You Be Trippin' - Turkey w/ David Cross | You Be Trippin' with Ari Shaffir
Episode Date: August 12, 2024Follow David on Instagram here: https://www.instagram.com/davidcrossofficial/ On this episode of You Be Trippin, David Cross trips acid and gets lost in the Grand Bazaar on his monthlong trip to Turk...ey. On the show, he talks about getting ripped off, a sketchy strip club, and getting woken up by the call to prayer. They also discuss traveling solo, underground cities, and buying rugs. Other topics include: Mr. Show, Umbrella Academy, rolling his ankle, and the Wayfair conspiracy. Tadını çıkarmak! You Be Trippin' Ep. 27 https://www.instagram.com/arishaffir https://www.instagram.com/youbetrippinpod https://store.ymhstudios.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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Where you been and where you going? This is Ari's Travel Show. Yeah, we're gonna talk about travel today. It's UB Trippin', yeah.
Welcome to UB Trippin', everybody.
The most diverse podcast on the planet.
Today we have a bald and a balding.
David Cross is my guest today.
Everyone clap at home.
Dave, where you wanna take me today?
I'd like to take you to Turkey.
Love it.
Yeah, hell yeah. Have you been there?
I was there for a long layover from Egypt to Oakland.
Wow.
Yeah, and I was like, they had to go this way and that way.
What was why Egypt and why Oakland?
I went to Israel first time back there in 25 years after since Yeshiva with my brother and then
And then I tried to do two new countries a year. Oh great. That's that's great. Yeah
What's been your what's like top five
I know that's okay. No, that's a better one than what's your favorite? What's your favorite? Yeah
Myanmar East Timor. Wow
What's your favorite? What's your favorite?
Yeah, I'm giving you five.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Myanmar, East Timor.
Wow.
Mate man, it's tough now.
Greece, Egypt was fucking ruled.
Romania.
Wow.
I don't wanna hit all, I haven't been to any of those.
Really?
Yeah.
Egypt is magic.
Yeah.
And I barely touched it.
Yeah, I'd like to.
Oh, China, China's gotta be up there. Where in China were you? Shanghai, Beijing, and I barely touched it. Yeah, I'd like China's got to be up there Where in China were you Shanghai Beijing and Hong Kong and then like cities outside those big towns?
It was a comedy spent nine days in Shanghai really yeah tour or just there no there for this other purpose, but
Just research chemicals it's not don't worry about it. It'll be legal. We were doing a bit and it was, you know, it was very
interesting in that it, you, I can't imagine Shanghai being built
in the way it was being built
in outside of a communist country where you can dictate.
I know they were trying to create work
for all the rural workers who were poor
and didn't have work.
And they had decided to make a concerted effort
to make Shanghai two, three times as big as it was,
and they just brought in tons of work.
It's really dense, and all the bamboo scaffolding
is something I never saw before.
It's crazy, I forgot about that.
And somebody said, at the point, whenever this was,
that 20% of the world's cranes were in Shanghai
and used in Shanghai, building Shanghai.
Which is already a big city, but then they tripled its size.
I forgot about the bamboo,
because we have all the scaffolding here.
It's like a massive thing in New York.
It's all steel.
It's all steel.
And wood, and there's bamboo.
But it's just bamboo, and it's 10 stories.
10, try fucking 50. And you you're like how does this hold up?
Bamboo and just crisscross and straight up. Yep. And then
Chan movie being filmed. Oh, yeah
Yeah saying I was a trip and what a what a crazy mix of
Capitalism and communism it was so I've, I haven't traveled as extensively as you have, but I've traveled
a fair bit and I've never seen, so you'd have like this very western kind of disco bar,
big, right?
You know, and something you'd see in the States, you know, a nice one and then they're every I don't know 20 25 feet there's a guy with an
military guy with the you know a machine gun or an armed you know an assault
rifle with a shiny silver helmet and white gloves and they're just standing
there all so you'd go it was just just weird. But also, you know, I remember two things.
They're both like in the same little area.
Bikes didn't have blocks on them.
Somebody would ride their bike
and they'd leave it outside of a store
and they'd go into the store.
I saw that and at the same area, very nice area,
meaning it was clean, it was very clean.
And there was a park.
Somebody, I walked into a store,
small one to get like a t-shirt that I saw in the window.
Hello, hello, hello.
Nobody's in there, store's open, right?
There's the till, there's everything.
Hello, hello.
And then after like 30 seconds of waiting,
somebody walks in, who is the store owner,
and she had been out to get like a coffee or something.
Just left it open.
And because if you steal a bike or do that,
they'll kill you.
Yeah, right, it's just like,
but you can't wrap your head around, like what?
But also, I mean, what a nice pleasant way to live
where you can just write leave your bike
You have to lock it up enough to locks you have to get two kryptonites attached to each other
That was my biggest problem coming back from China
We're like seeing some freedoms they had that we definitely don't have some nice things
They're like you could buy a beer at 3 a.m. And walk and drink it and not even try to hide it. It's fine
Yeah, and I never felt unsafe ever. And I was like all over the place too.
They told me when I got there and it was like,
it's so foreign, so it's so like scary.
And they were like, hey, there's zero violent crime here.
Yeah.
And I'm like, oh, all right, I'm out there.
And what are there, like 20 million people there?
It's crazy.
But yeah, I mean, it's just such a mix.
Yeah, I would say like Azara, you know,
and then McDonald's, and then three blocks over it's like just rural
and some guy sweeping with like a palm leaf broom
like being put to work, you know.
Did you have any of that liquor,
that like gasoline liquor that they?
Bajau or something like that?
Oh, was that it?
Yeah, the white clear.
It was like Moonshine, like Everclear.
Is that the most drank liquor in the world?
Is it like their liquors?
I don't know, but man, it is potent
and will make you blind.
And you can see, you see people just passed out, you know?
Bai Zhao.
Bai Zhao, you're right, that's it.
But they make it also, they'll just distill it.
They'll make it themselves, like prison liquor.
Did you know about the gutter oil?
No.
Gutter oil?
They told me what it, they drop buckets down
into the gutters and sewers and bring up whatever
and then render that down and then that's the oil
that we'd use to make your street noodles.
No. Yeah, and they said something like 20% we use to make your street noodles. No.
Yeah, and they said something like 20%
of street noodles are made with it.
No.
They were trying to crack that when I was there but.
Oh, oh my God, I'm glad I didn't know that.
I had a lot of good food, that was another thing.
Yeah, yeah.
And squab, which is pigeon, is one of their big street foods
and they charcoal grill, you know,
like we have the halal carts,
like they have the, and it's really good.
Squab is a, wow.
Yeah, so there's a lot of squab.
Oh.
It was really good.
I mean, I had it a couple times in different places
and they just, you get it on a stick
and it's fucking tasty.
Damn, you're been places.
All right, all right, hold on, we're fucked.
We gotta get to Turkey.
We got so much time, Ari.
Right, fair enough.
What were you doing?
I'd like to talk about Spokane first.
When'd you go to Turkey?
We could also just talk about China too,
or we could do another episode.
Well, next time you come back,
next time you got another thing.
All right, I went to Turkey in...
Season four of Umbrella Academy's out now.
I should do inserts, but this one's gonna air quickly.
So, what a fucking fun show.
David Cross is on it, and just binge it right now.
Where did, and you left off, so you saw the-
End of season three.
Yeah.
It felt like it wrapped up,
but there were definitely still like,
oh, are they just gonna stay here or not?
But they don't have their superpowers right it was just what they
kind of wanted yeah it's what they wanted and then and the the title of the
first episode of season four is I'm paraphrasing it but it's pretty close
it's like the unbearable tragedy of getting what you wanted or something
like that because they don't
they didn't want their they didn't want their powers and and then it's like well
well and then I'm it was nice to be strong afraid they're gonna have to get
them that was it was that the Simpsons episode they keep trying to rearrange
the past and then he comes back and it was like everything's perfect one of the
Halloween's and then there's like there's like a single ply toilet paper only.
And he's like, nope, change it, come back.
That's funny.
Anyway, watch this y'all,
I'll do another thing in the insert.
And David Cross has also got a fucking great podcast that I.
It's called Sense is Working Over Time.
Thank you, Ari.
You're welcome.
Have you heard it?
No.
Okay.
But I'm friends with Sean Patton and he's always
taking me to praises.
Well, I'm going out on tour with Sean again.
Really?
I went out with him last tour.
He's just the absolute best opener you could ever ask for.
Energy, he's a great hang, great guy to tour with.
Top five drinkers in America
Oh, yeah, like and also in a way that he doesn't bury you. He'll make you keep going
No, no, he's great
But but doesn't make you like throw up the next day from hanging out with them
Some drinkers are just like oh, I shouldn't have kept up with you Sean is just like it's a fun time
Yeah, yeah, totally and he's but also great
comic yeah and great energy to
Open the show so we'll be well and that that tour when is this airing or we're coming out soon
I'll put it in there. Is that correct? No, I guess not right? It's like we need a tape especially and all those young kids
Like what does that mean?
That's when when you say stuff like
It's on Netflix or UHF?
UHF
Did I have to explain to someone what UHF was?
It was just a second dial
I don't know why the first dial didn't go to 80
Yeah, they were weird shows
It was
What was I going to say?
