Speaker A
Welcome to the Virtual Expats podcast. This is part of the Virtual Expats Pod Tube experience which is part podcast that you're listening to right now and part YouTube channel. In the podcast, I chat with people living outside of their home or passport countries about how their geographical movement affects their online experience. In the YouTube channel, I share some of the more personal side of my own experience living outside of the US and how it affects what I do online. There is a new YouTube video available today along with this podcast. I'll put the link down in the show notes or you can just search on YouTube for virtual expat. My name is Stephanie and I have lived outside of the US for the majority of the past 15 years with a few breaks for grad school. I'm currently living in Shanghai, China. Recently I sat down with Andy Curtin, stand up comedian, main cast of Mama Hoo Hoo and as he says in his Twitter bio, the occasional shower. He also is a podcaster. Stuck in the Middle is his current podcast and it is a hilarious intersection of life as a comedian living in Shanghai and general quirks of things that happen in China. And a special congratulations to Andy and his family for the birth of their new child. So let's have a listen on how Andy's movement from Melbourne to Shanghai has changed what he does online. Well, thank you so much, Andy, for joining us on Virtual Expats.
Speaker B
Thank you for having me.
Speaker A
How many places have you lived in?
Speaker B
I mean, I've only lived in Melbourne and here, but you know, I'm away a lot, so I sort of feel like this is kind of my camp and I move around probably half the time.
Speaker A
How many places in China have you lived in?
Speaker B
Only in Shanghai. Yeah. Like I've only had an apartment in Shanghai. Yeah, I didn't do the whole. I didn't need to go deep and have a year of losing myself in rural China. Yeah, yeah, well, see, maybe I wish I had, but I didn't do that.
Speaker A
So you've been here long enough that you know why that that's surprising? Because a lot of people do start in the countryside and then work their way over to.
Speaker B
People who've done that will scoff at this. But like, I did live a very Chinese life when I came here, you know.
Speaker A
What does that mean?
Speaker B
Well, I lived with Chinese housemates and, and I lived in a more Chinese area and I only had Chinese colleagues, so I didn't have a lot of foreigners in my life in the beginning, but I got sick of that.
Speaker A
Yeah, that would take effort In Shanghai to be.
Speaker B
Well, no, I mean, I do. I, I think that. But that's why people go and live in, like, you know, Lanz for a year. Yeah. I was in Wuhan on the weekend.
Speaker A
A lot of people love living in Wuhan. But it's still 8 million people, right? It's still a city. No, no, no. But a lot of people.
Speaker B
Yeah. I mean, you know, the problem with a lot of those cities is that once you've seen one of them, there's not a. Like, I remember people said to me, oh, you should go to Yunnan. Yunnan is very beautiful. And it was very early on for me. So me and my housemate were like, all right, where do we go? In Unan, we went to. I can't even remember the night. What's the capital of Yunnan?
Speaker A
Oh.
Speaker B
Anyway. And it's just a city. Like, it's not an interesting place at all. In fact, it's like a lot of cities.
Speaker A
Yeah.
Speaker B
I didn't realize. I did go back and I did go to Lijiang and Tiger Living Gorge and stuff, but at that time, I didn't. I got there, I'm like, what did we come here for? Because it is an amazing thing to go and see a Chinese city. But once you've seen one, it's like, if someone had a bit about it, you know, you get to. There's the H M, there's the kfc, and then there's a whole bunch of building. There's a bunch.
Speaker A
Well, that's. I think it's different. If you live in those places for longer stretches, you'll start to notice the characteristics. But if you're just going there to visit for a few days, they do blend.
Speaker B
Yeah.
Speaker A
To each other.
Speaker B
I don't know if they're that different. I don't know if I'm ready to buy that. I'm sure people will say that because they don't want their experience to be devalued in any way. But I've been to a lot of cities like that multiple times. I, I, you know, I haven't been. I haven't. I went to. At one point, I was in Suzhou every week. And Suzhou is a great city, actually. Of all the places, you know, I'd consider Suzhou. Really? Yeah.
Speaker A
It feels like a permanent suburb to me. That doesn't mean it's awful.
Speaker B
Suburb of what?
Speaker A
Of, Of Shanghai.
Speaker B
Nah. If you're there, you, you know, people there. Most people there don't come into Shanghai that often. And it's, you know, like, whereas, like, Hangzhou. Like, what's the difference between Hangzhou and Suzhou? You know, it's an hour on the train versus half an hour on the train, but it's still a city just out of Shanghai. And I don't. Yeah, I don't think there's.
Speaker A
There's more tech in Hangzhou. Yeah, I don't know. I don't know. I think of extreme, like to Nanjing when we first got to mainland China.
Speaker B
Oh, yeah.
Speaker A
And then. But we traveled a lot up to Dalian and Chingdao and stuff. And those three places feel very different.
Speaker B
Sure. But Nanjing is very. What I'm talking about. That 8 million people just nailed the center of the chart of what I'm trying to describe right now.
Speaker A
The cookie cutter city.
Speaker B
Yeah.
Speaker A
Is that what you mean?
Speaker B
Yeah, it's just, you know, there's a bit of a wall, there's some stuff.
Speaker A
Oh, Mitch, we haven't even gotten online yet. All right, let's get online.
Speaker B
I've been on my phone this whole time.
Speaker A
Have you? God damn it, Andy. All right, so when did you start using the Internet for anything on a regular basis?
Speaker B
I mean, I don't know. I'm. I'm in my mid-30s, so I think, like most people my age, we began with a dial up modem that went. Which was like this. That was the sound of, you know, my mid teens. Yeah, back then. I don't know. I'm not a super geeky person, but I went through a phase of like building computers because I saw the Internet as being.
Speaker A
That sounds pretty geeky.
Speaker B
Yeah, looking back, it was more geeky than I would have wanted to admit at the time. But yeah, so we had a modem and we were, you know, doing irc. I don't know if I'm showing irc.
Speaker A
I have heard that. Oh, that came up in a previous interview. Remind me what that is.
Speaker B
Yeah, I'm definitely older than you. If you don't know.
Speaker A
No, you're not. I just wasn't that geeky yet.
Speaker B
I added about irs. Is that geeky? But then I, you know, that morphed into. What was it? The little ICQ, you know, send messenger and all that. MySpace.
Speaker A
IRC is what, like a chat room?
Speaker B
Yeah, it was a predecessor to. To icq.
Speaker A
So what were you looking. This is a good time to say that I mark. This podcast is marked explicit, so don't feel the need to censor. What?
Speaker B
Why do we assume that I'm going to drop some perverted answer to that.
Speaker A
Question whenever I say chat room?
Speaker B
What Filthy things were you doing, you animal. No, the innocent. The intern was actually remarkably innocent at that point. It was. No, I mean the Internet that I was on and it wasn't. Yeah, because it was so small. It wasn't filtered. Like the whole idea that you have a nanny Internet didn't exist back then. You could access whatever people were putting out there and chat rooms like it was, we were definitely trying. There was a thing someone said the other day. It said it was like age, sex, location, sex being gender was like how you would embark on a conversation with someone and if they were sufficiently interesting based on those three things, then you would just chat to them. But that was pretty much it. I mean, we were just blown away that we could talk to people somewhere else that were in Kenya, although probably down the street lying about their location.
Speaker A
What year would you put that at? Like the beginning of your IRC days?
Speaker B
Yeah, I don't know. I mean, I could easily be proven wrong, but I guess, you know, I was 15 in like 1998, so maybe around then, I guess.
Speaker A
Oh yeah, See, I wasn't really online into the early aughts.
Speaker B
Oh, wow.
Speaker A
With like stuff. I was in the U.S. oh yeah?
Speaker B
Yeah, I think that's the Internet there until recently. Actually.
Speaker A
It was Greg actually from the Brent Cock podcast that brought up irc, now that I think about it. And he was in Canada. Canada was ahead of us. Damn it.
Speaker B
Oh yeah. You know, it's Canadian.
Speaker A
Frickin A. Now I'm really just gonna cry. What topics were you chatting about? Do you remember?
Speaker B
No, yeah, I mean, we were trying to meet people we could call. I remember we said to get some girl gave us her phone number and we called and then we're like, oh my gosh. She answered and hung up, you know, a little bit much.
Speaker A
So you were, you were chatting with people online that you were that live near you?
Speaker B
Yeah, I mean, there was definitely like a lot of people we kind of dialed into and in Australia, but I, I, you know, there was nothing really notable going on that I would remember strongly.
Speaker A
Wait, were you calling people internationally?
Speaker B
Calling them? No, no, no. The people we called were in Australia.
Speaker A
Oh, okay, okay, okay. So moving on from the chat rooms, what it was the next big thing that you did online?
Speaker B
I don't know, I mean, I guess the, at some point, I think, really, it's hard to remember. We were sort of using Hotmail. Came along, everyone bonkers. Remember everyone had a hotmail. I remember when I moved to China. This is pretty funny. In 2009 and I lived with an American guy and he said, oh, can you give me your email address? And I gave him a Hotmail address and he thought I was giving him a fake address or like an old address. Because Americans didn't use Hotmail. And by that stage, I know one.
Speaker A
Person who still uses Hotmail.
Speaker B
Yeah. And then by the time you realize that Australians still use Hotmail, he's like, hey, the 90s cold. I want their email set.
Speaker A
Cruel. I mean, it didn't work that much worse than any other email.
Speaker B
It sucks. Now it's like my spam one that I give out. But, yeah, it was fine then. I didn't Gmail. Didn't. Took a little while to take hold in Australia, I think.
Speaker A
So Hotmail, MySpace.
