You Be Trippin' - Iran w/ Drew Binsky | You Be Trippin' with Ari Shaffir

Episode Date: May 18, 2026

The End is here! Ari's new storytelling show is $5.99 per episode at https://theend.ymhstudios.com/ There's a total of 7 episodes for you to enjoy! Follow Drew on Instagram here: https://www.instagram.com/drewbinsky/ SPONSORS: -Get sixty days free at https://ShipStation.com with code trippin On this week's episode of You Be Trippin', Ari Shaffir sits down with Drew Binsky about his trip to Iran. The cool thing about Drew is that he's been to every country in the world, and most of them twice. Drew shares all the beautiful cultures and people he's come across in his travels. He talks about sharing tents with nomads, getting shaken down in Sierra Leon, and of course Ari needs to know about the toilet situation. Drews stories and worldly knowledge are one in a million. Khodâhâfez (خداحافظ)! You Be Trippin' Ep. 119 https://www.instagram.com/arishaffir https://www.instagram.com/youbetrippinpod https://arishaffir.com Chapters 00:00:00 - Intro 00:10:49 - Drew Goes to Iran 00:15:43 - What Iranians are Like 00:23:06 - Things to do in Iran 00:39:01 - Ari's Trip to Timor-Leste 00:52:03 - Top Worst Tourists 00:56:20 - Back to Persepolis 01:02:09 - Toilets 01:13:12 - Religions 01:16:49 - Shake Downs 01:33:30 - Ayahuasca 01:47:06 - Outro Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What if the Nazis were just about time? I think they wouldn't be looked down upon so much. Right. They were like, if they still did all the killing, but it was about like, instead of like race-based, if it was like, you're late. Yeah. You've been to Germany nowadays?

Yeah. Everything, everything is on time. If the train is like 10 seconds late, it would be a shock. Everything is, it's bizarre. It's bizarre. It is just, the German culture is like extremely strict and punctual. I've never seen a culture like that. I mean, like, Dutch are kind of,

similar in some western Europe. It's not Spain, not Portugal, but you go to Germany, it's like, well, if you're meeting at nine and 8.505 is late. What I love about Germany is, you know stupid American? Is that a show? It's a way of life? Yeah, I know stupid American.

Okay. What a weapon. Yeah. What a weapon when you're out there. Always play dumb. My friend said the only other one is ditsy blonde. Yeah. We're like, I don't know.

Yeah, yeah. And then people are like, fine. I play dumb all the time. Like, droning is illegal everywhere, but I drone everywhere. for my content and I always just played like I don't know the rules like I'm dude this podcast drones on all the time um the tongue pun yeah but whenever I take the trains in Germany I do not pay and they go because it's honor system and I have it's the honor system yeah and then they go what do you I'm like oh I don't I look for the place they'll still charge you though if they catch you right

okay so you have two options they'll charge you they'll kick you won't charge you or they'll find you two of those are fine Two of those are totally, if it charged me, I was going to pay anyway. So what if I lost? Yeah. How are you feeling today, Ari? What's going on?

I feel pretty good. I've been drinking, well, yesterday I took off. Otherwise, it was nine straight days. Really? Yeah, hang out with Shane. He's a weapon. He's a problem. You were hanging out with Shane?

Yeah, it was a problem. In Austin and Gertorosa, it was like a real pig. I don't know if you know any pigs in your life. How are you feeling? I'm good. I was with Shane last night completely randomly. And Oliver Trees.

And Oliver Trees. Oliver Tree, great friend of mine, traveler, just likable, goofy guy. And he was like, yo, come hang. We're hanging and went to some bar around here, some rock star bar. And it was Shane's after party after his event last night at the Hollywood Bowl.

Yeah. It was great. We hung for like 30 minutes and shouted, and he had seen some of my videos. So we were just talking about when I got detained on the border of North Korea and Russia and eating baboon in Tanzania. So it had some good stories to show.

You've got a ton of stories. Here's the problem with this podcast when you meet someone like you. It's picking a place. because you've got too much and you want to get to all of them. Yeah, I've been traveling nonstop since 2012. When I was 20, I started.

And I've been to every country in the world, most of them twice. Actually, I'm only missing like 50 if I wanted to visit every country twice. I'm not really trying. But yeah, I'm obsessed with, I'm curious about the world and I'm obsessed with meeting new people

and experiencing new cultures. Okay, run the music. Where you've been and where you go. And this is our East Travel Show, yeah. We're going to talk about travel today. It's you'll be tripping, yeah. And we're back. Drew Benski is the guest today.

That's your stage name, obviously. His real name was Draw Benski. And then he wanted to make it more updated to what's going on currently. I am the past tense of draw. That's right. They must have killed you all that in high school. I got to bring my humor out because you're a comedian, so I got to dig deeper and find it.

You're actually a funny travel vlog. I don't even remember it. Yeah, video creator, storyteller. There's like two, I have this writer friend, Rolf Potts, and he's like, there's no humor in travel. It's only I was arrested or it was so spiritual. Yeah, it's funny. It's kind of true. Yeah, it's kind of lame. In my content, I'm more serious because I'm in crazy places like Afghanistan, but in real life, I think I'm a little funnier. And people meet me in real life. They're like, wait, you're actually a little more loose than you are in your videos.

Because I'm like locked in, man. I have like three days, four days to film something. I'm just like, I'm locked in, like 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. All I can think about is making the best story possible. Yeah. And there's a lot of components to that. Like, I do everything myself. I have a camera guy, but I'm ideating.

I'm figuring out what, like scripting. I'm figuring out who I'm meeting, who's going to be in the video, what I'm doing. What seems like I shoot it. I'm like, dude, this is not working out. you were just telling me sometimes you film stuff and it's like this isn't working

pods and I'm just like and then I go what happened with that one I'm like I either say it's still coming I go no I've been banking him for like over a year it's in production

yeah or or I just avoid the subject at one time somebody was like was it so bad did you throw it out and I'm like like Jordan Jensen I had won

and I was like yeah it was terrible you just showed me pictures of the Coliseum you told him that you said it was terrible yeah it was like Jordan it was really bad

and she was like I'm like yeah let's do a different one where something fucking happened you get laid anywhere i don't want to hear about you with your mom going to fucking see sights wait what happened in 2012 that made you go like i'm out i studied abroad in prague in college yeah best six months of my life first time my eyes and ears were opened up to new cultures new people i was you know 20 years old at the time in in europe you can go to any bar you want

they don't give a shit in the u.s you can't even legally drink so i was having the best time i heard progress real like like edm and like underground scenes of yeah i got into edm when i was living in prague was when the song levels came out by evici and like he came and played out of a club i don't know if you know that song or who evici is sing it sing 10 minutes there's no really not many lyrics to the drums and stuff give me a beer and i'll do it um but yeah then i just like got hooked on on that like music scene and that was just a great time in my life then i went back to college wisconsin graduated and then i was like madison yeah madison nice i don't want nine to five i'm getting out of here so i moved to south korea to

English and that was like that was like saying fuck you to anything else basically and I just wanted to start a new life in Asia and get paid to live in Asia that's why buddy Rolf did he speaks Korean I can speak Korean it's so funny you guys are so funny it's a so it's a language isolate yep so no it relates to nothing nothing and it's such a dumb fucking language to learn unless you're gonna learn a lot of language it's useless anywhere it's not like Spanish is the most yeah or English or Arabic or Arabic or Russian, those two languages can get you to like basically a hundred countries between those two. Yeah. And then, yeah, English, Portuguese and French and Spanish. Those language and Mandarin, but that's really just China. So those languages, you'll be so, you'll be so. Yeah, Mandarin has a lot of people to speak about, not a lot of places. Right. Yeah. Koreans, yeah, useless if you're not in Korea. You're like, I speak Tonga fluently. You're like, why? It's so funny. But then when we go to a Korean restaurant, he's like, I'm my time to shine. Exactly. Same. Yeah. I get really excited. And they're like,

Ooh. All I do is if I remember thank you. You got it. Then I say it and they go like, what? Yeah. Yeah. Oh, me and Marr. Wait, hold on.

Jesuba. What's Kapkamp? Kekong Kopp is Thai. Oh, that is. In Myanmar, Burmese, it's jessuba. Thank you. Okay. I'm pretty good at the thank yous around the world.

I think I got almost all of them. It's enough, especially as a redhead. They'd be like, what the fuck, dude? I'm a rare breed. Although in places like Syria and Afghanistan, yeah. They have like this redhead gene. it's so freaking weird bro

even in Pakistan and like they'll start speaking to me in the local language because I guess I got that Jewish Ashkenazi whatever Middle Eastern face and they'll like start speaking to me in Arabic I'm like in Syria I'm like and then they'll tell me like

you look like you're I'm telling you ask a Syrian and show them my face and he'll be like oh he's probably Syrian weird right yeah yeah I think I understand what you're talking about though it's trippy I can picture of those people with like a turban and the red beard

and like this kind of bigger nose and like white European features. It's really odd. Yeah. It's also interesting of how people got to a place. Right. We're talking about how borders mean nothing. Yeah.

But it's like, so like in Latin America, like cultural slowly change. Occasionally there'll be a sharp change. Yeah. Like when I left Guatemala for El Salvador, all the indigenous outfits stopped. Didn't slow down. They just stopped. And I was like, what's going on? I was like, oh, we had a bounty on their heads in the 30s.

We murdered all, all but like 50 of them. It's crazy. And you're like, oh, that's a reason, I guess. Right, right. Were you alone? Yeah. Yeah. How did you travel by buses?

Mostly buses, casual boats and trains and mostly buses. I applaud you for taking those buses, man. Why? Brutal. Are you kidding me? Why? No, you're right. Some question.

My first time in India, I took a night bus from Udaipur to Jodepur. I was on the, it was a double-decker. I was on the top shelf. Two in the morning. I was the only white person on the bus. Two in the morning, bus driver slams a break. on the freeway, turns the wheel, we fall over like a five-foot curb, bus shatters, two people died on the bus.

This is like my worst story. I might as well get into it. Yeah. So all the windows shattered, like everything shattered. There was dirt, dust flying, kids were crying, and I had all this glass. I was in the bed that I was sitting and it was a sleeper bus. There was like this high in glass. I had glass.

I was bleeding all over my leg and foot. Thankfully, I didn't get like cuts in my neck. And then I was like, I remember like I was holding onto the bar and I was, I was on the lower level and I was looking through. and these kids' shoes were dangling right of me because the bus flipped, right? And I was on the bottom of the bus. So, yeah, that was crazy.

And then I had to get, I had to... Two people died. Two people died. Yep, I had to get out of the bus, throw all my bags. Actually, it's that same backpack you see right there. I've had that bag. I mean, same kind of backpack.

Throw it off, throw it off the bus. And then I was stranded on the side of the road. Two in the morning, all by myself. And then some people were stuck in the bus because the bus kind of cracked. And then everyone was weeping and crying. And they were just like, they were doing this sign. Like, they're stuck in the bus.

they died. People were like hurt, like blood. Dude, it was crazy. It was insane. The safety on these buses. And it's funny. I've ever been to India, but it's the same in like kind of every third world. Yeah. What's crazy is if I died, like I don't know when that would have got reported. Right. Right. Of course I would have been missing in my family.

They had your wallet, maybe, to identify you. It could have been like a week until I would have been missing because I wouldn't have done. Who would you know who to call? Exactly. It's super scary, man. They're not going to be like, it's called mom. No. What a call, too.

Hello. You're like, I'm not interested. You're like, no, no, this is not spam. Your son is dead. Yeah, but, you know, that stuff happens in India all the time, and it just goes unreported. One bus crash here. First page of CNN, like, if a bus crash and people died.

Anyways, we can get into some brighter stories. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So, okay, where are we going to go today? Let's do Iran. I think we should talk Iran because there's a war happening in Iran. And it's in people's minds. It's in people's minds. I've been four times.

I love it. I've spent two months combined in Iran. I'm an open... Okay, before we get into it, I want to hear what happened in 2012. So you went there and just kind of opened your eyes. My first time to Iran? No, just in general. So you got to that.

I'm trying to think of what made you into what you are. Oh, okay, guys. So go back to the story. So studied abroad in Prague, taught English in Korea, started a travel blog. This is way before YouTube. I was like, it was called the Hungry Partier.com. Food and Nightlife reviews around Asia, Europe.

anywhere I was going. It was perfect. That's what you want. Yeah. Like where's a cool spot to have? Yeah. And so I was getting a lot of hits on my blog. And then that sort of evolved into making videos.

I just, so I had a goal to travel to every country in the world. I met Deanna, who's now my wife. I met her when I was at Country 49 in 2015. And I told her, I really like you. I really, but I want to visit every country in the world. And then she's like, let's do it. So right away, we traveled.

We went to Vanuatu, Fiji. We lived in Hanoi. We lived in Bangkok. We lived in Manila. as a base and then she travels with me a lot. You go from there. Yeah, and then started making videos in 2017 because Deanna bought me a camera

when we were in Vietnam and she was like, you should start filming. You're like, don't just go there and post it on Instagram or Snapchat. Like, you should actually make videos and they'll live forever. So my first viral video was in North Korea in 2017. And then basically, from then on,

I've just taught myself how to do it. Now I have a team of 30. What a goal, too, like, I'm just good to everyone. Yep. Do you ever have like, in the next 10 years, Scotland will be a new country? If it is. Are you going to go back?

Or do you want to say already went when it was a different country? I'll probably go back just to be satisfied to enter the country when it's officially a new country. With a different stamp. But like I've been, yeah, I've been to most of the unrecognized countries too. There's a few I haven't been to yet. That are like not officially countries? Yeah, like Western Sahara, I've not been there yet. It's just south of Morocco.

