was like 6'4".
He looks at me and he starts
pointing, and he's yelling,
"Hey, fat man! Fat man!
"What about us, huh?
What about the Germans?
"What do we drink?" I was like, "Dude,
that was like five minutes ago!"
"We were giving you a chance!
What do we drink?"
I'm like, "First of all, sir, I apologize.
I'm really nervous right now.
"Um, I had no idea there was
gonna be Germans here tonight."
I felt like Poland.
I don't care if you laugh or not,
that's a smart-ass joke.
That's a smart-ass joke.
It's not my fault some of
you pendejos failed history.
You'd better Google that and
find out why it's so damn funny.
All the older white people are,
"God damn it, yeah."
So anyway, so I'm standing and I go,
"Listen, sir, you need to have a seat,
okay? The people are getting nervous.
"You need to have a seat so I can finish
the show." And the guy, he refuses.
"I will not sit down, fat man,
until you tell us what we drink."
I go, "Listen, I don't
know what you guys drink."
And the Indians are being so cute.
They're trying to help me.
They're yelling,
"Hey! They like Fanta, too!"
And the guy was like, "We do not
like Fanta!" I'm like, "Dude!"
I go, "Sir, please have a..."
"I will not have a seat until you tell us
"what we drink! Tell us, fat man!"
I go, "Listen, sir, you need to sit down
and you need to stop
calling me 'fat man.'".
Now it's starting to bother me.
It's like the sixth time he does it,
and I didn't just lose 100 pounds
to now get called "fat man."
So I go, "Sir, if you
don't have a seat,
"we're gonna have a problem,
especially if you call me 'fat man' again.
And he freakin' did it.
"What are you gonna do, fat man?
What do we drink?"
Even Martin, who's
behind the curtain, knew.
He knows when I'm at that point
where I've crossed over.
I can hear him in the back.
"Don't do it!"
Too late, Fluffy's pissed.
So, I said, "You wanna
know what you drink?"
"Tell me!" Don't ask me
where this came from.
I got right in his face and
I said, "Blood of Jews!"
Now, see, automatically you guys
gave me a whole different reaction.
In Delhi that was probably the most
shocking thing ever
said on that stage.
So shocking that 2,000 people
at the exact same time
got so quiet, you guys, so quiet,
you could hear everyone's ass just...
And I'm still standing there,
and my hand's out.
Have you ever said
something that was so bad,
And I mean you knew it was bad as
it was coming out of your mouth?
And you're trying to
stop it but it's too late,
it's already out,
and you're like, "No!"
And it's too late. "Blood of Jews"
is all over his face, right?
I'm standing there and my hand's out,
I'm looking at him, he's looking at me,
and I'm like...
He says, "That's a good one!
Ja, that's a good one!"
"Oh, my God, thank you! Thank you!"
It doesn't end there.
I'm telling you guys,
this is so crazy.
So, next morning,
Martin and I are flying
back home to Los Angeles from Delhi.
We're taking an airline
called British Airways.
We go from Delhi to London, England,
and we have a connecting
flight over there.
Once we get to England, they canceled
our connect for whatever reason.
And so we got rebooked on
another airline called Lufthansa.
It's a German airline.
Now, this is why I believe in karma.
Seriously, Martin's like, "Really,
'blood of Jews'?" I'm like, "I know!"
I felt like they phoned ahead.
"Und take care of Fluffy."
So I put down my credit card,
I made sure that Martin and I got
upgraded to at least their business class,
'cause it's like a long flight,
and so we're in there, we're on
the plane and the plane takes off.
About 20 minutes into the flight,
we're just sitting there, we're laughing,
and the flight attendant, she starts coming
down the aisle with the little cart.
And she's coming down the aisle
and she sees me, and she goes,
"Hello, sir. Do you have a
preferred drink of choice today?"
Martin looks at me, taps me
in the chest, and he goes,
"Hey! Tell her!
"Tell her, bro! "Come on, ask for it.
If anybody has it..."
"Dude, shut up!"
And then she looks at Martin.
"Sir, do you have a
preferred drink of choice?"
And Martin's like, "Yeah,
do you guys got blood of..."
She's like, "Bloody Mary?"
"Yes. Yes, Bloody Mary."
Freakin' "Machete's" gonna
get me banned from flying.
So we make it back home.
I'm trying to tell the story
to my girlfriend and my son,
and my girl, she's barely laughing.
She's like...
Like, she's jaded. She doesn't
laugh at my jokes anymore.
My son Frankie, on the
other hand, he is dying.
And I'm like, "Really?"
He's 16 years old.
I go, "Really, Frankie,
you thought that was funny?"
He goes, "Yeah. That's funny!" I go,
"What was so funny about my story?"
He goes, "Those people
you're talking about."
I go, "Who, the Indians?"
He goes, "No, the other ones."
I go, "The Germans?"
He goes, "Yeah, it's funny."
I go, "What's so funny
about the Germans?"
"The way that they speak."
I go, "What's so funny about
the way that they speak?"
He goes, "They sound like the Three
Little Pigs from the movie Shrek!"
I had to go on YouTube
and freakin' find it,
and sure enough, all Three Little Pigs,
"Und ja! Hello, Shrek!"
I was just waiting for one
of them to go, "Fat man!"
By the way, since my last special,
I gotta tell you something
about my son Frankie.
He now, now, wears deodorant.
Now for the rest of you
that are watching right now,
wondering, "What is
he talking about?"
And the people watching
the movie, going,
"I don't get this," let me explain.
In my last special, I made
reference to my son Frankie
and how he refuses to
regularly put deodorant on.
And so I told him,
"If you don't start doing it,
"I'm going put your business on TV,
"and your friends are going
to see me talking about you,
"and they're going to
check you for me."
Sure enough, my last special airs.
The next day, Frankie goes to school,
and those kids were merciless.
He came home.
He takes off his backpack.
He unzips it, and he dumps out,
like, 17 deodorants.
"See what you did!"
I was like, "Wow, look at all
the money we just saved."
His mom was impressed.
She was like, "Talk about
how he needs towels."
Hell, yeah. He's going to get towels.
And it's funny, because,
you know, for me to relate to my son,
it's a little challenging, you guys.
It's not that I can't relate
to a teenager, because I can.
I can relate to almost any age.
You know, I got people that
brought kids here tonight.
The problem is, is that my son
doesn't see me as an entertainer.