Speaker B
Yeah. And then I guess by the time I was in university, they had places had Internet in them in the walls. Remember back then, you'd plug into the wall.
Speaker A
It wasn't WI fi, the DSL connection. Yeah.
Speaker B
It was all cables. In fact, you know what? No, I remember in school we had laptops and we would plug into the walls and, you know, in the classroom. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker A
Seriously.
Speaker B
Yeah. It was so funny because back then, like, laptops were. It was really easy to break the screen. We were, you know, we. In Australia, you get the tram to school. Melbourne at least, and your bag gets banged. Every single day, someone had opened their bag and just like a smashed screen laptop, like, every day. And the hard drives broke all the time.
Speaker A
Oh, God. Were the screens fixable back then for.
Speaker B
A good bit of money? Yeah.
Speaker A
Wait, I'm still focused on this. You guys had DSL cables for every student in the rooms?
Speaker B
You know what? I guess. I guess so. Yeah.
Speaker A
That's amazing.
Speaker B
I think they had like. I can't even remember what they call them because they haven't had them so long, but you would get like a box and everyone could play. Multiple people could plug into it.
Speaker A
That is so crazy to me. No, I know what you mean. They're just on the tables because it's.
Speaker B
Just a completely obsolete. But it's not obsolete. But for most people, for, like, home use, it's obsolete.
Speaker A
In some public libraries in the U.S. they still have those, like, in the middle of the giant study air tables. They'll still have those and you can plug into them.
Speaker B
Yeah.
Speaker A
It's faster and more reliable than the WI fi, but I think we completely skipped over that step in the us we went straight from no computers in the room to everybody bring their laptop and hoping that their battery lasted through class.
Speaker B
Yeah, yeah. But I mean, no, that wasn't a big jump. So there was like, you know, IRC of 15, and then I think about 16. We all got laptops, but it was mostly just, you know, tight dog word documents and taking notes and stuff like that. There wasn't a lot to do on the Internet, I think, at that point. And I remember back then, it was so funny. Like, people. They didn't have, like, password security sucked back then. And I remember you could get, like, an app and just figure out people's passwords.
Speaker A
What did you do with them?
Speaker B
Yeah, I remember one guy, he's like. He's like. I was like, I could get it.
Speaker A
You can.
Speaker B
He's like, no, you couldn't. I clicked on this thing, and I was like, oh, Lindsay. As his password was just like, in the dictionary of possible passwords that top, top 100 passwords that people use.
Speaker A
Really? Do people use the same passwords back then?
Speaker B
No one put numbers. It was just people just had a word to be like, you know, your dad's name or you depending on your animal's name or something.
Speaker A
Some people did use password as their password.
Speaker B
Yeah, still do.
Speaker A
Trips me. Still do. Really?
Speaker B
Oh, yeah. But I hate. I feel like the whole password thing is just stupid. Like, it's. They've got to come up with a better idea. I spent so much.
Speaker A
I'm not giving you the thumbs up. I'm actually saying the bio whatever thingy. What the hell is that called? I can't think of it now when you have to do your thumbprint.
Speaker B
Oh, yeah. I mean, I don't know. That's a little Orwellian for me, but. But I just think that it just logically, like, this whole thing where, like, I called the bank the other day and they asked me a couple questions like, we can't verify. I'm like, how can you not verify me? It's me. Like, you're not asking the right questions. Then at the end, it was because, like, I typed my mother's maiden name in lowercase instead of capitalizing the first letter. And I took me two weeks to get access to a bank account because of that. And it's like, can we reason a little bit? Like, these crazy password requirements. It's like, who gives a sh. No, I don't care if anyone gets into my. My obsolete email account or, you know.
Speaker A
Yeah, well, they got a letter, a number, capital letter, special symbol.
Speaker B
We'll give you a discount if you sign up for a bookstore. Oh, you need to have a password. Who's gonna Use my. I bought one book from your bookstore. I'm like, oh, God. They're gonna crack in and buy other books from my. Under my name, their own money.
Speaker A
Oh, it's crazy. And then they, like, every few months for some passwords, the systems, you create a new one, and then all of your passwords are different.
Speaker B
The company I'm working for, I think once someone high up the food chain just cracked it on that because they just got called in and they're like, we're not gonna make you change your password any month anymore. I'm like, yeah, great.
Speaker A
Thank God.
Speaker B
Yeah.
Speaker A
And now they sell services where you can store all of your passwords.
Speaker B
I tell you, if anybody wants my life, get my phone.
Speaker A
Right?
Speaker B
Every password is in there in a document, because I'm not remembering anything. Because how can you remember? You have to change them every 20 seconds.
Speaker A
You absolutely can't. Yeah. And my work one does change.
Speaker B
Every one of my friends has the same password for everything. And when I go home, like, I literally go to my brother's banking account.
Speaker A
Dear listener, feel free to hack in anything.
Speaker B
So not only can you steal my life, you can steal the life of all of my immediate family members.
Speaker A
Oh, gosh. Yeah. No passwords. Yeah. There does need to be something else that doesn't seem like it's just one.
Speaker B
Of those things where you're like, hey, hey. You know how you guys are, like, trying to, you know, build this useless technology, like toilets to clean themselves or something? Or, like, can we just.
Speaker A
That doesn't sound useless to me.
Speaker B
All right, that was a bad example. I don't clean toilets, so I don't give a shit who cleans it. But you get my point. There's lots of things being invented that we don't need.
Speaker A
I've got something to tell you. Are you ready? I've got a special tip today for the Americans out there. Thinking, planning, actually in the process of moving abroad. Can I just tell you how much stress I have alleviated by using a product called Traveling Mailboxes? Oh, my gosh. The snafu that we got into at one point when we got audited by the irs, if it wasn't for Traveling Mailbox, it would still be an ongoing issue. What they do is they give you an address in the US and you have all of your. Whatever's left of your paper ness going there. And trust me, you think you're all digital. Mmm. There's some stuff that isn't. And I am reminded of this every time I get an email from them. So what happens is they give you the address, all your mail goes there. They open it and scan it and email it to you, and then you can decide if you want it forwarded, if you want it deleted, or what have you. I've even had a couple of checks come through there, and they forward it to me overseas. So, I mean, there's a lot of. A lot of stuff you can do with this service, and it has really, really saved me time and time again. So I've got a link for you in the show notes, so you can sign up with the service, and I am happy to share the information about them because this is a really useful tool. Enjoy. Oh, the. The refrigerators, where you can see what's in there while you're grocery shopping. I'm still trying to work that out. Really smart refrigerators. I'm like, I would rather that every other piece of technology that we currently have works, as opposed to me knowing what's in my refrigerator.
Speaker B
Yeah. The frequency with which stuff breaks down.
Speaker A
Yeah.
Speaker B
Is a little.
Speaker A
Yeah. I feel like we need some quality control before we do smart appliances. But it's already too late.
Speaker B
It started M2M. It's coming.
Speaker A
M2M.
Speaker B
It's the. The Internet of things.
Speaker A
Oh, is that what it's M2M. Okay.
Speaker B
Yeah. That's one of the names for it. I actually had a job briefly as a translator doing technology translation. And I have a weird lexicon of random technological words in my brain for I. I don't nothing like.
Speaker A
What does that stand for?
Speaker B
Machine to. It stands for machine to machine, because the idea being that all of your devices are synced into each other.
Speaker A
It's also a Norwegian pop music group.
Speaker B
Oh, that's what I was referring to.
Speaker A
Oh, okay. Go Internet. Were you ever putting anything online, like blogging or pictures or putting your own stuff on MySpace? Were you ever a musician? Probably.
Speaker B
I. I was a musician for a really long time, but I did not put anything online. It was not the Internet. And me being a muso didn't line up, or my use of it, anyway. But, you know, I got into MySpace. I didn't really get into it, but I. I started a page and I kind of looked at it. I just. I wasn't really having a lot of creative output until I came to China, to be honest.
Speaker A
Oh, my God. Can I tell you how many people say that?
Speaker B
Well, if I'm being perfectly honest with you, I didn't think I was a creative person. Like, I studied law and I have an engineering degree.
Speaker A
Are you kidding Right now.
Speaker B
No, I'm serious.
Speaker A
Oh, okay.
Speaker B
And I. And I was working in finance. Like, that's what I thought I was good at. And I realized I had this. I was working for this small private equity firm here, and I hated most of what I was doing, but I realized I was really enjoying making their PPTs. But it was the best part of my day. It was the best part of my.
Speaker A
Day because it was, like, visual and creative.
Speaker B
I was like, these are great. I felt like I was adding value. You know, we were going in and trying to sell fucking solar farms in Italy. And I was like, well, we're going to look good when we go in there. And they say no.
Speaker A
And I wasn't saying that in surprise. Like, yeah, you like, oh, you're not smart enough. No, no, no, no, no, no.
Speaker B
You don't look like you've showered, sir. You start. You. You read books.
Speaker A
Not at all.
Speaker B
What.
Speaker A
My reaction. My reaction was you seem so overtly creative that I. It. It didn't. It wouldn't even dawn.
Speaker B
Yeah, I mean, I did, because I didn't. The thing is that I started music when I was really young. And when you start something like that really young, you don't know that you have an inclination to it and you kind of miss the boat in a lot of ways. People that can start things creatively when they're young and. And fall in love with it when they get older, because that's how it has to work, really, I think are lucky. I probably. If I'd been the person I am now with the ability that I had when I was 18, I may have been a musician. In fact, I nearly did do what we call the Victorian College of the Arts instead of regular university. And I was like, but I hate this. I didn't hate it, but I just. You get to a point where you have to practice four or five hours a day. And I was like, this is not interesting to me at all. And I was pretty happy to stop. And then, you know, looking back, I was like, wow, that would have been nice. But it was about six years later, I. It was when I clicked that actually I should be doing something like that.