Somaliland? I've been to Somaliland. I've been to Somaliland. I've been to Somaliland. It's a much safer version of Somalia. I met a Somali guy in, in, in, in, in, in, in, on Lake Gatitlan. The Gatislan, nice. I love that place.

Yeah. And he was like, everyone here fucking sucks. They're all fucking pseudo, so what is he say, pseudo spiritual narcissists. Yes. But he was telling me about Somalian a little bit and he goes, it's rules, there's music. Safe, clean. There's a town called Hargeza, which is bustling and people are friendly and you don't have to look, look over your shoulder.

It's like they have their own flag, their own, uh, money, their own government. But they're not an official country. They're not, like, they're not, they're not like, they're not officially recognized by the UN. That's what makes 197. That's like the UN list. And then there's like a next tier. But yeah, Mogadishu, bro, that place is nuts, man. Do you, okay, let's get to Iran. And actually, this will be my question anyway. Sure. So there's, you, I'm sure you talk to everybody. Like, how can you go there? It's dangerous. It's not. It's not nearly as bad as you think. Completely. Or like, it was dangerous, but keep your wits of it. I used to hate that. It was like,

just be smart. Like, what does just be smart mean, though? stay in your hotel yeah um but then there's like is it safe and then they're like is it safe for a jew i always get the jew yeah we can get into the jew stuff because iran especially so iran is the most misconceived country in the world boom like 100 percent yeah the people in the government are different everywhere in the world even in the u.s right but in iran i went there during ramadan the first time do you know what that is yeah it's just it's his duties play basketball for the national team no it's a it's a holiday in islam it's okay Okay, it lasts 30 days and they can't eat when the sun is out.

So you have to, you have to fast, basically. But nobody- Do you know I'm joking when I say things without a smile? Oh, I didn't know you were joking. I've said many things today and you're like, yeah, what is that? So, I got, fair. I can't tell. Okay, all right.

I can't read you. We just met, bro. We just met. Yeah. I don't know your sense of- Fuck, now I feel like an idiot, bro. No, it's okay. I know Ramadan is not a dude who played for the national team.

Oh, no, man. All right, it's fair. know what you know i should i need to have like warnings of like i'm joking yeah all right it's on me wink it next time okay okay okay because they're during ramadan nobody was fasting they just can't eat in public just for the government like you can't eat in public and women have to cover their hair bro immediately when they get in closed doors like they take it off oh yeah like i went to underground like party in iran i've never seen humans drink vodka faster than i've seen in iran period what city uh that was in uh esphahan which is a southern city in the south.

Big city? Yeah. Big city. So there's a way to smuggle in booze into Iran. It's expensive. It's like 300 bucks for like absolute bottle of vodka. But they go hard, hard. There was like 30 people in this underground party I was in four handles of vodka and it was gone an hour and a half.

Wow. Yeah. It's crazy. Iranians like, I mean, we're in Tarangeloist right now. Like, that's what they call it. There's a shit load of, you never heard that? No, that's so funny. Okay, so we're in Tehranus.

There's a million Iranians in Southern California, which is the biggest diaspora and anywhere in the world in one concentrated place. But people in Iran, they're extremely welcoming and they love Americans. They always want to talk about America. They have an uncle in America. They watch American movies. They like wrestlers from America. They like music.

They love the U.S. And that's something that you would never realize until you go. The people. The people. That's the other thing. the separation of like official stance of a government and then the humans actually right yeah the government doesn't like americans at all and it's really hard to get the visa and there was a spot on my first trip they had sent a spy to watch me where what i was doing so okay i've heard about this when you say spy

what do you mean a chaperone or like someone hiding i didn't see them i don't know their name or i don't know their face but as soon as i arrived in iran the first time my guide was taken in the back room before i had arrived by the officials and we're like we know he's here we know everything about him, we're going to be watching him the whole time. And I was on a group trip. The only way to get into Iran my first time was on an organized group trip. What year was it? 2017? 20, 18. There was 10 people in the group, including my wife, she came with me on that trip. And I felt so bad because we would be at these amazing sites. And then my guide, his name is Amin. My guide's phone would be ringing and it would be the government calling him like, what is Drew doing? Who is he with? Where do

he sleep last night? What bus? What seat is he on the bus? The whole time. So for like a two-week trip he would get phone calls and they were checking in on me and he informed me that they had sent someone to watch us but we didn't know where they were but i was scared shitless man i was like i don't want to do something wrong like this country's amazing the people are amazing but like am i about to just get abducted am i going to get like taken in a back room somewhere because it's hard enough like socially i don't want to like stick out right and then to be like no it's illegal right exactly i don't even think being jewish is a problem i think we can talk about judaism i'm happy to but i think it's because I was on a tourist visa, but technically I'm working.

They know I'm a YouTuber. I was making videos. I was going viral. So, you know, I'm the same thing as like an undercover journalist from BBC that, like, got into Iran and, like, who knows what story he's making. I could be exposing them in negative ways. In fact, I wasn't. And you wouldn't be saying that's what you're doing there.

Of course. I would just say, oh, I want to go on a pleasure trip to Iran. Yeah. And if you watch my videos in Iran, they're all pretty positive. Like, they're awesome experiences in Iran. Hey, guys, quick break to tell you a little about the game. Yes, Drew Bensky, what a dude. He really challenges us to have to go tripping all over the fucking world.

Every country he's been to. Every country he's been to. You can go to his website, drewbinski.com right now. You can see his speaking reel. You can book him. You can go find him on YouTube where he makes tons of cool videos that we talk about in this episode. YouTube.com slash at Drew Binsky. Or is Instagram.com.

At Drew Benski. For myself, you can check out my Instagram at Ari Shafir. We can check out the Instagram for the UBTripping Pod at UB Trippin Pod. Please subscribe wherever you're watching you're listening at UBTrippin' pod. Tell a friend about it. And guys, if you're watching, please leave a comment for the algorithm. They help. They legitimately help, and it helps me get guys that are wild like Rubensky.

Yeah, I love talking to these guys. He's been to every country in the world most twice. So it's cool to be able to get them. Because you watch and tell me about people like this, I didn't know about Drew Benski. That came from your tips. So please continue to leave in the comments who you think I should get, who's traveled well, and I'll continue to book them.

You can watch me in my new TV show, The End. Guys, oh, you've been so supportive. It's already been a massive success. We've made our money back and then some. The comments are getting paid. We have tested this outsider way to do it, and it has worked because you have supported it, which means I can now make other new shit away from the fucking studio

system. It has worked. We've done it together. It's wild and you've loved all the comments about it. Any kind of you liked on the end, please reach out to them on Instagram. Tell them you like their episode. Tell them you like their story. They love to hear it and they're all getting paid and we're doing it together, guys. We're bucking the system. So it's pretty, it's pretty freaking cool. I am also going to do a live U.B. Trippin' Pod in New York in probably June. The date is June 10th at the Brooklyn Improv. The plan is that do an episode about Octoberfest. Dress up in your best German Octoberfest gear.

I mean, it's on you if you want to do the one outfit that I think you might do. I would say don't do it, but Leader Hozen is probably a better idea. You know what I'm talking about. Guys, you're going to have to leave or come in with that. And there's going to be someone who's not going to get the joke. So I'm not going to tell anybody what to do funny or not funny. But be careful on that. Just he's kind of an electric guy.

So I'm saying I would not do it, but I'm also. knock and get in the way. That's it everybody. And then that's it. That's all the dates I got. Watch Legion of Skanks every week on Gas Digital and peace. I'll talk to you later. Let's get back to the episode. This is a wild one. But yeah, that first trip every day, I would wake up and be like, am I about to get a knock on my door in this hotel room? Yeah. Damn. For two weeks. What I've heard about the Jews is that they're like, oh, there's plenty there. And they live alone as long as you don't talk about Israel. There's 10,000 Jews living in Iran.

It's the third most populated Jewish country in the Middle East right now. And, and, they don't have a problem with Judaism, they have a problem with Israel. So I don't like rep Israel. I don't talk about Israel. I don't really want to talk about Israel. It's like a conversation I'm not looking to have. But Judaism,

did you say boring? It's kind of. It's just boring. I mean, it's like excited, but it's like enough, right? You're all saying the same shit to new people. Exactly. But the religion of Judaism is part of their culture.

There's synagogues that are 2,000 years old that I went in, and there's still like Hebrew writings on the walls. And like, that's cool. And so when they, I tell everyone I'm Jewish, I'm super open about it. I, like, purposely will go into villages and, like, tell them, yeah, I'm a Jewish traveler, and I want to get their reactions. Only, only, like, twice have I had some say, like, you can't be here, like, get out of here.

Like, we don't want to be around you. Where was that? One was in Syria. One was in Yemen. Sorry. One was in Syria. One was in Libya. Wow.

In Libya, recently, like, at my second trip, like, eight months ago, I did this whole trip. I took my wife there. We had a great time. And my guide didn't know I was Jewish. And on the last day, I told him I was Jewish. And he, like, freaked out. He's like, you can't be here right now. I could go to prison if I know that I'm with you.

And so that was an interesting, that was an interesting one. But yeah, most times they don't care, dude. Like, Jews and Muslims are pretty similar. Yeah, they are. Like, actually, like, food hospitality, wearing small hats on your head, reading from right to left, Friday night prayer. Dude, if it goes on and on, it's all the same shit. Interesting.

And it's also like, who is responsible for Fluffel? And everyone's like, us. It's us. Or hummus. Yeah, it started right here in Syria. No, it's Libya. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Lebanon.

Lebanon has a word to say Syria. They all claim it. Oh, man. But, yeah, we can stay on Iran if you want to go deeper. So you went there. I wonder what everyone else in your group must have been fucking mad. Yeah, I just felt so bad. I was like, man, I'm the problem.

They paid all this money to go on a trip, and I'm the problem. I'm the asshole. So what did you get into while you were there? We just went by bus from Tehran to Shiraz. to Esfahan. I can, if you pull up a map, I can show you, it's fine. Yeah, we just basically did a big circle. Yeah, we're not, it's just going to run out of reach. We did a big circle, but Iran's got every type of climate, you have desert, you have beaches, you have mountains. I went skiing in Iran, I played golf in Iran, dude. Really? You did both in the same trip? In the same day.

Wow. I did both in the same day. Yeah. So the Caspian Sea is beautiful. Um, there's islands. Dude, it's like, there's huge mountains, small villages. And it's also like, the Silk Road, right? It went from China to Europe in the 1400s. Which is what just for silk? It was a trading route for goods and ideas and it's just like how things spread from east to west basically. So Iran was like the epicenter of the Silk Road. So we have all these little towns where there was like mergent and traders and they set up these little markets and they built these beautiful like mosques and mausoleums and they're still there and these beautiful blue tiles and like it's so historic and you're walking in these cities and you're like this looks unchanged for 800 years. Damn. That's not a thing that you say in most places when you travel. I mean, Italy, whatever, but yeah, it's fucking Iran, dude. Wow.

Nobody, few people have smartphones. It's like, yeah, it's crazy, man. Were they, like, educated? In Tehran, they have smartphones, and it's very modern, but the moment you get out of the cities, it's very, like, traditional and very old school and very slow and beautiful. Yeah, they're educated. Most of them are, they'll go to cities if they want to. education but it's like different in the countryside it's super different like what do you mean just like

it's just like not flashy they're like no like no buzz no no no no honking horns no traffic like no one's no one's there's no bars in the country it's a dry country so there's no all the night life is in a house underground as i told you that they still have it they have it but you can't publicly do it isn't that crazy my friend went to Kabul when it was when it was when it was um still no us control and he was like can i bring anything they go lick bring two bottles of Jack Daniels and we can have a bar for a week they said that to him yeah but they were like because it was all those like u.s. like people working there whatever yeah sure um yeah but they're getting it was so hard but they got it they're like like you said

they're like let's go yeah let's go yeah they do water down coke and jacks because they're like we gotta make it last yeah yeah it's hard to smuggle things in but you can and it's possible so this tour took you on small towns too small towns um traditional villages big cities we went to a to a to a to a to a to town called, we went to a site called Persepolis, which is this old ancient 2,000-year-old kingdom that was built for the old kings and queens there. And it's like, it looks, it's hard to explain it without looking at photos, but yeah, look up Persepolis. Okay. Oh, really? Yeah, because I love to reference things and show because it's hard to explain. Hell yeah. Should I wait? Well, yeah, tell me about how the skiing was. Yeah, so.

In the meantime. Yeah. And we'll get the Percephalus. Persepolis. Okay. I never knew you could ski in Iran until I was there in February and there's fucking huge mountains with snow on them. It's mountainous. Huge mountains. Like 15,000 feet high peaks, like huge mountains. You wouldn't think you would have enough skiers there. So like I saw the Oasis in Sao Paulo. Nice. And they were in Santiago too and you're like, well, tickets are expensive. And isn't this a poor country? And you're like, yeah, but not everybody. Right. Yeah, exactly. Not everybody. Of course there are skiers there. So I went skiing. It was great.

Nice. Okay, is this going to be shown to your viewers? Okay, dude, this is incredibly helpful. I need like a laser pointer now to be like I went from here to here. Okay, so. Esfahan, I see. Yeah, I started in Tehran in the center. Okay.