He sees me as the guy that
tells him to take a shower,
put on deodorant, you know,
"Stop picking your nose," That's me.
His friends, on the other hand,
I'm like a god to his friends.
Every time I drop off Frankie at
school now, I pull up, you know.
The kids see my car.
They freak out,
and they run over to it,
and they put their hands
on it like it's a shrine.
They touch the car like freaking,
"Selena estaqu," you know?
Some of you got that. Gracias.
Anyway...
Then the kids start shaking
my car side to side, chanting,
"Fluffy. Fluffy. Fluffy."
And Frankie's in the front
seat pissed. He's pissed.
He's like, "This is bullshit."
I'm like, "Hey, dude,
don't get mad at me,
"cause I'm more popular than you
at your school." Little hater.
He gets out of the car all mad.
They're still chanting.
"Fluffy, Fluffy."
The thing is, is that our
worlds are very different.
His world revolves around
Grand Theft Auto, the video game,
YouTube and girls.
He's really good at two of those.
The other one, not so much.
And it's not that I'm trying
to be a hater about it.
It's just that I tell Frankie,
"Listen, you need to start
having more conversations.
"You need to become more
talkative and interact like this."
See, he'd rather text than talk.
That's his whole thing. I'm like,
"Dude, you got to learn,
you know, start...
"Talk to me! I wish you
would talk to me more.
"You could learn a lot about
talking by talking to me.
"I'm just saying, I only
do it professionally."
But, no, he'd rather text.
It's at the point now where
if I'm in the house and I yell,
"Frankie, did you
take out the trash?"
Nothing. All of a sudden...
I take out my phone.
"No."
But if I say, "I got money for you,"
freaking Houdini, right? "Oh, hello."
'Cause you can't text cash.
That's my big thing right now.
I just want him to take out the trash.
He's 16 years old now.
He should have been doing
this since he was 10,
but, you know,
better late than never.
And what he does is he'll
sit in the living room,
and he tunes out the
rest of the house.
He sits there, and he'll
put on these headphones
that I got him for Christmas
a couple of years ago,
these Beats with the
freaking studio button,
and it cuts out all of the sound.
They are so strong
that when he starts watching
his YouTube videos,
he can't hear himself laugh.
And for me, that is the
funniest thing in the world.
I'm in the other room,
and I can hear him.
This is what I hear...
I'm in the other room, like,
"Who brought the Germans?"
And so I walk out into the
living room, and I see Frankie,
and he's laughing at his phone,
and I got to flag him down.
"Hey, hey, hey."
And he'll take 'em off.
"What? What's up, Dad?"
I go, "Frankie,
can you do me a favor?
"Can you please take out the trash?"
"Okay." And then he puts 'em back on.
"What?
"Now?"
I go, "Yes, now.
"When you ask me for a ride,
it's because you need a ride
"when you ask for a ride, not later."
Then he says, "Where are we going?"
"Just take out the trash."
And then he does it.
He takes out the trash,
but he acts like he's doing me
the biggest favor in the world,
and he stares me down, and he doesn't
break eye contact, He's like...
And then he'll hold the bag over
the can, and he makes the sound...
I'm like, "Dude, so much drama."
It's crazy. I'd like to have
normal conversations with him,
but usually I gotta take it
that far for us to interact.
You know? I look forward
to conversations.
Even if it's something
small and minute,
at least it gives me a chance to
trigger another conversation with him.
I look forward to a few things.
I look forward to December,
because in December,
Frankie becomes very chatty.
Otherwise, he's "One-word Kid."
Parents, you know what I'm talking
about, kids, "One-word Kid"?
And you try to talk to 'em.
"Hey, how was your day?" "Good."
"You have any homework?" "Yeah."
"Are you going to do it?" "Maybe."
"You hungry?" "Mmm-hmm"
"What do you want?" "Food."
Usually that's what I get.
But December rolls around,
and guess what December is.
December's when he
becomes very chatty,
because he has an agenda.
All of a sudden, he goes from
"One-word Kid" to very, like,
"Hey, how's your week, Dad?
You doing good?
"Yeah, how are the shows going?
You doing all right?
"Do you need anything?
You need anything?"
I'm like, "I needed this in July.
Just saying."
And I know it's fake,
but at least, once again,
it allows me to put my real
conversation on top of his fake one.
And if that's what it takes,
then that's what it takes.
In addition to that,
I look forward to problems.
I like problems,
because if there's problems,
Frankie and I can work on it
together to find a solution, right?
And I see that as a
great form of bonding.
Now don't get me wrong, you guys.
Sometimes it's expensive.
Yeah, you're laughing.
Let me tell you.
Like, one time, they took
his iPhone from school,
and he comes home,
and he's all devastated, right?
He's like, "Dad, Dad,
I got to talk to you."
I'm like, "What? Tell me. What?"
"They stole my phone."
I'm like, "That's why
you're talking."
And I started laughing.
He goes, "It's not funny."
I go, "You have no
idea how funny it is."
I go, "So what happened, Frankie?
"So they broke into my locker at school,
and they took my iPhone,
"they took my friend's iPhone,
"and if we go to the school right now,
we can fill out a report.
"We know exactly who did it.
Can we go to the school right now?"
I go, "Listen, Frankie, I'd love to,
"but I'm really tired.
I just got off a flight
"and, you know,
I'm really, really tired.
"I promise you tomorrow morning,
I'll take you early.
"I'll help you fill out the
report and we'll turn it in."
"Could we go right now?" I go, "Frankie,
seriously. Just please, tomorrow."
"I need my phone."
I go, "Listen, Frankie,
"you can handle one day
without your phone."
He's not getting his way,
so he turns around,
and he yells at
the ground, and he goes,
"They took my phone!"
I looked at him. I say,
"Hey, you took my freedom.
"You don't hear me screaming."
"I just accept it and process it,
"and we move on. That's it."
So then he asks,
"What's going to happen?"
I go, "Well, I'm gonna go upstairs,
take a shower, and probably go to bed."
"No, what's gonna happen if
I don't get my phone back?"
I go, "That's a good question,
Frankie. I don't know."
"You're not going to
get me a new one?"
"No, dude. I already got you a phone.
"It was your responsibility
to take care of that phone."
"It's not fair." I go,
"Life's not fair, Frankie, okay?
"But things happen."
"You should get me a phone."
"Dude, seriously?"
And then he looks at me, and he says,
and this kind of messed with me.
He goes, "You should get me a phone.
