Transcript
Speaker: Anybody out there listening to Dirty Briefs?
Speaker: Arigato gozaimasu for being here, everybody.
Speaker: It's me, Alex Hooper, fresh back from two weeks traveling all around Japan.
Speaker: And I can't wait to tell you about it.
Speaker: Japan is a place I have wanted to go for my entire life.
Speaker: I love Japanese food.
Speaker: I love Japanese culture.
Speaker: I'm not an anime fan.
Speaker: I'm not a manga guy, but I do appreciate a culture that completely sticks to what they want to do.
Speaker: And when you go over there, it is another planet.
Speaker: My wife and I went together.
Speaker: We did about two weeks over there.
Speaker: We started in Osaka because we have a friend, one of our very close friends from college.
Speaker: He lives in Osaka, has been there for seven years.
Speaker: So we figured it would be a great place to start to follow him around and kind of get our toes dipped in the water before we plunge headfirst into the deep end.
Speaker: And I am glad we did because he gave us experiences that I never thought I would have in Japan.
Speaker: His best friend is a gangster.
Speaker: And when I say gangster, I mean an actual member of the Yakuza.
Speaker: The Yakuza.
Speaker: You know what I'm talking about?
Speaker: The Japanese mafia?
Speaker: I had just finished watching a show on HBO Max called Tokyo Vice that is all about the Yakuza in Japan.
Speaker: And did I think I was going to get to meet one over there?
Speaker: Of course not!
Speaker: I thought I was just going to eat noodles and see museums, maybe the countryside, but no!
Speaker: Next thing I know, my friend says, hey...
Speaker: My friend is going to take us in his car to a town about 45 minutes outside of Osaka called Nara.
Speaker: So Nara, if you don't know, is, which I didn't, of course, I wouldn't expect you to know this.
Speaker: It is a small town, which in Japan means probably a million people,
Speaker: But it's basically one giant nature preserve.
Speaker: There are thousands of deer that are just running rampant throughout these parks.
Speaker: And they are treated as gods.
Speaker: They are, you know, said to be pirates.
Speaker: past lives of buddhist monks and things like that and they are revered so what you do is you go to nara and then you immediately can start interacting with these deer they are everywhere you buy these little things called deer cookies they cost 200 yen which is about a buck 50 for a stack of 10 of them and then deer will just walk up to you and you can feed them you can lay with them you can pet their coats you can sneak
Speaker: You can snuggle them.
Speaker: You can ask them questions about their dating life.
Speaker: You can do anything with these deer and they will follow you around.
Speaker: And sometimes they get a little aggressive.
Speaker: a little aggressive.
Speaker: I watched them snap at a six-year-old girl who was trying to like hit it from the back.
Speaker: And when I say hit it from the back, if you're not watching this, I don't actually mean like, yeah, she's trying to hit it from the back.
Speaker: You're gross, if that's what you thought.
Speaker: But she was just trying to tap it and this deer turned around and snapped at her and she started crying.
Speaker: And the next thing I know, another one of the deer is picking up someone's tote bag and trying to eat their way through it.
Speaker: It was gnarly.
Speaker: I'm walking around this park with my wife, some friends, and of course, this member of the Yakuza, and he just hands me a vape pen of weed.
Speaker: I didn't think I was going to get to smoke weed in Japan.
Speaker: It's super illegal there, as are all drugs, which I got to say, Japan loves to drink.
Speaker: They are so pristine during the day.
Speaker: They're wearing suits.
Speaker: Women are dressed like Amish people.
Speaker: They are nothing but clean, polite, and prudence.
Speaker: perfectly just presentable.
Speaker: And then the nighttime hits and that tie loosens up like Rodney Dangerfield and they get no respect at all.
Speaker: It's so fun to watch just all of civilization just crumble from their norms.
Speaker: So I didn't think, so they get so drunk.
Speaker: They gotta find out about cocaine in Japan.
Speaker: I don't know where you get cocaine in Japan or if they have cocaine in Japan.