Yeah, and then we went down to Yazd. Lee, nice. Went down to Esfahan, then we went to Yaz, which is this really traditional, beautiful city. And then we went to Shiraz, I went to Kermann. These are all like... How far away are these? They're like three, four hour drives from each other. I'm just explaining to you my first trip in Iran,

and then in my later trips, I did, like, crazier road trips, like deep into the Kurdish villages and stuff. Okay. And then I went to Bandara Bas in the very south in the pink area. It's actually right on the Strait of Hormuz, which is in every single headline right now because it's closed and all the oil is being blocked right now.

Could you swim in it? Yeah, you could swim in it, yeah. Nice. I thought about going back soon, like trying to go, like, hang out in the Strait of Hormuz. Then I went to see where Pakistan is in the bottom right? There's a town called Chabahar right on the border. See that?

It's right all the way down. It's called Chabahar. Yeah. That place is awesome. Dude, there's black Iranians. They are black-skinned. They speak Farsi. But it's crazy.

I had pictures of me and like black people and they're Iranian. Can you imagine if you met a black dude on the street and he's like, yeah, I'm from Iran? Not insane. Blows around. Like Moors? Like from African black. Oh, I guess it's right there. It's not.

Well, that's, yeah. And they worked their way up? Yeah, I guess they just settled there. I mean, over the years. It's crazy, but it's really cool to see. And they made a little village house? They didn't have slavery, did they? Or did they?

I don't know. The answer to that. Maybe way back. Yeah, but it's really, really cool to be in these places that you know that nobody has ever been to. And no one you know has been to. But yeah, one experience I want to highlight was in between Esfahan and Shiraz, yeah, those two kind of bigger red dots. This is on my second trip to Iran, but I was with my guy to mean. And we were driving and I saw these nomads living, like on the freeway.

I just say he's a little huts. And I'm like, dude, let's go back. Let's go in. So we go in and they've never seen an outsider. The first thing they said is we've never seen a non-Farsi speaking person. We've never seen a non-Iranian in our life. And they're speaking through the guide. Yeah, speaking through the guy.

They were super happy to see us. They bring us in, give tea, sit on the floor. They have their camels or goats. They have their cows. And then they have the women have these beautiful blue eyes, like shockingly blue eyes. These nomads, they're living. in the middle of the desert, they move, but depending on the season, wherever the cattle can get food and water. And they live in these, like, little shacks with, like, no electricity. It gets cold

at night there in the winter and hot in the summer. And they just make their own food. They cultivate their own rice, and they just get vegetables from markets. And they, they just move around. And so we end up sleeping the night with them. The unbelievable. Like, I didn't even ask for anything. And they provided this, like, they sacrificed a goat, which is a big deal. And those, you know. Sacrificed it? Or killed it for food? They killed it for food. They call it sacrifice. They killed it for food. No, sacrifice is like, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Maybe there was some of that involved too. Yeah, and then they, I wasn't even expecting this, but then they, like, laid out, like, this whole presentation of, like, all the different ways they can prepare the meat, and they got the onions, and they got the tomatoes, and, like... They weren't even expecting you. No, they weren't expecting us, and, like, I tried to give them money. Ari, I'm telling you, they were, like, they slapped it out of my hand,

like, aggressively. Like, I... I got it to my friend, they didn't talk to me for two years. I thought about how much. hiding money like you know one of those tricks we hide it and then my guide i mean was like dude that's just the culture like though like is that bedou and shit where it's like if you're out of the desert it's our it's like abrahamic kind of it's our it's our like you're on the desert we need to be you're on their turf yeah and like it was so awesome man wow they weren't even expecting you

could yeah it was right it was like it's in that little orangey area there's no it's not even a town yeah somewhere right around there where the mouse is there's everything i'm explaining there's videos on youtube so if you were your viewers are interested you can just type in Drew Binski, Iran, and find these stories. But, yeah, we spent the whole day with them. Can we put up some of your clips in this? Yeah, sure. Okay, absolutely.

Tell me off air. I don't want to pressure it. Yeah, no, no, I can actually find it immediately. Do you want to, I can tell you exactly where it is. Yeah. It'll take me like 30 seconds. To put up? Yeah.

Should we reference it? Just go to YouTube. It's up in Drew Binski, Iran. It's YouTube. For the list of it's home, that's YouTube. Have you heard of that one? Hashtash slash slash. Jubinsky, Iran.

I have a theory. Sorry, go ahead. Now I want to hear your theory first. That there's, rate the women of a, of a, of a place. So, Myanmar, I believe, is the ugliest one. You think Myanmar's the ugliest one? For the women.

And the shortest country in the world is Guatemala that I've ever been to. That from my, I've said, you've seen more. Yeah, sure, sure. And then it's that second video down. Just click it and turn off the volume. And then, so as we're talking. Yeah. Yeah.

Wow. So, well, this is just like the intro of the video. So, but the range of hot to hot to not is the widest of Iranians. Yeah. Yeah, for sure. Yeah, I agree with that. From princesses to like, get the fuck. Shave your nose.

Here you go. I'm giving this to you. But I am Ari Shapir. It's a fucking crazy night we're going to have here. Shit's about to go down. Look. And we're here to talk, Paul. This is a love story.

Media, herpes, gonorrhea, AIDS. I'm desperate. I'll stab you with your motherfuck. One of the worst things that could happen. What's your favorite Bible verse? I'm like, I don't know any. I'm Catholic. Did you just shit your pants?

It's not my shit. If you're up there, lady, don't call me. I'm the bad guy in the story. I know that. I'll be a better person tomorrow. At least he's consistent. Finally, something we can agree on. Discuss it in hard.

It's not the evening I plan, but I'm having a blast. Now if you'll excuse me. Hey guys, today's episode of UB Chipping is brought to you by Shipstation. You know, most businesses are overpaying on shipping without realizing you. And I hate overpaying. They say a lot of stuff about my people. But one thing they're not wrong about is we hate overpaying. Ship Station automatically compares rates across UPS, USPS, and FedEx on everyday order with savings of up to 90%.

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The sooner you switch, the sooner you start saving time and money. Get started with ShipStation today and get 60 days free at shipstation. com with co-trippin that shipstation.com co-tripping shipstation.com co-tripping taxes and fees apply let's get back to the episode the most beautiful are eastern europeans and like some Asian countries yeah but then i think iran i think you're right is a huge a huge difference like wherever you go so click uh this is just yeah yeah it's that's the scene you're on the scene you're on the scene right now um yeah see those wow i dude it's crazy go back if you can go back to her, oh, these are these kids like, ah, man, I couldn't believe her eyes.

Well, uh, that was so hot and like a face, like weathered, but... Right, and I just... Look where they're living. They're living in that little tent on the side of the road. Wow. Look at that, man. I just showed up, and they started making bread, they're bringing us tea. That's my guy to mean. We slept there. There's... And you didn't even know you were going. They didn't even know we were coming, bro. Like, look at that feast that they made. Do they mention it all why they do this, that you said this is... Oh, it was his 10th birthday, so I was singing, I was like, happy birthday, man. Like, this is going to be a memorable birthday.

Look at that feast. Insane. Remember when you were 10 and that white came? Yeah, exactly. I always think about what they think about this experience. I'm having a great time. It seems like they're having a great time, too. But I always think...

What was the food like? What was like? Oh, it's just so good, man. There's so many flavors. Like, it's kind of like Mediterranean food a little bit. Yeah. A lot of different colors on your plate, like a lot of vegetables, a lot of kebab meats, you know? You already eat with your hands at that point

Oh yeah Eat with hands is Yeah Like this thing Oh yeah Crill up the ball Like if I ask for a fork Honestly they would be like

I like what What is that Really They probably never eaten With utensils I want to see that lady's eyes again She was so hot Yeah I know

I don't know It was such a weathered face I can't Yeah it's somewhere right in there Like yeah Play there Where I'm like feeding With feeding the goats and shit

Yeah Look at this man That's like What a life They have cars or that's your car? No, that was our car that we rolled in. Look at this, dude. I was just like, what can I do to help you guys right now?

I just look like an idiot. True, it's so funny that everyone else is like, where are the resorts? Where can I go? And you're just like, yes, let's live, NG. This is what shapes you. Like, when you're old and you look back at travel stories and your life adventures, like these are the things

that are going to be the most impactful. Yeah. Every resort looks the same, dude. Every resort does look the same. Wow. I mean, I could talk, I mean, yeah, he's super nice. So they just took you in, they seemed normal about it, and they were like...

Spent a whole day to get, like, they were like so... Look how handsome these young men are like, dude. Unibro. Unibro. Unfortunately, the one on the right is having major problems in life, but the one on the left has a chance. And then that guy looks like he could just be a club dude.

Yeah, is right? For sure, like a problem at a club. It's really cool to reference this while we're talking. Anyways, um... Dude, the scenery there is just gorgeous. We're just two. Boom, there she is. Wow.

Can you believe that? Dude. Were you with the chick at that point? Yeah, I was married. Oh, yeah. Were you like, I should have been there before. I could have taken you away from all this. Yeah, they're really, really pretty faces.

God damn. And then the other one was pretty grody. Yeah. The mom or whatever was like, oh, you're a papusa. Pabusa. That's El Salvadorian street food. Papusa. All right, skip forward a little bit more.

We slept that night, like in the, You stayed with him. Yeah, I slept there. Wow. Like, where were you planning on going? We were planning to sleep in a little guest house, and then they were like, no, just stay here with us. Woke up in, like, beautiful stars at night.

Like, oh, you must have been out in the middle of nowhere. We're out in the middle desert. Like, these are the experiences that I want to have more of. And, like, look, that's a morning shot right there. It's like, there are so many of these experiences in the world. You just have to go out there and find them. Like, it's... It seems so barren.

It's super... There's nothing out there. but they're super happy like they're just living life man wow here we are worried about getting the latest iPhone and shit and like maybe not you i saw your phone you don't have the latest iPhone it was the iPhone 13 but these people are just every day the same and just just just god damn just hurting and doing whatever and they can get access to like glasses or shirts or shit like that they need yeah yeah they trade some chickens for yeah yeah exactly they barter animals um for it's a little shotgun and that's for what wolf

I don't really know what he uses that for. I don't know if it's for protection. I don't think he hunts. Maybe he hunts. Did you get a sense from any of them that they're, that anything would, oh, dude, you need my dentist. Yeah, gnarly. Wuga.

But yeah, I'm glad that you like these stories because, I mean, this is just, I live for this stuff. Yeah. Yeah. So how many times you go there? Four times, because you loved it. Love it. I'm hoping to go back soon.

and I'm getting my Lithuanian passport through my Jewish ancestry. I'm getting Romanian. Good for you. Yeah. So mine should be coming soon. Yeah. And we also both took untimed SATs

from our Jewish interests. You just claim you have learning disabilities. You don't have a clock. Yeah. My brother did that for real. Really? Yeah. And it was like, I don't know.

I qualify. It was like, oh, I can take them again. Yeah, well, whatever works. Yeah. But yeah, as soon as I get Lithuania, I don't need a visa. I can just go to Iran. So hoping to go back.

I'm remembering now I met a chicken in East Timor. Nice. You went to East Timor? Yeah. Did you know that East Timor means East? Because the word Timor means East.

So the country is East East East East. Okay, so how was Dili? Dillie was very cool. Some cockfights. Dillie's weird, man. Some cockfights that were like pretty bomb. That was my standout, but also just like the way they go like coffee,

you're like, no, like Timor coffee. Yeah. And you're like, I'm supposed to, okay, I'll have some. Was it Kava? No, it just meant like while growing versus like. powdered have you tried cover in the pacific islands you know what it you have stores all over no no kava is this drink um sorry while we're out can you go to youtube and just type in jubinsky kava

it's it's my whole life is on the internet's crazy so it's made from this like tree roots and they like they get like the sap of the tree and then you drink it's a ceremonial drink but it fucks you up dude it makes your whole face numb it's like it's like you're just yeah um k ava yeah all good So they drink it all across the Pacific. Yeah, that one. So this is me trying it. Like, it's really intense. It's like.

Oh, out of a gourd? Yeah, and it makes, it just like really, yeah, you're tingling and you can't feel your mouth, because that's what it is. So it's, yeah. I'm asking them, how do you, when you smoke weed, is it the same feeling? And he's like, yeah, it's good.

It makes me feel numb. They say you're supposed to get a little high off. Yeah, it definitely makes you high. Yeah, it makes you really lightheaded and super giggly. But it only lasts like 20 minutes. That's good. Yeah. You can like get into that?

Yeah. It's when you're trying to get someone to do mushrooms like how long it lasts like six hours. Yeah. Nah. Yeah. I don't have that on me. Yeah, exactly. So I mean,

so now there's all these cova bars in the US and I'm like, they're like extracting it and making it a powder. But the real cova, they have it in East Timor. That's why I asked you if you tried it. What I had is they were super into their coffee. It was the last one of the last like wild growing, uh, free range coffee. That's what I'll, like, Dutch or Portuguese.

was there was like yeah sure sure and so that but it's also I don't know why it would be expensive but they have so much powder coffee and then so much also Timor coffee right and they took pride in the Timor coffee why did you go to East Timor? I was through Southeast Asia and and ended up there the end yeah started Myanmar ended in East Timor Leicester did you hike Timor Lessee did you hike to Jesus yeah nice in Dili in Daly yeah these guys took me in I went to went to um I took a moped kind of around the cold country nice and uh everywhere I went people like dude you can't you shouldn't be on that you need to have on the

moped that's a city bike yeah and I was like well I'm here bro I'm already way out like it's I know but I'm doing it that's funny yeah everyone's nice I just remember fatham descansa like do you have a place to sleep that's still stuck in my head just get to a place but like fatum Descantza and they go and then you get to ask from there and they go that way then you just find it but and then just like come with me so it seems like both of us have that same drive like that instinct to just go out the middle nowhere meet people and figure it out dude there's nothing else like i have trouble i have trouble expressing it same how how sick it is and it's like through like 150 podcast episodes maybe you can start getting it but really it's it's your nowhere you're

get washing or shower you're kind of laughing but you're already now you're used to it the first day's tough on a trip because you're used to like an American bed and then the second day still by the 10th day you're like it's barely any blood of these sheets that's like not actually that bad yeah i completely agree yeah and it's just like yeah you get that's shit that bedouin whatever it's so cool nomads i guess i don't know if they're better ones or not makes me feel alive man like i i always want to be doing stuff like that Do you ever feel worried that you're like zoifying people? I definitely have a part of me.