Oh yeah, so when is this coming out?
Soon.
Okay.
We'll try to time it around the first or second season week.
I'll say, uh, so the name of the tour is
the end of the beginning of the end.
It'll be out with Sean Patton.
Go to officialdavidcross.com.
That'll have all the cities.
It'll be here, Canada, and Europe.
Nice. Yep. Um. But not Turkey. Where you got any here Canada in Europe nice
But not Turkey where you got any weird spots in Europe, but let's go to Turkey let's do Turkey, okay
Yeah, I go why'd you go when'd you go what were you hoping for?
Tell me about it. I think I'm gonna say it was it was definitely after mr. Show
So that would have been after 98
I Would have I'm gonna say it was probably 99
Give or take a year, okay, and
How were you doing mr. Show I was 30
When did mr. Show start 95 I think I caught it later I cost came in
this sure so I would have been 31 through 35 okay and right okay yeah it
makes sense I think I'm pretty sure mr. show was 95 through 98 can I I break in for a second? Because when you
were coming in I wasn't even thinking about Mr. Show. But like there's a few
moments in like this pretty horrible industry of Hollywood where it's just
been nailed and that was definitely one of them. Oh well thank you yeah that was
fun. And some of that shit I haven't you know people are more familiar with it
than I am yeah just because I haven't seen it in a long I haven't really
watched it I watched some actually I watched some like three or four episodes
before we were getting ready to write with Bob and David which is something
which is we did four sketch shows for Netflix back in
whatever was mid mid-aughts something like that later I don't know but um but
I really haven't seen it you know I can remember 99% of it but but it it still
holds up yeah Duncan I didn't I didn't have cable growing up, so then Duncan Trussell showed it to me in like 2003
or something.
And it was like, what the fuck?
And everyone's like trying to talk to everybody.
It was like, it's over, man.
We all, ah fuck.
We've all moved on.
Yeah.
But anyway, so anyway, so you went to Turkey then
during that?
Yeah, and initially, I had a friend who had gone and spent
some time in Turkey and I think
pretty much did, there's something called the Fertile Crescent or something like that
and it's a trip you can take that is the same route that the the traders the spice traders would would go which would take
you through I'm guessing I'm guessing like Georgia and Armenia and I don't
remember what it is or down maybe down to Israel maybe that was it Turkey
damn it's way bigger than Syria it's about the size of like two and a half pigs in a blanket on your map.
That's about right.
Like the Trader Joe's pigs in a blanket.
Not those crazy big things they have at state fairs.
I don't know.
It's upsetting.
That's just a hot dog.
Just a fully wrapped hot dog.
Come on guys.
You know what I really don't?
The bagel hot dog is, it ruins two things that I like.
I like a good bagel, and I like a hot dog,
but a bagel hot dog's too dense, you're not,
what's the point?
I'd rather have a pig in a blanket.
Eat a bagel, then eat a hot dog.
Wash down a hot dog with a bagel.
Sure.
Or take a bite of a bagel. Go to the hot dog. And take a bite of the hot dog.
It's your choice. You move at your own pace the way you do it. Yeah I don't need to
mash the two up. It's not... I don't appreciate it. Hey everybody quick break
from the episode to tell you about David Cross's tour coming up. It's the
beginning of the end of the beginning... up. It's the beginning of the end of the beginning, no, the end of the beginning of the end tour.
David Cross.
When I started, I will tell you this,
when I started stand-up comedy,
I went to go see, not him, but he was on a show at Largo.
It was like the alternative show of the week.
Largo, I went a couple of times,
and it's just like, he was like an influential comic on me watching the easy had that whole alt
scene, it got fucking sour, but that whole alt scene was really
fucking cool back then in LA.
They were like doing this, this different thing.
It was real natural.
Eventually the mainstream kind of swallowed it up.
They took what they, what they used, used, kind of like China with American business
when they were there.
And then we were like, no more use for you, Alt.
And Alt wanted to be so different that eventually
it just morphed into this other thing.
It got weird, but David Cross was always fucking great.
Coming in with like, whatever, he was awesome.
And he's on tour right now.
The beginning of the end, wait,
the beginning of the middle of the end tour. the beginning of the middle of the end tour the beginning of the middle at
the beginning of the of the middle of the end tour what is it beginning of the
where the end of the beginning of the end tour that's it end of the beginning
of the end tour nice sorry way to right. Way to be a professional.
Get tickets right now at officialdavidcross.com starting at the end of August in New Orleans.
I assume Sean Patton will be there for that one.
Seattle, Washington, September, Olympia, Washington, Portland, Oregon, Eugene, Oregon,
Arcata, California, Sacramento, Oakland, San Diego, LA, Phoenix, Houston.
God damn, he's touring a lot.
This is all still September.
Dallas, Austin, San Antonio, OKC, Denver, Salt Lake City, Madison, Minneapolis, St, Houston, god damn, he's torn a lot. This is all still September, Dallas, Austin,
San Antonio, OKC, Denver, Salt Lake City, Madison, Minneapolis, St. Louis,
Lawrence, Harbor, North Carolina,
never heard of that place, Atlanta, Charleston,
Asheville, Nashville, Indianapolis, Lexington,
Ann Arbor, Columbus, Toronto, Chicago,
damn, we're just now in November, Washington,
Kent, Ohio, Portland, Portland, Maine, okay.
Albany, Boston, Glenside, Pennsylvania,
Munhal, Buffalo, Ithaca, Charlottesville,
Roanoke, more, I can't keep reading this.
Charlotte, Chattanooga, Boise, goddamn.
Oh, I'm almost done.
Boise, Airway Heights, Washington, Missoula, Montana. Might be most jealous of that one. What's the December, so I'm almost done. Boise, Airway Heights, Washington, Missoula, Montana.
I might be most jealous of that one. What's the December? So I'm not jealous.
Also got to see David Cross in the new season of the Umbrella Academy.
It's on right now on Netflix. The Umbrella Academy.
Dude, I watch the show and when he was like, I'm in it, I was like, wait, what?
And he goes, do you watch them again? I've seen every fucking episode.
I like sci fi sometimes. I got into that show. It was fucking episode. I like sci-fi sometimes. Like, I don't know that show.
It was fucking great.
I didn't know that we were gonna do another season.
And he's on it.
Three minutes, let's wrap this up.
Let's get back to the episode about Turkey.
Yeah, he's on it.
I was like, what's your part?
And he goes, do you watch the show?
And I'm like, yeah.
And he's enough of fucking sci-fi nerd.
He's enough of a fucking sci-fi nerd to have the class.
David Cross has class. And I'm like what's your part on there? And he goes, you
watch the show? I'm like yeah. He goes, well then I'm not gonna tell you. And I
was like, oh yeah. Oh right, yeah I'm gonna watch it. Yeah.
Imagine if you're like, oh, you were on The Wire?
Where were you?
I'm like, I'm the one who shot Omar.
I'm about to watch, I'm about to start watching The Wire.
What's your part?
I'm the one who shot Omar.
What?
Omar got shot?
Umbrella Academy season four on Netflix right now.
It just came out.
That's it, let's get back to the episode this is a fucking good one on turkey
We'll do the outro by the way subscribe right now wherever you're watching or listening. It's subscribe right now
I'm getting up closer and closer to my goal of a hundred thousand subscribers on YouTube and on Spotify and fucking
number three in the rankings behind Tucker Carlson and Joe Rogan
Click subscribe right now and Joe Rogan.
Click subscribe right now and fuck all that. Let's get back to the episode about Turkey.
This is a fucking good one.
All right, David, more about Turkey, go.
And so I got one of those Lonely Planet guides to
the Turkey and Syria and Egypt.
I mean, you end up in Egypt.
And I knew I had a month Wow a month
Yeah, I'm fucking great. And this is pure vacation. Yes. Wow and
The more I read about
Turkey in this book
The more I was like fuck these other places. I know I'm when I travel. I'm really a big strong proponent of I
I'm really a strong proponent of, I'm not trying to hit 10 places in 10 days.
I would rather hit three places
and get three plus days in each
so I can figure it out.
You know?
Minimum, minimum.
If you find a coffee shop,
you wanna go back.
If you find like a cool place.
Yeah, but you're also,
you're not, you know,
you're gonna go to the cool section
or the artsy section or whatever,
but you're only gonna see 1 1% of the city
and you're not gonna get a feel for it, or the place.
And unless it's like Palm Springs
and then I just need like 10 minutes
and I can get out of there.
But so the more I was reading about it, the more I was like, oh and then I just need like 10 minutes I can get out of there.
So the more I was reading about the more I was like oh I'll just go I'm gonna stay in Turkey and I'll go to Istanbul for a couple days whatever it ended up being like three or four days
and I'll rent a car and I'm gonna go to all these places on my list and end up back in
to all these places on my list and end up back in
Istanbul and I
At the time they everybody was saying stay away from Eastern Turkey It's one of the most dangerous places in the world. So that cut off a good towards our media
Yeah, and that cut off, you know a good third if not half of where I would be going right okay so
damn so now you're talking about roughly the country the size of Poland or
perhaps one and quarter pigs pig in a blanket and which is much more doable so
and Istanbul is the whole place was amazing. It was one of the best trips I've ever taken anywhere and and then my other rule was to
Not really have a rule which is I have an itinerary. I had my itinerary. I want to go to Cappadocia. I want to go to
Or was it Uz it, Uzbek?