Speaker: I'm sure they do.
Speaker: It's everywhere.
Speaker: But man, they get sloppy drunk, like fall down all over themselves drunk.
Speaker: And one little line of sea will take that problem away for at least a few minutes.
Speaker: So I didn't think I was going to get smoked weed in Japan.
Speaker: Here I am walking around this nature reserve, smoking weed with some good friends, some new friends, thousands of deer, looking at this beautiful temple that is out there.
Speaker: It has the world's largest cast iron Buddha, and it's over, it's like 60 feet tall.
Speaker: It is overwhelming.
Speaker: When you get to see it in real life.
Speaker: And I'm just high, enjoying everything.
Speaker: We get back in the car and his friend is going to drive us obviously back to Osaka.
Speaker: And he immediately lights up a joint and starts passing it around.
Speaker: And my friend who has lived there for a little while looked at me and goes,
Speaker: this is not a typical Japanese experience.
Speaker: I was like, yeah, no shit, dude.
Speaker: I'm hanging out with an actual member of the Japanese mafia smoking weed while driving in a car.
Speaker: Those are things I never thought I'd be able to say in my life.
Speaker: Then they took us out for Korean barbecue, yakiniku, they call it when you're grilling it yourselves on the table.
Speaker: And he, the Yakuza member, he cooked for everything.
Speaker: Everybody.
Speaker: He ordered for everybody.
Speaker: He referred to the woman who was running the restaurant as Mama.
Speaker: It was the best.
Speaker: He made fun of the way I hold my chopsticks.
Speaker: I will never forget that for the rest of my life.
Speaker: And all I could do was laugh because what am I going to do?
Speaker: Argue with him?
Speaker: No.
Speaker: It could have been a...
Speaker: Real fast for old Alex.
Speaker: But man, what an experience.
Speaker: It was one of those things that I'll remember for the rest of my life.
Speaker: And everything about Japan was something that I will remember forever.
Speaker: I mean...
Speaker: I got to try my new favorite food, Okanami Yaki, which if you've never had Okanami Yaki, I don't know if you can find it in the United States.
Speaker: I think there's like two restaurants in LA that do it, but it's basically a scallion pancake put on a grill with noodles on top, eggs, cheese, seafood, pork.
Speaker: and just they just layer layer layer and grill it all in front of you then cover it with sauce and oh my gosh how many orgasms in my mouth did I have while I was eating okanami yaki it was fantastic loved every second of it now Japan is a culture built on respect and it
Speaker: It shows when you are there because I'll tell you who they really respect.
Speaker: They respect their elders and it is biting them in the ass because they are having an aging crisis in Japan.
Speaker: By the year 2050, one third of their population is going to be over 65 years old.
Speaker: Over 65, a third of their population.
Speaker: And when you're in Japan, you see it.
Speaker: These people are so old.
Speaker: There's over 60,000 people that are over 100 years old in Japan.
Speaker: 60,000 people over 100.
Speaker: See, this is where they are going wrong, why they're having an aging crisis.
Speaker: They respect their elders.
Speaker: They take care of them.
Speaker: They help them.
Speaker: Not here in America.
Speaker: We just as soon spit on an elderly person as to be reminded of our own mortality.
Speaker: We don't want to look at you.
Speaker: We treat old people like pieces of paper.
Speaker: As soon as it gets a little bit crinkled, we throw it away.
Speaker: We either put it in a home or we make it work at Walmart for the rest of their lives, greeting thousands of people a day that are younger than them that are reminding them that, yes, death is around the corner for you too.
Speaker: What a crazy place to experience life.
Speaker: You pick up the culture so fast.
Speaker: You know, they don't eat or drink when they walk.
Speaker: They wear their backpacks on the front in a crowded subway.
Speaker: And those Japanese subways, wow.
Speaker: Talk about crowded indeed.
Speaker: Every stereotype you have ever heard.
Speaker: We were packed in there like a jar of pickles.
Speaker: We couldn't even get out at certain times.
Speaker: But man, wow.
