Ep. 480: Going Feral with the Hmong

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You can't predict anything.

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Hey Spencer and Yanni here before this episode of meat Eater, Yannie and I have a big announcement about a big announcement, Yannie.

That's right, Meat Eater Live is coming to eight cities this December, and.

We're going to tell you when and where to find us on Wednesday's episode of Trivia, So please tune in to Wednesday episode. At the very beginning, we're gonna give you all the details you want to know about where we're going to be, when we're going to be there, and how you can get tickets.

Be there or b square.

Uh trying to figure.

It's a great start to start.

Well, I'm gonna do a better start here, right, start over, Phil, Okay, what's throwing my glasses?

They're fine, they're fine.

I'm turning up my magnification.

Is this one of those times where you're joking about cutting it out or you actually want to like start.

Over, Okay, let's do it.

Well, I was gonna talk. I don't know you decided later Phil, I was gonna So we recently, just to just bring people into up to speed. First off, this is my The episode is called well it's not. In the old days, it would have been called Mung Dudes Are Trouble, Part two, And we're joined by Yah Yang and in Year Yang Vang Year Vang and yeah you used to be Yeah, I used to be Yeah, yes, that simplifies thing. How you guys, how well do you guys know what you've met in the past.

Never met He's familiar with your food. Well, I listened to the pod with him on with you guys, but other than that.

Got it.

But he's he's you've eaten at his restaurant, Yeah, yeah, actually, yeah, probably doesn't know this, but I've been at like he caters fun fundraisers that you did the Monk Museum fundraisers.

Oh sure that.

You probably don't know this, but you did a a house catering party. This is pre pandemic, and it was in somebody's basement. You came to the house and I was in that party. It was for our fortieth birthday party.

And they had your your.

Team coach, I think I remember.

Yeah, yeah, you were introducing us to like edible flowers and stuff like that.

So yeah, like among dudes don't if they meet, they don't necessarily like trade information.

Yeah, I mean Steven Slay white people like, you know, it's different white people, but you are related.

It's different white people, white people in America. If okay, if I was in if we have how many people are in this country three hundred three hundred three okay, okay, for me to run into a white dude born in America, that doesn't catch my attention. If I had been born in uh Laos, Okay, and uh was displaced by activities around the Vietnam War and wound up in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and I ran into another dude roughly my age who'd been through a similar set of circumstances, I don't know.

Wow, yeah. I think the thing that people have to realize is in Minneapolis, there's seventy five thousand Mongk people in the metro, Is it really Yeah, seventy five thousand Mongk people in the metros.

You can't keep track everybody.

No, yeah, like we like we don't all subscribe to the same newsletter. But you know it's you know sometimes the media. Yeah, no, seventy five thousand. It's the largest, most concentrated among people out outside of China, the South China area where there's about two million there.

But yeah, see, you guys have the problem of having too many of of your your your culture because if I meet a Latvian, I don't know, I don't know them.

I know somebody that they know, they make they make well, even even with like the monk. Like, so the thing with the Mongk people is we have eighteen clans or eighteen last names, you know, so there's like our tribal names within that too. Like there's a way of finding out like you're related to somebody to you know, some way, if you go back far enough, you know, you'll always be like, oh yeah, so like that uncle's you know, aunt's cousin Da da da. And that's kind of what

Also they also capped the the dowry a set amount so that everybody should just follow that versus otherwise. It is a it goes all night negotiation.

Yeah, you know how I just got caught being racist, like thinking you guys knew each other. Let me tell you something.

Yeah.

Normally when a white guy gets caught being racist, he'll do stuff like he'll be like, well, I'm gonna do more listening than talking, right, I'm not, well, I'm gonna do more talking to listening because let me tell you something. Yeah, has been pitching you to us.

Yeah.

I was like, you should have this guy on. So eventually where we got you to where we got you to come on, we said to yeah, you should come out and hang out.

Yeah.

Is that bad?