He's doing it, but I don't care. There are times where, well, first of all, anytime I film someone, they know I'm filming. Right. So, like, I tell them what I'm doing and I'm holding a camera in their face. And if someone doesn't want to be filmed, I don't film them.

So I brief them. They don't know that it's going on a huge YouTube channel that's going to be viewed by millions of people, but, you know, I'm okay with that. It's hard to explain to these people what YouTube are. How can you even explain to them well YouTube aren't they don't look up your channel well they don't have a phone because people so it's um yeah i'm aware of it and i try to just i'm just trying to share the good

side of humanity so i feel like i'm doing a good deed for society and and i'm just i believe in that it's like you believe in your humor i say why you're moving to london you're like well i'm gonna keep my humor even if they don't agree with it like you think you're doing something that's like making people laugh so you just if i thought i was doing something wrong Or I wouldn't do it, but I just try to believe in my work, essentially. Yeah. But some people do ask me that. They're like, yeah, aren't you like manipulating people or putting people like?

The manipulate, I don't think, put it about at risk. What are you going to say? I don't know. No, I wouldn't worry about that. It's just sometimes in me. I'm like, I wish I was conversing more and viewing people less. It's not like it's a terrible thing, but like, what you mean? It's just like, sometimes it's like, I'm looking at your culture, but somebody's like, hey, I'm a person.

Come party. Come like hang and talk about nothing. Gotcha. And then I'm still like in observing mode. But language is a big barrier. So it's like, I really can't get that close. And also, I don't know how you don't seem like an introvert, but I am. So even if I'm in Chicago or even across town or New York, I'm at a party.

It takes me a while to open up. Yeah. So I'm just kind of observing for a while. But then when you're observing another culture, you're like, I don't know. It's like bad word to it. But I don't, yeah. It's not like it's the negative of like zoification, but it's more like, I wish I could get in there. actually like be hanging.

Sometimes I just have this something in my brain. It's like, okay, just go strike up a conversation. Go do something. What I've realized from traveling is that people are dying to share their culture with you. Why did you do? What did you do that? Oh, I did this thing with my hand and you were like. Illuminati.

He's an Illuminati. Show it. Obviously, he's telling you right now. Yeah, what the fuck is that? Dude, obviously you can't hide this shit anymore. We know who you are. Let me just hold my telegram. People are dying to share their culture with.

you just have to be in a position to let them share their culture with you. They want to meet. They do. In the same way that like if you had a friend of a friend visiting LA or New York, you'd like, yeah, I'll show you a cool bar in town. Like it's the same concept. People want to hang out with you and they want to have a cultural exchange, but oftentimes they're too shy.

Most of the world is shy. I had an Uber driver yesterday and he was like, a good, you know, music okay, whatever, it's like temperature okay. It was like music, I'm like, whatever you want, but he's like, whatever I want. I'm like, yeah, he goes, can't play your Armenian? music? I was like, sure, yeah. Play me some Armenian rapper, and I was like, this is cool. He goes, he's really big. Let me play

another song. And he really did. It was that same thing. He would love to show you. Exactly. But he didn't know that you had interest in it. So he was too shy to play it. He picked the right guy. Yeah, I picked the right fucking guy. So I believe in that a lot. So I just try to have the courage and just, like, what's the worst that happens? They're just like,

they don't want to talk. Okay, cool. Have a good day. Later, bro. That's the worst that happens. No one's aggressive. No one gets in your face. No one's going to punch you. You know, like I've never been robbed, mugged, kidnapped, nothing like that. So funny, I have to explain to people now because in the comedy world, even little trips,

like the South America stuff or whatever, with the people like, what the fuck? You're so foreign to, I'm sure you're friends from high school like that. Yeah. Like, what do you mean you're going to do this? Yeah, you've made a business of us so they probably can understand it.

But like... But still, yeah. But then like, they want to like hear about the dangerous times and I'm just getting to this. Now I'm like, hey, this is going to be clip friendly. It really wasn't thinking. I know you want me to build it to me if I got arrested by Russian troops or something, but like, nah, none of that should happen.

It was almost, it was safer, or about the same safe as New York. The world is mostly really safe. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, let's get back to Iran. Yeah, sure. So the mountains.

Oh, yeah, what was the skiing like? How good was a skiing? I mean, it wasn't like top tier skiing, but I was great. I mean, it was, yeah, it was black diamond. Like, it wasn't like a little bunny slope. Challenging? Yeah, it was challenging. And then I'm also a big golfer.

I grew up playing golf. So, like, after I skied, I just went down to the golf course and played Tehran Country Club. The temperature difference was big enough? Yeah. It's kind of like in California. You can drive two hours inland. Surfing, surf and surfing the whatever. It's actually similar in that regard.

Yeah. Wow. So, yeah, I went, yeah, I skied and played golf in the same day. And, yeah, Iran, like, it's very basic. They don't have, like, glamorous, fancy, like, they have nice restaurants, but it's not, like, what's the most rugged place you've ever been? been you've been in some places yeah like you mean like country yeah I'm now I'm trying to think me trying to explain Iran to you like have been to Turkey apparently just the big city okay

once Iran is like Turkey similar culturally but they just don't like it's just Egypt yeah even Egypt yeah trying to think it's not as chaotic Cairo's insane dude you went to Cairo no it's Geiza and then south I started in Geiza and they just went south they skip Cairo okay good Garo's crazy. Yeah, what's like rugged? I'm trying to think. I mean, I know like, yeah, the Bedouins of Israel. You stayed with them when we were like,

that was like a for hire show of these kids what life was like. Yeah, that's not what you had. Like, there's no tourism in Iran. So that's another thing. Everything is pure, authentic. Even in the markets, you just brought up a really good point. Even in the markets, they don't nickel and dime you.

They don't try to negotiate. They don't. That's not part of the culture. Nothing, man. Well, there's white nickel and diming and there's standard nickel and diamond. Yeah. where they're like, bargaining's part of it.

No, but they didn't have that. No. And the prices are so honest. And it's almost like, I want to give you more for this. Like, this is like, it's super cheap in Iran. It's among the five cheapest countries in the world. If you have, if you have dollars and you convert it, it's like this would be like 10 cents in Iran.

It's like, I want to give you $3 for this just to make you happy. And if you try to give them $3, they will hand you back the money. It's, dude, it's the only place that's like that. It's funny when you go to a market in Latin America and you're like buy some vegetables or whatever. And then at the end, they go, man, here's like the oranges. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like, you're doing well. I don't know.

It takes some extra shit. It's an extra banana. Yeah. But yeah, so markets in Iran, very honest. And other people weren't, like, bargaining also? It's not a bargaining culture. It's not a bargaining culture. Fun fact, they have the best fruit I've ever had in Iran.

Really, really, really good, like, apples, oranges, cantaloupe, plums. They have the climate, like, higher elevation climate to grow it. and they have an abundance of those fruits. So all the markets, strawberries, blueberries. Are they GMOing it or are they? No, they're just growing it, man. Yeah. So, I mean.

So what did you get into? Oh, Persepolis. This is why we brought up the screen in the beginning. Can you just type in Persepolis on Google, please? So this is this beautiful 2000 year, sorry, P-E-R. You're good, honey. P-E-R-S-E. P-O-L-I-S

Lee used to be fat He had fat fingers He's re-learning how to type Go to images Okay So Wow Yeah click

Just click one of those at the top And just you can Scroll right As you make them bigger Yeah That's like Wikipedia So I don't want to like Yeah

So What is the fuck is this? It's just like It's this ancient city That was built 2,000 years ago For like Old Iranian How far is this from Egypt?

This is exactly like Egyptian I know right No one's even heard of this before. It's a UNESCO site. It's not far from Shiraz, the city of Shiraz. It's like a 30-minute drive. Shira's the wine? Yeah, exactly.

Is that where it's from? They make wine and Shiraz. Yeah, exactly what Shiraz is. That's the city in Iran. That's so funny. So this is 30 minutes from Shiraz. So I've been here twice. There's nobody there.

I mean, and the ticket is like, there's a little booths some guy. It's like $1, $2 to enter. Dude, if this was in Italy, it'd be like $100. And there'd be like a line. We have one hour. You'd be like the Vatican. These are all... And you'd have Chinese people blocking the fucking view

with their iPads, taking pictures. Yeah. It's not an outside instrument. A lot of Chinese tour. Take the picture with your phone and put it on your iPad to show. I'm watching the sunset. God. Worst travelers.

Yeah, Chinese are probably the worst. Yeah. They also spit in their bad manners and they just push you around and it's like, hello, I'm a human. Like, say hi or something. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Wait. Oh, got that sidebar. Let's just, in no order, top five worst travelers that you want to run into that you don't. Chinese? Chinese, maybe Indian. It depends. Okay. There's a wide variety of Indians.

We're not talking about the highest level ones. Yeah. We're not talking about the cool ones. Just like, like, if you're like, oh shit. Yeah. You see four of them anywhere. Which one do you avoid most? Yeah.

Chinese, it's funny. I actually avoid Americans when I travel. Yeah, because it takes you out of it. I just think. that, but sometimes they're obnoxious and they don't respect cultures and they're just like, you see this all the time. And they're just like, you're in a quiet space on a metro or in a restaurant. And they're like, oh my God, this morning. And it's like, girl, like, we are allowed. We are allowed people. What's wrong with you? Like, social awareness, we were talking, like,

understand that people are whispering or just not screaming? Why are you being an asshole? Yeah, I don't understand. It's a lot of like, they don't matter, we matter. I'm doing it my way. And I don't like that mentality. Especially in Europe, you see Americans just like trashing places and it's like, okay go out and have fun with your friends but you don't have to be an idiot doing it so okay americans chinese yeah americans chinese where's russian on there um russians really mind to themselves they're they're they're they're i mean in duby they're kind of more flashy and more annoying so in some places those are the rich russians yeah the rich russians yes but regular russian travelers i think that they're fine um i heard hotels won't rent to them in some places because they will

be fighting so they're like it's gonna be an issue it's gonna get broken so we just say we're full I'm trying to think of other Australians go high and low Yeah They go to the utmost high and the utmost lows They'll be most likely to take a blowjob And barf outside like a place that people are at And then the most likely to be like

I don't feel like going out like we're going out Right They are really friendly but they're just very much like In your face like Very just like What's the word I'm thinking of? Like I got red hair right I'll meet an Aussie and they'll be like

Oh you're a Ranga That's what they're word for for ginger. And they're like, you're ginger. I'm like, okay, nice to meet you too. Like, if we're friends, maybe, you could throw that, but like, I don't even know you, bro. So it's like, they're the kind of people that will just like,

a very, um, sarcastic, very sarcastic, extremely sarcastic. Oh, wow. Like you. Yeah. Oh, oh, I had it. Israelis. Oh, definitely the most annoying. My friend, my friend, come here.

They're always bargaining over everything. Yeah. They are, they take this level of, of, of, of comfort to be like, I'll go in the kitchen and make myself something. And they're like, no, no, this isn't like an open kitchen here. This is like only for the staff. And they very, and Israelis will congregate

with other Israelis when they travel and they'll find a Kabad house and they'll eat. And it's like, go out and like see something. You don't have to like hang out with like 10 other Israelis. I found a town on Ahtitlan that was Israeli taken over, like half of it. It was like the border of that's Israeli. That's backpackers.

There's this island of the Philippines called Shiarga, which is a great vacation spot. It's beautiful. It's like very rural. and the Israelis have found it and now they're like making a synagogue and like and all the local there's articles right now and all the locals are like

we don't want them here like they're being super disrespectful and like so yeah Israel so I think we got to five yeah that's good sometimes French like English can be a problem too sometimes yeah it's like French people like they are nice but something they don't show it and sometimes they're just like a little close minded

it's hard to generalize a country of 80 million people but yeah I would say All the French people I ever met were, like, couldn't get over how cheap cigarettes were, wherever we were. And they were just on cloud nine. They do smoke a lot of six. Yeah, and they were like, they're like, nothing here. They smoke a lot of six, but no one smokes more cigs than Russians and Chinese and North Koreans. Russians also have the best stance for a smoke.

Do they? Well, I mean, show me this. Wait, hold on. Oh, the squat? Oh, the Chinese bikini. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, oh, yeah, for sure. Yes, yes.

The squat? The squat. And they just sit there all day. It's hard on my knees right now. Yeah. It's just a standard. Yeah. I love that, dude.

All right. Yeah. Back to Persepolis. I mean, I don't know. What do you want to talk about? I could talk about anything, bro. Just kind of everything you saw there and the people you met. That kind of thing, the hanging with the nomads is exactly what I want to hear.

More your trip than like the history of the place. Yeah. Even though it's part of it. Well, it's hard to ignore amazing history when you're traveling. And I always say travel is the best education you can have because it's not like I'm, like, wanting to read about Persepolis when I'm home. Who cares? But when you're there and you're looking at it, you want to know everything about this place.