Speaker A
I completely, like, grew up in a creative environment, needed all kinds of things like writing and music and stuff like that, and thought it was too easy. So when I went to university, I was like, give me the hardest shit you can, and veered in that direction, totally ignoring.
Speaker B
You know what? That's a really interesting thing. I think that's a huge problem with university, is a Lot of people do well in high school and then they don't know what they want to do and so they do the thing that's the hardest thing to do and it's a real trap. Like Australia is an example. There's too many lawyers because the law schools are the hardest things to get into, but they're the hardest things to get into because there's a limited number of spots and people are all trying to get into the hardest thing to get into. So there's this sort of self fulfilling cycle of people overvaluing something. We don't need that many lawyers, we need, you know, other things and engineers we need. But there's more places there, so it's easy to get into.
Speaker A
True, so true, so true. What about after that? How about when social media hit?
Speaker B
Well, that's a good question. You know, for me what happened was I started running stand up shows and actually there was a real transit social media. What? Social media, at least in Shanghai, you know, WeChat wasn't around until really four.
Speaker A
Or five years ago.
Speaker B
Yeah, not that long ago. So when I started running shows before WeChat was a thing and back then I would hand deliver tickets to like big shows.
Speaker A
Yeah, yeah, not individual folks.
Speaker B
I mean a single ticket to like Pudong. I've been to Jin Chow with two tickets.
Speaker A
I have no idea where Jin Chow is.
Speaker B
There's good reason for that. It's basically, you know, at the airport, it's really far away and I get out of the guy, the guy's like, I just want one. I don't want to. It was three, three and a half hours out of my day to deliver a single ticket. So my point being that at that point we were starting to put stuff online which was to promote shows.
Speaker A
You know, where did you promote? Was it what, QQ or, you know.
Speaker B
Back then when we were very new and we were unique. So the magazines were really supportive. It was very easy to get coverage in Smart Shanghai, that. Shanghai, Shanghai. All these guys that were very back back then, back in the day, boy, was it easy.
Speaker A
Were they online at that point or was it just the paper?
Speaker B
They were all online. Yeah. I didn't think Smart Shanghai ever had a printed version. Not to my knowledge. Yeah, so we were putting ads on, you know, websites and we were, we started our own website. It was pretty terrible. And we were just marketing. It was a lot of marketing going out, making posters, putting photos out there, trying to get people dialed into this new scene that we're trying to create.
Speaker A
Stand up scene is this pre kung fu comedy.
Speaker B
That is kung fu comedy.
Speaker A
Oh, that is the start of it.
Speaker B
Yeah.
Speaker A
Okay. So there you weren't really social media.
Speaker B
In Melbourne, I guess Facebook. I remember when Facebook came out, if you remember this. But when Facebook first came out, only people at Harvard could get on it. And then it was like a collection of universities. And I remember saying someone saying to me, oh, we can go on Facebook now. And what's Facebook? Okay, put your photos online. I want to do that. Yeah, But I remember we did it. And yeah, Facebook definitely was like, throughout the. What did you call them? The naughts? The naughty nuts?
Speaker A
What did I call them? No, that's a generally recognized phrase.
Speaker B
I'm not a hypocrite.
Speaker A
The zeros or the knots? Don't ask me how to spell. I think it's an ou.
Speaker B
I try not to remember that part of my life.
Speaker A
No, there's a story.
Speaker B
Name it. So, yeah, so that. I think that, you know what happened. This is what happened. I got an answer for you. Finally. I was traveling a lot. I would travel in the summer. In fact, funny story, at my university, I failed a lot of university. Yeah. And if you fail in law, they won't hire you at the end. And you still have to finish it. Seven and a half years took me to get through undergraduate degrees. But here's the thing. And at my university, to. To kick you out, you have to appear in front of a board. And the boards are during the holidays. So I would be overseas every holidays, and I would come home from overseas having missed the letter inviting me to the board. And they would never. They couldn't kick me out because I was never there for. And it's just like a loophole that I accidentally walked into. And literally, after seven years of being there, I felt another subject. And they came in. I looked at my school. They're like, how have you noticed. Been in front of this board before? I don't know. You guys keep sending letters while I'm away. And they're like, just finish, please. Can you please just finish your degree? So I finished it anyway. So I would travel and you would meet people. It was really cool, actually, back then it was so crazy that you would, like, be in, like, the Greek islands and then meet someone, and they're from God knows where, you know, Turkey. And then you add them and, you know, I still got people from back then that are still on my Facebook. I have weird fragments of knowledge about what's happened to them since then. Pops up on my feed.
Speaker A
Lots of, like, yeah.
Speaker B
So I guess that's what really kind of hooked me into social media and being on the Internet and stuff like that. When I arrived in China, Facebook, Google, everything was unblocked within a week of me being here. I think YouTube and Facebook got blocked and it was. There was. I don't really talk about political stuff, but stuff happened and then they got shut down and then I just was off. I couldn't get on it. I don't know, I didn't actually. I'd never heard of VPNs. I was so ignorant about the Internet that I was calling my parents on Skype frequently on my family and my housemate. I walked past his room one day and he had a video of his family on the screen. And I'm like, what is that? He's like a Skype. There's a little button. You press it, the video camera comes on. I was like, what? So we'd be having these audio calls, not knowing that we literally just had to press a button and we would be looking at each other. So. Yeah, I'm an idiot. Yeah.
Speaker A
No, no, no, no. You don't know until you know.
Speaker B
So I guess, you know, the, the naughts. The. The are we calling.
Speaker A
You see now I've just forgotten.
Speaker B
Yeah.
Speaker A
Early aughts. Arts is like not is what you shouldn't do. Arts is what we live through.
Speaker B
I shouldn't have done the odds. Anyway, so I was basically just using Facebook and stuff like that at that point and a little bit of email. And then I came to China and. And that's when I started using things like Skype and Gmail and all that jazz.
Speaker A
Oh, fun fact, August. I've just been spelling it wrong ever since 2001. See, we both find a G, H, T, S apparently. I've seriously been spelling it like not, which could be. This could explain a lot.
Speaker B
Anyway, sorry, why are you using R T S?
Speaker A
I've been using O U G H T instead of a U G H T. But I never spell it because.
Speaker B
I just put the weird British spelling.
Speaker A
I'm not going to go into the entomology that'll turn into its own friggin podcast.
Speaker B
How many are you using this word?
Speaker A
This word? Odds. A lot. A lot happened in those 10 years, but usually if I write it, it's zero, so I don't care about how it's spelled.
Speaker B
I'm glad I can bring riveting content to your listeners.
Speaker A
That is. That is actually very important for a digital soul to understand how to spell this decade of our lives when so much exploded online. There's me trying to save that moment. Hey there, it's me, Nicole Palazzo. You probably don't know me. That's kind of why I'm popping into Steph's show, actually. I'm also a fan of the Virtual Expats podcast, and I'm also an expat. And in fact, I'm also a podcaster myself. I am an American who moved to Church Germany about a year and a half ago. And already in the short time. It is overwhelming how many changes my life has been through. The best way I found to cope with all of this has been to connect with other expats. And for me, that took the form of a podcast. It's called the Expat Cast, and you can find it on whatever app you're listening to the Virtual Expats on. You can also find us on Instagram and Twitter. Hexpatcast. Every Thursday, I release a new episode with a fellow expert expat where we swap stories, share tips, and explore every mishap on the road to finding home abroad once again. That's the Expat Cast. Go ahead and give us a listen. See you over there. Choose right. So, okay, so you're in Shanghai. You're promoting kung fu comedy, mostly through. That's Shanghai and Smart Shanghai. When did you get a vpn?
Speaker B
That's a good question. I don't really know. I was off Facebook for a while. Like, maybe three years or something. Like, I mean. I mean, I'm not saying that, like, I deserve a badge of honor, but I just mean that I really just. I didn't need to be on it. It was really hard to get on it. And Gmail was still accessible, I think.
Speaker A
Really?
Speaker B
Yeah, I definitely had a Gmail and was using it, so I can't remember exactly how it interacted. But Google subsequently got shut down. It's Definitely Facebook and YouTube are the first to go. And then, yeah, I got a vpn, I guess, and I wanted to get back on Facebook. And I did, maybe in, like, 2012, I would guess. And somewhere around there, we started to, like, you know, get a Facebook page for the comedy shows. And we started to put more stuff on our own, you know, Twitter account. And then so I remember someone saying to me, I'll put something on WeChat. I was like, wechat? I don't know about that. That seems pretty useless for what we do. It was. It just really just changed everything, just in a huge way. Suddenly you could get people to Post, you know, posters on their moments, and everyone they knew would see it and stuff was getting shared around. A lot of. There would be groups. You could post stuff in groups. And then I remember later on, there was a. A lady, a friend of mine, Natalie, who has a company that does marketing for WeChat and stuff like that. And she called. She called me in and she said, you got to get a public account. I was like, no, I don't want that. That's, again, terrible. I'm bad at predicting trends. I don't know if you've picked up on that. I was like, mobile phones.
Speaker A
Why would I want one of those?