I feel like that's great. No, No, it's it's awesome. You know, it's funny. My buddy Jordan, he like wrote in a little something so on his episode, I was like, this guy's awesome, my best friend.

So you did it too.

In June of twenty twenty one, I pulled it up today. It took me some doing, but in Gmail, I was like I totally sent an email. I now I don't know if I, you know, wrote it well or not and I know you did the same thing and the same thing he wrote, the guys I'd like to know each other. And it was more so, this is another great I know, white guy. It's not exactly what I said.

Done a horrible job introducing there, But I don't we haven't even got into Yanni's Mountain.

Sorry, yeah, sorry, Yannie, I don't just do it. Do it quick?

You plug yourself, plug your Yeah.

Yeah, so Yabang we from Minneapolis area. We have a restaurant called Union Munk Kitchen and then we're building out a second one that's in the works and hopefully I'll be finalized by this week. Called v n I, which is the refugee camp that my parents met in I was born in. Over ninety thousand Mong people went through there from seventy five to ninety two, and so we wanted to name this restaurant v n I. It's our first big brick and mortar project. It I tell people,

Okay, we're gonna, we're gonna we're gonna dive into your your food and your past and all that kind of stuff.

We worked off of just that little pitch, the like I want one on the list love letter to mom and dad.

I'm sold. Yeah, it's been It's been really fun, man, it's been really fun.

So Ryan Callahan still me and then go ahead.

And my name's Jordan Vold, college buddy of you. We went to school UW Lacrosse US years ago.

And you're the guy. He said. If he comes out of the show you're coming.

To tattooed on his parm right there.

That's great.

I gotta get one of them.

I mean, there's nothing like a bluegill.

No, my kid has one now in a tank, so you're gonna saytoo tank. I love that thing so much. Man, we feed it like worms and stuff with that bluegill is trained. Now he used to be kind of spooky that when you come in the room. Now that bluegill is lined up.

That w I don't want to get way into it. But two summers ago I never met my dad's dad, my paternal grandfather. He loved you know, he's loved to fish, fish bluegill like any good Wisconsin. I never met him. Was fishing with my dad and his brother, my uncle Ron,

I was telling my kids about the other day because I was saying to them, I can't wait till that bluegill turns into a keeper. They're like, you know, I can eat no what I mean, Like, Dad just wanted to be that looking in the aquarium and it's like a keeper bluegill in there. And I was telling him when I was a little cap member, my dad made us sticks that were six inches long with your name written on it, and if you were fishing bluegills, you had to have that stick. And if it wasn't as

Yep, y.

I told you my little story about the neighbor that fished with in North Carolina.

He's a neighbor of my in laws.

And he used to be like, had his sales or something, and Rey's fishing tackle maybe anyway, so he went and saw a lot of tackle dealers, tackle makers, et cetera. And he said he had been in the place where there's a bunch of aquariums with large mouthed bass in them. He walked in there once with other dudes with white coats on, and as you walked down these aquariums.

The fish would.

All just turn and watch these and the guys be like, oh, yeah, it's time for a new batch, because like, you can't test a lure on a fish that it's just like waiting drop something into the association.

Yeah, we're to come right. Back's got a story. I don't even know. I don't even know the story. I don't even know what it is. Chester's here.

Yep. Well, my mom was in labor with me on Mullet Lake while my dad and Mullet were fishing bluegills.

Keep back. I just got so distracted.

She was in the boat as well.

We went into labor and there were fishing bluegills on Mullet Lake, so.

So it was like a race to get your limit.

That's my connection to bluegills.

Holds fishing wall eyes. The day your kid was born. Mm hmm. Yeah, Yangs here, thanks for coming. Yeah, of course you're gonna hit youth turkeys with us again. Of course, you know they're they're they're gonna it's things are moving along to get youth season to four days. Yeah, it's great. And your daughter got a turkey after we hunted together.

Yes, yes, and you.

Got a buck.

Last year, you got a buck. Last year, I got a turkey.