"It's nothing for you
to get me a new phone."
"It's nothing for you
to get me a new phone."
Bay Area, my son thinks
that what I do is easy.
He thinks it's easy,
because all he sees
when he attends one
or two shows per year
is that I walk out onstage,
you guys start chanting,
and then cool shit magically
appears in his room.
He doesn't realize that
this is actually a job
and there's sacrifice
that comes along with it.
So I told him. I said, "Listen,
Frankie, how 'bout this?
"How 'bout you explain to me why
I should get you a new phone,
"and if it makes sense,
I'll do it right now. Go."
"I need one."
I said, "No, Frankie. You're a teenager.
You don't need a phone.
"A cell phone for a
teenager isn't a necessity.
"It's a luxury, okay?
"It's not a necessity,
it's a luxury."
He says, "What if
there's an emergency?"
I go, "Like what?
Someone taking your phone?
"What did you do today when
they took your phone?"
"I went to the...
I went to the cafeteria,
"and I talked to my friend Angel
"and he let me use his phone,
and I called my mom."
And I go, "And guess what?
If that doesn't work,
"you can go to the office
and let them know,
"'There's a family emergency,
please contact my mom or my dad.' Next."
"What if you need to
get a hold of me?"
"I know what school you go to."
"What about when I'm walking home?"
"I know the route that you take."
And then he pulled this one out,
one of the greatest lines ever.
"You know what?
You talk a lot about me on TV.
"People know who I am now.
"What if someone tries to kidnap me?"
I said, "You weigh 225. Good luck.
"They are not kidnapping your ass
"without an iPhone
and a box of Oreos.
"That's the only way
that's going to happen."
I said, "Frankie, do you
realize how lucky you are?
"You had a phone. I didn't
have a phone in school.
"Your mom didn't have
a phone in school.
"If we needed to make a phone call,
"we had to carry change,
or we had to call collect."
"What's that?" Oh, my God!
Trying to explain the concept
of a collect call to my kid
is like trying to
explain rocket science.
He'll never have to deal with it.
He'll never know what it's
like to be out late somewhere
and have to use a phone.
First of all, to find a pay phone.
If you see a pay phone now,
you look at it like,
"Oh, wow.
They forgot to take it down.
"Get your camera. Take a picture.
"Cause that shit's gone.
Take a picture."
He'll never know about
staying out late at night
and having to use one
of those nasty phones
and taking off that receiver.
You know, the nasty one that has gum
and gonorrhea all over it, right?
And you got to keep it
far away from your face,
so you don't get infected.
And then you make that phone call,
you know, that freaking...
When you make a collect
call back in the day?
It was expensive. He's not
going to have to do that now.
Back in the day, if you made a
collect call, it was a mission.
It was a mission,
and it was expensive.
If you called my mom collect,
it better have been life or death
or that's what it was going to be.
You call my mom back
in the day, shoot,
we were on welfare and Section 8.
Every penny counted.
You call her up.
"Hello."
And then she'd get the presentation.
"AT&T.
"Do you accept a collect call from...
"Caller, at the tone,
say only your name."
You had to get creative.
"Mom, it's me. Pick me
up at 7-Eleven at 6:00.
"Hurry up. I love you. Bye."
"Do you accept the charges?"
"Hell, no. I'm on my way, mijo."
And if you couldn't get
the whole message out,
you had to call back, do that
whole process all over again,
and then say another sentence
until they cut you off.
I told Frankie we call
that "ghetto texting."
'Cause he'll never have to do it.
The problem is, is that
my son is very spoiled,
and I realize that it's my fault.
It's 100% my fault.
When he first came into my life,
when he was seven years old,
he was very appreciative.
Everything was, "Thank you."
Everything was like, "Oh, my God.
"This is so cool. Thank you.
Thank you. Thank you."
Big old hug. "Thank you.
I love you. Thank you."
And what I did was, is that
I started giving him stuff,
and I never expected anything for it,
and, you know, with me,
I was always like, you know,
I work really hard
to have nice things,
and is it a crime that I want
my family to have nice things?
I figure, you know what?
I went through a lot.
I just want my son to have the best.
But you can't always
give 'em everything,
because then they don't learn
to appreciate and value things,
and I had to find out the hard way.
It takes a lot for me to tell
you guys that, by the way,
that I freaking messed up.
My girl pointed it out.
She goes, "You're messing up."
I go, "What am I doing wrong?"
She goes, "You don't let him earn
anything. You don't let him try.
"You don't let him make an attempt
"to try to work toward something,
"so of course he doesn't
appreciate things."
And it was very evident last month,
you know, birthday time?
I bought him a pair of Jordans.
Not just a regular pair of Jordans.
They were a special collector's
edition pair of Jordans.
You know, the kind of Jordans where
people wait in line the night before
just so they can buy these shoes.
Except I didn't,
'cause I got the hookup!
Yeah.
They were really nice shoes,
$180 pair of shoes, and...
Yeah. Hey, lot of jokes. So...
I didn't even wrap 'em, okay?
I put 'em on the box, and I waited
for him to walk in the room.
And I'm standing there,
and he walks in.
I go, "Happy birthday,"
and he sees the shoes.
He looks at the shoes,
and all he says is,
"Cool." That's it. "Cool."
Sometimes I'll get lucky,
he'll say it twice.
"Cool, cool."
And then he walks around to see
what other presents there are,
and I told his mom,
"Did you see that? Did you see..."
"Don't get mad. I told you,
you don't let him earn anything.
"Now that's why he acts that way.
He expects things."
I'm like, "Oh."
And I want to get upset,
but she's absolutely right.
He's at the point now of spoiled
where he walks up to me, and he goes,
"Dad, I'm really bored
with my Nintendo Wii.
"Can I give it to my friend Angel?"
I go, "What did you just say?"
"I'm bored with my Nintendo Wii.
Can I give it away?"
I go, "Is it broken?"
"No."
"How long have you had it?"
"Ooh, like, four years."
I go, "How many games do you
have for the Nintendo Wii?"
"Like, 300."
I could feel you
judging me over there.
I felt that. "Oh!"
You're freaking...
You're judging me right now.
I can feel it.
She's over there, she's like,
"This is some Dr. Phil
shit right here.
"He really messed him up."
Yeah, I heard you.
Let me just for the record,
let me set this straight, okay?
I did not buy my son 300 games.
Here's what happened.