Not Uzbek, let me look at it.
Can I look on the map?
Yeah.
All right, where is it?
So, I went.
Should I just put it in Cappadocia?
Yeah, with a C.
There it is.
Damn it.
Go back, there you go.
Whoa.
Where do you see it?
I see pictures here.
Cappadocia is fucking awesome and beautiful and crazy natural.
So I went, um...
How'd you hear about it?
It was just from the book.
From the Lonely Planet.
So you didn't know anything about it before?
Nothing.
And I was reading the book which was specific to
the Fertile Crescent which was Turkey, Syria, Lebanon.
Yeah.
Down into, through Israel and Egypt.
Oh, there you go.
Wow.
So those are all,
and it's a tiny town, that's pretty much it.
But there's.
And they got like houses built into these mounds like that?
Yeah, I stayed in a...
I stayed in, and it was insanely cheap.
What?
Like how much?
Oh man, the whole trip was ridiculously cheap.
The food, and somebody said when I was there
that Turkey at the time was only one of seven countries
that produces more food than they consume.
So the food is plentiful and it's all over the map.
So when you're in the north and you're on the,
yeah, that's just.
God damn.
And I stayed in a place that was built into those.
Yeah, it was really cool.
Really, really cool.
There's something to like, you know how like,
whatever you were
raised with you're like I can't explain why this is good but I just like I like
it as an American you'd be in another country like oh it's an American style
thing when you're a Jew and then you're like look you're doing well but they're
still like how much was it? You know I still am frugal and I don't like
wasting anything.
So I ended up staying, that was the first place
where I was initially gonna be there
for like a day or two days.
I'm like, I'm staying for a couple days.
Because it was really, really cool.
Can you just make a decision on the fly?
Yes, I had no idea.
Was it just you?
It was just me.
Wow.
So I knew I was flying into Istanbul
and I had a little shitty hotel
that I booked online.
It was kind of early online booking too,
you know, and so you don't know what.
And I get the best part.
So I knew I was arriving in Istanbul
and I had a departure date out of the airport.
And everything else was fine.
I had a room for three days
because I knew I wanted to start off in Istanbul
and walk around, it's huge, man.
Istanbul. Yeah.
Oh yeah.
And just that ride, airport to Oman,
it was like an hour to get there.
So outside of that, I was on my own itinerary.
Yeah, there you go.
There's the Chimney Ferry.
Oh, there's the Chimney Ferry.
I get what you're saying.
Whatever they're called.
Wow.
Yeah, it's beautiful.
It's just crazy beautiful.
And so I had booked it online.
And I can be cheap.
I don't need fancy stuff, right?
And the hotel that I got was, I wouldn't say it was like a bait and switch scam, but I
clearly, it was early internet and they just, I was
still a sucker almost like with real estate like, well this looks like a nice
place with a fisheye lens and it's looking out of half of the window which
is looking out in this beautiful whatever and you can see the Hagia Sophia in the
background. It's just like this corner of a room, it's like alright, pretty clean. And I get a, it's
transportation to, they pick you up at the, which I don't speak the room, it's like, all right, pretty clean. And I get a, it's transportation, too. They pick you up at the, which I don't speak the language,
it's great, it's gonna be a long trip,
I'm gonna be fuckin', what do you call it,
a jet lagged and drunk and whatever, whatever.
Yeah, I'll pre-transport, that does rule
about other countries, but like,
we'll get you from the airport.
Yeah. Really?
I wouldn't do that by a friend.
Yeah, well, you know, it was part of the package.
So then I get there, and I get through customs,
and I don't have a ton of luggage, you know,
and I got my stuff.
And there's a kid, I want to say he's about,
I'm going to say 17, 18, signed with my name on it,
just handwritten on a piece of paper.
I'm like, oh hey and
He speaks a little English and I had like tried to learn. I don't know
ten words and four phrases whatever was and
And we go to his car and it's his
Car and it's a shitty and we had to like move stuff There's no room in the trunk, or my stuff goes in the back seat.
I sit next to him, and we're moving stuff off of that seat, and the ashtrays are overflowing
full.
It was like an AM radio that's stuck, and it's a manual transmission.
He's just, he's this kid, and he's chain and And and so that's the beginning and then I get to the hotel and it's um
It's the size I I don't want to say it's
bigger than but it was it was probably as big as a uh, uh, have you ever seen a uh,
female mouse the clitoris
The clitoris?
The clitoris?
I've closed my eyes and licked one, but I've never licked.
Yeah, so it was slightly bigger than that.
And then, at, I want to say four in the morning,
I'm jet lagged, this is at night,
and I mean, I'm all fucked up,
and about four something in the morning,
right outside my window, which is open,
the call to prayer is going off of a tinny
Radio Shack type of speaker.
Loudspeaker. Yeah.
Like literally like on the two buildings next.
And I'm, what?
What the fuck
And it was jarring scary
Don't worry, they'll do that four more times
That's what you need an Airbnb like just so you know, you must be up by four
Yeah, it was pretty crazy and then
And then I did something they put a Dutch guy when I was in Myanmar in jail
He was in jail serving a six but they let him out after a month
But it's serving a six month sentence for unplugging one by his hotel room. It was for like a yeah
And he was like, I didn't know like you have a hundred percent knew, you were tired, we've all been there, you should have just taken it.
That's true, of course he knew.
What did you think it was you were unplugging outside?
So he got up out of bed, went outside.
Fuck this, just.
That's pretty funny.
But yeah, I.
Wow.
So I spent. Was Istanbul, were you scared there?
No, the only...
There were two moments I had that were uncomfortable.
And one, and this is not like me, I'm not claustrophobic at all.
I'm not...
I mean, I usually will dive right into this kind of thing setting, but I wanted
to go to the, what's the crazy big, you know, market, the...
In Istanbul?
In Istanbul, it's famous.
The, you know, what's it called?
You know what it is, it's the Grand Bazaar.
Grand Bazaar, Grand Bazaar.
So, thank you, internet.
So it's all under, it's all under...
Oh, the cucumbers.
I'm telling you, the produce is crazy, man.
The food was cheap and great, and like super fresh.
So the Grand Bazaar is all, it's like the stuff you see
in those movies in the 40s and 50s.
So see that, right?
This one?
Yeah, but there's no, everything, so it's that times,
100, and you kinda enter, and there's no air,
there's no, You're not seeing light
All those things are covered there's there's
some of them are are like tarped over with like rugs and blankets and stuff and
That is not what it looks like. That is not that looks like Pike's Place Market. Yeah, right. Okay. This was
place market in Seattle, right? This was lower seat.
Because that's probably an entrance.
And then you go into these other,
like go to, yeah, that's a little bit more indicative.
And not that one.
I want to see, because it's,
like go to this one right here.
That stuff?
Yep.
Okay, so see how these are covered?
Yeah.
So once you get out,
Oh wow.
Imagine there's no sun,
and there's no, and I got lost.
It's, and it's huge.
I mean it's blocks and blocks and blocks and blocks.
It looks like it's just curves in places too.
Yes it does.
And once you get outside of the kind of,
what looks like Grand Central kind of,
which is beautiful, all that stuff is beautiful,
but you get into where it's really dense, it's packed,
you don't know where you're going,
and it does curve, and there's no signs,
there's no like, exit this way, you know?
And everyone is, I mean, every
single person is, you know, hassling you like going and
they're they're trying to guess what language you speak. Right.
So they'll go through everything, you know, those to
start with French, then they'll do like Hebrew, and then they're
like, English and Spanish. And, you know, it is a great way to
get people just say, Hey, you turn like the gotcha.
Well I mean I learned quickly just to shake it off
but they're all, and that's throughout Turkey as well.
People are always trying to sell you stuff.
That's fine, that's part of travel.
But in this place when I couldn't get out
and I wanted to get out and after like
Five minutes became ten minutes became twenty minutes. I'm like get me the fuck out of here
And it was I've never really experienced that before but it was really kind of claustrophobic and I get I get that kind of anxiety
Feeling now from because it was I just wanted out
Give me the fuck out. I'll you know
And you don't know and you don't want to engage in anybody cuz they'll like nice and
you buy anything at the bazaars I didn't buy anything there, but I bought four rugs.
Was it a haggling system or was it a...
It's totally haggling, but man, they see you coming.
They see me coming.
I'm sure they started at double what they would normally do and then got down to where
I thought it was walking away like, hey, I got it half off and it's like no you got it actually for twice as much
no like oh you're fucked and then and they're so good at it though there's so
there was one guy I went to college nothing to do with this bro you're
fucked there was one guy who I had already bought two rugs, one for me and one for my mom.
And.
Should've got one for your head.
And, I don't get it.
Oh, right, yeah, because of the, yeah.
Wait, no, maybe not.
So, a lot of times, when you come into a home,
you need a place to wipe your feet off.
Right.
So, like, you can get one for your head too.
So you can wipe your head off.
Ruck for your head.
In case it's raining outside or something.
So you would suspend it.
Yeah, you suspend it.
And then it'd be on a pulley system
depending on how tall or short the person was.
You walk right through it.
Huh.
Yeah.