Speaker B
So she said to me something which has always stuck with me from a marketing point of view. She said, when you run your own business, you think people want to talk to you. They don't. And she said the numbers are conclusive. If you have online the ability for people through an automated system to buy stuff and buy tickets, they're going to buy more and they can shop. It's like, it's. It's the analogy. The analogy for me is like, if you're in a store and you just want to look in the store, you don't want some standing next to me like, hi, hi. You have to talk to me. But it's that, you know, but it's easy to. When I say it like that, it's really obvious. But when you're actually doing it, you're like, this is my brand. My brand is my name. These people, if they're interested, they're interested in me. I need to make myself available. And some people do love that, but most people do not. Or they want the option to contact you and let you know that they're a fan, but they don't want to every. They want to be able to check your schedule without interacting with a human. They want to be able to do it at all hours of the night. So her whole thing was, you get it all on a public account, get it out there, start pushing people into that. And that became such a huge thing. Everything we did after that was about getting people in our public account. We're doing raffles, QR codes everywhere.
Speaker A
And, and that was 2010ish.
Speaker B
No, no, no, no. This is like 2015 or something.
Speaker A
Oh, okay.
Speaker B
Okay.
Speaker A
Yeah, yeah. Still, that's pretty much the beginning of WeChat.
Speaker B
Yeah, we, we. We got onto it early, I think. You know, it's funny, like, this might sound come out the wrong way, but I do think a lot of businesses in Shanghai copied What we were doing and the way we were doing it. And they're fine to do that.
Speaker A
Not surprised.
Speaker B
Yeah, but I just. Because when you come up with an idea and then you see someone else doing, you're like, that's very close to what I'm doing. And it was fine. They weren't even in the same industry or anything like that. It was just a compliment, really. And it was one of those things where I don't want to tell them I know even if I know the owner, because if you're wrong, you just look like an arrogant tool. But I'm pretty sure that we did in many ways set the standard for how public accounts for foreign businesses run in Shanghai were done, at least in the ones that I see. Feel like we were a little bit ahead of the curve on that one. And then the next thing we did, which again, changed thing was to get all of our ticketing embedded into the public account and so people could look at an ad, click on it, buy the ticket within WeChat and send it to their friends, go up tickets to this. You said we started group post in there.
Speaker A
Brilliant. And did ticket sales increase? Like she said, Crazy. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker B
That was why we were able to then able to open a club that was open all the time, because all the shows were just on sale all the time. So people just gone through your calendar and picking out the one they want and everything's filling up and then shows are selling out and pushing me to the other ones. And it was. Couldn't have done that with that. WeChat wouldn't. It wouldn't have been possible. They just weren't doing the volumes.
Speaker A
But you still had a Facebook account for Kung Fu Comedy 2, right. You were doing both of those.
Speaker B
Because all the western social media platforms are blocked. So my presence on there was for out of China. You know, for us, the club Kung Fu Comedy is pretty well known with comics in the US actually, and they need to be able to find it and see that it's a real thing. So we weren't advertising shows. We were just sort of putting out stuff from the club so that people could see that it was functioning. And at least in stand up, you know, if you. If you say, I'm going to book this guy, he's like, I'm going to look you up. You need to have that presence there so they know that you're a real operator. And so Twitter and all that, it was the same.
Speaker A
Okay, so this is all business. Like, what about personally, were you doing anything on social Media online.
Speaker B
Yeah, I mean, I've always looked at being online from a utility point of view. I don't have a personal interest in social media. Maybe to keep in contact with people, but. But not really. Everything I do online is the purpose of building what I'm trying to do. So when you're a comedian and you're starting out, you're not getting booked anywhere and you don't have anything interesting to put online as you develop and people pay you to fly in and do their shows and stuff like that, you need to be able to have an audience. You should be able to draw in different cities. So everything I do online is about building, you know that.
Speaker A
Building your brand.
Speaker B
Yeah, but you know, my brain said that to me and I was like.
Speaker A
It has such a negative connotation these days. I want to see your facial expression influencer. See how did these things get so negative? I don't.
Speaker B
Yeah, well, because the people that do it are remarkably pretentious.
Speaker A
There could be that.
Speaker B
Yeah, that's because it's not to say that people copy a functionally productive influencer. It said the people that use that expression flagrantly are. Need to take a moment out of the, the tanning bed because it's, it's flying their brain, their neurons a little bit.
Speaker A
It can, it can be a bit much.
Speaker B
We started doing a podcast a long time ago. I think I've had maybe like four or five iterations of the podcast and that was you know, maybe like 2013 or something like that. We started to do some interview based stuff and it was really fun. We had a lot of. We did some cool stuff. I guess you can go back and listen to it. I'm sure it hasn't aged well.
Speaker A
Is it on the same RSS feed?
Speaker B
It's not in Stuck in the Middle, but Stuck in the Middle as part of the Comfort Company group. And the original ones are on there somewhere. Okay, I gotta go look it up. So, yeah, so. So we were trying to, you know, develop an audience and I've tried a lot of different things to try and make that happen. And podcasting is one of them, you know, making online content, you know, started my own website and just personal social media, but as a comedian, Facebook page and Twitter account and all of that. And Instagram. Instagram is pretty hot these days.
Speaker A
It is. All the kids are doing it.
Speaker B
Yeah, I mean, but it is to make that not sound wanky. If you are trying to build an audience, you're gonna do it a lot faster on Instagram.
Speaker A
Oh, hell, yeah, you have to go where people are is what I keep saying. So.
Speaker B
Yeah, that's very good influencer chat.
Speaker A
It is, it is. I listen to podcasts about influencers. Oh, I wish I was kidding.
Speaker B
You know, it'd be great. Is that if they were, like, torturing them while they were doing it?
Speaker A
No, that would not. I don't wish that on them.
Speaker B
Hashtag much.
Speaker A
So what. Okay, what you said there were different iterations of the podcast. Do you remember the names of the different ones?
Speaker B
The first podcast we did was called the Bottle Opener in reference to the building in Shanghai, in Pudong. The. What is it? Shanghai Financial Center.
Speaker A
I never remember the names of the buildings. They're buildings. Yeah, I do know.
Speaker B
Yeah. Yeah. And that. You know that we had a pretty good run with that. And I think actually the. The next name that I used was stuck in the middle and that sort of jumped around and what we were doing with it. And then I co produced another one called Polymorph Self, which was not something I would do, but it was. Andy Best is a friend of mine, and everyone who's been in Shanghai a long time has crossed his path at some point. And he. It was a Dungeons and Dragons role playing podcast, which we had on. On the comedy website.
Speaker A
Okay. That feels like it should be a very visual experience. Yeah.
Speaker B
And, you know, it's a really niche part of the Internet and it did pretty well. Actually not well enough to keep going. Because the problem is, as I said to you is, like with podcasting, if you. It was very hard. They had to get four people together to.
Speaker A
Oh, my gosh. Yeah.
Speaker B
Have like, full set up, like, multiple.
Speaker A
Oh, you were. You weren't talking about D and D. You were actually, actually like, recording the game itself.
Speaker B
And I would play a game.
Speaker A
Wow. Okay. Wow.
Speaker B
Yeah.
Speaker A
That was hard to coordinate. Yeah.
Speaker B
Yeah. So it. You know, it. Eventually he just. I think Andy ran. I haven't actually. I. I spoke to him the other day, but I hadn't asked him what. Why it died, but I think he just ran out of steam.
Speaker A
So.
Speaker B
Yeah, so they were putting a lot of different podcasts out there. And then at some point there was a. A guy named Alessio Afizano, who. I don't know.
Speaker A
He.
Speaker B
He's the director behind Mama who. And just like, he's just a genius. He's a really. He's really dialed into making great content. He's a really passionate video maker and, you know, a very, very good friend of mine now. But when I first met him, he came into the comedy club. And he's like, I want to make some videos. And I was like, yeah, man, a lot of people want to make videos. And he was like, I'll make him with you. And so we started filming shows and putting him online and we made some content that I thought was really great, but it didn't, it didn't do very well for the amount of effort we were doing at that point. I'd flown a professional comedian out to Shanghai who lived here for 10 months as a resident and he was a raging alcoholic. It was one of the rockiest periods of my life. But he had a show every week called the Gathering and it was pretty incredible, actually. He would bring two interesting people from Shanghai on. They would have stand up, he would interview them. If they were a musician, they would play. If they're a dancer, they would dance. Like it was really, really mixed sort of variety show. And. And Alessio was filming a lot of them and putting them out there. And. And whilst he was doing that, he started a thing called the Monkey Kings, which was a prank show in Shanghai. And we were, you know, I was, I was sort of obtusely involved in that and they were great. But prank shows are just like, ah, it's just super stressful for the people trying to make it. It. It's, it's a weird genre of content that does well, but is, you know, on the nose for a lot of people, especially when you're white and you're making, you know, jokes that are potentially the expense of the local population doesn't go down well with a lot of people. But some locals don't like it from. People in the west don't like it. No one was really comfortable about what they were making. And then he also discovered at that point, Donnie does. I don't know if you, you're never gonna come across Donnie. So Donnie's huge now. Like, he's a really. Donnie rocketed. Zach Eckind is, is Donnie. So, so Donnie is an Alessio style brain, but for making, for being on camera. And he was, he. He ran a thing with a bunch of guys called Panda. It was like a pub crawl. It was like a huge pub crawl and they would like rent buses and it was really, really sloppy. And they started making these videos and he came up with this character earlier of this Boston townie that was just walking around China completely lost and a lot of people didn't like I. To be honest, I didn't like it when I first. And I remember Alessio asked me about It. And I was like, I don't know, man. This is pretty on the nose. We're already. There are people already a bit funny about, you know, content making fun of people. This is really rough. And he. Alessio, he's just got that brain. He's just like, nah, there's another layer to this. And he said to me, he's like, this is a guy. He's working class.