I have a friend who's
a computer hacker,
and for 75 bucks,
he put 300 games on
my son's hard drive.
Yes, I have money,
but I'm still ghetto.
Oh, yeah.
So I tell Frankie, "Do you
realize how lucky you are?"
And then he rolls his eyes.
"Oh, lucky."
I go, "Yeah, dude, you are."
I says, "You got a
Nintendo Wii that works.
"You've had it for four years,
and it still works.
"If something happens to it,
loan take it back to the store,
"get you a new one,
because I got a warranty
"that'll last you
another four years."
"Why is that a big deal?"
"Because when I was your age,
I had a Nintendo."
"Wii?" "No.
"Frankie, in 1987,
"I had a thing called a Nintendo
Entertainment System, okay?"
Nintendo Entertainment System.
It didn't last four years.
It lasts 90 days.
90 days is what it took
for you to hit "Power,"
and start seeing a
flashing red screen.
You know the flashing red screen,
where you have to look at
the ground or look away,
or you have a seizure right
then and there? Oh, yeah.
And then what you had to do is
you had to flip the Nintendo over,
and there was a silver sticker,
a silver sticker with
an 800 number on it,
and you call the 800 number,
and they put you in contact
with someone in Japan,
who made you feel like a pendejo.
Oh, yeah. He made you feel stupid.
You call him up, and he's like,
"It cost 250 to repair Nintendo."
250 to fix it?
But it's 150 for a brand-new one.
And if you couldn't afford
150 for a brand-new one,
like we couldn't afford
150 for a brand-new one,
you had to become a technician.
At the age of seven,
eight, nine, 10, 11,
you had to go in the kitchen
and find the most messed-up
butter knife you could.
Right? The one that had
bend marks and rust stains,
and take that sucker
back in the living room,
because you were going
to perform an operation.
You were going to perform an operation
and bring that Nintendo back to life.
Yeah.
You had to work to play.
You had to unplug it,
plug it back in,
power, reset, power,
reset, power, reset.
It was like performing CPR.
You'd hold a cartridge
and it was like you push
it down, you push it up,
you push it down, you push it up,
push it down, you push it up,
push it down, you push it up.
Give it oxygen!
And if you were lucky,
if you were lucky,
you'd hear the magical sound.
"It's alive! It's alive!"
You were more happy about
making your game work
than actually playing
it back in the day.
Frankie will never know about having
to repair his game system
in order to play it.
He'll never have to deal
with the cartridge.
He barely has to touch the disk.
Most of the games now,
you stream it through Wi-Fi.
And if the Wi-Fi's messing up,
you're not going to fix
Wi-Fi the same way
you'd fix an old-school
Nintendo cartridge.
That doesn't work.
"Wi-Fi's out." "Hold on.
"Try it again."
You can't touch Wi-Fi.
Gadgets and devices now are
so delicate and sensitive.
You can't touch anything.
Everything requires a specialist
or a technician to
come over and fix it.
Back in the day,
gadgets and appliances
worked so much better
when you applied
just a little violence to them.
You didn't have to
call a repairperson.
If you had a big-screen TV
and there was lines
going through the middle,
how would you fix it?
Right? And what happened?
Ta-da!
Let you try that method tonight
on a flat-screen,
and see what happens.
"Stupid flat-screen. Shit! Broke it!
"Pick it up right there.
I got a warranty. Come on. Let's go."
I tell Frankie, "You are so lucky.
"You're in an age of
technology that's amazing.
"You don't have to worry."
I want him to get it.
I want him to understand.
I want him to appreciate,
but at the same time, I got to
learn to freaking check myself.
Sometimes he says things.
Sometimes he says things to me,
and sometimes they sound
a little rude or hurtful.
For example, every Monday,
when I go home,
every Monday night, I go home,
and I always take my family out.
It's always movie night.
I love movie night on Mondays.
There's no lines. You go in,
you go out, good parking. It's sweet.
And I always tell Frankie before
we go out, "Hey, one hour.
"We're leaving, okay, one hour.
"Make sure you're ready, okay?"
"Okay." "Good."
And then I go in the room,
and I take a nap,
and sometimes I oversleep,
and so, an hour and a half later,
Frankie comes over to the room.
He pounds on the door. Door...
And I wake up. I'm like,
"Hey, what's up, Frankie?"
"I thought you said we
were leaving in an hour.
"What happened to an hour?"
I don't get mad. I don't yell.
I just look at him, and I say,
"Please forgive me, sir.
I do apologize.
"As soon as I am done
washing the horses,
"I shall take the carriage
to your quarters, sir."
"Why are you talking
to me like that?"
"I am speaking to you this way,
"because you're speaking to
me like I'm an asshole, sir,
"and I shall not
tolerate such behavior
"coming from my offspring
that is technically not mine.
"Do you have anything else, sir?"
"Can my friends go with
us to the movies?"
"Oh, the vultures are here.
"Oh, they are here to pick
at the fruit of my labor.
"Absolutely, Frankie.
Is there anything else?"
"What are you going to do?"
"I am going in the room, sir."
"To do what?"
"I'm going to defile
your mother, Frankie.
"She's been quite chatty,
and someone must put her in her place."
I stumbled on gold that night.
I stumbled on gold, you guys.
When I said that about his mom,
I found out
that Frankie is very
sensitive about his mom.
And he's at the age right now where
affection really bothers him.
Not necessarily from me, because
if I try to hug him, he's cool with it,
'cause I give those quick
bro hugs, you know, like,
"Hey. Hey, what's up?" You know?
However, if his mom is
standing right next to me
and I reach over and I grab her hand,
he sees that as gross,
and he'll make the face.
"Ugh!"
"What?"
"Ah."
"The hand?"
"That's gross, Dad."
I'm like, "Oh, that's not gross,
Frankie. That's not gross,
"Baby, open your mouth."
That's his weak spot, and I
go for it every single time.
One day, I was ironing
one of my shirts
that I was going to put on, right?
I'm ironing the shirt, and I'm
talking to him about his grades.
As I'm talking to him
about his grades,
there's a car driving
in front of the house,
and the stereo was really loud,
and you could feel the bass.
So I started dancing. "Oh, yeah."
Frankie starts laughing, right?
And that felt good.
I was making my son laugh.
But then he starts pointing.
He starts pointing.
"Why are you pointing?"
"'Cause you're fat,
your fat's going everywhere.
"Your fat's going everywhere."
I go, "Really? My fat's going
everywhere? Well, guess what?