This year you did. Yeah. Oh that's right, you said, yeah, that's great. All r Yeah, you're ready to tell this. Oh, can I tell one thing before you tell your thing? You bet? Yeah, he's got a mountain lion story. It's not You're not in it, though, are you?

No? Okay, second hand.

I'm just trying to think. I'm trying to think of a way to plug my buddy's uh business again, not just thought of it. Uh, Chester explained the tax exchange we just had.

Uh. Steve introduced me to his buddy, Matt Matt Tros. Matt Tros, he's got a little bar yet he opened up mobile bar, and uh.

Is there a direct sale of alcohol with this mobile bar?

Uh? Well, no, you have to supply, you have to buy the boots.

Other Let's say you live in northern Michigan and you're having an event, Yes, fiftieth wedding anniversary, a regular wedding.

Yeah, but we didn't just have that in the text exchange.

No, I'm just helping. Like I said, I was using this as a jump off point. And you want to have a great experience for your guests. So what you do is you go to Roaming n o m I Roaming Northern Michigan but is not Roaming Nomi dot com. My buddy's a school teacher. This is his summertime business. He has a camper trailer rigged up like a bar. When you're doing your event and you're you know, you get married, you're like serving booze. Anyways, he helps you

Yep.

And nothing to gain from this pretty soon if you want it. And Chester has just out of the kindness of his little heart.

My parents own a cocktail garnish company out of Wisconsin. So if you go to any grocery store liquor store and you look for garnishes, it's probably forest flour foods. But now you're going to be able to go to Matt Drozer's mobile box, Droast Drost and.

Order a bloody makes a Western big game.

But you're going to be able to order a bloody Mary and he's gonna have all the fixings for it. Or you're gonna be able to order an old fashion. You'll get a sweet pickled mushroom as a garnish or really whatever you want. Nice cherries for kitty, cocktail for your kids. Maybe even we throw those in there too.

But I got more Matt Droll stories, and you'd be able to stomach we used to drink. I remember Mad Dog twenty twenty.

Well, I don't really remember it, but I like Matt. I feel like he had a thirty thirty rifle. We used to call him MD thirty thirty because like mad Dog, you know that's not a good one.

I got some good if I do have some good ones.

Yeah, let's not get into Mad Dog twenty twenty stories.

All right. The Mountain Lion story.

Okay, so this story comes from my buddy Jeff Flood, who I met through Bart George, who's our big game biologist friends. It works out, yeah, for the coutiney tribe in Washington and our buddy Bruce help Bart with a mountain lion collaring project that you can I forget which episode it is. Maybe Karent will plug it in, but you can hear all about it. When we had bart On telling us about this coloring study there.

What episode is that kar it was?

You know, I remember it was. It was COVID.

It was early COVID because I remember we came and it was like mid twenty.

Yeah, it was. It was remote because of COVID.

Yeah, so they're they're researching like how much if they can deter lions from being around humans by playing loud human voices to them repeatedly. That's not what they're doing.

It's a little more complicated, but go ahead.

Well, I know I'm trying to simplify it so I can get to the main part of the story. So to do this, they call they catch cats and they collar them, and they catch them the first time using hounds and they collar them, and then when they come back, they know the location of the cat because it's been collared, and they can walk up to it playing usually the Meter podcast at a loud volume, and then they measure at what point the cat runs how far it runs.

Because they're creating an association. Yes, in this cat's mind, they're creating association between trouble and human voices.

That's right, because after they hear the human voices, the hounds are released and then they're sort of you know, run agitated by hounds up into a tree and.

They make that association.

Yeah, they do that repeatedly, and then they you know, take the data. So it's ongoing study.

This being because in the old days, if a lion so much has looked at a person, it was dead, And nowadays there's a little less social tolerance for that, for lethal control of right.

That's right.

Yeah, Well, there's a lot of stuff going on over there in north east Washington. We won't get into it with just the whole the controversies around mountain lions and people and.

Just the state and the governor and the Game commission. We need to do a dedicated episode on that.

Oh man.