Speaker A
Us.
Speaker B
You know, it's. It's a universally relatable point of view. And he was right, and Jack was brilliant. And so Zach made a couple of videos that went bananas. He. He looks a little like Roger Federer. And so he went to Nanjing Donglu dressed as Roger Federer. Like, he just walked off a court, and people swarmed him.
Speaker A
Oh, my God.
Speaker B
He even walked into the Nike store, and they were accommodating and thinking that someone had walked in. But he was dressed like he just walked off the court. Right, right. Like, he had the headband on and he was carrying a racket and then didn't clue on to them.
Speaker A
Yeah.
Speaker B
Doesn't dress like that, but he's not actually playing tennis. Yeah.
Speaker A
Oh, my God. Yeah.
Speaker B
Yeah. And so then he did another one, which was bananas. He went and, like, he. He went and snuck into the Pacquiao. His stories. He has the best stories. He snuck into the Pacquiao fight in Macau. He got. Got into the ring during the fight. I think it must have been, like, between rounds or something. I don't. I still to this day, I don't know how he did it. And he also, like, found, like, Billy Baldwin and harassed him on camera and. Yeah, yeah, yeah. He. He. He snuck into. The Rolling Stones came and he snuck in backstage and got, like. They had, like, some formal, like, CIA agent or something as their, like, last. Last line of defense. And he got, like, taken down by this guy and, like, tied to a chair and interrogated, like, bag over his head, and he's like, you're going down, man. We're gonna hand you over to the Chinese authorities. You're gonna be jailed for a long time. Of course, they take the police station.
Speaker A
Like, what do you want me to do with him? Yeah, cigarettes. Oh, my God.
Speaker B
So. So I did a few. A couple things with him. And, yeah, I did something with him recently, actually. And, you know, Zach is just the most genuine, like, dude and brilliant talent. He had a bright star. He got picked up by a company called Barstool Sports, and he's now in the US Making mad, massive content.
Speaker A
Wow. And he.
Speaker B
He's got A place back here. He comes back here a lot and makes stuff.
Speaker A
Yeah.
Speaker B
But he's legitimately doing huge things over there. I mean, most people. A lot of people have heard of barstool sports. It's really, really big. He's one of their main guys, and he got that from being a content creator at China.
Speaker A
And do you know what else could go to another level? The listenership of this podcast. No, really. I love talking about what our geographic movement does to our online presence. And you'll hear more from Andy in just a second. But I just wanted to ask you one quick favorite. If you like this conversation and the conversations that we do on this podcast, could you please share this? Now? I have some ideas with how you can do that super easily. For example, Screenshot, the podcast app where you're listening to it that has the name of the podcast and just quick send it to someone. Or you can actually post it online on Twitter or Facebook or LinkedIn, Instagram, anything like that. Even without the link, as long as they have the name, people can find the podcast in their podcast player. You can email it to someone. It really depends on what's easiest for you. The point is, word of mouth is very powerful, and I appreciate anything you do to spread the word about the virtual Expats podcast and the virtual Expats pod tube experience. Thank you so much.
Speaker B
It's just. And you know, he. At one point, he trolled Trump. He went to a Trump rally. And I'll have a sign that said, trump likes his stakes. Well done. Done like, right. And it got in all these newspapers and. But. But those guys, you know, it's really fun hanging out with people like that, because I feel like the. The world that I live in is seen to be unplanned, and it's really planned. And those guys, like Alessio and. And Zach are. They can see an opportunity when it's happening, and they'll adapt what they're doing and just capture it. And it's a pretty phenomenal thing to be there for. I remember we did one video, which I want to go into many details because it is really embarrassing. I'm pretty sure they took it offline. It was not tasteful at all, but it involved the marriage market, people square. And it didn't. And the police came in huge numbers. And I was like, I'm gonna die. Yeah, I just throw. I just, like, froze. And he just. His personality just triples in size as the stakes go up. And.
Speaker A
Wait, were you guys just filming it, or you were like, Doing the interactive.
Speaker B
We were attracting a lot of attention, a lot more attention than they wanted foreigners to be getting in such a busy area. And we were doing some stuff that was a bit on the nose, but for me it was an eye opener into people that can operate like that, that can adapt and make great content as it's happening. I don't know if you're not familiar with him, but he used to harass the Sharks. The Shanghai Sharks. He used to harass their basketball games so much that he got a lifetime ban and then they subsequently asked him to come and curate their halftime entertainment.
Speaker A
That's awesome.
Speaker B
This video online of him trying to sneak in whilst he was banned. He's dressed up as a woman and they're catching him anyway, so he goes and runs into the woman's bathroom.
Speaker A
That's so crazy. That's so crazy. So, okay, wait, we need to backtrack because, yeah, this is also.
Speaker B
This is not my content.
Speaker A
No, no, no, no, no. But, but, but you're. It's like example after example after example. We keep coming across people who really just started to blossom when they come to China. And it's going to sound a little.
Speaker B
Bit like, no, I was way better before I got.
Speaker A
But I've heard from a lot of people, there's something about when they come here. I don't know if it's the, the lack of financial stress because of the pay or what have you, but there's something that happens where they have the, the mental sanity or what have you to be able to like let their creative side flourish. What the hell is it though?
Speaker B
I think that I would. I have a different take on that. I think that people have ideas about what they're supposed to be doing. And when you're in the place that you come from, it's very hard to detach from that because there's so many people around you reminding you of who you are and what you told them you're doing and what you seem to be doing and stuff like that. And you know, there is a stereotype of people coming here and reinventing themselves. But, but there's a truth and there's a reason, I think, for that. And that is that nobody knows who you are. You can say that, you could say that you're anything and you can be that. I mean, how many people have you seen whether you're like you're a rapper.
Speaker A
But is it them coming to China or them just going anywhere else other.
Speaker B
Than their home country has a non unique dynamic that you are not really socially accepted into the people that are living here. And so they don't, as a. As a weird silver lining, they're not putting any social pressure on you to do it or be anything. And that's not to say that the expat community can't put that pressure on you, but it's just wildly different. And I've seen people just realize that if anyone in the expat community really puts pressure on you, don't like, you can usually just not be around them anymore, which is not an option. You know, if you come from a town or your family or whatever, that. So that's like part of it. And then the other thing is that people in my experience that have been successful here across the board have done something that they didn't set out here to do. Right. And that's just because it is a hyper, hyper developing place. Change is really incredible here. And the change is so dramatic. And your information about what it's like you're so low before you come, it's unlikely that you're going to guess what opportunity is the right one at the time that you're there when you leave home. And the people that I've seen fail are the ones that fail to realize that. And the ones that have done well have been the ones. I mean, like, what if I change what I'm doing a little bit and I see this opportunity and it pans out really well. And I also think that, like a lot of things, you know, your personal development is hard to separate it from the place and the things that you're doing. And so is it a catalyst? Does it play a role? You know, being in a place where you're so out of your depth and out of your environment is going to cause personal change. And that personal change is then going to change your perspective and then it's going to change your priorities. And all of this is bleeding into you doing, you know, method.
Speaker A
No, wait, that's not where I thought your conclusion was gonna go.
Speaker B
Waxing lyrical.
Speaker A
But.
Speaker B
No, no, no, no, no.
Speaker A
But you hit on a lot of factors that I think do end up to be the recipe for why. A lot. This happens a lot. Because I've lived most of my adult life in different countries overseas, and I've seen some. I am, yeah. And. But there was. There was also a lot of work that goes into that. But yeah, there is the opportunity to do it.
Speaker B
Easy.
Speaker A
No, no, it's not easy at all.
Speaker B
Plot twists.
Speaker A
It's easier to fit in in your home country and just stay There.
Speaker B
There's a great quote from Bill Bear is a comedian. I don't know if you're familiar with him. And people say, you know, it was so brave to take the chance to do something you love. And he said, brave is. Is going to bed every night in the easiest option, knowing there's no chance of you being happy.
Speaker A
That's brave.
Speaker B
Yeah. He's like, that is the scary, scariest thing to try. Oh, yeah, he's sort of trying to. He doesn't really think that it's nobly brave.
Speaker A
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker B
But he does think that that is the scariest of the options.
Speaker A
I think it's funny. People think it's an option to express yourself or not. I don't fully understand not trying to express yourself.
Speaker B
Yeah, I understand that.
Speaker A
Yeah.
Speaker B
I mean, I think at our very core nature, we are observers and not actors.
Speaker A
Really.
Speaker B
Yes. I feel very firmly that that's the truth. Truth. And that is certainly my truth. And so I believe it's your truth.
Speaker A
I'm just not so sure it's the overall truth. If there is an over. There's probably different camps of folks who.
Speaker B
Yeah, but I need to. Yeah, but I think, well, okay. Another way to kind of maybe describe that is that there are different ways to enjoy human experience, and creating is only one of them. It is a great one, and for some people, it's the best one. But it isn't the only one, particularly if you suck. There are a lot of people creating stuff who I think would be great as observers.
Speaker A
Oh, I. I agree with you. However, it's like people saying, oh, there are too many bloggers, too many podcasters, too many musicians. I don't think it's a question of.
Speaker B
There being too many.
Speaker A
Yeah.
Speaker B
I think that some people are making content and not. I don't think making bad content is a crime. I've made plenty of bad content, and.
Speaker A
A lot of people need to make bad content for a while before they make really good content. Sure.
Speaker B
But the people I'm really having to pick with are the ones who keep.
Speaker A
Making the same stuff, same bad content.
Speaker B
Reviewing what went wrong.