"This fat makes your mom horny."
And he's like...
If I ask him to do something,
and he doesn't do it,
like, for example, as parents,
you want your kids to go
to sleep by a certain time,
because you need 'em to wake up
in time to get ready for school.
Frankie's cutoff is 11:00.
It's pretty late,
if you ask me, for a kid.
Sometimes he'll push it to midnight,
you know, play dumb.
"Oh, I didn't know what time it was."
"Yeah, whatever.
You're only holding a clock."
But I get it. I used
to play dumb, too.
So then he'll walk in his room,
and he'll say...
"Good night, Dad,"
and he'll close the door.
And he thinks he's slick.
He takes a towel, and he
starts rolling up the towel,
and he puts it under the door,
so that I can't see the
light coming from the TV.
Sounds pretty genius, right?
But, hello, cover the
rest of the stupid door.
He freaking turns on his big-ass TV,
and it looks like Immigration's
breaking in to his bedroom.
And so what happens is he'll stay up
until 2:00, 3:00,
4:00 in the morning,
and he, you know,
he's supposed to wake up at 6:00.
His alarm goes off, and he
sleeps through the alarm,
and it's a real alarm-alarm.
It's not a radio. It's freaking...
Whole house awake. Him?
And it's right here.
So I got to get out of bed,
and I go over to his room,
and I open the door, and I kick
the stupid towel out of the way,
and then I walk over, you know.
And I yell, "Frankie! Frankie!"
Nothing, so I shake him.
"Frankie, wake up."
You know what happens when
I shake my son in the morning?
It makes him eat in his sleep.
That's what happens.
I shake him, and he does this.
So you know what I do?
I get on top of the bed,
and I slowly lay on top of him,
and I apply my full weight,
bro, all of it,
slowly, and you could hear him.
"Oh, God! Oh, God!
You're too big! You're too big!"
And then I whisper in his ear,
"That's what your mom said."
I know one day, my son is going to write
a book called Fluffy's Full of Shit.
It's kind of crazy.
I talked to his mom.
I talked to Frankie's mom,
and she tells me, "Listen."
She goes, "I'm going to tell
you something. Don't get mad.
"The reason why you and Frankie
are always butting heads
"is because you guys are
basically the same person."
And I go, "We are not
the same person."
She goes,
"Your mannerisms are the same.
"The way you guys think is the same.
"You're exactly...
You're moody in the same way.
"It's the same."
And keep in mind,
Frankie's technically my stepson,
so my girl insisting this,
that we're the same,
I'm like, "Hello, I wasn't
there at the beginning."
But, no, she insists.
"You guys are the same."
And I started analyzing our lives.
I started analyzing Frankie's life,
and I started analyzing my life,
and I started realizing that,
you know what,
our lives run on these
crazy parallels.
I'm going to tell you guys something.
In all my previous specials,
I'd always talk about my mom.
My mom, my mom, my mom, my mom.
I never really made
references about my dad,
because my dad wasn't there
when I was growing up.
And I made a joke one time
about how my mom said that
my dad was a mariachi.
Which is true,
and that he was the guy
that was on the bottle of hot sauce.
My dad was the Tapato guy.
So after that,
people started asking
questions about my dad,
and so they're like, "So what's
the story with your dad?"
And it felt really awkward
for me to bring up the fact
that I didn't grow up
with one, you know?
And nobody wants to tell people,
"I grew up without a parent."
For me, it was very personal,
and I started building up this wall,
because people kept asking questions,
especially this one,
"What would you say if your
dad wanted to see you now?"
And for me, it's been over 30 years,
and so I'd always say the same thing.
I said, "Well, if my
dad wanted to see me,
"I'd tell him he has
to buy a ticket."
That was the go-to line.
"If my dad wants to see me,
I'll tell him to buy a ticket.
"I'll tell him to buy a ticket.
"My dad wants to see
me 30 years later,
"I'm going to have him buy a ticket."
I said this for over seven years.
And guess who bought a ticket?
Bay Area, it's about to get real.
Oh, let me tell you this one.
So I'm doing a show at
a comedy club in LA
called the Comedy & Magic Club,
and it's about a 250-seat room,
and the manager Richard comes
up to me before I go onstage,
and he goes, "Hey, listen, Gabe.
"Your dad's in the back of the room.
"Can we pay for his drinks and his food?"
I go, "What are you talking about?"
He goes, "Yeah, your dad's in the back.
"Are we paying for
his food and drinks?"
I go, "Listen, I haven't seen
my dad in over 30 years.
"That's somebody trying to
get free food and drinks.
"Cut him off.
Don't pay for anything."
"Got it, bro." So I go up onstage.
I start doing my thing.
No problem, show goes over very well.
I wind up outside after the show,
and I'm doing a meet-and-greet.
I'm taking pictures,
and I'm signing DVDs.
My dad goes out and gets in line
with the rest of the fans
to try to meet me like that.
And my manager goes
to the back of the line,
and then she comes up
to me, and she goes,
"Listen, Gabe. Um...
"The guy that's at the
back of the line,
"I have a feeling that
that could be your dad."
I go, "Really? You, too? Why?"
"I saw his ID. Gabe,
is his name Jesus?"
And I was like, "Well, that's a one-in-four
chance right there, you know?"
I mean, seriously,
you can't throw a rock
in Los Angeles without hitting
a Jesus. You really can't.
And so I go, "That's it?"
She goes, "Gabe, I'm going to be
honest with you. He has your eyes."
I go, "Really? Out of all of this,
"you went to the two smallest things
on my body to compare us two?
"Are you kidding me?"
And then she said, "Is his
birthday December 25th?"
And my heart dropped, because my
dad's birthday is actually Christmas.
Every year, my mom would remind me,
"Merry Christmas. He's not
here again. Open your gift."
And so it always stuck right here,
"December 25th, December 25th,
December 25th."
So it freaked me out so bad that I
started shaking. I started shaking.
I was freaking out, because it was
a bunch of emotions. I was angry.
I was sad. I was happy. It was just
everything all at the same time.
And so people are coming up to me.
They're like, "Are you okay?"
And I kept saying this over and over.
I said, "My dad's here. My dad's here.
My dad's here. My dad's here."
And they're like, "That's good.
Your dad's here to support you."
I'm like, "I haven't seen
him in over 30 years."
And they're like, "Awkward.
Yeah. Awkward."
So I told my manager, "Go to the
back of the line and get him out.