Okay, no, I'm just just I'm picturing it. Where'd you grow up in the East Coast? Well more New York I guess then. No I
grew up in Atlanta. Oh that's why. That's why because we didn't have that. We didn't have head rugs. Yeah. Where I came from all right Sorry haggling or whatever
Know the guy was I was like I'm not gonna buy listen. He's like just come in have a cup of tea
Oh, that's all I get that tea man, and I was like well. I did I did want a cup of tea
So I was like okay, but I'm telling you I'm not buying a rug. Okay. It's fine
I don't want you to buy it and we're're talking, talking, and cut to 30 minutes later,
I'm walking out with a $500 rug.
It's beautiful, I still have it.
I still have it, oh yeah.
It is in my office as we speak.
And I gave my mom a rug, and I have one of them's upstate,
one of them's, oh one thing, here's an,
I'm gonna be all over.
Go for it, yeah.
Completely digressing.
Kind of just imagine this as if you just got home from here
and you're just telling your friend about it.
Yeah. You know?
Look at the blue one, see the blue one?
I have that but in red.
Like I have a, that's the one the guy sold me
where he's like, but imagine like a really deep red.
And. 1200 bucks. Yeah, they're not cheap. But
here.
What's gonna say the rug? Oh, yeah, so I went to in one of my
little side trips. I ended up at this rug, this place where all these women make the rugs, custom, they're
all handmade.
And the guys kind of walking me through and, you know, they basically want to sell you
a rug later when you're done.
But it was interesting for, you know, 20 minutes or so to like see the process and all that
stuff and there are all these everybody's nice and um uh and the they he's he points out the rug and goes and every one
or every one of these rugs and these women they um you'll see this and he points this thing out
where it's a piece of material or the thread or the
Or cross stitch or something that is
Purposely
Mistake not right. It doesn't fit it doesn't and I and I said oh
What do you do that? And he's definitely like showing me this for a reason and I asked the obvious question. Oh, well, why what's that about?
Why do you do that? He goes
because only God
can make something perfect and
of course, I was like
Well, no, you could
Chose not to
Are you saying that God refused he doesn't want us to he wants to be the only thing that makes
Something perfect so that this isn't making any sense to me sir. It was the weirdest logic because and he said it with that kind of rabbinical kind of
like a little like a smiley eyes like because only God can make something
perfect.
You're like, that's not true though.
You could have done it.
You intentionally made, if you didn't do that,
it would, and can I have a perfect one please?
Can I have one without the mistake?
Yeah, it's not only God's allowed to make something perfect.
It's just a weird, strange logic, but I don't know.
Yeah, that's funny.
Now this rug here is very nice.
This seems very...
This is probably a wayfarer.
I got it in exchange for a child.
Oh, are they still doing that?
No, they stopped after a fucking fight.
Can you believe that?
I actually did a bit talking about that,
but not enough people knew what I was talking about.
But that was a thing for like a hot week.
Yeah, Wayfair is transporting children in their cabinetry.
And if you go online, it's like the Pizza.
There's clues, hidden clues.
It was like Comet Pizza where it's all like,
I want a pepperoni pizza.
Oh, that means I want a 12 year old to suck my dick and the way fair
Somebody somewhere and people bought it people believed it. It's the craziest thing
I love like a QAnon because it really is just like let's make up stuff and see if we can go
You know what reminds me of it reminds me of the Batman TV show,
where they would feed a question into the,
whatever they call the bat-ometer or whatever,
Batman and Robin would be down in their lab, right?
On the TV show, and be like,
what does the Riddler mean by this?
And they'd put it into the do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do
you know, machine, and it would spit something out and then Batman would make a would come to the conclusion of figure
out the riddle or figure out what the Joker was gonna do in these like seven
or eight steps that had tenuous connections at best and it wrote QAnon
and all that kind of crazy shit reminds me of
the Batman, you know, like let's put it into the Bat-ometer.
And it was like.
We need a left-wing QAnon.
We need just the wild idea stuff on both sides.
So we'll bring our bread together.
I mean, it just, I wish.
I passed a Wayfair factory.
You immediately go to that.
Did you hear screaming?
Yeah, it's like, that's where they had them.
Let us out.
Dong, dong, dong, dong, dong.
I want more Cheetos.
My favorite was the guy who went with his shotgun
to the pizza place.
That poor motherfucker.
Because he was doing the right thing.
Yeah, and then he immediately knew.
He came in and they're like, we don't have a basement.
They didn't even have a basement.
He's like, oh.
Yeah, and he knew.
He had driven up from North Carolina, I believe.
And you're right, you're absolutely right.
He was saving, he was gonna go save children.
Yeah, I mean, if they're not gonna do, if the police aren't gonna do anything about this, you can't, you gotta absolutely right. He was saving, he was gonna go save children. Yeah, I mean if they're not gonna do,
if the police aren't gonna do anything about this,
you can't, you gotta step up for what you believe in.
And children's safety is what I believe in.
And then of course, and then just that poor motherfucker
just like, oh, well why can't he sue somebody?
You know, and the thing how.
Just for the gas money alone.
Yes.
And he kept all his receipts.
This is from a Buc-ee's and I got a chopped brisket sandwich
and some boiled peanuts and I'd like the state
to cover this please.
And that crazy idea of like, oh, it's all code.
Yeah.
You know, if you order a mushroom pizza with extra cheese.
And the way fair thing, that somebody,
some mentally ill person figured out the code on the online.
And maybe they were looking for like an end table.
And then they stumbled upon an international child sex
trafficking ring because of the SKU number.
At relatively affordable furniture that ships.
How?
How did it happen?
And why Wayfair and not Target or anything else?
How the fuck did it happen?
I don't know if it's, we're getting back to Target,
but I don't know if it's a mentally ill person
or someone who's like,
hey, there's mentally ill people out there
and we can just exploit them.
They'll spread our dumb fucking thing. Ah, no, I think it's the, I, there's mentally ill people out there, and we can just exploit them. They'll spread our dumb fucking thing.
No, I think it's the, I think it's.
That they did it.
I think it's the former, yeah.
I think it was somebody who saw it,
who read the tea leaves, as it were.
That's what I never said about God,
where they're like, it's a sign.
I'm like, you know what's a better sign?
A sign.
Just like God exists.
Just have him take a fucking rental space out.
Why make leaves turn into a Jewish star?
Like see?
Yeah, like that's how he, he's very tricky that way.
Yeah, like early movie ghost.
In, on the side of a bank in Clearwater, Florida,
I'm gonna make some streaks look like the Virgin Mary.
Yeah, yeah, that'll show you that you should.
I'm gonna put my only son's image on a tortilla
in Costa Rica.
Yeah, just give us a real sign.
Yeah, just come, come down.
Just come on down.
You're God.
Hey, you're all hearing this.
Okay, let's go back to Turkey.
So this is pretty fucking cool.
So you stayed in Istanbul for a few days.
I stayed in Istanbul for a few days and my first night or second night there I did something
I've never, I think I just wasn't in the right mind.
I'm too much of a pussy for this kind of thing, but I was at this bar.
They have bars?
Yeah, they have bars, yeah.
Okay.
And, I mean, it wasn't like an American,
but it was just like kind of a shitty,
you go downstairs, this is the place I was at,
and the local beer is F-S, E-F-F-E-S.
Yeah.
And it's like a little, you know,
a Pilsner or a Lager or whatever.
And, uh.
The local shit beer.
Yeah, and I, so I was just drinking a bunch of those
and there was like this older guy
and a younger guy behind this.
Yeah, that's it.
Barely a bar with shitty music. And I'm just drinking because I'm in
that headspace. And I drink and I don't know the exchange rate yet. I haven't really mastered
any of this stuff. It's probably my first night, I'm guessing, shortly, the call to prayer woke me up, but I
I I had probably like three drinks there and
paid
And then went somewhere else
And got a beer maybe outside and whatever
realized
uh
When I paid the for the second drink somewhere else,
you know, around the corner, whatever,
block away, whatever, that they had overcharged me
by an extraordinary amount of money.
And I was in the exact right head space to go fuck that
and to go fuck that
and to go back. You weren't scared like foreign country
don't know the rules.
I should have been, that's what I'm saying.
I should have been but I think it was a combination
of jet lag, drinking, the energy you get
from being at a foreign place.
I don't know, this is not like me, it really isn't.
And I like marched back there there went up to the guy I
was like I want my money or something like that and he opened up the thing and
he had it all in one thing and he just gave it to me and I walked out it was the
weirdest that could have gone south so many different ways but and I don't know
that is not a thing that I would normally...
Was he like, I'm aware I overcharged you, or was he like, oh shit, you're right.
He had the money that I had given him in one place.
It wasn't like he went to a till and he took a 20 and a 20 and a 20 and a 5 and a 2.
He had the money that I gave him.
I'm guessing in case I came back, and maybe they do this all the time, I don't know.
And he opened the thing and just handed it to me.
And I just took it and I walked out.
That's right.
Yeah, that is so not like me.
Wow, whoa, ballsy.
I'm telling you, right now I wouldn't do it.
Yeah.
I wouldn't.
I'm always afraid to like.
Or if I did, I'd be like, hey, hi, I was in here earlier.
And I think I misunderstood.
Math is different where I live.
So, that's crazy.
I'm always worried that they're gonna call the cops
and the cops are always gonna take the side of the local.