Speaker A
But anyway, going back to my original point is I've lived in a few different countries and I've seen some places where the expats that move into the country flourish and do something they didn't expect to do.
Speaker B
And I.
Speaker A
But I've never seen it. This turned up as here.
Speaker B
I don't have anywhere to compare it to.
Speaker A
And the funny thing is, you know what Westerners think of people come To China. And it's so fill in the blank with negative adjective. You know, it's so restricted. It's so difficult. It's so police stated out. It's so this. It's so that like they think that our lives in some ways are just as awful as the newspapers paint it.
Speaker B
You know, people talk about, and I think it was true up until recently, is that the great restricted restrictions that people want to talk about don't actually affect day to day life that much. And then a lot of the great restrictions that are on day to day life are way more prevalent in the US than they are here, for example, or the West. You know, for example, police harassing you and stuff like that, or feeling unsafe in public places or violence or you know, any of that sort of stuff, you know, because you don't deal with it here actually is a far more pronounced experience on your daily life. But I think things have changed and I think that creative people are leaving here in dry.
Speaker A
Oh yeah, yeah, it's been going on for. When would you say the exodus started? Year, Two years.
Speaker B
I mean, it's been going on for about two years, but this past year it really picked up speed. I mean, I would say the last six months it's gone to another level.
Speaker A
Let's veer back online. So it sounds like a lot of your online stuff, not only business or focus oriented on your creative endeavors, but is pretty balanced with offline activities.
Speaker B
Yeah, well, it's all about the offline activities. Although that being said, I do, I have, I've grown to love this stuff that I do online. I really enjoy doing podcasting. I really. There's an alignment with what I do in live shows. Between that and the podcasting, I've done a lot of live podcasts now. They were great. I really enjoyed it. And there's a connection. You know, I got to a point where I could sell out, you know, shows in certain cities and stuff like that. And these people, they knew who I was. I had a connection through the content that I was making. And then also the part that I didn't mention that I was sort of veering to very slowly is that when Monkey Kings died. And it died because they made a video that got him into a lot of trouble. They made a video during Halloween that dressed a guy up like a zombie, pretended to start bleeding out of his mouth on the metro and people lost their minds. Whoa. There was like a stampede. Yeah, that guy, the cops fan. And he went to pre. A week in prison. And then the. Yeah, they Banned Halloween outfits in Shanghai on the metro because of that video. Yeah. So. So everyone was like, no more pranks. And that was how Mama who started. That's actually how it started.
Speaker A
Wow. Okay.
Speaker B
And so last year was like, well, let's make some really great content that fuses, you know, the west and China. It's like where the two meet and how it's funny. And we, we made some sort of more viral based content to begin with. You know, the, the classic videos, like things Chinese people say, things foreigners say. It's Chinese people. And, and it was just an instant, like, it was like, man, we got the mix right. You know, instantly people, everyone was watching it. You know, the millions and millions of views were coming in and it was. I'd never done anything like that. Like, I've never seen something go so well in terms of content creation. Wow. Yeah.
Speaker A
Was there any feedback that you got on those videos that were surprising?
Speaker B
I mean, every day. Yeah, I mean, every day. I don't know. The guys wouldn't be happy to say this, but we do check comments and it does get shared around if it's funny or. And we get abused a lot when you, when you're viewed by that many people, people, you get the full spectrum of responses possible. So it doesn't matter what you put up. There's some people that think that hate you and think you're racist or whatever. You know, we had one person, you know, that allegedly been a subscriber for years. We made a joke that Wayne Gretzky is the God of Canada. They said that we'd offended their religion.
Speaker A
Oh, dear God. Really?
Speaker B
But that's like, I mean, this stuff, every day we get stuff like this. So am I surprised at this point? I didn't. There's nothing that could surprise me. But when we started getting more. When you start to get noticed more than you've ever been noticed before, you're like, what are they? What's wrong with these people?
Speaker A
Right? Why are they taking this so seriously?
Speaker B
Yeah, like, we just try to make a goofy video. Like, how has this become such a big thing? A few years ago, we made a video for Chinese New Year where it was about how you can rent a boyfriend to take back to your parents so they don't ask you why you're not.
Speaker A
Which is a real thing.
Speaker B
Yeah, but it was a clearly a joke video. Like, I mean, we were really mocking us. The guys that were being bargained off and stuff. And it was recently on Israeli television, they thought it was real. They were like, this is an ad in China and they had like, me as a French guy being like, yeah. I was like, how did you not pick up? Yeah.
Speaker A
Like looking at the list of videos and probably the guessing. I've never read the description. And mama who like YouTube. I watch in YouTube.
Speaker B
It's very clearly comedy.
Speaker A
Yeah. Like, how did they miss.
Speaker B
They weren't looking. They wanted a story. Maybe they saw it. Who knows? People. People that put out. I have. No. Not a lot of respect for the media, have you?
Speaker A
Because on YouTube now, you can actually delete. Like, as a moderator, you can delete comments.
Speaker B
You guys, to be honest, for I. It sucks, but, like, if you put a girl in a video, you're gonna have to delete a lot of the comments about it. It doesn't matter. It's just the way the Internet is. I'm not defending it.
Speaker A
No, no, no. I know.
Speaker B
Want to run a channel that's like, got some sort of, you know, and in fairness to the women, because, you know, I. We write a script, you ask a girl often, it's a friend, you know, you want to be a video. She doesn't deserve that sort of treatment.
Speaker A
No one deserves that treatment anywhere.
Speaker B
Yeah, I'll make women get singled out a lot more.
Speaker A
Yeah. Oh, I know for sure. I'm aware.
Speaker B
Surprise you with my knowledge about what it's like to be a woman.
Speaker A
Are there any comments that you wish you had received for any of those videos that you haven't?
Speaker B
Yeah, I don't know. Maybe. I think you can't. If you're serious about making good stuff, it's never done. And I think that's a real trap. I think a lot of creators fail because they want to wait until it's perfect, and it's just never perfect. And. And a lot of people, people who are good, I think, don't need to get it to 100%. And getting it out often counts for more. It sucks, but it's just the way it is. And so, yeah, you know, people will suggest stuff. I'm like, ah, that would have been funny. How do we miss that as an angle? But I've just. I've accepted that once you've sent it out, there it is done. And beating yourself up about you. You might get inspiration for another video or another podcast or take it in another direction. But I've never. I just don't think in terms of regret, especially with something like that, because it does come up and you just like, nah, I couldn't sit there and worry about everything we missed in Every video. And sometimes, you know, you have a joke that like, making videos is hard because there's a team. When you're a stand up, you have full control over the content, how it's done, your timing and stuff. Like, say you write a script, you know, you're not even in it. You know, the actors are going to have their own interpretation, the editor. You know, one of the things I, I didn't realize is like directors, they have, they make it. You think actors make it. Actors are just a really, you know, they don't have as much as you'd think going on. The directors are the ones that come in and look at, and piece it all together and fix the timing and make it all line up. And that was a whole process that I just didn't know about. And, and, and yeah, sometimes it gets you at the end of it, you're like, that's not actually what I had in mind. But, but it got out there.
Speaker A
Yeah.
Speaker B
And it's done well. So, you know, you just can't sweat on that level once it's out there.
Speaker A
Yeah, you don't always have control of the create what of the thing you're creating.
Speaker B
You know, it might not be control. You know, you might have a bad day and you just, you miss something and you put it out there before you can fix it or whatever. I mean, I've sometimes, I mean, you know, even just on a stupid level, I've put out podcasts where I just like ruined the audio and didn't check it.
Speaker A
You know, I can't even. Yeah, I've had a lot of audio issues this week. I did an entire interview with my. I was video.
Speaker B
You just gotta keep it simple.
Speaker A
Oh, I know, I know. But it was a video and I could see my friend Baby in her hands in the video and her baby was clearly making noises. And I was just so into the conversation that I ignored the, the fact that I was going to have to try to edit that out later. And we just kept going.
Speaker B
I've had several. I think I've had three live shows where I didn't hit the record button with a full audience. And they're like, this is great. When's it coming out? I'm like, well, I didn't record it. I've had interviews where the guest was crying and I'm looking down and I realized I've missed it. I just didn't. Or the cards full. That's another one. The card gets full every now and then because I wasn't deleting him I now delete everything, you know, so. Ah, so many. Yeah. But Mike's bust or whatever. Like Dean Edwards, who's a former SNL actor. I, I, he invited me on his podcast, which was great. Yeah. And he just didn't turn my mic on. Oh, no. You know what? He used my equipment and he didn't understand how to, to switch them both to mono. So he put this podcast out there where he's asking questions, and I am the faintest voice in the background.
Speaker A
Oh, no. See, now I'm paranoid. So I'm gonna check to make sure we're recording both of us right now.
Speaker B
It would be ironic.
Speaker A
It would be.
Speaker B
It would be ironic to not record a podcast about not recording.
Speaker A
About not recording. Yeah.
Speaker B
Or maybe it's not ironic. Maybe it should be expected.
Speaker A
Yeah. Is there anything else online?
Speaker B
So podcasts, you know, I started out doing interviews, and it was so great. Like, it was such an amazing way at that point. I was, I was sort of connected in Shanghai. I could get to people pretty well. I did some, I got some. I bagged some pretty good guests over the years. Like, I got the guy who built Cintiand, the architect that did the whole thing.
Speaker A
Is this still online?