Speaker: It was the best.
Speaker: It was the best.
Speaker: We were eating like five meals a day because over there, not only do they not rape you on food prices, things are very affordable, but also they give you tiny little portions.
Speaker: Going to a Japanese bar is intimidating because sometimes you walk into a place, there's four seats, it's pitch black, and you feel like you stumbled into someone's house.
Speaker: At one point, I'm in a bar,
Speaker: with three other people.
Speaker: And I just look around.
Speaker: I'm like, how do you guys know each other?
Speaker: And they were like, mother, father, son, you, but they were just too polite to ask me to leave.
Speaker: I think I was actually in someone's house on their tatami mats.
Speaker: We spent a night in the countryside.
Speaker: at a ryokan.
Speaker: I don't know if I'm saying that right.
Speaker: Ryokan, R-O-Y-O-K-A-N.
Speaker: It's basically a bed and breakfast in the mountains and hillsides of Japan.
Speaker: And they have natural hot springs that come up from the ground and they're very healing, very cleansing.
Speaker: We had one on our balcony.
Speaker: of our room looking out into the mountains, a private natural hot spring, hot tub.
Speaker: And you wear a kimono the whole time, no shoes.
Speaker: They serve you all your food and your dinner and your breakfast in one tiny private room.
Speaker: And everything just comes to you.
Speaker: You don't have to order it.
Speaker: It's,
Speaker: was magical.
Speaker: I have so many great things to say about Japan, performing over there, doing Tokyo Comedy Bar, getting to judge Roast Battle, a show that I have been a part of for almost 10 years.
Speaker: I've judged it in London and now I've gone to Japan and judged it over there and these comics were amazing.
Speaker: They crushed it.
Speaker: It was such a cool experience.
Speaker: My headlining show was sold out, Roast Battle was sold out, and what a brilliant last night to spend.
Speaker: on our trip.
Speaker: I'm going to have a lot more to say about this.
Speaker: I don't know how many dirty briefs are going to be about Japan, but I can talk about it for months and not get tired of it because the other thing is I was off social media the whole time.
Speaker: When was the last time you took a social media break or a phone break in general?
Speaker: The only thing I was using my phone for was navigating directions.
Speaker: All around the city, obviously, and restaurant recommendations.
Speaker: And my wife was actually doing most of that for us because she didn't really trust me because I'm not great at directions or going following orders by any means.
Speaker: I think you guys know that about me.
Speaker: So.
Speaker: Full social media break for two weeks.
Speaker: I was present.
Speaker: I was in the moment.
Speaker: I was enjoying life.
Speaker: And then I came back, 16-hour time difference, got back on Sunday, the 23rd, and filmed with Comedy Central on the 24th.
Speaker: I was loose.
Speaker: I was happy.
Speaker: I wasn't over-rehearsed.
Speaker: I was just in an amazing place.
Speaker: And I think it showed when I did my taping.
Speaker: And I can't wait for you guys to see that set.
Speaker: It felt really special.
Speaker: I think it's going to look beautiful.
Speaker: And every comic on there crushed.
Speaker: It was really, really cool to be part of that experience.
Speaker: But it's just another night in comedy.
Speaker: You can't put too much stake on anything.
Speaker: You can't have expectations about what it's going to do for you.
Speaker: Because there will always be another night, another taping, another trip to Japan.
Speaker: So you need to enjoy every moment that you have out there.
Speaker: Come see me, everybody.
Speaker: HooperComedy.com shows are coming back and lots of dance parties are coming back too.
Speaker: I feel so good being out of my feet.
Speaker: I was doing 20,000 steps a day on average in Japan.
Speaker: Me, the guy who four months ago couldn't even walk.
Speaker: Boom.
Speaker: Feels so good.
Speaker: Thanks for Dirty Briefing, everybody.
Speaker: You know what to do here at Hooper Hair Puff on all social media.
Speaker: Share these things.
Speaker: Put some positivity and silliness in your life.
Speaker: I love you so much.
Speaker: And I will see you.