Yeah, of course.
And then they'll just arrest me for asking.
Or the guy would just laugh in my face.
No, I didn't.
You know, yeah.
Prove it.
Yeah, exactly.
Yeah.
I don't know what I was thinking.
I don't know, and it could not have ended any better.
The guy just literally had it all there,
open the thing, handed it to me.
No, but he didn't say I'm sorry or anything,
and I just took it and left.
Okay, wow.
Very strange.
What kind of food do you eat out there?
Was it like crazy different or was it American style stuff?
Tennessee Fried Chicken,
McRonald's,
Burger Prince,
Pizza Town.
No, I had lots and lots of Mediterranean type,
you know, tomato, feta, cucumber, onion salad,
a lot of that, a lot of lentil,
the lentil soup with lemon that you can,
there was a place that was in the guidebook too
that was right near my hotel,
and they're like, it's got the best something,
it was just like a, you know,
for my day.
Those pre-internet days are so fucking cool
because it's not like everyone accessing
the same thing all the time.
It is that book, but like, you gotta buy it.
Yeah, but I had it and I carry it with me
and it was not my phone and it was, you know.
And I had a camera too, so I didn't have, you know,
because there was no phone camera or whatever.
And so I went to this place and it was very good.
It was a cheap, like, I don't know, diner type swarm of, you know, Turkish food. Really good.
And then depending on what region you were in, if you were by the Mediterranean, a lot of
the Mediterranean, a lot of fish and mussels,
on the sides of the road, there'd be these guys with these big kind of, like, woks almost,
like barrel, kettle things.
And yeah, basically like a large wok
and deep fried mussels on a skewer for like 30 cents.
And you get like six of them with this little kind of creamy, mayonnaise-y type dipping thing. deep fried mussels on a skewer for like 30 cents.
And you get like six of them with this little kind of creamy mayonnaise-y type dipping thing.
Right on the side row and they were fucking delicious,
fresh, you know.
And then if you were like closer to the mountains,
you'd have a lot of goat.
There was a lot of goat.
And...
You go for it, you're just like, I'll try everything?
I tried everything.
I was in Ismir and I had, not tripe,
it's something, it's something that I took
on my second bite, I just spit it out
and threw it in the trash.
It was a street food that is like stomach lining,
I can't remember the name of it.
Yeah.
It's very unctuous, like when you bite into it,
like if you like it, you're gonna really like it.
But it's also chewy and not my thing at all.
I went to China and I got, there was a skewers
and it was like, it was 10 cents each, 15 cents each,
whatever, one was lamb, one was beef, one was something,
and it's like, nope, and it's just junk.
But as soon as you bite, uh uh.
Oh dude, I got this thing that,
I think in the book they were like,
and if you're up for it, try the something.
And I got it and I like struggled with the first bite
and then I took that second bite.
I was like no, I just spit it out and threw it.
Threw it in the thing.
But other than that, everything was fucking great really good food
And you know as I said it was on no itinerary so
Oh
the other thing is when I rented a car online again, I
Made sure to get a car with a CD player I brought some CDs
CDs there yeah and trips must have been yeah go ahead and then what do you what
do you write a question down that I'm not gonna forget? Okay, and then
And to and I wanted a you know
automatic transmission and I go
to the place and it
The radio is broken and it's a manual
And I'm like I'm not driving through the streets of fucking Istanbul in a stick shift that I haven't driven one of those. And I just sat there and I was by this little
hippodrome area, I remember sitting there
and I was smoking.
And I just sat on the, looked at the car,
at the keys and I was just looking at it
in the middle of this dense, crazy,
no rhyme or reason to the traffic,
and knowing I had to get out of there. I just sat and I had a couple cigarettes
and stared at that car, and then I was like,
okay, here we go.
You're just doing it.
I just got in, lurching my way, honking, whatever,
ended up going the wrong way up.
I was still in town, I had gotten probably, you know,
out of the crazy dense part, but it was still dense.
And then I got up, started going up this, you know,
where like chickens are running in the street,
that kind of thing, and everybody's running out,
going like this, you know, and it's like babushka type women, right?
And I'm going the wrong way on a one way thing
up this area, and I had to figure out,
it was like a nine point turn to get back.
With stick, on a hill.
With stick, on a hill, yeah.
With people, right?
You know, like kids ran around, I'm just sweating balls. It's so hard. With stick on a hill stick on a hill. Yeah with people right, you know
Like kids right around it was I'm just
And then I ended up I got I did it I got out and I got onto a
Highway finally it took a while and then I drove
Can you show me the map because I don't know if Ankara was the first,
I was going to be in Ankara, or Ankara,
I can't remember how to pronounce it,
for two or three nights.
That's what your plan was?
Yeah, because then I think I went down
at Cappadocia from there. So,
okay. So that was the first drive and it's and it was by the time I got in it was night
and it was raining and which also makes a city not quite as you know attractive or interesting.
Yeah, you really should come into cities daytime. Yeah, It's also feels, to me anyway, feels hella dangerous, which is at night.
I don't know what this is.
But the second night, you're fine.
Yeah, it's just coming in and it just, the vibe isn't great.
And it wasn't, the driving is not easy.
And I got somewhere and I was like, there's like a Hilton.
It's the capital, but it's also very communist era
architecture, very kind of Russian block looking.
Oh, interesting.
You know, that kind of brutalist architecture and stuff,
a lot of big cement buildings, you know, that kind of brutalist architecture and stuff, a lot of big cement buildings, you know, with whatever.
And absolutely charmless,
nothing remotely like Istanbul
or any place I had been to or was going to go to.
And again, like, you know, night and raining
and I check into like a Hilton or whatever,
and I go to this bar,
and it's one of those things where I was walking,
I walked for a bit,
and the fact that it was raining
and I didn't find anything that,
and I might have been in a super shitty part of town,
you know, I could have been in the, you know,
the midtown part of whatever, but...
It was just not... There was nothing nice about it.
And then... And I was like, I wanted to get out of the rain.
And then there was a guy, big stocky guy,
outside of a doorway of a bar.
You know, my friend, my friend, you know.
And I just stupidly went, I'll drink here, I'll go here. Go downstairs, it's a strip club, but not a
like, it was more like, like not, it wasn't like cheetahs or, you know, one
of those type of things. wasn't there was nothing it
was like a bar that had occasionally a woman would take her top you know what
I mean it was like that it was more like Claremont Lounge. Queen Vashti. Say what?
Queen Vashti. What is that? That's before Queen Esther the Purim story.
Haman had another wife and he was like hey my friends are here playing cards
show us your pussy. I didn't know that. No, massive like feminist character and he was like, hey, my friends are here playing cards, show us your pussy.
And she was like, no.
She's a massive feminist character.
She was like, no.
And he was like, get out of here.
And then they had to go search for the next.
I only know the reformed version,
which is basically just celebrate.
Esther did this.
Yeah.
You know.
That whole story's nuts.
Hey, you know how you hate Jews?
I'm a Jew.
Can you just please not kill them all?
All right, way to go, Jews. Way to survive.
Way to go, Lester.
So yeah, so this is shitty strip club.
So, and then the guy, and immediately I'm like, oh, I don't want to be here.
And it's Russian. It's all like, and the guy did that thing that,
and his hand is roughly three times the size of mine.
It's massive, right?
And he's sitting next to me and I'm like in a booth,
a little banquet, and I'm like,
cause I don't know what kind of evening I'm in for now
because this all happens in seconds, right?
Coming down, da da da, sits me in a booth, da da,
and then puts his hand on my
thigh, you know, that grip that can hurt too, and it's also like pressure points,
you know, like Krav Magrav kind of stuff where you're like, ah, I'll get a drink,
and I ended up, you know, probably, I don't know, $40 for two beers, and because you
have to tip, and you have to tip and you have to,
and he's just sitting next to me with his hand on my leg,
and at some point, I got out of there.
Nothing happened.
There was some.
Strong arming, yeah.
Yeah, yeah, well, literally.
Literally, yeah.
And at some point, it was one of those things
that doesn't, the story, there's no story to it,
but the whole time I'm thinking this could end up really badly this could end up poorly
and it didn't yeah eventually I got out of there but you know also you're in this
position like I'm not in control oh I'm away from anyone who can hear me so far out of
control in every way shape and form I have nothing I don't speak the language
I don't know where the I don't even know anything about Ankara or Ankara.
I don't even know how to pronounce it.
I ended up leaving, then I say I woke up,
I was like fuck this, and then drove to Cappadocia,
which is awesome, and I spent more time than I expected to.
How are we doing on time here?
What time is it?
Oh shit, I am gonna have to go, but I will come back,
and I'll give you some
Bullet points so that I don't miss them. Okay. Okay. One is
Going to the school and sitting in class an elementary class in a rural part of Turkey. Whoa to to
To the delight of the kids and to trick the teacher it was one of the
Class like as a student as a student in the back. And I wanna say they were like first graders,
second graders.
It was one of the greatest moments of my life.
Sang a song.
And it's rural, we're in the middle of,
I mean, and I've got pictures,
I can send some to a company.
Oh yeah.
Were they just like, look at this crazy white?
Well, I'll tell you the whole thing,
because I got lost and I thought I was in this place
I was trying to go to and it turns out I wasn't,
but there were all these kids and I had some candy
or something in my snacks or whatever it was,
and they were all in school uniform, right?