Can you touch the shit? Yeah, you can touch it. Yeah, you can do whatever. You can take rocks from that. It can do whatever you want. Like, there's no... Who are these people? I don't want to...

Yeah, I don't want to like... I don't know so much about the history, so I can't... No, this podcast is pretty standard, gets it wrong. Okay, cool. Yeah, we're not experts. We're just... I went to house. Two thousand years old built for old Iranian kings

that used to live in the area. used to have huge parties here. They used to host gatherings for other world leaders of old empires. And yeah, I mean, it looks like something you see in Egypt or Greece. And what's amazing is the structures are still standing after all these earthquakes, all these wars. You would think this would be the first place that they would want to, like, destroy. But there's another place. Can you open a...

Can you bring up the map of like the whole Middle East? I want to see where this is, where Iran is, like, in terms of like trade routes of like... Yeah, sure. You spelled that one right, perfect. Middle East. The two Ds was where it was going to get you. If you got over the two Ds, you're fine. So it's going to be in Iran

in that yellow country. So that's the border to the far east. Yeah, and Shiraz, you can see Shiraz. It's in Iran. It's in the southern. Is that city. So the Persepolis is right near Shiraz. Were they at all, the ones

to people you met, were they at all, like, taken with Afghanistan? What do you mean taken? Like mentally taken. with Afghanistan. Because they were at war for forever. They were at war. I think there's not a huge conflict now.

Was there Iran and Iraq? Well, all. Iran and Iraq and Iran and Afghanistan. Iran and Afghanistan speak the same language, Farsi. Iran and Iraq speak different language. But there's been many wars between these two countries. They're all brothers.

I mean, it's when you talk to people face to face, they're like, yeah, like they'll make a joke about Iraq. Like, no, that's our land or in Afghanistan. Like, no, they speak our language. Like, it's a Persian empire. But I don't think they're not. so nationalistic where they're like no like Afghanistan is ours like we own that they're they don't have that they don't that's not the sense um I'm gonna show you two really other cool

sites like Persepolis it's gonna blow your mind so go open up a new tab type in Palmyra Syria P-A-L-Y-M-R-A wait before you type it in so here's what I know about it yeah there is in Edinburgh when we do the festival there there's a place called Palmyra yeah that's Syria and it's a late-night place yeah and we'd all go get drunk there And then someone who was like, they destroyed this place. Yeah, that's, they destroyed that, but ISIS destroyed it. So this place is insane. I was here recently.

It's crazy, dude. It's like, yeah, ISIS came in in 2015, 16, and 17. And if you ever, did you watch the videos where they would behead people? I watched one. Yeah. So those beheadings mostly took place in, in Palmyra. What a beautiful place to die. What a very interesting.

Yeah, they were like in the orange uniforms and stuff. Like outside in this? Yeah, no, they would. Right there, like right in the main amphitheater area, they would sit you down and they would behead you. If the videos are still online, you can watch them. I suggest not. That's the one.

I would watch everything back then, and that was the one that got, like when they beheaded that journalist. Yeah. And it was wearing an orange out there. And it was like, you watch it once, and they're like, oh, there it is. Right in my stomach.

Yeah. I know. It wasn't fast enough the beheadings. No, if it was just chop and roll, like we thought up when we were little, it'd be like, fine. It was like, ow! And they just kept like slicing out it.

That's tough. So there's that. And there's one more I want to show you. Type in one more tab. S-H-I-B-A-M. And they destroyed Palmyra. What do you mean? They just like went in and bombed the shit of it?

For what? Just to have pride. Yeah, this is 2,000 years old. Yeah, it's Shibam Yemen. Let me just show you this one more. So this is called the Manhattan of the desert. 15th century. They built skyscrapers made out of mud bricks.

So there's 15 to 20 floor skyscrapers in the moscrapers. in the middle of the Yemeni desert. It's been around for six, seven hundred years. How did they do it? They just built one floor at a time. They built it with mud bricks, bro. Is that air conditioning in one?

I don't know if there's AC. I didn't see that. But this is in mainland Yemen, and it's really hard to access. And the checkpoint, the checkpoint that we were at, we only had 10 minutes here because they were like, the checkpoint just got bombed that we went through. We need to get out of here right away. So we had to go out a different, a different.

But yeah, so my point is, like, traveling like you find places like this that you never knew of and they're freaking amazing and like wow like could you and so yeah it dude it's it's just insane did your chick you went with your chick and not not in Yemen not in Yemen but in Iran in Iran yes did she have to cover up she had to cover up always always yep was there even like if you went on a hike the one lady oh I was gonna say in East team where I met a lady who had been there to Swedish girls like a really you know a better travel than me And she was like, oh, only the big towns.

You got to cover up when you're hiking, you're fine. No, if you're in public, you got to cover it. It's funny, like on the flight to Iran from Turkey, no women is covered up. I mean, like none. It's just like a flight you take here. The moment that plane lands in Tehran, oh, scarf's on. Is that Qatar Airlines when they're like, let's scarf up.

We're about to land. I have a vivid memory, bro. I have a vivid memory, bro. We're out of airspace. It's like, boom, yes. I have a vivid memory of arriving in Iran the first time and just seeing all the women scrambling to find their scarves in there in the bags and here. And like, because they have to put it on.

And the plane is mostly women. I mean, there's a lot of women there. So, and then, yeah, it's so messed up, dude. It's the only country in the world where it's mandatory for women to, not even Saudi, not even Syria, not even Afghanistan. It's mandatory for women by law to cover the hair in public. It's the only country in the world. Iran. What were the toilet situation?

I love the toilet question. Ooh, toilet toilets. In Iran. Um, a lot of holes in the ground, like literal holes. Literal holes. In the countryside, literally like... Not even like, holed with porcelain. Like, no door.

No door to opening clothes, but there'll be like a structure for a bathroom, like at a gas station or at a restaurant. And it's like the size of a golf hole in the ground. And there's like shit like all over next to it and stuff. Because yeah, you make it too small. People are going to miss. I prefer, this is a hot take. I prefer never to use a toilet in a country like that and I will always go outside. Hold it? No, I'll just go outside.

But like find a bush. Oh, why? Because it's more enjoyable. And I don't have to be stepping on human feces when I go. I was in Patagonia and I was like traveling by a camper van. And so you get to some places that are just like that but like not even nomads. It is nice to shit out there. You just go behind a bush.

Yeah, it's great. Take your shit. Just don't let the toilet people run away. You got to take a rock and put it down. Nothing like a good nature poop. Oh, seriously. It's the best. I mean, that's what he's.

Humans did until... And then you're, like, looking out as you're shitting and just kind of, like, staring at everything. It's great. It's really great, because you don't get it that much. And you do it in the city, people look at you weird. Yeah, right. This random thing just popped in my head.

My first time in India on that backpacking trip when I got on the bus crash on that trip, I remember the first time I ever saw a guy openly pooping totally middle of the day, 2 p.m. And he was pooping on the edge of this, like, lake, right? It's kind of like a longer lake. and he was pooping in the lake, okay, on the edge of the lake.

And then on the other, and on the other edge of the lake, which is in vision, there's kids swimming in the water and a guy fishing in the same lake that a guy was pooping in. And I remember, so I was 23 years old

and I was like, okay, the world is not like it is in Arizona where I grew up. Yeah, right, right, right. That is a sign of like, I didn't even consider that not everybody shoots this way. You don't know until you see,

right? Like, you know, like, you've probably seen stuff like that too, but some things I just stick with you and you're like wow that I can't believe that that's happening does any part of you want to like like if you see I don't know like okay okay in New York I saw somebody we had a bunch of like outdoor seating for a while it might be gone now but because of COVID and then it was like late night in the East Village and someone was going into one that they'd taken the chairs that I went to pee it and I was like I was like dude there's a park across the street

don't piss in this fucking structure they're going to be eating in he's like I wasn't I was just like, no, you were, dude, but there's fucking bush is there. Yeah, yeah. I get it. Yeah. I've been drunk in public before, but find a bush. Find a bush.

And, uh, but like that, like, hey, you're doing this wrong. When I go to another place, I'm like, you actually might be doing it right. I don't know. Part of me goes, don't, but then another part of me is like, maybe I don't.

It's kind of situational in modern day life. And go back a few hundred years, like, there were no toilets, bro. There were no toilets. Well, there was probably something to do your business in, but not like a flushable, nice toilet with with a nice water system

yeah so I had the toilet situation I mean I've had so I mean the worst is I've had food poisoning about 30 to 40 times like pretty bad so the worst is when you're you're shitting your brains out like constantly throughout the day and then you're on a real you're on this road trip

on long dirt roads and then you have to just continuously stop and that's the worst because it's like 10 times a day and it keeps going you're like I it's Ethiopia, it comes to mind. There's been some times there where it's like, I'm like, driver, like, I got to stop.

Like, and then eventually he just, I was like, stop. Like, he could go, no, no, five minutes. There's a town. I'm like, I don't got five minutes, bro. I got five seconds. Like, you got to stop. And so then he starts laughing and I'm just like. I love that when it's like rocking a hard place or like

immovable force and whatever they're called. And then you're like, no, I get that we're going to that town, but I have a Jewish bladder. Yeah, exactly. Obviously, I shouldn't have to make the whole bus stop again, but I'm gonna piss my pants. Yeah. Yeah, the Ashkenazi bladders system is a real thing, yeah. I was somewhere where they were like in Brazil and they were just like,

I was like, hey, the door's not open. It's just, don't shit in there. I'm like, dude, you cannot lock the bathroom door on an overnight bus. That's crazy. I know I'm not the wrong one here. You don't just bring a bottle and pee in the bottle? I'm stuff around people. People are sleeping on a bus.

Listen, if I could tell you I haven't done it, I'd be lying. By the way, pause for one second. Is everything going great? I mean, yeah, cool. I think this is awesome. I know you wanted to like dig deeper into Iran, but we're kind of going everywhere, but. It's like this and then.

Are you cool? Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah. Just wanted to make sure. Okay, so I had this travel. Yeah. I did Rolf Potts's podcast in Paris. Like this writing class. Nice.

And then we start to, we've been friends for a while. And, and it's, he used it as a writing exercise now. Like he was like one time in I don't know this I took it in London I took a train you know up to Leeds and did that I'm like oh yeah dude one time in Cairo I took a train Um at overnight train it was like the windows were so dirty you couldn't see out and he goes oh bro I went to Cairo or Egypt and and I did this and I met a woman like dude I met a woman in something it just like reminds you of other things Yeah exactly yeah you just spiral out from there that's kind of what's happening right now yeah actually yeah I'm reminded of things and experiences that I've had so much in the last 15 years, so many things and so much stimulation and sometimes I just slips my mind. Do you ever feel like you're not slowing down enough to enjoy a place or you're just checking off a list? A few countries, I feel like I went fast. Like in West Africa, we road trip

from me and my buddy of mine from Nigeria to Senegal and all those small countries. There's like 12 countries in there and we kind of just did like one or two days, but there's not a lot of events happening in those places is so that we got stuck in a coup in guinea that wasn't that wasn't fun all these police came out with shields and like freaking helmets on and we're like what is going on and they're like get out of here so that was in guinea oh yeah so we started in Nigeria and yeah we just went through all those little countries I've since been back to most of these countries more than once uh the coup was in in in in Guinea um but I could tell you something guinea and guinea basau are not the most enjoyable countries to visit I did so I was scamming on the border of

Liberia and Sierra Leone. This is a great story. I exited Liberia, no problem. Okay. Get into Sierra Leone immigration. And before we got to the passport check, these two guys in police uniforms, in police uniforms, grab us and go, you got to come down here first before you go to the immigration checkpoint. Okay. They take us in a room about this size. And we sit down and they go, give me a yellow fever vaccine. We go, okay, yellow fever, which is mandatory. And they say, give me your cholera vaccine. Color is like a water bacteria disease that you can get. They go, give me it. Show me. be a cholera vaccine. We go, we don't need a cholera vaccine to enter Sierra Leone. They had

printed out on the wall, like in really bad, in bad writing. They printed out, like, must have cholera vaccine to enter Sierra Leone. And it was clearly, we were getting scammed. And me and my buddy were like, what do we do? The guy goes, we need $500 each for you to enter Sierra Leone.

We cannot enter unless he's... First of all, even if I did need a cholera vaccine, the $500 would not stop me from getting cholera. It has nothing to do with what you're talking. Good point. Yeah, so they demand 500 bucks each and we go absolutely not. Then the officer And you're rocking a hard place. You're Jew and a fucking shakedown. It's going to be a fucking battle royal. And then aggressively the officer takes out, opens a drawer, takes out a freaking syringe and flicks it. And I remember when he flicked it, I remember seeing the water droplets flying off of the syringe. And he goes, give me your arm. As if he was going to inject me with something, some vaccine that I needed. And it was his way. He knew we were going to say no, but it was his way. He knew we were going to say no, but it was his. his way of being like trying to get more money.

So long story short, we ended up getting him down to $300 each. So we both paid $300. Then after we paid, he worked with the immigration officer. He walked us, he after, those guys walked us to get our passport stamped. And they said, have a good time in Sierra Leone. That happened. So those guys, I'm trying to wrap my head around it. Yeah, bro.