"This is not the time or the
place to do this, right?"
So she goes back there,
and I see them talking.
Then I see him walking away,
and then he stops,
and he turns around, and he
looks at me, and he waves.
And it freaked me out, you guys.
In addition to freaking me out,
he's holding one of my DVDs,
which really messed me up,
because I've been signing DVDs all night.
What was I going to put on his?
You know? "Hey, where you been?"
So she gets his info, gives it to me.
I give the info to my girlfriend,
right, and I finish the meet-and-greet.
We get in the car. We go back home.
I'm not saying anything.
I'm just shaking.
I'm sweating, and my
girl goes, "You okay?"
I said, "Listen, you know what?
"I been playing this scenario
in my head for over 30 years,
"what would I do if
he ever showed up.
"I thought I was
prepared to handle this,
"and I'm not. I'm freaking out."
And she goes, "Baby, listen,
how 'bout we sleep on it,
"and we'll figure this
out together tomorrow?
"Just sleep on it. Try to relax."
And I'm like, "That's a good idea."
So we get in bed.
She knocks out, and I'm just...
I can't. I can't sleep.
And 3:00 in the morning rolls around,
and I say, "I can't take it anymore."
So I wake up my girl.
I said, "Baby, get up."
"What is it? What?"
I go, "Listen, call him."
"Right now?" I go, "Yes."
"It's 3:00 in the morning.
That's disrespectful."
I'm like, "Hello.
Who waited 30 years?"
"Fine." So she gets on the
phone, and she calls my dad,
and he answered on the first ring,
and I could hear 'em talking,
going back and forth.
And then she hangs up
the phone, and she says,
"Listen, baby, your dad
wants me to let you know
"that he doesn't want any money.
He doesn't want any money.
"He doesn't want anything from you,
but 10 minutes of your time,
"so he can ask you a
couple of questions
"and hopefully answer some questions.
"Me, personally, I think you need closure,
because you're messed up."
My girl keeps it real.
So I said, "Listen, call him back.
"Let him know that I
want to see him today
"at the comedy club where we met."
She goes, "Fine."
So she calls him back.
She hangs up the phone. And she goes,
"Okay, baby, I confirmed it.
"7:00 at the comedy club.
Can we get some sleep now?"
And I go, "Listen,
I got to do something."
She goes, "What?" And I get out of bed,
and I walk over to the living room.
And in the living room,
I have a giant mirror, okay?
And this giant mirror,
I get in front of it,
and I start rehearsing the speech
I'm about to have with my dad
that I haven't seen in over 30 years.
Now keep in mind, you guys.
This is the only thing I've ever really
rehearsed. I can't rehearse this,
because I don't know if it's funny
or not until you laugh at it.
Seriously. I can stand in
front of the mirror all day.
Apparently that shit is funny.
Okay, cool.
I'll try it again tomorrow.
So I'm front of the mirror.
I'm very emotional, and my
whole chest is bright red,
because I'm doing the stupid,
emotional macho thing.
I'm standing there,
and I'm doing this...
"Who do you think you are?
"Who do you think you are?"
And my girlfriend grabs me.
She grabs me.
"Baby, calm down,"
and I snapped on her.
I said, "Listen, this is the only way
I know how to handle this, okay?
"Just give me a little bit of space.
"I promise you tomorrow
I'll be a better person.
"This is the only way I
know how to deal with this.
"Please understand." And she
was like, "I get it, No worries.
"I'm in the room if you need me."
And so she goes in the room,
and I keep freaking yelling
and emotional, screaming.
And later on, she told me that I
guess I was being really loud
with the screaming and the hitting,
and I woke up Frankie.
And she says that Frankie
came in the living room,
and he hears freaking yelling and
hits and pops, and so he got scared,
and he sees me standing there in front
of the mirror, and I'm hitting myself,
and he freaked out. He was like...
"I better take out the trash."
Now don't get me wrong.
It's hysterical now, but at that moment,
I didn't notice it,
and I didn't care.
My focus is, "What am I
gonna say to this man?"
So I'm freaking nailing myself,
and finally, okay, 6:45 rolls around.
My girl and I get in the car,
and we head over to the comedy club.
We get there about 15 minutes late,
and you know what?
I'm like, "That's cool.
I'm glad we're late.
"This way, I'll just
walk into the club,
"I'll look at him,
and I'll start talking."
We pull up to the front.
I get out of the car. I start
walking up towards the sidewalk.
My dad is also 15 minutes late,
and he's walking up the curb,
It caught me off-guard,
because I wasn't planning on
meeting him on the street.
I was gonna meet him inside.
So now I froze. I'm like...
He looks at me,
and he does this. He goes...
And for me, I'm like,
"You know what? No.
"You can't do this. You can't show up
after 30 years and expect to hug me."
In my head, I'm like, "Do I
hug him, or do I hit him?"
And if my girl wouldn't have been
there, I'd have laid his ass out.
You don't do that to a kid.
And seriously, you guys. You can't.
You can't just show up...
And so my girl's looking at me, and she
sees the situation from different eyes,
so she's like, "You know what?
Just..." And I'm like...
So I walk over to him,
and I put my arms around him,
and I'll be honest with you guys.
It was the emptiest hug
I have ever given anyone,
and I'm hugging him,
and he starts crying in my ear.
And when he starts crying in
my ear, I pushed him off.
And I go, "No,
don't even try that. No."
And he's like, "No, no, no.
No, no. Sorry. Sorry. Sorry."
And I go, "Turn around.
Go inside." And he's, "Okay, okay."
So he turns around, and he goes
inside, and I start shaking.
And my girl's like, "You okay?"
I go, "I'm freaking out right now."
She goes, "Baby, just breathe."
I'm like...
I'm trying to breathe and relax,
and he walks in.
Five minutes go by, and I go,
"All right. Here we go."
I walk inside.
I see him sitting down, and I
walk right up to him, and I go...
"Who do you think you are?"
And my girlfriend grabbed me.
"Baby, calm down."
"Hey, you saw me doing
the shit at the house."
And I started laying into my dad.
I started asking all the questions.
You know, "Why? Where were you?
What happened? Did you even try?
"What was going on in your
life that was so important?"
And what really bothered
me was the fact
that he had a solid answer for every
single question I hit him with,
because I compared 'em to notes
from my mom and my sisters.
And more than anything,
I just wanted to vent.
I wanted to yell. I wanted to cuss.