Again, I've got a picture, I'll search them out
and try to get you one.
Again, I've got a picture. I'll search them out and try to get you one.
And then, you know, no communication.
And then they brought me to their school.
And so one room, kind of shakky, cement kind of thing
in the middle of this mountain, mountainous region
where I mistakenly got off the road.
I thought I was going to this place and it was not ended up sitting in the
back of the class when the teacher and they're all
giggling. They don't speak English. It was amazing.
Because one of the greatest moments of my life. I'll tell
you more about it. And then another trip and on acid with
these two crazy kids.
Who like Turkey, you got acid in turkey yeah named
them Dippy and trippy and they were they were they had they were like some rich
kids who had were fleeing conscription so they were down by the by the water
then I made a rash decision to get on a boat. I spent three days on a boat with these Australian people.
It was completely rash.
As I was still under the acid effects the next morning.
Oh yeah, those are the aftershocks.
And then I will tell you about-
Where was that?
What city, what'd you do with acid?
How'd you get the acid?
It was on the coast.
If you go-
How'd you get the acid? They had it, they. If you go. How'd you get the acid?
They had it, they had it.
And you were just making friends and then they were like.
Yeah.
Hey, we're weird, you wanna get weird?
Yeah.
And we ended up going to this place.
It was one of those things where I thought
we were in a car going to,
they did, they shot some movie somewhere
middle of the woods.
It was very small.
It was like, oh, I had rolled my
ankle and sprained my ankle the night before. Oh, that's a whole other story. Oh, that was
a different boat where they had Rocky, you know, the, the liquor, where they, you add,
you add water to it and it turns cloudy. Okay.
That's a great story because that was also miscommunication
where I was on this boat that I thought was a tour boat,
right, in this marina, this dock,
and they have a bunch of them, right?
And I get on this thing and it turns out, so there's this captain
who looks like Mr. Clean but with a big mustache,
like fucking, looks as tough, like G. Gordon Liddy,
like tough motherfucker, right?
Big, big shaved head.
And he's the captain of this boat,
and his friends are this husband, wife, and daughter,
and a friend of theirs who do a musical lounge act.
They sing, right, and they play keyboards or whatever.
And I'm sitting on the boat.
I'm sitting on somebody's personal boat.
It's their boat.
It's the guy's boat.
And I think I'm going for a day trip into this.
He's just like, who is this fucking guy?
But he ends up letting me,
and I'm super embarrassed, right?
Oh, and the woman, the mom is cooking food,
and I'm just sitting there like,
when does this thing take off?
It was a crazy miscommunication,
but then they embraced me, like, let's go out.
Were you looking to go out?
Because the guy spoke a little English.
And I ended up hanging out with them and eating.
Oh, and getting hammered.
And swimming, I think I have some pictures of that too.
But I got fucking, I passed, I was in the sun
and drinking this straight liquor.
I got so many stories. but that so I rolled my ankle
that night and then had to
This is all the answer your question where I was
With the acid which was on the coast south, okay
and
Don't worry about where and then I and then in Ismere I bought Hash and thought I was gonna be,
I thought I was gonna die.
I thought I was gonna get totally fucking, you know,
not die but like...
It's crazy that you're like, we had Hash?
Sure, same thing.
Cause I'm in this guy's car and we're driving up
and up and up and I'm doing things in the car
as we're driving cause it's so remote
and his friends
don't speak English and they're kind of laughing and making jokes and I'm like I'm gonna get rolled I'm gonna get totally rolled. You're laughing at me. Yeah they're laughing at me. They were
absolutely laughing at me and I'm outside every time we pass somebody I'm making noise and letting
people see me thinking am I like I'm they're gonna fucking
roll me get rid of the you know beat me unconscious I don't know and and I'm
doing stuff like I'm tapping the side of the car and on hey what's up you know
whatever so people can see me in the car it should they need to tell the police if they come and acquire. Notice me, notice me. Exactly.
Wait, so, good acid?
Bad acid or just acid?
Oh yeah, it was good, no it was good.
It was good.
It was a crazy weird night.
I mean, again, there was a little onset of paranoia
when we were driving out to this,
where this set was,
that they had shot some movie a long time ago,
that still existed, and it's in the middle of nowhere,
and they're friend, we were going to visit friend,
I don't know, like where the fuck am I going, but.
Great place to do acid, abandoned set.
But the sky, like you can see the Milky Way clearly,
like clearly, like.
Wow.
It was, I'll never forget that sky.
But that's so fucking bold to take acid
with fucking strangers.
Yeah, they were very, it seemed very safe
because their English was pretty good.
And you'd already been there for a week or two?
Oh yeah, at this point I'm probably,
yeah, a week and a half at least.
At least.
Did you get over any,
is it like a, for me it is anyway,
where it's like, I'm like,
oh, I don't know what to do with the customers.
And a few days in, I don't know what the number is,
and she's like, oh, I'm a regular here, no.
No, I didn't feel like that really,
but it was more about I got used, excuse me,
I got used to being,
traveling alone in a foreign country.
Not so much about Turkey per se,
but just got comfortable with,
I know how to do this, I know.
You know how to kick ass.
Yeah, and...
How were the drives in between cities?
I mean, pretty, you know, mostly beautiful.
I was in the, oh, I went to an underground city too,
which was, they built during the Crusades, I guess?
Yeah.
And that was really cool.
That was in, somewhere outside, within Cappadocia, but I want to say Ugric, something like that.
And it's amazing what they were able to figure out.
And when you're standing in this field, and you can see these little things that were basically kind of rose up and provided like
somebody could sort of stand there and you'd maybe be eight nine ten inches
above the ground and you could see you know pretty much 360 and then there'd
be at some point there's some sort of entrance that would you know the the
guide would point out and you'd go down and they'd carved out this, and this is, like,
this is the bedroom where the, you know, the mayor or the king or whoever was
slept here, and this is where they would cook and clean, and they showed, like,
they had created, what do you call them, the ability to get water, the aqueducts, from somewhere that
went through. And then they had these rooms that were... it was to trick the soldiers...
so the soldiers would come in, the Christian soldiers would get tricked into coming to this room and
then they had this big round stone that they'd roll and trap them in and then
they had this above part where they would have boiling oil. Yeah, it's pretty
crazy. But they had this whole underground, and when I say city it's not a
city, it's not bigger than, it's not much bigger than this apartment.
You know, I mean it's a couple of these, you know?
But it was, you know, they had,
and they were like connected,
they were like these little tunnel-y things
that you could go through, but you know,
there were like a dozen of these type of places,
but with like, that's where they cooked, that's where they did their laundry.
Up there is where they would.
Why would they build underground?
Because they were coming to slaughter them.
And convert them via sword to Christianity.
So if I have to, it's like you need to convert,
I'd just be like, sure, yeah, whatever.
Let's just do it, sure, guys, I don't care.
The Lenny Bruce bit about,
oh, I'd be the first to talk.
As soon as they got the, you know,
they put the thing up your ass
and they're gonna pour molten lead.
And it was like, no, no, I got everything.
I'll tell you whatever.
I'll tell you what, you know.
Did you booze a lot with locals like that?
I mean, the acid must have been fucking sick. How long did it last? I got a bunch of questions about drugs and booze a lot with locals like that? I mean, the acid must have been fucking sick.
How long did it last?
I got a bunch of questions about drugs and booze.
I mean, it was a typical, I don't know when we took it,
but it would have been, I'm guessing, late afternoon.
Because it definitely went into the evening.
And in the morning, we were definitely coming out of it,
but you're still kind of wired and speedy.
But you also are kind of exhausted,
because you've been tripping all night.
So as the sun was up, and at one point,
and I thought these guys were totally full of shit.
They were walking along the water.
He's like, hey.
And they talk like this. totally full of shit. They were walking along the water. He's like, hey, and they
talk like this and, hey, do you hear that, man? What? Do you not hear that, man? No.
There's a cat or there's a kitten. And I think he's... and they
weren't very funny either, so there was no,
there was no like, that was one thing that I missed when I was in Turkey was like,
there's not a lot of laughter, there's not a lot of,
they don't get irony that, you know,
Americans and Western culture traffic's in,
a lot of irony and they didn't get like,
sarcastic.
Saying the opposite of what you believe.
Yeah, and sarcastic stuff.
Like it just, so these guys, I don't know what,
and it turns out there was a fucking kitten
in these like really tall reeds that we were walking by
and this guy heard it.
I did not hear it, I thought he was trippin'.
And he goes in in he pulls out this
kitten which you know when you're on acid is also a weird thing and it was a little
kitten and and he was saying oh yeah the guy runs the you know whatever the little place
on the water you know he threw cats in the thing or whatever but yeah we rescued a little
kitten and I was like,
hey, I gotta get on this boat.
And they couldn't believe I was gonna do it.
They were like, stay here and trip with us or whatever.
I was like, no, I'm gonna go, you're not gonna like it.
Because they're also like, that's just some guy's boat.
No, no, this is a different,
this is a totally different thing.
That was north, that was on the, that was up.
Up by, yeah, somewhere up there,
because then I went down and I had a,
as I said, I had a stick shift and I had rolled my ankle.