If you're the immigration, those guys are like, hey, I'm going to shake down people. They work together. Don't stop me and goes, well, you got to cut me. Yeah, absolutely. All right. So you do, I'm not going to. shaking down. You're really good at shaking down. Yep. So you shake down, give me my

100, you keep whatever extra. Yep. And then tell me who's good. Absolutely. I had a hidden camera. It's on YouTube. I was filming this whole thing and then I posted that thing. Yeah, go to YouTube and type in Drew Binski, Sierra Leone. And then I made a video about these three scammers, three guys scammers. And then I got an email from the government the next morning and said, hey, we've gone down and arrested these guys in there in prison because we don't want

tourism to be scared to enter. We don't want any bribery happening or anybody getting scammed. Do you think they did? Check this out. Yeah, I think so, yeah, click that one. And they spoke French? That's me and my buddy. Just skip, skip forward.

What a dork, nice shirt. I know, brother. This classic white man in Africa shirt. Is that our gosh thing? Wait, so we're telling the story as I'm showing footage. So yeah, you can kind of cut through, kind of, that was our driver. I think I had a hidden camera. Keep going.

Yeah. But you can't see the, we were just telling the story here of what happened. but I thought I was filming the guy at some point. Anyways, maybe it's the other one. Maybe it's the other one, yeah. These scammers are arrested. Yeah, I made another video talking about how the scammers got arrested. I will tell you, we used to get here when I worked for the comedy store, worked, worked.

We would get complaint letters. This was like 99, 2000, about Paul Mooney. And they said we were offended. He was like really racist. He is, but it's so funny. And then I was like, what am I supposed to do? She goes, call those people. tell them, they left him, tell them

that we're giving you two free tickets to a show and we're gonna ban that guy that was so racist for a month. And I was like, you're banning Mooney? She goes, no, no. Call those people and tell them that Paul Mooney is banned. Then call Paul Mooney and read him

the letter because he loves hearing these and tell him, here's his spots for the week. So I wonder if they were like, we arrested them and they're just like, there, just tell this guy. Yeah, I actually don't know everything that happened. And I also don't know why the footage is not showing, but I think maybe I didn't get enough footage.

You're a shill for the Sierra Leone's. But, you know, also like, I don't know, man. Like, there's not many tourists enter. This is what the roads look like, bro. Can you imagine that? I mean, Timor was bad. Yeah. There's not many tours entering these borders.

So put him, oh, go back to that. That's a shot. See, I had a hit, I put my GoPro on the desk and he didn't see it. And so I was filming it. I blurred his face. But this is him interrogating us and saying, like, you need to get this vaccine to enter and we're like bro we don't need this vaccine how young you look there do i look younger shit yeah it was like eight years ago nine years ago it's a big difference

wow so are there places in in iran that you're like i didn't get to go there i would have loved to yeah mashad uh if you pull up the map of iran it's in northeast there's a huge pilgrimage happening it's near turkmenistan border northeast um mashad yeah there's like a huge mosque and a big It's one of the biggest pilgrimages in the world where people walk for days to enter during this time of the year. It's really wholly traditional city for Shia Islam. Islam has Sunni and Shia. Oh, yeah, we got to get to that. Yeah.

So Iran is Shia and Iraq is Shia, but almost all other Muslim countries are Sunni. They're two different branches of Islam and Iran is very Shia. And so this is a very important site for Shia Islam. I have a relative who was a captain in the army at the time. and his job was a set of provisional government in, I believe, Iraq. Could have been Afghanistan. It doesn't really matter for the story.

But he had to, they spent a year negotiating on what percentages of the Congress should be Muslim, Sunni, Shia, and maybe one other, I don't know. And after a year of negotiations, they figure out the right percentages. Like, okay, fine. Are we good?

He was so frustrated. And he was, like, leaving his posts you know in another two weeks or three weeks and they go uh yeah sure it goes great tomorrow we'll meet we'll have our first session and they're like i'm not sitting in a room with a sunni and he goes oh fuck and then it was like square one that's pretty funny yeah um so did it change from region to region in iran or they all kind of a thing they're mostly shia um there's a small amount of of sunni in iran but no they are they persecuted so. I know that Baha'i, Baha'i is a religion. It started in Iran. Have you heard of the Baha'i Faye?

I thought it started in Hifa. No, it started in Iran. 100% started around. There's a Baha'i temple in Hifa. Okay. Yeah. That's what Rain Wilson is. Yeah, yeah. I met him through a Baha'i video I did. So Baha'i faith started in Iran, but Baha'i is persecuted and they're not able to be Baha'i in public and all the Baha'i temples. There's still a lot of Baha'i there, but they're all in households. And if you're openly a Baha'i in Iran, they could take you in prison and... Wow. So they're okay with Jews. Yeah. Not Baha'i.

Yeah. Isn't that crazy? I think Baha'i is one of the most interesting religions. It's super interesting. They believe in all religions and they think they were all one. I think it's beautiful, actually. Yeah, I mean, that's nerdy enough to, like, beat that motherfucker up. That guy ain't fighting back.

Right. No, Baha'i's face is super interesting. From what I understand it, it was just like, what is similar between many, there's, like, certain ones that are just one religion, and that might have been, like, man, like, obfuscating the Word of God over, like, playing a telephone game. Yes. seven hundred years like Moses Muhammad Jesus Buddha like all these are like real people like it's like a lineage that all led to the one one human race basically and also all religions are

kind of similar they all tell you to do good for society honor your father mother yeah pretty much everyone yeah so they go that's a real one then yes um don't mix linen and cottons like that's just jews that might have been a fuck up let's ignore that one um don't kill don't kill don't steal so like Those are probably straight word of God. Yeah. Be a good person. Yeah, no fish for 40 days. Like, that's just Christians.

That's probably not, or whatever. I don't know, whatever they do in Lent. It's dumb. They give up something. Yeah. I don't know what they give up. They'll stop gambling. They choose what they give up.

Daytimes for three weeks. Yeah, so all these religions are connected. And I'm not that religious, but I do think it's cool that. What was the get-around system? Did you just use cars with guides? Or were there buses? First trip took a bus. The next three trips, I just was in a car with my local friend.

Just me. And I mean, the guy that you saw on the video, he's my good friend and tour guide. And we just got in like a shitty Toyota Corolla and just drove around. Could you get weed there? I didn't try, but I got hashed in Afghanistan. It's pretty good. You could get weed everywhere. Like every single country in the world, even in like Singapore where when you enter the country,

you sign a paper that says if you're caught with any drugs, you will be killed by death penalty. Have you been to Singapore? No. When you enter and you sign that paper, it's like any drug use, because they, enforced by death penalty but dude people are there's drugs everywhere there's there's weed everywhere everywhere yeah no one really cares i mean it's like it's like it's like a shakedown offense in a lot of places we're like we don't give a shit but we can get a hundred bucks out of you yeah true so it's like broken tail have you ever given bribes um south america i've done it in north america

interesting you want to get in the front of the line somewhere it goes a long way I'm a little embarrassed, but if I'm with somebody, I'm like, I will give the 20 bucks if you give it to that guy and ask. What about with like police officers or government officials? In Ecuador, we got shaken down because it was like, I didn't, I'm not ready a lot, but then it was like some cop, just a checkpoint. And it was like, whoa, your license is, you're only supposed to be over three months. You're four. And I was like, no, I know. I went back to the consulate because it's COVID. We renewed. Here's our paperwork. And they go, mm, it's not good. And it's like. And they'll hold you. Yeah, they keep holding.

Yeah. That's when I played dumb American. I just keep going. Like, I understand. I went to the consulate. They go, no, it's only three months. I'm like, no, no, they said six months. And then I'm also like, my Spanish wasn't perfect.

So then it was like, eventually was like, get out of here. He didn't, he didn't take money. He wanted it. Well, the thing is like, they have all day to sit there and talk and you don't. You got place to be. So a lot of times when that happens to me in Africa, if we get pulled over, just giving some money. In Thailand, it was like went the wrong way on a mop.

But it was like, pull out of a place like oh it's wrong way then immediately turn around i mean within like 10 feet that's enough he goes all right you can go get a ticket or you can give me whatever 100 bot right now and i'll just handle it for you 100 bots like three dollars yeah yeah and it is that thing of like no do not get over on me yeah but also just do it one time i was in afghanistan with my guide nur and we were on the freeway and it was just me and him driving he hit a dog cross the freeway a big dog like like a big dog up to my waist we killed the dog sadly dog flew like flew into the bushes and and we were like really shaken up and we couldn't believe that he just killed the dog and we were

really sad they fucked up the bumper so the bumper of the car was like down and it wasn't dragging on the street but it was almost dragging on the street so we get to it there's checkpoints every 20 minutes in you in afghanistan there's like a checkpoint Taliban checkpoint or just a checkpoint we get to the checkpoint and immediately they take my they take my password they take my guide in the back room I'm sitting in the car so then my guy guide comes to me, his name's Noor, he goes, they're accusing us of killing someone like a hit and run. They wanted, it was like a bribery situation. They're like, they're accusing us of killing someone. Why? Like, because he said, why didn't you fix your car? The car's on that stuff. Why would you be

driving like this? You would have taken it to a shop to fix it. And they didn't believe that we had killed a dog. And so we're held at this checkpoint for two. Like, who's even dead though, bro? They're just making up stuff. And so we're told it. And also, I'm American and they're like, oh, like, why is he here? And like the raised question. So, what country's is? Afghanistan. Okay. So I'm stuck in this car for like an hour and a half. with my phone not working, me literally shaking, like don't know what to do. My passport is not with me,

which is basically my whole identity. I'm sure you know, when someone, how has your passport? You're like, give me the passport. The only thing that you can't lose. Take everything. You can recover if they get your wallet. Anything, anything.

Phone, bro, figure it out. Passport is like, yeah. So they have my passport hour and a half and like my guide noor is on the phone with all of his contacts, he knows the police. And eventually he ended up paying something and they let us go. but that hour and a half,

I, like, I was so scared, man. And I couldn't leave the car. I couldn't just, like, go, I couldn't even take a piss. They were, like, look, there were eagle eye hawking. Like, who is this guy in the car? What are you guys doing?

And I had no context. And I, like, every, like, 20 minutes, he would come and be like, okay, I'm working on it. Like, they think that. And I'm worried that, like, they're just going to be like, no, we're taking this guy.

Like, you guys are, we're skeptical of what you're doing and I'm taking you to prison. Like, they can do whatever they want. Kidnapping is my biggest fear. straight up like anything can happen you can like but kidnapping is would be the would be the worst case scenario have you heard of anyone getting kidnapped yeah like like not heard of news story but i mean like heard of someone who's yeah my guide in haiti uh his name was

sean he's a Haitian guy he took me in the the biggest gang in in pota prince which i did a story it's one of my most viral videos on youtube crazy crazy crazy like unbelievable scary place yeah tabin droubinsky Haiti are you okay go ahead and then he ended up getting kidnapped a few months later with another YouTuber who I know where that video I spent a day in Haiti's Most Dangerous Islam. This video is insane. You can just click around. So they got kidnapped. Yeah, it's crazy. They got kidnapped for like a few weeks and they had pay a ransom to get out. But that's, that's Sean. So he's a great guy speaks English. It's a French speaking English. He got kidnapped? Yeah, he got kidnapped with another YouTuber. Someone just like me who went to Haiti. His name is

Arab. That's his actual channel name. He's a Lebanese-American guy. Okay. Cool guy. I mean, he makes cool stories, but, um, so yeah. Are you seeking out danger in these places? Are you trying to avoid? I try to, I try to go places that are scary and just try to find like, what's actually happening

here. Like, no one knows, like, there's 20,000 people living in this community and like, not a single person knows what's happening. So I try to, like, if you scroll through, like, this, if you ever want to see me, like, really scared, this is like, this is probably the experience. But, I mean, there's people living their life like this. Like, I'm just like, what's going on? like how like i'm just in

dolchen gabana i'm really curious stylish george and guvana i'm just yeah i went inside this lady's house go back a little bit her house is covered in water because it was just a flood yeah look um no that's not this woman's house anyways this is another woman but i i'm just really curious and i try to share the good the good side of humanity

even if it's in this like scary dangerous bombs kidnap if that's all happening on the outside but what is who's living here and like what's actually happening here and that's i like to be the messenger to go find those stories that's what it comes down to um okay well unless there's anything more in iran that you can remember of like interesting stuff because those were all very interesting um iran okay so yeah i missed i miss this whole thing so my most recent trip my most recent trip to iran which was a year ago i started in shiraz and then i road tripped do they have the wine there they still have the wine but it's illegal it's but they still do it

underground. Okay. Yeah, there's a big, a lot of grapes in Shiraz. I started in Shiraz, and I road tripped all the way west, all the way along the border of Iraq, all the way up. So this is, it's Kurdish. So the Kurds are the world's largest ethnic group without a country. There's 40 million Kurds.

They don't have their own country. They're split between Iran. 40 million. 40 million. Iran, Iraq, Syria, Syria, and Turkey. And so they, they- Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Turkey. Yeah, there's 40 million Kurds.

They don't have their own country. but in Iran, so I went through all these Kurdish villages and they have their own language, they have their own customs, they have their own traditions, they're like a different ethnic group. Yeah, pretty cool, right? And so... What do they do different? What do they do different? I mean, they're left similar lives to other people in Iran. They dress differently. They have these, like, the men have these big, it looks like a robe that they wear with a big, like, belt and they wear these little different hats and they, but they're

still like Shia Muslims, like it's, they don't have different religion, but, um, Is it ethnic? They're a different ethnic group. Oh, okay. Yeah, yeah. They're called Kurdish, yeah. I'm sure you've heard of them before. Yeah, for sure.

Yeah, for sure. Yeah, I mean, yeah. Kurdistan. Yeah, what is Kurdistan? Kurdistan is this de facto state. Like, press that, yes, that's Kurdistan. So it spreads between Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Turkey, and a little bit of Armenia. So that's where the Kurds live.