Speaker B
Yeah, yeah, yeah. He was great. Kind of ruined the audio on that one as well. But it's listenable. I learned how to repair them at some point. I, you know, I became really good. Like, one of my really good friends now is Anchin Chen, who, you know, he owns Bund 18 and the Blackstone Magic Bar, which is awesome if you want to check it out. He's this incredibly talented magician. You know, we became friends because Adam is a guest. You know, lots of people became my friends because I would invite them on and they had such great stories. Yeah, I had one guy, he was, I interviewed a Nigerian drug dealer about how his life was here. Yeah.
Speaker A
How did you find.
Speaker B
I thought he was ex. Turned out current. One of the comedians was one of his clients and hooked me up. And then there was. Yeah, I had another one. I had the guy who was like Andy Warhol's personal photographer, who'd been with him out in China, like the 80s and stuff like that, and his whole life they'd worked work together. So, you know, that was kind of what I was doing. And then I, I was like, I want to bring a comedian in and have some, an intro. So this is when the podcast started to get really complicated. My, One of my best friends, Joe Schaefer, is one of the funniest people I know. We would do an introduction together. And when we start playing games, like, I would read him stories and he would guess if news stories, he would guess if they happen in China, you know, and then we did these other things, like anti social media, where we would find stories in the west that were anti China and like unabashedly. And people loved it. You know, it was really good, but it was a lot of work. And then I started to record by myself, which was terrifying. I couldn't do a minute of it. And now I do an hour of it every week.
Speaker A
You know, what was the. What was the problem with doing.
Speaker B
I don't know. It's funny because people talk to me all the time about their fear of stand up and what happens to them. I've seen people start stand up and really the brain just gets overwhelmed with the circumstances. And it was my thing. It was overwhelming. I couldn't do it. And I just tried. I just kept doing it and I started doing like five minutes at the end of every podcast of just me just talking and. And I just sort of acquired that skill in a way through repetition. And then at some point I. I had a kid, my wife got very sick, and I just, I couldn't do all of that editing. I lost a couple of podcasts, a live one, and I was, I had to go and do another one that week. I was like, this is killing me. And I. And I stopped. But I loved it so much. I always wanted to get back to it. And so when I brought it back, I was like, no more interviews, no more chasing people, and no more finding a comedian who's hungover all the time. Just me in the laundry and a microphone and let's get it out every week. And, and, and it's been the best thing I ever did.
Speaker A
Well, it's very, very good, but for the best decision you've ever made. How long has it been going on now? From the start. Where would you even start it? Because you said it went through so many iterations.
Speaker B
The current iteration?
Speaker A
Yeah, just in. No, the first. Okay. Starting from the first.
Speaker B
I mean, I'd have to look it up, but I think it was like 2012 or something like that. Wow. Yeah, I've probably recorded maybe like 150 podcasts or something.
Speaker A
Podcast episodes?
Speaker B
Yeah. Yeah, it's. It'd be in that range for sure. 100 and. Yeah, so, yeah, an hour. 150.
Speaker A
Why did you start podcasting?
Speaker B
We wanted to have. Well, you know, at that time in 2009, Stand up took off around the world and it took off around the world, I think, because podcasting became a thing and suddenly people could listen to comedians and learn about how to become a comedian. And suddenly simultaneously stand up started in India, in China, all over Asia, all over Eastern Europe.
Speaker A
2009, why 2009? What was going on?
Speaker B
Podcasting was sort of hitting a bit of a, a huge news. You know, I can't remember who, like Bill Burr was pretty big man. And I think Joe Rogans was getting pretty big. There was, there was a, a few of them out there that were really. People were getting into and we were comics, we wanted to, we can, we want to try this thing. We think we can do it. And I don't know if I was so focused at that point in my life, but certainly at some point I realized the value, which is I, I've worked with a lot of comedians and I've worked with a lot of guys who are as talented as anyone could ever hope to be, who haven't made it. And they're 20 years in and they haven't made it and they don't know why they haven't made it. And it's a really scary thing. Like some of these people are organized and you know, they've been successful in a way, but they're not making money beyond sort of scraping by. And it's scary as hell. And the realization I had is that stand ups have this trap is they try to develop to get through the industry of stand up, but they don't build an audience. And what that means is you go out and you try to get into comedy clubs and you get accepted to headline in places like that. But when you don't have your audience, you can't take the next level. The next level is draw. The next level is you're the one selling the tickets. It doesn't matter if it's in the comedy club or it's in the basketball court, people are going to come because it's your show. And I realized that if I wanted to be in 20 years time, a comedian that wasn't just scraping by, I needed to find a way to have people that would come and see my show. And that was what drove me to it. And it was great. It was, it was, I was lucky that I enjoy a lot doing the thing that works with that. And I get that. For me, that makes sense because you do have to pour a lot of time into something that often is not giving you the results that you want. So you want to enjoy it. Otherwise your life is going to Suck. So I just feel very lucky that they all kind of fused together like that. And it was through a lot of trial and error of stuff not working and finding what the balance was that fit for me.
Speaker A
Do you feel that because you've been doing that so well, you've been doing all of these different things so publicly so long, all online. Do you feel that there's a pressure for you to keep doing them?
Speaker B
I think you stop and people forget you straight away. Yeah, they really do. Is that a yes, so. Well, no, I don't. I'm saying there's no pressure.
Speaker A
Oh, there's no pressure?
Speaker B
No, there's no.
Speaker A
Well, you don't want to be forgotten though, do you?
Speaker B
Well, that's the pressure. But no one else is putting it on you.
Speaker A
Right? Right, Right. Yeah. Okay.
Speaker B
You're putting it on yourself.
Speaker A
Yeah.
Speaker B
I feel pressured to, to meet the timetable that I have. My life is a little difficult at the moment. I'm having a second time working kid. And I'm, and I'm, and I'm not at home a lot. So to have a scheduled thing like that takes a lot of planning and that is a pressure. But it's a good pressure. You know, I think that life is best enjoyed with a, with a measured amount of suffering. No, but you need to have the right kind of suffering.
Speaker A
That's awesome.
Speaker B
Elect, you know, accepted or elected suffering.
Speaker A
Yeah. Well, there is, is good stress, apparently. Like there's stress that kind of motivates you to keep going.
Speaker B
You know, these people inside love to be just sitting on a beach restaurant. Oh, I get so I have tried that.
Speaker A
Yeah.
Speaker B
I'm an hour in. I'm like, this beach is dirty.
Speaker A
I'm like searching in my bag for content. I'm like, I need to read or do something right now.
Speaker B
I, I, it's also like I, I have to perform a few times a week or I go bonkers. Which, which restricts the cities that I can live in. But I love it. It sucks when it's not going well, but it's, but it's brilliant when it's going well. And I love trying to make it go well as often as possible, I.
Speaker A
Must admit, and I probably should have told you this ahead of time, I'm not very familiar with stand up. The standup industry.
Speaker B
Sure.
Speaker A
Comedic industry. I don't even know what it's called. Comedy industry. Yeah. Okay.
Speaker B
Comedy is probably more general comedy.
Speaker A
Okay. My thought is like, I know that things are captured and put online after the fact. Like you were talking about the the shows that you put online after the fact. Are there a lot of live events that are put online that people quote, unquote, go to more than go to in person?
Speaker B
Well, yeah, I mean, content online is watched by multiples more than than live shows. Yeah. And stand up is an alternative, alternative art form. Most people have not been to a show even in the US So even if you go to like I remember. So I, I'm from Melbourne and Melbourne has the second or third biggest stand up festival. Festival in the world. And most people in Melbourne have never been to a show. Yeah. And they have 11. Well, I think they've peaked at like 1700 shows in one festival.
Speaker A
What's the festival called?
Speaker B
The Melbourne International Comedy Festival.
Speaker A
Oh, well, that makes sense.
Speaker B
Hard to remember.
Speaker A
Not if you know it. Damn it. Okay, okay.
Speaker B
You don't know about the Melbourne International comic. What is, what is this interview? What research have you done? I think possibly the part that, that you may not know about is that developing material takes a lot of time. And really good jokes. They say take a couple of years to kind of really pin down of doing them every week.
Speaker A
Right.
Speaker B
And just tweaking them. And so generally when someone records something, they're burning it, they're putting it online and they're not going to do it anymore. Yeah, that's how it works. Because once it's online, people have seen it. You can't then continue doing in your life.
Speaker A
It's not like music at all where people want to hear the same songs from.
Speaker B
Oh God, no, no, no, no. And that's why like the, the model for big comedians now is that they will develop an hour, they'll tour it for, for one to two years around the world and then they'll record it and they'll sell it to Netflix or something. That's how that whole game works. Right. So that's why when you go to see someone, what you're saying is their next special that they're going to record, not the last one. Unless they suck.
Speaker A
Okay, so have we caught up to present day stuff that you do online?
Speaker B
Yeah, I mean now, you know, I've, I've limited what I put my energy into. Mama who takes up a lot of time and not a lot of time, but that's big focus. The podcast is a big focus. And then just sort of keeping people dialed into my touring and stuff like that online, that's what I'm putting out there. So the Facebook and the Instagram and the Twitter personal website, I think that there's a trap in trying to do too much. And I think if you're really good at a few things, then. I'm not saying that I am good, but I. This is the logic that I'm applying is that you're gonna get better results just to do a few things.
Speaker A
Well, that's promising to hear that if you keep doing the same thing, you can get better.
Speaker B
Yeah, I feel like I. I've been fortunate enough to see some of the stuff that I've worked on for a few years grow to other levels and allow me to do different things.
Speaker A
The big question we try to get to in the podcast is if your geographical movement affected what you did online. Do you think moving from Melbourne to Shanghai affected what you did online?