I wanted to scream.
I wanted to get physical, and he
wasn't giving me that opportunity.
So I started making stuff up.
I was like, "You know what, Dad?
"My mom was mean to
me because of you."
He goes, "Well,
you know something, mijo,
"your mother had to do whatever
she had to do to raise you right.
"Look how good you turned out."
I was like, "Oh, he's good."
Apparently he has a mirror, too.
So I kept hitting him
with more questions,
and he kept coming back
with solid answers.
Eventually I got to the point
where I started asking the same
questions over and over again,
to see if maybe I'd get
a different answer,
and it started becoming redundant,
and I'm just going in circles.
Next thing I know,
my dad starts cracking jokes.
I'm like, "Seriously? 30 years,
and now you're cracking jokes?"
And it's not so much that he was
cracking jokes that bothered me.
It's the fact that they were funny.
I mean, really funny.
My girl's laughing.
Yeah, I could hear her. "Really?"
"What? What? I see where you get it."
I'm like, "Cabrona,
you're gonna get it."
"Yeah."
So the conversation is not
going anywhere. So I said,
"You know what? Let me
just change the subject.
"Let me just try to talk to
this guy as a regular person,
"not try to meet him as my dad."
So next thing I know, we got on
the subject of entertainment,
and that's something that
we both clicked with,
because my dad was a
mariachi for 20 years,
and of course I do what I do,
but the stories and the
lifestyle is very similar.
You know, we shared a lot of stories
about being at train stations,
bus stations, the airports,
being in the shuttle vans,
being in this city, that city,
this country, that country,
coming home to a family
that missed you,
or coming home to a family that
only wanted to see the check.
Next thing I know, we started
laughing. He high-fived me.
And then I told him, I says, "You know
what? I got to be honest with you."
I said, "I tried. I tried to
hate you. I really did."
I go, "But I understand.
I understand what happened.
"And I just want to let you know that
I'm very grateful that you're here,
"and I'm sorry that I was
the way that I was, um..."
Yeah.
I says, "I think I
really needed this."
And he goes, "I know I
needed this." I go, "Yeah."
I go, "Listen, I want to
ask you for a favor."
"Anything. Tu dime.
Whatever. Tu dime."
I go, "Look, I don't have
any pictures of you,
"of my mom, and myself together.
"It would mean a lot to me
if I could get a picture
"with the three of us together,
so that I could blow it up and frame it
"and put it on my wall.
Would you be willing
"to take a picture with
my mom and myself?"
"No problem. You name it.
Yo lo hago. No problem."
I go, "Okay, thank you.
I appreciate that."
I go, "I just gotta check
with my mom." And he goes...
And I was like, "Right?"
So I gave him a real hug.
I got his direct info, and, you know,
he told me he was going back to Mexico
for eight months and he
was gonna come back,
and he told me I had two sisters
that I didn't know about,
and I couldn't take it.
My girl and I, we get in the car,
and we go to my mom's house.
We get to the front,
and my mom hears the car,
so she comes outside, and she's like...
"What are you doing here?"
I go, "Mom, you are not gonna
believe who I just had dinner with."
"Obama."
I go, "No, Ma, this is actually
"bigger than Obama,
if you could believe this."
I say, "Let's go inside the house.
"This is a good one,
a really good one."
So she goes inside. I follow her,
my girl's behind me.
Close the door. I go, "Mom, listen."
I says, "I need you to sit down,
"because what I got to
tell you is a big deal."
"Mijo, don't tell me to sit
down in my own house."
I go, "Mom, trust me.
You want to sit down."
"What? Who did you have
dinner with? Who? Who?"
"I had dinner with my dad."
And she got all Telemundo.
And I hugged her, and she's
being like an octopus.
And I'm trying to grab her,
and I'm looking at my girl.
"Baby, help me." She's like,
"That's your mom. This is you."
I finally get my mom to
sit down, and she's...
And she keeps saying the same thing
over and over. "El dinero. El dinero."
"The money. The money.
He wants the money.
"El cabron has cable now."
When she finally calmed down,
the first thing she says to me is...
"Who looks better?"
"Are you serious, Mom?
You're 11 years older than him,
"and you want to know
who looks better?"
"I'm just asking."
"You look better." "You're such a liar."
"Why are you asking me?"
"What does he want?
"He wanted to buy a car?
What? What, what, what?"
I go, "Mom, listen.
"My dad, all he wanted
"was he just wanted to talk to me.
He doesn't want any money.
"He doesn't want me
to buy him anything.
"He's got a ranch in Mexico.
He's very happy.
"He just wanted to talk
and ask some questions
"and hopefully answer some
questions, and he told me...
"Mom, Mom, my dad told me
"that I have two sisters
that I didn't know about."
"Ah. I could have
told you about that."
"You knew I had two sisters,
and you didn't tell me?"
"Mijo, you don't like
the ones you have now.
"I'm going to burden you
con otras dos cabronas
"que no les va a hablar,
ni a mandar e-mail?"
So we talked for a good hour,
and then I brought it up.
I said, "Listen, Mom,
I asked my dad for a favor."
"You should. You should ask
him for many favors..."
I go, "Look, Mom, I'm going to
ask you for the same favor."
"Why? Why am I getting...
"I raised you while this cabron
was at the bars in Tijuana...
"Why are..."
I go, "Mom, listen. It's an easy favor,
but it's a hard one, okay?
"I don't have any pictures of you,
my dad, and me together."
"Because he wasn't there!" "Mom!
"I know he wasn't there,
but you know what?
"He's here now, and he's not that bad.
It would mean a lot to me if I could
"take a picture with the
two of you and myself,
"so that I could frame it
and put it on my wall."
"Why?"
"Mom, so that when people
come over to the house,
"I can point and go, 'Look.
Those are my parents.'
"I've never been able to do that.
"It would mean a lot to be able to say,
'Look, these are my parents.'
"One picture.
"Just one picture."
So I says, "Would you
please entertain the idea
"of getting together with
us for a few minutes,
"so that we could just
take some pictures?"
And she goes, "No, mijo,
you can't ask me to do that."
And we went back and forth for a while,
and she eventually agreed to it.
She goes, "Okay, pero not right now.
"Ahorita no, mijo. No, I have to get
ready." I'm like, "Oh, God, really?"
I go, "Well, Mom, here's the deal.
My dad went back to Mexico.
"He'll be back here in eight months.
Is that long enough?"