So if there was like a natural, actual border, that would be a country. Yes. Yes. Like, in those, in that border are all Kurds. Like 90-something percent Kurds living there. 40 million people. That's a lot of people. And Turkey doesn't want to give up that land. Armenia doesn't want to give up the bottom part.

Iran doesn't want to give us that. Exactly. All the countries are like, no, we want this to be ours. Like, we don't want to give you all those natural resources and all that land. So Turkey and the Kurds have the biggest conflict. Iraq. Iraq is the most lenient. Whereas the Iraqi government, they recognize Iraqi Kurdistan. And Iraqi Kurdistan has their own flag and their own currency and stuff.

But in Turkey, like, no, like you cannot say that you have like Kurdish Kurdistan because they'll want to kill you. So I road triped all of that Iran, all that red orange in Iran, and it was so beautiful. I met the world shortest man. He has a Guinness Book of World Records certificate. He's a Kurdish. I went to his house. Yeah, I made a video about his life. He's a...

How tall was he? He's less than two feet tall. Look up. Yeah, he's 26 years old. I was thinking like five one. Type in world shortest man, Iran. I broke the story. I broke the story international and like, yeah, that's him.

Yep. That's my video. All that's my video that they're clipping. Look at him in his little suit. Yeah, I took him to go to a suit shopper, whatever it's called, people that make suits. And I took him to get in haircut. He's the cutest.

Is this an adult? Yeah, he's 26. Yeah, he also has the world's smallest hands. He's sitting on a watermelon. Oh, you'll like this story. I'm sorry to keep referencing my channel, but it just makes sense. Yeah, you have the videos of it. Yeah.

Go to just type in Rubinski's shortest man because I went to his house and another story of like his family just. You drowned in a toilet? No, they're so amazingly nice, man. What's he got? A day in the life of the world shortest man. So that's him. He's the cutest kid ever. Like, he's...

He's got wrinkles. How old is he? He's 26, I think. And he knows his value to the world. He knows why he's... Like, he doesn't... Oh, that's tough, dude. So it's hard for him to walk.

He has a good cognitive ability. He's smart. He's praising in the mosque. I'm going to look at a haircut there. that's where I got him to get his suit. So he does not mind you measuring people measuring him. No, he's proud of it. Like he's got two Guinness World Records

and we're in the middle of Iran. But once again, went to his family's house. If you scroll through, they cook me an amazing dinner. I think that was towards the end. And just like, unannounced.

There's no other country where you would just show up unannounced and they will just like roll out the red carpet for you, except for your, this isn't a restaurant. If you keep going later, it's something.

But yeah, that's his father. It's funny. He has siblings and stuff and they're both, they're all like normal size. and he just got this really rare disease. Yeah, what is it? I don't know.

It's like a one in billion disease. He just looks like a kid. Keep going to the right? Yeah, this is the dinner scene where his parents were like out all night cooking for it. I didn't even know they were cooking for us. We were out shooting and then we came home. That's the world's shortest woman who I also met

and he knows her too. So we sent a selfie to her. Is he trying to, is they trying to smash? I'm trying to set them up. I thought about making another video called I set up the world's shortest people. So yeah, his family, like, made this whole meal for us while we were out shooting and we got back.

I went back to his house to drop us his mom. I went back to his house to drop him off and say, like, thanks for an amazing day. And I come home to this feast unannounced. Unannounced, man. And they wouldn't take any money. That's his father. Because, like, if you pay him, we're like, we're not working. They're so offended if you pay them.

They're so offended. No other place I'm telling you, man. Like, I mean, people are nice. Like, if you went into the countryside of kids. Kentucky. I'm sure people would be like, hey, come on in. Like, we're having like a little like mashed potatoes and like they'd probably invite you to dinner, right? But these people went out of their way to go shopping to go buy ingredients to put on this huge thing for a stranger, basically. So yeah, I mean. I mean, paying them too is like if somebody's like, I'll get your drink and they're like here, take five dollars. Like, yeah, it's all I got this round. And like, come on take it. You're like, dude, stop. Yeah. Get around. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, but on a much higher level. Yeah, man. So Iran is. Is he trying to bang that? chick I would I think that I'm gonna set them up yeah I'm actually he's gonna I'm working on it yeah I'm working on it seriously I want to I want to like find a meeting

place she lives in India and he lives in Iran so Turkey could be like that they're right middle country and like just get them there and then just kind of spend a couple days with them and then just be like enjoy I want yeah you want them to hit it off I wonder what if she was like matters were awful they would have to have to have the smallest kids in the world. One would think. They'd lose their record. Do you have smaller kids or taller kids?

How are you three feet tall? Like, I know, my dad was, my dad was two six. I'm way bigger. But I think you're starting to see the thread line of Iran is like anywhere you go. They're very nice. They're so nice. And like, it pains me that, yes, there's war. And you can think whatever you want about that.

But people just had this negative stereotype about Iran. They're like, oh, Iran, dangerous. I would never go there, like the people, whatever. They're all, oh, I know an Iranian-American, he's nice, but he's American-ice. Like, people in Iran are, no, like, Iran is beautiful, and, like, it's, I can't wait to go back. Yeah. Did you have, like, Kibbe and stuff like that? Kibbe is great.

Is that big there? It's, like, all the Middle Eastern standards? Yep, all the mainstream standards. They have the best, like, cababs. Yeah, saffron. They have a lot of kebabs. They'll come out on, like, sometimes it comes on literally a sword, like, a pointed tip. And it's, like, the freshest meat that you've ever seen.

A lot of rice, a lot of, like, the way they cook their tomatoes. It's the same in, you'll find in like the middle. It's Middle Eastern food. But yeah, they got a lot of good Iranian restaurants. See, that's the tomatoes, how they cook them. That's the standard kebab right there. Wait, stop.

Don't move off that for a second. That looks so good. I'm so hungry right now. That looks so good. I might have a little bit of time if you want to get some food out to this. Yeah, I'm down. Yeah, so.

Yeah, let's see if there's a Persian place. Oh, that's the other thing I heard. Persia, but I just thought that was a new way to say Iran. And then somebody was like, it's actually not just Iran. It's like a couple multi-countries And it's not all of Iran Yeah, so I don't know the exact answer

But I know that some Iranians Like to be called Iranians And some Iranians like to be called Persians So let's see, Persians It's for, wait Wait, go back to the This is all Persia No, that's the Persian Empire

Which was huge. Wait, go back to what, what is, okay, hold on there Persia is historical Western name For the region course, Modern Day Iran, okay. Centered in the Southwood. Iran officially adopted his native name in 1935. So they're kind of interchangeable,

but if you talk to Iranians that are very passionate about it, they'll... Persepolis was the capital. Yeah, there we go. Persepolis, yeah. Oh, Zoroastrianism, that's interesting. That's a religion. Freddie Mercury was Zoroastrian.

It's, they have this, like, burning fire temple, the fire never goes out. It's an Iranian religion, and it's still popular. Zoroastrianism, yeah. What the fuck is that? It's a dying religion, but it was born in Iran. I'm telling you, I went to the original fire temple of where it, the fires, the fire hasn't gone out in like thousands of years.

Really? Like, literally, yeah. It's a, I mean, Freddie Mercury was like always talking about Zoroastrianism. Yeah, that's, I mean, that's maybe one of the fire temples they have. Did they worship fire? Honestly, dude, I can't even tell you how to explain it. Yeah, yeah. It's a thriving religion in Iran.

4,000 years of faith, fire, see fire in the battle between good and evil. It's crazy, man. There's a weird element, fire where it's like not there. Yeah, right. But then it gets going and it's on. Also, all humans have primitive instincts to fire. Like, whenever you sit around a campfire,

everybody just locks in. And they just stare at the fire. And it's crazy. Like, all of us, like, fire has been, all humans have had fires, like, to cook food. Stare at it. Not even casual. You just like not, like everyone in the circle will just be like staring at it.

And it's like a weird subconscious, subconscious thing with fire. Yeah, Zoroastrianism is really interesting. Wow. The worshiping with it right there. That's. Yeah, dude, they love fire. They're all about the fire. That seems like an Indiana Jones kind of thing.

Kind of, yeah. Yeah, when I was doing like ayahuasca, there was like, fire's going to be key here. Let it, like keep staring into it. We'll keep throwing shit in there. Too scared to do that, man. I've tried a lot of drugs, but Zoroastrian, I mean, Zoroastrian, but ayahuasca, like, you did you reset you for like a week or like three days? I reset you for quite some time.

Are you still reset? Yeah. You just change. You think you're different now than you were before? Okay, well there's like a reset of like, okay, I feel clean or whatever. And it's like just like mushrooms like feel good for like a while and it slowly kind of goes away. And then this one's like that but then also just like a shift change. You know, like if you lost your arm, you'd be like, all right, that's not coming back.

And you still feel that shift change. It's not so much feeling it. It's just like, there's just like you're a little different. Like the people that got their rods through the brain and it came out, but they lived. And now they're like weirdly like, you know, they're just like different person. How many days were you high for? Just one, but they say it keeps working on you for eight. They said you should, if you want like.

Do the full cycle. If you have four days in a row. But they didn't hit me with that until after I woke up on day two. And I was like, no, no. You would have had to tell me. I'm already so worn out. And you remember everything of what happened? Yeah.

I mostly usually just be sitting there, puking. Yeah. Everybody pukes, right? Yeah. You can't not puke. You can't not puke. And honestly, I was like not puking. There was another person there.

They were puking way fast. And I was kind of like just had like a mushroomy trip for a bit. And then I was like, oh, starting to get nauseous. But like an hour and a half in. And then I was like, trying not to barf. And then I was like, oh, maybe I should barf. Maybe this is like. That's what you're supposed to do?

I guess so. My theory, I don't know, is just like, once you cleanse, then the shit works. So you barfed and then I barfed. And then I was like, boom. And how does it hit you different than mushroom? trip it starts there and then you're it's much more like oh you're kind of not here for a bit you know like you're just thoughts are there and your body doesn't even kind of matter and then and then with the waves of mushroom you know waves go up and then down and back up I think I'm done you're like no

no are they positive thoughts mostly or is they scary negative thoughts all of them sad thoughts scary clear thoughts I think it takes you where it wants to take you so it's up to it or what's inside you that you need to deal with so he was telling us about one guy that had gone there and it was a it was a Sakaria and he was he was realized what he did for a living was take lives and and he just was screaming and he was punching the ground so he said he just kept punching the ground it was what the fuck what am i what have i done like it hit like you know you internalize something for the first time you're like I was a bad person so that guy had to face that I didn't have are you in the room with them no okay tell me about another about the

outstanding one are you alone There's one of the person there. It was because it was right after COVID. It could have been 15. Got it. I don't know. Too scared to do that stuff there. Yeah, Shaman beating a little drum to get you focused and then throwing like wax into the fire.

So it makes like sort of shapes. You fall and hallucinate, right? Yeah. Yeah. But yeah. And then you're just seeing like you're looking up at the top of the hut and it's just like that kind of, it's like movie version. That kind of fades away. Now you're looking at the sky and the stars and just beyond.

Did you do it again? I have not. I would. I feel like kind of has to call to you. Yeah. So we've met a guy in somewhere and he was like, I found a good guy. I was like, oh, tell me about it. I did it once badly.

Okay. And then it was like a tourist thing. And then I found this guy. Here? There's Ecuador. They do it here too, but it's better to do it in Ecuador. Yeah. I mean, it was definitely felt more authentic.

Yeah. You know? For sure. Some guys like, I'm not, he did it for like 40 bucks, you know, plus a stipe's steep and breakfast it wasn't even like anything crazy but like yeah but like you're you hear the jungle sounds around you that's so cool and and he's like let me show you where I got the ayahuasca from he's like yeah this was planted by 80 years ago we cut that off just that's your portion that tree was planted 80 years ago yeah

he's like my grandfather planted that right here so you're like we're getting it from right here you're doing it right there you put it in a tea and drink it grind it up in a way um I met somebody else some other shaman who's making the guy who was gonna do it prepare his own ayahuasca. So I think every tribe is different, how they handle it too. Can it kill you? Nothing I know of. I haven't really heard of that even being a possibility.

So bizarre. Yeah, but then they said like, so you're done, he goes, hey, you still can't have sex or drink or eat certain types of meat for the next eight days because he said it's still working in you. You're not tripping out, but it's still doing something to you. So don't fuck with it. Because if you have sex, then it'll never be that good again? Or what?

No, no. That's if you have sex with a black chick. that's crazy man oh no it's because some sort of purity i don't know but he told us about a couple that like were there it's fine and then they were like got whatever they got out of it and then six days out they're like we're far it's over the trip's over yeah let's look we can have sex and then they started fighting and broke up like a month later damn yeah there's a drug called eboga it's in uh west africa i tried it but i didn't take enough to like it

Is there where Ibrahimate's room? It's like ayahuasca. It comes from the root of a tree, and then they just put it in a drink and you drink it. I only took, like, you're supposed to take eight pieces of it. I only took two because I was too scared. I felt like a little bit just like a little high. You got to go. But people, like, to go there to reset.