Speaker B
Yeah, well, I mean, obviously the Internet that we use here is different to the Internet that we have in Australia, so clearly, I mean, if I was in Melbourne, I'm only on one WeChat or Weibo, so that's a factor. But then I think, you know, I do think that aside from China's attempts to change the course of technological evolution, I do think that there is a. A singularity that we're circling in terms of different countries. And by that I mean the differences in the way each country is used. The Internet is getting smaller and smaller.
Speaker A
You mean they're making them more local, specific kind of stuff?
Speaker B
No, I mean the opposite. I mean, we're starting to use the same websites more and more.
Speaker A
Yeah.
Speaker B
Like Russia has its own version of Facebook. I can't remember the name of it, but yeah, yeah.
Speaker A
And Korea apparently has like a lot of mirror social medias.
Speaker B
Yeah.
Speaker A
Similar to what China based.
Speaker B
But I'm not saying they are the same. I'm saying that even those different websites are starting to look more similar.
Speaker A
Oh, they are. They definitely are.
Speaker B
Because the good ideas are the ones that people understand that at the end of the day, it's really. Because it's so easy. The barriers to moving around what you're doing online are so low now that the. The stuff that's good is people are just gonna go and use it. You know, you can't. You can't expect people to be through nationalistic values, use, you know, your domestic version of something, unless you block their answer.
Speaker A
That's very true. Do you think we've hit a saturation point of newness and innovation with apps and we just want simple, easy and quick?
Speaker B
No, I think that there's a tendency to think that there was more innovation in the past, because when you look at the past, it's like, if you were standing on the horizon looking at hills, right, you're going to just see the tops of the biggest hills, but actually those hills are not even necessarily next to each other, you know, but visually you're like, look at those hills over there. We're not on a hill that high right now, you know, but innovation is going to keep morphing. You know, there are people out there that just. I think I really got a good idea out of Stand up about how some people genuinely are original thinkers. You know, they can really take something. And I'm not saying it's limited in stand up, but it was very obvious to me in Stand up, there are some people who were sort of polishing what has already been done. And then other people, I'm like that person. It just thinks differently. And I think that that's true of innovation. I think that at any day now, there's going to be some other thing that no one had thought of, that someone's a genius and they came out with it, and it'll disrupt. It's a disruptor. To use the influencer phraseology. That's another influencer word, by the way. Phraseology.
Speaker A
Is it?
Speaker B
I just. Yeah, I'm an influencer, so. Yeah.
Speaker A
Oh, okay.
Speaker B
You're not in the WeChat group for influences, okay?
Speaker A
No, I'm not. I'm not an influencer.
Speaker B
I'm not.
Speaker A
I play one in a podcast.
Speaker B
So I don't think. I don't think there's any limit. I think people. I think that. I think that we live in a world now more than at any time in history, where people feel like if they have a good idea, they can actualize it. Now, that's a completely feel assessment. I understand that, but it seems to me like, I think that in general, you know, it's.
Speaker A
It's.
Speaker B
We're not as trough. Of. Of innovative potential. Is that all right?
Speaker A
That's. That's great. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. No, I'm sorry. I'm a very visual person. So when you say trough, I literally see a trough with the pigs next to it. And then I start thinking about bacon. What.
Speaker B
The. I just, you know, I did the same thing as you and I keep thinking about, because behind you is the Huangpu river on a close back.
Speaker A
Yeah. Which is apparently a highly inaccurate map, which.
Speaker B
Which I call. I call the Huangpu River Pig Creek. If you remember the few years ago, 16,000 dead pigs floated down.
Speaker A
Yes.
Speaker B
There we go.
Speaker A
Swine flu is back, apparently in China. I'm sorry about.
Speaker B
On the Podcast?
Speaker A
Yes. That's where I learned about it actually. It all comes around the circle of podcasting.
Speaker B
Sounds like you've been influenced.
Speaker A
I have. So is there anything online that you want to do that doesn't exist yet?
Speaker B
Yeah, I mean, I think it's so hard to make videos right now and I think that there's still scope for that to be easier.
Speaker A
What's hard about it right now?
Speaker B
You gotta. I don't know, I listen. I don't know how they're gonna make it easier, but there's a lot of someone's gotta write a script. Other people have to check it. You know, everyone has their input. You get fine. You gotta find actors. That takes ages. You can find locations. Like there's so many things that could make that really difficult process faster. The editing takes a long time. I think it would be exciting to see them, you know, sort of streamline that whole process. I think that it's very hard to record stand up content well without hiring a full on production crew. I think there's a lot of scope for advances in technology to make it easier. Like we were recording, recording videos at the comedy club. We just put a GoPro in a good place with a good camera and they were okay. They were good enough to put out there. They weren't amazing. They could be a lot better. With simple advances in technology, the sound could be better. Maybe we easy to have like multiple camera locations, that kind of stuff. So if you can improve that in fixed locations for stand up, you can get to a point where you're recording everything and then every time something good happens, you can instantly put it out. So, you know, just off the top of my head, there's like a couple of things that, for what I do that would make life a lot easier.
Speaker A
Are you tempted at all to be someone to make that? No, not at all. Fair enough.
Speaker B
Not even gonna me answering that question is the extent of the effort I'm all willing to put into that.
Speaker A
Fair enough. So keeping in mind, we're trying to figure out if people's geographical movements to different countries affects what they do online. What questions are missing from this podcast? What should I ask future guests?
Speaker B
Maybe how has their presence online affected their actual life? You know, like what is it? You know, I think that Shanghai as expat in Shanghai, life is very built around. We channel the people you interact with. I mean, a lot of my human interaction comes from there's certain groups that I'm in. They're my go to. When something happens to me, I go to them. And they, my world is like that then that the world wasn't like that a few years ago. The world wasn't. I did not live in a world where something happened to me. Today there's seven friends I have in a group that I know would respond to that and I would talk to them and they would chat about. We take photos, you know, send it like how. And that doesn't exist in Australia. Like my family are in groups similar on WhatsApp because I'm here, but their lives aren't like that. So how has your online presence impacted the actual way you live? You know, as a parent here, the parent groups are huge. Buying and selling stuff. I was exercising at home this morning. I had five deliveries while I was exercising. And that's normal that, you know, we just buy so much stuff online and, you know, I'm fascinated into that interaction. I'm worried that when I leave, I'm real. That's the biggest thing I'm gonna miss. I don't want to have to go to the store for toilet paper anymore. I've outgrown that. Just bring it. Huma is, is like the Alibaba fresh food food delivery service. Whenever the doorbell rings, my one year old son says, huma, they will deliver. They slowed it down a little bit used to begin with within 30 minutes. Yeah. They literally fresh food produce within 30 minutes. It's. It's out to like an hour now.
Speaker A
And it's worst stuff.
Speaker B
No, it's high quality fresh fruit. Yeah. I'm looking for Alibaba sponsor my podcast, you schmucks. You know, doing all the hard work for them all. Legwork. Yeah, it's really good. So, you know, I haven't been to a supermarket in years. I just order food now. Like it's nothing if I don't have food in the fridge. Boom. And then if it doesn't come in half an hour, I sit there at home being like, what is my life?
Speaker A
I start to email them if I, if I'm not on their WeChat, I'll even email them and say, where is my order?
Speaker B
I nearly complained after 35 minutes the other day. And then I looked at the time, I was like, you're a disgusting human.
Speaker A
Do you know what's crazy is I have a hard time thinking of WeChat as the Internet or is something online like I'm so. It's such a part of my daily life.
Speaker B
That's what they want. Yeah. I just think it's another organ that I grew. It sucks To. To admit that. But, you know, life is. I don't want to. I hate wasting time, gonna buy stuff or whatever. You lose a lot of your day.
Speaker A
You do. And not being able to find it because it's.
Speaker B
Oh my God.
Speaker A
Here today, gone tomorrow.
Speaker B
I first got Tower and we had an air conditioning unit we were never able to use because we didn't have a remote control. Taobao Bang from ewu, they brought it out straight away. I had an AC unit. Just needed to find because how are you gonna find that in what store.
Speaker A
Would you even look for that?
Speaker B
I don't know people that. People that can't lived in Quin Ming know how to do that. But.
Speaker A
Well, you're officially part of the list now. You're immortalized forever.
Speaker B
Because I could use Taobao.
Speaker A
No, no, no. Your question is forever on the list now. As long as virtual Xbox exist, you exist.
Speaker B
Oh, God. She told me that before I asked the question.
Speaker A
Why would you change the question? Yeah, to what?
Speaker B
What color undies are you wearing? Just something really horrible that makes them hate you at the end of your podcast. That's what I would go for. And you're forced to do it every time. And every guest is like this, Steph, man, fucking. It was like fun for an hour. And then she asked me this question.
Speaker A
About, you know, I probably wouldn't have used it if you had done that. I'm just saying that's not great.
Speaker B
Podcast integrity. Influence isn't worth more than that.
Speaker A
Yeah, we're still going with that, eh? Thank you very much for coming on Virtual Expats.
Speaker B
Thank you for having me on. It was lot of fun.
Speaker A
This was a lot of fun. Thank you so much to Andy Curtin for joining us in this episode of Virtual Expats podcast. And thank you for listening. Also, since I'm doing all the thank yous. Thank you to Damon Castillo for the music that you hear in this podcast. It is from the Mess of Me album and you can find him@damoncastillo.com it's also in the show note, my contact information is Steph Fuccio. S T E E P H F U C C I O. That is my handle everywhere and it's also my Gmail address. So you can find me on any social media to give me feedback, ask questions, make comments, as you wish. Thank you so much for listening to this episode of Virtual Expats. More soon when