"I can do eight months.
"Eight months, s, se puede.
Eight months, okay."
"All right." And I was
excited, you guys.
We had a date planned out,
we had a restaurant, and I told her,
"Look, here's how
it's gonna work, Mom.
"We're gonna walk
into this restaurant.
"You're gonna sit on my left,
he's gonna sit on my right,
"and we're gonna take three pictures,
and then we're gonna leave,
"and I'm going to take
you to Golden Corral."
And she tells me, "Why does
he get to sit on the right?"
"You can sit on the right.
Oh, my God!"
So the date was set eight months later,
and unfortunately for me,
- my mom died before I got that opportunity.
- Aw!
The only bright side to the picture,
is that I got a photo
from my brother...
It's a black-and-white picture, 8x10.
It's a picture of my mom and my dad
the night they met at a bar in
Tijuana when my dad was performing.
It's a picture of him in his
mariachi outfit, right?
And he's got the microphone,
and my mom is sitting front row
center with a white miniskirt on.
And she's got her hand like this,
and she's looking at my dad,
and she has this look on her face like,
"We're going to make a Fluffy."
I never framed it. I keep
it at home in a drawer.
It's weird for me to look at
the picture on a regular basis,
so I keep it in a
folder in my drawer.
Every now and then,
I'll open it, take a look at it.
I'm like, "All right.
It's cool." It'll make me smile.
Here's what I was
talking about earlier
about the whole parallels
with my son and with me.
As this whole situation's going on,
where my dad comes back into my life,
Frankie's dad comes back into
his life at the exact same time.
And for me, you guys,
this was way more upsetting
than the whole situation with my dad.
This guy e-mails me, right?
He had my e-mail address.
And of course,
now he decides to use it.
And I recognized the
name as soon as I saw it.
And then I opened up the e-mail,
and right away, "I want to
thank you for raising Frankie.
"I want to thank you for
being there for Frankie.
"I want to be involved
in Frankie's life.
"I want to take him to sports.
I want to get involved.
"I want to be there
for him financially..."
And I'm getting pissed.
I'm getting piss...
I'm screaming again. I'm like, "Really?
Now you want to get involved?
"Now you want to be a part of this,
"after all the love
and time and energy
"I put into a kid that wasn't even mine?
Are you shitting me?
"I just got him to
take out the trash."
I started yelling at the screen more,
and my girl hears me, so she comes in.
She goes, "What's going on? Relax."
I go, "Look at the screen.
Look at the screen."
"What? Relax." "Look at the screen."
"Calm down." So she starts reading.
And as soon as she starts
reading, she starts,
"Oh, this asshole,
now he's going to ruin every..."
And now I got to be her rock.
So I stand up, and I'm like,
"No, it's okay. Shh..."
"But he's going to..."
Frankie hears his mom
getting hysterical,
and then he walks into the office,
and he's like, "Who died? Who died?"
I go, "No, Frankie, nobody died.
Get in here." "Why is my mom crying?"
"I'm going to tell you why your
mom's crying. Have a seat."
"I'm in trouble, huh?"
"Frankie, you're not in trouble."
"I didn't do it. "Whatever it is,
you did it. Sit down."
So he sits down.
I got these office chairs
with the little wheels, right?
And so I sit down.
He sits in front of me, and I
sit his mom down next to me,
and I grab his chair, and I
pull it right up to mine.
And his knees are pretty
much touching mine,
and he's right here,
and I go, "Listen, Frankie,
"what I got to tell you
is probably the hardest
"thing I've ever had
to say to you. Um...
"Your dad...
"Your dad, he...
Your dad wants to see you."
And he looks at me, and he goes...
"I'm right here."
Oh.
I go, "Frankie, I love you so much,
but that's not what I mean.
"Oh, my God! Your dad-dad."
"Dad-dad?"
"Oh, my God. Um...
"The man that gave you life?"
"Jesus?"
"No! Oh, my God! That's my dad.
"Your biological father,
Frankie. Your dad.
"Your mom's ex-boyfriend,
your father, your dad, Randy."
And he went from having
this look of confusion
to, like, a straight-up
despaired look.
He just looks at the ground,
and he starts mumbling.
And as soon as he finished mumbling,
he starts telling me his memory,
his last memory of his dad.
And I'll be honest with you guys.
It's one thing to hear a
messed-up story involving a kid
seeing something he shouldn't
have seen from an adult.
It's another when you hear
it from the kid themselves.
And so for me, I'm just like,
"Oh, my God!
"Why am I putting him through this?"
He starts telling me,
and my girl is just bawling.
I'm getting choked up.
I go, "Look, Frankie,
"whatever you want to do,
okay, we support it.
"If you want to see your dad,
your mom and I will make it happen.
"If you don't want to see him,
you don't have to see him,
"but you're old enough now,
and it has to come from you.
"So you let us know
whenever you're ready,
"and we'll make it
happen either way."
"What do you think I should do?"
"Frankie, I wish I could tell you.
"I wish I could tell you, honestly,
"but you saw what I just went through."
You were yelling at the mirror."
"I know I was yelling
at the mirror. I know."
"What did you do?" "Well, Frankie,
in my case, it was different,
"because my dad waited 30 years,
and so I had to wait 30 years,
"and fortunately for me,
I was more mature,
"and I was able to handle
it a little bit better.
"Plus your mom was there
to keep me in check,
"so I didn't do anything
stupid, but 30 years,
"it actually worked out pretty good,
and now we have an actual...
"We're going to go back and
forth and start talking,
"so 30 years worked out for me."
And then he looks at the ground,
and it felt like it took forever.
I wanted to ask him if he was okay,
but I didn't want to accidentally
trigger another memory
and put him through that same
thing again, so I'm just waiting,
and his mom's wailing,
and we're just waiting,
and then he looks at me,
and he goes, "You know what?
"I'm gonna wait 30 years, too."
Oh, my God!
I got so choked up.
I started crying, and then he
puts his hand on my shoulder,
and I started bawling.
And then he hugs me,
and I'm like, "Oh, my God!"
And we're hugging, and I'm crying,
and his mom's crying,
and then she looks at me.
"Now what are you gonna do?
Now what are you gonna do?"
"What do you think I'm gonna do?
"I'm going to get him an iPhone."
Thank you, Bay Area.
I love you guys. Thank you.
Hijo, I'm home.
Did you give any more
thought to my question
about what you want to
be when you grow up?