It's exactly like ayahuasca, but it's only in Gabon, Cameroon, and I think it's in Central African Republic, or it's in like three countries. You never heard of it? I, B-O-G-A. Iboga. Iboga. Yeah, I did a story on it one. time ago and then since then i be oga everyone hits me up and they're like how can i try i boga i'm like i don't know man boga plant there it's it's it's it's yeah how can you it's like yeah evergreen rain first and

it's central yep told you so it's everyone says it's just like iwaska damn um people dude yeah probably this woman that i she's taking it like all the time and she just like lives out in the jungle it's funny too because these aren't like acid was the creation right you know like yeah And figured out what-humans made it. Yeah, Tylenol is a creation. Yeah, right. But then ayahuasca is like, it was just, do it. And so you had to discover.

Yeah, someone just ate it. And it's not just eating it. You know, grind it down, making it much, and then combine it with another plant. So I think what the ayahuasca does is take all their blocks away from you and then a little DMT that's in grass or anything. Interesting. That it hits you better.

But the ayahuasca is like a cleanser. So that's not what's making you. It's just make you, so maybe it's that too. But it's like, but like, Yeah. Was this shit planted everywhere? Yeah. That kind of stuff that needs you.

So this one guy I met was like, in like a lodge in the Amazon, we were like, oh, we can't eat meat. I don't know about pork. And he's like, why? And we're like embarrassed to tell him because I wasn't, I wasn't doing it with him. And I was like, and then eventually it was like, I'm taking eyewasks. Oh, okay, no, you're good on pork. And but he was so casual about it. And it was like, have you done?

He goes, yeah, like seven eight times. 70? Seven or eight. Oh, seven or eight. And like, when? Why? And he goes, no, it's just like... It's normal.

It's normal. It goes, your shaman calls you in. Yeah. He treated it like a principal. That's crazy. Going like, hey, I need to see you tomorrow. It's your time. You're not, I've noticed your grades are slipping, you know, like a principal might.

Like, I want to talk to you one on one. Is everything okay at home? That kind of thing. He goes, you talk to you, tell your mom to stop making beef for you. Wow. And I'll, you know, I'll call you run and say, mom, the shaman told me. It was like, all right. What a different world out there?

It was just like, I need to keep up on you. Yeah, it's just so different. And so he's like, it was so casual as a part of their upbringing. The shaman was like the spirit cop, you know, who could tell you what to do. Okay, so this is what I tell everybody at the end, but this is going to be weird for you. I ask two questions. A travel tip, general or specific, like when going to Gabon, don't pay the fuck it. Serra, don't pay the guy.

Give him a third of what he wants. Or Pack Light is like a big broad one. And also, I ask what place is called? calling you next, but this is a wearer because you've been to all of them. So the travel tip, bring half the clothes and twice the money. And what I mean by that is like, no one cares what you wear, like re-wear shirts. And you can always do laundry. People don't understand.

The whole world does laundry. People do laundry. They hand wash it. There's washing machines. There's laundry mats everywhere. You literally need three shirts, one pair of underwear and like a pair of pants and a pair of shoes. Like, I mean. And you're way down by all of them.

Yeah, dude. Like, who wants to carry with like all of them? these shirts like who cares man so and then the money like you want to have a u.s cash because us cash is king and it's accepted everywhere and if you ever get in a situation where you need to give money if you take out tie bot no one's going to take it so um right and and i usually keep money like in different parts in my bag just in case i get i do that yeah a book another yeah just have have a couple different stats because also like if you are getting let's say someone comes with a gun or and then you open you know if you open up one space they're going to think all your

money's there and so you you need to have other money also like if you lose your credit card or something, you want to have. I always travel with like $2,000 to $5,000 of cash on me just to have it. Wow, you don't think that makes your target? You don't think that makes me a target? Well, now people know I carry that with me. So I never said that publicly. No, I think it's fine.

Like I want to be prepared in case I need to. Yeah, how would they know you have it? Yeah. So it's not, they would have to see it. Yeah. So half the clothes, twice of money. And then a place that's calling me. That's a great freaking question, my man.

Like right now I'm called back to. Southeast Asia and it's been so long it's been calling for like two or three years. Nice. Nice. Nice. Yeah, yeah. Let's talk. I mean, you've been everywhere. I'm happy to give you a lot of advice. I've lived there for many years and I've been to all this countries and many times. What's calling me right now, more China. I did a China trip a couple years ago and I loved it. I was in Western China, but I want to go to Central China. I want to go to Southern. So whenever I look at a map, this is old style map. Yeah. But so you have like, you have like most of the cities. Yeah, on the East Coast.

Right. And then if you look at a map, There's huge dots here. No, dude. It's huge. Like Tibet. Yeah. I want to go to Tibet. I've never been there.

Like that sounds super interesting. I have a calling to those kind of cultures. So, and more central Asia. Like all the stand countries, dude, they're so good. Like Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Kazakhstan. We didn't have a good. You mean like you had good times or just pretty? They're clean, safe, cheap, nice people, amazing food, nature, unbelievable.

Good, like, so it's everything you possibly want, basically. No tourists. Do you Bing everywhere? No tourist is such a fucking key. It's a myth. Because then the experience is more real. They're actually asking you instead of trying to shake you down. Yeah, exactly.

Because why would they shake you down? There's no people there waiting for tourists because there are none, so that's not an industry. Like what I said in Iran. They don't even try to like negotiate. Yeah, right. It's crazy, man. So yeah, I have a calling to that whole Central Asian region. You were going to say something?

Do you remember? It was, but I don't. It definitely wasn't important. also africa too like african tribes i mean i love oh i know i was going to say so you've been everywhere now um are you researching ahead of time what to avoid what's safe what's not no no i just try to find the best story i don't even think about current situation in countries or what to avoid i just try to find the best story and then i find a local guide or if we call them fixers they will help me tell the story how do you find those friends of friends websites youtube um fixers yeah they're

We called fixers. So it's like a local person who's okay to be on camera to be the person to show me the culture. I pay them for their time. They're like a tour guide. But they like, they know shit. They're not just like a random Joe Schmo like, like, hey, let me show you around my town. They like work in tourism. Like they're used to taking people around to show them interesting things.

Those are fixers. So if I find a story in let's say like the Congo, I'll have to find a good fixer who speaks English. They all speak English. And then he'll kind of be my resource to kind of get in there and make the story. But I don't, I'm not looking at, like, I told you I'll go to Iran right now. I have no fear.

Yeah. Yeah, right. Nice. Okay. So you're gonna tell me a joke to end this or what? No. No? Not really.

Okay. Yeah. I was like thinking of like what else. Dude, I took so long off. I haven't done, I haven't recorded a podcast and I've long time. You're good, man. I think it went pretty well. Yeah, I think so.

It was interesting. Yeah, I love to, I could talk to, I mean, we'll be friends for a while so I can talk about a lot of shit. Yeah, you'll do it again. at some point. Sure. The fun thing about this pod is like, it's not just like,

it's like, well, no, cover it's cover another country. Absolutely. You've been to all of them. Been to all of them, yeah. Has anyone else? There's about 250 people that have been to every country.

And you try to have to kill them all to become the one. It's an interesting thought. When I did, I think, a good R movie. I finished at 30. I'm the last, I'm the only one. I finished at 30.

And at the time I was one of the top five youngest to visit. I think there's been a few more since then. Wow. But I'm definitely the only one to properly document everything. Because from the early days, I was, like, filming. So I got good stuff. You must get a lot of the same typical questions.

Like, not typical, but the same way over and over again. Same three questions. That's your favorite country. What surprised you the most? How was North Korea? How was North Korea? Yep. We'll save it for the next pod.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. All right, Drew Binski. Dude, great. I really enjoyed that. Yeah, that was awesome. That was. It's so fun to just talk it over with people. Like, when you get to a hostel,

and everyone's just shes. sharing where they've been. Oh, I love it. Well, everybody, that's the episode. What a great episode. God damn, that guy's interesting. This was, let me tell you my weaknesses as an interviewer. Number one, I should have gone more into that nomad village you lived in.

I mean, I had more questions that I thought of later. Like, what were their names? What were the differences between the people? It was just like, whoa. It's my first interview back. Really, my first interview back, since kind of, since I got back. You know, I let Tom interview me for you be tripping. Did I do any? I think I must have, but it is really my first one. So it was a little off, but I didn't interrupt too much, so I'm

pretty happy about it. But man, what a cool, interesting trip. I guess Trippy Award for most makes you want to go to Iran. I'm happy about these parts. You stay away from politics. Nothing to do with this trip. This trip happened a while ago, and there's nothing to do with what's going on. and now. I haven't followed what's going on now. I've heard of Hormos Roshiti, popular comedian in Los Angeles, but I don't know anything about it, and I really don't want to know. And this is the kind of the joy of this podcast, as we get to just look at the joy of a place without having to worry about the hatred associated with anything going on.

I don't know what's going on. I don't actually know who's involved. I don't know what they're doing. I've stayed away completely on purpose, and it's been pretty great. But Drew Bitsky's got to come back. Check him out at Drew Bitsky. Vosinski.com and all is at Drew Buski YouTube and and Instagram and stuff like that. We've got to have that guy back and do another. It's so fun. I asked him, like, which country you want to go? Which one has you been to?

He goes, all of them. I was like, what? Yeah, all of them. Most, multiple times. You've got to check out this guy. He's been everywhere. It's pretty fucking wild. And man, I'll put that up there.

Iranian chicks. Top to bottom, hottest to worst. So like me and Mar, the best are really not. It's funny on a podcast with Small Brain American, I said that Burmese women are the ugliest in the world. Then it got out and they started telling me how like they're wrong and they sent me this video. Some of them were like cartoons. Like literally, they showed me all these different hot Burmese.

One of them was cartooned. The other was An Song Suu Kyi, this old leader. That's how ugly Burmese people are. They think Aung San Suu Kyi is a fucking hot, hot, They think a cartoon is an ah chick. Persian's different. Persian top to bottom. I mean, you got princess.

Run the world princess. And then it's a wide range. Latinos up there too. Hot Latino to ugly Latino. You go from hot Latino. And the weird thing is hot Latinos turn into fucking papuces. It's nuts. You see pictures of fucking these abuelas later.

And they was like, wait, what? You were fuckable? And then, yeah, well, that's a problem. was fuckable and Latino men love to fucking drop loads. They love to do a lot of work and drop loads. Oh yeah. Latino men love to drop loads. So guys, go get the end, the storytelling show.

Again, thank you everybody who's bought it and supported it. We have done it, you guys. We have gotten to, I mean, we're in the profits. We're deeply in the profits and we're paying comedians. We're paying people's rents, us together. And we're not going through a system. And the reason I don't want to do it, this system is I don't want notes from some network telling me what I can or cannot do, and I don't want anybody owning this shit.

We own it. You and me together. The deal is, go to R.eshafear.com. It, like, moved to the end. Dot yMH studios.com. It's the same thing. Just go to Rishabee.com. The link is right there.

It is, each episode is one hour. They're like an hour-long special. as long as any stand-up comedy special, except Jew, which is on Netflix right now. And it's six bucks for like three to five comedians telling high-level stories in front of a great audience shot honestly better than anything you're going to see on HBO or Netflix. Honestly, better.

Unless it's like, honestly, unless it's like something Bo Bermanam is shot, his stuff is pretty high-level. But besides that, this is better than anything you're going to see. And then Bo Burnham sometimes chooses to work with comics who don't fucking prepare. So this is comics to prepare and Bo Burnham like fucking videos. Six bucks. If you get five of them, you get two for free. That's 40% on top for free.

So they end up being about four bucks per hour-long episodes. It's not charity, but you are supporting live independent stand-up, which is fucking sick. We've done it, you guys. Everyone who's seen it has loved it. I'm so overwhelmed by the response. It's been great. it's going to allow me to make other TV shows like this. Yeah, I know some of you are like, I don't really pay for stand-up, and I get that, so don't, you know.

Those of you steal, I get it. I was a pirator. If that's the way you do it, fine, but this is not one of those. I put all my own money into it. This is not a studio's money. And then we're paying the comedians. We're splitting it up between the comedians. So the ones who do it are getting paid.

They're not like these fights you hear about later where they're like, oh, that I ever got residuals. They're getting all of it. they're getting paid. Every purchase you make goes to the fucking comic. So it's been fucking sick. So get all, get five and get seven for free. So it's like, and the prologue we made that bridges the gap from maybe what you knew about the old storytelling to now. It's a really degenerate, sick, disgusting prologue by a great, great artist named Will Child.

And all the paintings are by Kevin Christie, who did all the artwork for. for the old This Not Happening shows. God, I couldn't be happy with it. So get them all right now. Oh, I'm doing a live, you be tripping pod. Almost definitely. If I can get these four people I know that went to for a date in June

that went to Octoberfest, we're going to do an October fest episode somewhere in Manhattan or Brooklyn. It's going to be on June 10th at the Brooklyn Improv. And I'm not going to tell you that it's going to be guys you want to see and dress up in Liederhausen

or something else. And if it's not that, then, well, I'll promote something else. But hopefully it's that. We can do some live ones. It could be really cool, right? Everyone dress up, bring your fucking shit in. I don't know.

It'd be cool. Maybe we'll take some questions with the audience or stuff you did. Okay, guys, that's it. Next week, I don't know who's on the episode. I was trying to get Joe DeRosa recorded, so, but I did not. So maybe Big J, if I can get him in. Maybe Michael Malice did one in North Korea. Maybe we go from Iran to North Korea, dangerous to dangerous.

I'm trying to think who else is around Fahim Tommy Pope Cuba Maybe we do that Leave in the comments Who you want to see Leave in the comments

Just for the algorithm In general And guys, that's it This is a fucking fun episode in Iran This guy travels Like we all want to travel All right

Bye, everybody Until next week Wait, how do you say goodbye And uh... Not a salam alaikum, see goodbye in Arabic. Salam? I don't know. All right, bye!