So the clutch was becoming really too unbearable
and I ended up seeing a sign for,
I think I was going maybe on my way to Ismir maybe.
And I saw a sign that said, you know, whatever.
Peacock Village, you know, amongst the sea or something,
you know, turn down here and I go down this long, twisty,
twisty, long, lot of switchbacks. I just, I ended up, I just couldn't, you know, the pain was too
much for this, for using the clutch with my sprained ankle. And ended up going down and just pulling up down, you know, down this mountain. And there were peacocks. And that's where I
met those two guys. And there's all these little things along
the the water, like, you know, like villas, but not that fancy.
And these guys were in the next one over, they had a didgeridoo
to what they did a didgeridoo too. What?
They had a didgeridoo.
The first time I met them,
they were sitting in this little kind of,
you know, what you might look like a yoga meditation zone,
you know, whatever, mats outside,
and the guy's playing this didgeridoo.
Hey man, because they were taught in,
I think in England.
So their English was pretty good
and they had a Turkish via England accent
when they spoke English.
Amen, yeah, come on.
Yeah, they didn't want to be conscripted into the army
so they were hiding out down there.
Damn.
And one guy,
especially the guy Trippie,
Dippy was really just an airhead kind of guy,
but Trippie at one point was like,
you know, I would want to have a baby man
to just have a child
and just feed it acid.
What a beautiful life that would be.
That's almost a verbatim quote.
I was like, yeah, I'm not sure about that.
But.
I'm smoking like a guy who's never had kids.
What a beautiful life that would be, yeah?
No.
I think I could see how you see it.
It's not gonna go that way.
Yeah, it's easier said than done.
Not everybody as an adult is cool on acid.
No.
Anyway, so I have much more to,
we can take it up later.
All right, that sounds like a fuckin' sick trip.
It was great.
I mean, it was, I've never done anything quite like that.
And I've never traveled that extensively by myself since.
A month gone by yourself, with no pre-smartphones,
there's no real connection to America.
No, there's no internet, I mean, there's internet,
but not like I was going to a cyber cafe
or anything like that, so there's nothing, there's no internet, I mean there's internet, but not like I was going to a cyber cafe or anything like that, so there's nothing,
there's no, I don't even know what the news is back home.
Wow.
You know, and it was nice.
That must have felt really nice.
It was good, I didn't realize how good I had it, you know.
But, and also the key was having a vague itinerary,
but not having a stick, like I was gonna be I
got out of Ankara like fuck this place and spent extra time in that's smart
the ability to be like yeah or like actually more yeah that's a good travel
I just knew I had I was flying into Istanbul and I had a departure date out
of you know and I and when I went back I had given myself a couple
days and and then did all the touristy stuff went to Hagia Sophia went to the
cisterns all cool I've highly recommend really cool stuff went to the went to
the not Hamas what do you call what do you call the what do you call the thing where it's like a steam shower with terrorists?
Hamam.
Hamam. It's a Hamas.
Hamams.
Hamams. Hamasps. Anyway, I went to the real famous original one. It's huge. They have
all these side things and then this big open area in the center and there and the
The light comes down through this glass ceiling King built it for himself. Yeah
That's such a cool difference of travel between like let me see these amazing things these sisters and also like let me do some drugs
With some locals. Yeah. Yeah, and it's just like they're both I one gets you moving and the other is like that's what you're there for
Yeah, I mean I I you know clearly had so many
experiences some you know transforming some just
creepy crazy weird some scary
But that's what you wanted. Yeah, and be able to come out. You know intact. Oh, dude. It sounds fucking awesome
it was great and and and be able to come out intact. Oh dude, it sounds fucking awesome.
It was great.
And I do wonder if I'm over romanticizing it,
but I don't think I am because I had all these stories
when I came back and talked about them.
So I think it was all pretty much good
except for the handful of like, oh, this is scary.
And I didn't really go into the Ismir, meeting this guy.
Oh, here's another thing I learned.
This is also in Ismir.
When they come, at least at this restaurant I went to,
and they offer you bread, and they bring you bread,
you get charged every time.
No, really?
Yeah, you better check that bill at the end.
You're like, what?
More bread?
You're like, sure. That sounds like another beer. You're like absolutely these guys are great free beers. No
Good tip good tip
I was usually asked people about a travel tip, but I think the fucking itinerary one is a great one
It is I would I that's the number one thing like go with enough time that you and you know
Where you want to go and you know where you want to go,
and you know what you want to see, but don't be,
don't do that thing where it's like,
I gotta get out of here by noon
because I gotta get to the train station
because I want to go to the Eiffel Tower,
and then when I'm there with the Eiffel Tower,
I want to go to Montmartre, but I want to just...
It's an American thing of like,
let's get all these things done.
Let's still be productive.
And also, this tip is for travel anywhere.
And like yourself, I'm on the road quite a bit
and sometimes you're in a place
for two, three, four, five, six days.
Always, as soon as you can, as soon as you're feeling it,
just put your shit in the hotel room and walk,
walk and walk and walk and walk.
And walk completely around your hotel or Airbnb
because the fucking worst feeling is being somewhere
for three, four, five, six days,
and on the very last day you're like,
I didn't know this was here.
This is fucking three blocks from the hotel,
this is awesome.
And now you don't have time,
and just walk and walk and observe everything
in like an eight square block radius.
And then just walk, just go and check everything out
as much as you can, then you can go take a nap or whatever.
And, but just, you don't want to do that thing on day five or you're just
around the corner and to the left and just down this alley is literally the
coolest record store bookstore bar that shit you can only find I mean our
neighborhood or whatever is like you get high walk around like oh is a record
store here
Oh cool. Yeah, you just like the walking is the only way to do it. Yep
Yeah, anyway david crossed everybody his new season of umbrella academies on uh netflix.com right now
Uh and his uh tour hold on I got it the beginning of the
end wait The end of the beginning of the end. Yep of the end. The end of the beginning of the end?
Yep, that's it. The end of the beginning of the end.
And also check out his podcast,
Some Dumb Fuck Speaks Into a Microphone.
It's also available.
That's in the parenthetical.
Buddy, I'm fucking jealous as shit of that trip.
That sounds so cool.
It was great. You still have time, Ari. Yeah, yeah. You have time already yeah yeah time to do it yourself all right all right fair enough all right
thanks god fucking damn it how does it how does it feel when you do a whole
fucking outro and then and then uh had a great time and then didn't hit record on
the fucking video it's the DIY-ness of my fucking job that's so god that's where I
get into trouble. I'm not good technically. I'm a comedian and then I'm
trying to be fucking for any thank you David Cross for coming in what a fucking
good episode. Get it together alright. Get it fucking together. If you like David
Cross go reach out to him on Instagram right now
and tell him he's at the official David Cross no David Cross official on
Instagram leave him a message or just I don't know I don't know how to reach out
tag him and check out a fucking the Umbrella Academy Right now it's on the Netflix.com.
Remember when they used to be Netflix.com? Remember they drop shipped?
Good fucking episode. I'll tell you what I do though.
My problem is when I have somebody that I kind of look up to at some point,
especially early on when I was younger as a comedian and as a human,
like Rob Lowe actually is a good example. David Cross is another one.
When I started comedy,
David Cross was like the leader of the alt scene.
Alternative comedy was fucking cool.
They were like, we're not doing the same standard
like set up punchline in front of a brick wall.
They were more natural, they were cool.
I saw David Cross on like letterman
and he's wearing like jeans and a t-shirt
and that wasn't done before.
It was always like sport jacket and button down.
Like you had to kind of dress up.
And the alt scene was like, no, no, let's just be ourselves.
Talking about just like stuff that happened in life,
just like talking as their real selves was interesting.
Eventually the mainstream comedy, I'll just tell you,
took that from them.
Didn't steal it, but learned from them, took it.
And then alt and their later years tried to be different and then they went to this
other and they got more sketchy to be honest. They got weird for the sake of
being weird instead of like weird for the sake of being themselves. But man
David Cross is so fucking cool. I saw him at a super chunk show at the knitting
factory. I don't say you're a hipster without saying you're a hipster and I was like David fucking crosses here
slack motherfucker
But when I bring in big guests I'm like I don't know how to tell them what to do and and with Rob Lowe and with David cross
They so fucking impressed me. I'm like, all right. I can't challenge him or tell her guide him and and man
Just he's had a great fucking story. I'm jealous. It made me wanna do his trip to Turkey.
Right?
I mean, that's the sign of this podcast,
when it's done well, is when you're like,
that makes me wanna go.
I went to Turkey, it was nothing like that.
It was nothing like that.
God damn.
Yeah, good fucking episode.
I went to Turkey.
Don't forget to check out David Cross on his tour.
Beginning of the, what is it?
The end of the beginning of the end tour.
Some of these dates will be with my man Sean Patton,
New Orleans, Seattle, Olympia, Portland,
Eugene, Arcata, Sacramento, Oakland, San Diego,
Los Angeles, Phoenix, Houston, Dallas, Austin,
San Antonio, Oklahoma City, Denver, Salt Lake,
Madison, Minneapolis, St. Louis, oh my God, Lawrence, Carbro, Dallas, Austin, San Antonio, Oklahoma City, Denver, Salt Lake, Madison,
Minneapolis, St. Louis, Lawrence, Carboro, Atlanta, South Carolina, North Carolina,
Tennessee, Indianapolis, Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio, Ontario, that's not a state, Illinois,
DC, Ohio again, Michigan, Kentucky, New York, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, New York, Vancouver, Jesus Christ, Montana.
Yeah, you're everywhere, bro.
Yeah, I went to Istanbul.
I did a long layover.
I was either from Egypt, I think, so I think I can't, I couldn't fly from Israel straight
to Egypt.
I think they had some sort of embargo.
Maybe like, I think it was like one or two days a week they had a flight so I had to go through Turkey, and I was like oh sick
I'll cross over to country off my list I'm able to get a fridge back. I try to get fridge magnets wherever I go
It's just something that gets me moving it's lame
Fridge over there fridge magnets. I'll show you one day
over there. Fridge magnets I'll show you one day. But a couple of them are still at home. In the studio. This is one I got from Istanbul. Can you see it? Yeah I got another one too.
But I got this one. Yeah. It gets me moving. It's lame but it gets me fucking moving around
with like whatever. I'm gonna put this up. So what I did is I took a long layover.
Kayak doesn't always tell you
how long a layover you're allowed to take.
It tells you how long of a layover,
limited, small amount of time.
But I was like, no, I want more time
because I wanted to go into Turkey, into Istanbul,
and go to one of those hamams.
Why, I should have pictures of this.
Caffeine might need more pictures.
Today's episode is produced by the Your Moms House Network.
It is edited by Alan Caffe.
Caffe, bro, you're starting to get compliments
on the comments on YouTube.
I saw it.
People are like, wow, the way you put the pictures
into the Rob Lowe episode were fucking really good.
That's you, bud.
I can't make fun of you anymore, but I can say that Zolo voted for the Green Party.
He said, I would rather throw in my vote than to vote for either party.
And people said, people said, Zolo, what's the Green Party?
He goes, I don't know.
Ari's making this up as he speaks.
So this didn't really happen.
That's what he said.
Turkish Hamam. Let's see if this one works. Ari's making this up as he speaks. So this didn't really happen, is what he said.
Turkish Hamam. Let's see if this one went.
So they were built by old Szilagetian,
but it was Tak, yup, this is it.
Tatakale Hamami, dating to the second half
of the 15th century.
This splendid double bath managed to survive
only barely the earthquake of 1894,
the fire of 1911, and the indignity of serving as a storehouse for cheese in the 80s. Sulaimaniya
Hamami. Damn I don't know which one I went to. I'll find pictures. You'll put
them in there. But so I took a long layover. It's an eight hour layover and I
left the airport got my shit. I think it was like a storage locker. You can put your stuff in, or carry on it.
Put that in there.
And they gave you like, there was like a one day visa
you could get at the airport.
Because I guess people do this thing.
And I just fucking got in a cab,
bolted across town, so overcrowded, so traffic.
Took me longer than I thought.
Took me an hour plus to get there.
So I was like, okay, I gotta save time and get back. I
Went to this hamam was so cool. They scrub you down these old men. They scrub you down
You're in this beautiful like palace almost
There's a cold bath and a hot bath. I mean they they wash you and then there's like this hot room
kind of really remember all of it, but it was fucking badass and then I went got a Turkish breakfast and
I don't really remember all of it, but it was fucking badass. And then I went, got a Turkish breakfast, and walked around.
I might have gotten that fridge magnet from the airport.
I try not to get them from the airport if I can.
Because I try to get something that mimics my experience there.
I don't think Istanbul was that.
Sometimes I get two. I've learned my lesson. I got a safety one. I'm like, this isn't exactly the right one, but let me get it.
So when I was in Paris, I was like, I want to get something that is my experience.
So they had a bunch of Eiffel Tower ones and I'm like, I didn't go to the Eiffel Tower.
I saw it, but I didn't go there.
And then I saw one that had a bunch of different wines and I'm like, that's me.
That's what I did.
I drank wine all day and smoked fucking rollies at cafes.
If they had like a hand rolled cigarette
and coffee fridge magnet,
that would have been the one for sure.
Anyway, then I saw some, I got some Turkish,
I saw some Turkish kid, like a three year old,
like this in his phone.
It might've been an iPad, I don't remember.
And I remember going like, we're doomed, it's a society.
He's just staring at it, eyes wide wide open his parents aren't paying attention to him
That hurt actually and then went back into the Turkish airport and I swear that there was a separate entrance for women now
I've been told that this is wrong and I do what I always do is how can I find that?
I am NOT wrong. How could I not admit defeat?
and
The Turkish airport was rebuilt so it might have been that
everyone was saying an old one. It also might have been it was the Egyptian
airport. It could have been that because it was within probably the same day
actually. So I think I flew from I think it was this and then it wouldn't have
been the same day. I think I flew from Israel to Turkey to Egypt because there's no direct flights from Israel to Egypt. That day I had to go. Or it was
on the way home from Egypt I stopped in Turkey to get another country in. No, I wouldn't have been
to get another country in because Egypt and Jordan I had just gotten.
So I got my two countries for the year.
I try to get two new countries a year.
I got to get another one coming, this one.
Remember the old skeptic tank fucking rants?
Here was the problem.
They were great when podcasts were starting.
You're welcome for all your favorite podcasts.
I did that. Um. I'm kidding. I'm not joking. Um.
Uh.
But you go on this rant and now the people are like just get to the interview.
Just get to it.
I've listened to a, I'm realizing this.
My favorite murder, I listened to one and she was talking about her fucking dumb cat
being sick.
And it's like get to the fucking episode.
But I do like the rants.
How about afterwards? Subscribe wherever you're listening or watching by the way.
Leave a comment on the YouTube page.
UBTrippinPod on YouTube.
YouTube.com slash at UBTrippinPod.
We're on Instagram too.
At UBTrippinPod.
Subscribe wherever you're listening at UBTrippin.
Almost we're getting on our way to 100,000 subscribers on it on on on
YouTube it's getting there I like it starting to get bigger guests they're
starting to notice and they want to talk about their travels leave a comment with
anyone you know who's big that has that has traveled and been to somewhere cool
leave just if you want some random person in general someone suggests
Sergio Simpson I sent him a DM guess Guess what he said back? Nothing.
Because he wouldn't have noticed.
Because he's way bigger than that.
But at least I tried.
At least I tried.
It would be cool.
I don't know if he's been anywhere.
Some people are like, this guy's been to this place.
Like if you knew David Cross had spent a month in Turkey, like hey David Cross went to Turkey
for a month, I would reach out.
Leave that shit in the comments.
It worked.
I got wanton don on I got whatever hit over to the patreon the you be tripping patrons patreon.com
You be tripping where every week I read some we'll do a few different things
But talk about a place on a map. I I read travel postcards. I've been getting postcards and people all over the globe
And I talked about the place read off the postcard and then I filling up my back wall not here
But those in the patreon room filling up the fucking postcard wall
With just like a wallpaper of the shit I get from across the globe
It is fun
And what I want to do is when I get to 2,000 subscribers gonna pick somebody not from the patreon just pick some listener from here
And send them around the globe we're
gonna live vicariously through somebody else I want to spend a year travel on
the road backpacking in the hostels and I can't do it I don't have the time the
money is one thing people say why you can't travel but really it's a time you'd
have to quit your job you have to put your life on hold you have to tell your
wife I'm out of here so we're gonna find someone who has the time we're gonna
live vicariously through them okay they're gonna travel the way I want to travel which is no. I don't want you writing in every week
I want you once a month finding a fucking
Internet cafe or a
Computer at a hostel you're staying in sign up for a gmail account send me a letter of what you've been up to
Once a month or so
Yeah, I'm gonna give month or so yeah I'm
gonna give them enough money I'm gonna keep putting it on a credit card so if
we get the 2,000 subscribers you will be part of that dream patreon.com slash
you be tripping three weeks three episodes a month getting the fucking
voicemail thing down so we can call in and whatever there's also like tips on
where to travel from other people like that have been there that
Have questions. It's like a little community going on there. So
Head over on over there and support this podcast that way and I think that's it. I think that's all I have to say
Yeah, so my point was you can't do the fucking rants at the beginning of the episodes the skeptic tech rants
But how about we do them at the end of an episode
How about you sit there in a fucking shirt you got at a fucking juvay pre a brief party to the
carnival pretty fucking cool though right I was a paint wash down it's
pretty fucking badass especially on the story. I got a Carnival episode coming up. I got and then I got yeah and then I got anyway that's it guys that's it.
Also if you've been to Turkey leave a comment on there about your own
experiences in Turkey or I don't know man I don't know I'm having a fucking
blast with this. I really am. Where do you want to go? Where else is there that you
want to go on the map? Mongolia. Tom Rhodes been trying to get me to Mongolia
for a while. I heard a Ulan Batur, there's a fucking gig. I want to go.
And I heard there's a gig in Turkey. My promoter in Romania told me about a
gig in Istanbul that Danos Los did and I said I remember this it was in the winter I said maybe in
September October. Shit. I gotta get on that.
I got two new countries a year I got one more coming. No it won't be Turkey. I've already been there.
Anyway, that's the episode. I hope you guys enjoyed it.
Until next week, gulay gulay everybody.
I'm having fun with this.
I hope you guys are too.
David Cross, that was fucking that rule, buddy.
If you got any other trips, please come back in.