Yeah, we're hustling hard on getting actual current commissioners signed off on interviews and stuff like that. I think everybody over there knows that they're not really well received right now, so we're not making a lot of headway.

Yeah, my least favorite governor in America used to be Murphy over New Jersey because he campaigned against bear hunts, and my new least favorite governor is Insley in Washington.

Go on, so they call Heed a female off of a deer kill in late March, and a lot of times this is Jeff doing this work.

A lot of times.

What Jeff does is if he sees a deer kill and it's there's enough carcass left, he'll throw up a camera just to see what happens. Right, So he threw up a camera and in the first night, four adult lions and two kittens show up that night. So he just said, needless to say, it didn't last long. This is that's kind of a little side story to the main story.

Uh.

He figures, with that pressure, this mountain lion uh moved a couple miles away. The next time they went to uh to to catch her. They when they from the other line from the other lions, and she he figures now that he knows what he knows now that it was because she was about to give birth, so she moved a ways away, didn't want to be by the lions. So the next time they catch her, she's given that he can tell that she has kittens, because she's lactating.

The numbers right. Uh.

He figures they were about ten days old, and uh, he said he thought it was interesting that how how long sometimes she would leave all of them sometimes? And again this is just through watching pictures on a trail camp, so you never know if mom's just behind the camera or next to it not getting picked up. But at some point seven hours she would leave them, oh by that and not be there on May fourth at eleven eight eleven am it can yeh?

Can this be like this be commented on as you go?

Yeah?

The reason I don't surprise me is it would be that feeding itself is just more involved, right, exactly, like a deer could just go grays whatever, twenty minutes right, come back, grays, come back. But for that thing, I mean, it's headed.

Out right hunting.

It's not like a mission. Yeah, you know what I mean. So it sees that they would need to be able to do like some kind of lengthy stash, because it's not like, hey, I'll be back in an hour, sure, you know.

And I guess that the reason you would think that it is a long time is because you would think that, oh, how are those kittens going to survive that long without being able to get a little milk in a seven hour period?

Right?

So may fourth, first thing in the morning, she moves her first kitten, grabs it by the back of the neck, walks off with it, doesn't come back until six pm.

To get grab this.

What time did I grab the first one?

Eight am?

So who knows how far it moves it, but comes back at six pm to grab the second one and moves it same day. One kitten left.

Right, It's like a bad children's book, but at a parent at midnight. At midnight that next morning.

I want to make sure I'm getting on. So it's the first one at what time?

Six am?

Okay? Then comes back in the afternoon eight No?

Eight? Well what did I say? No? Eight am and six pm? Okay?

So it gets one to eight am, brings it wherever. Yeah, comes back that evening six pm. Now there's one sitting there into the dark.

And at midnight a skunk shows up. Oh yeah.

And again it's not like documented by pictures, but the skunk was there for quite some time. There was blood on the skunk. Mom showed up the next day and spent five hours there just like looking around and doing circles before she left, and then he never saw it again. The skunk eighth the kitten, whether it ate it or it just killed it, you know, but I mean think about.

From this skunk's perspective, that's a big win.

Yeah, take it out now, that's one lass dude later taking me out or my you know kid.

Do you know how big these kittens are at what.

Tiny this stage? Like I mean, you know, little fur balls. I mean not not not even the size of a housecatt.

That's a cold blooded skunk.

I want to understand Mom's like decision making to like how does she select a kitten. Is it totally random?

Oh yeah?

Or is she like yeah, oh.

Yeah, like my big favorite one, the best kitten, right, the one in the middle is the best kitten.

The first one to leave is super exposed or is it less sent If you're the first one, it's fascinating.

The middle is the favorite. I would think the middle it's like, I'm gonna bring the one I like, the one I really don't like. I'll figure it out later. The one I sort of like, I'm gonna bring it now to pioneer this new spot. If it looks good, I'll go get my favorite one, and then if I got time later, I'll get my least favorite one. We should write a Maybe we could publish an academic article about this called Favoritism, uh favor and Feline con Colorists.

Or just writing a children's book, writing.

Children's book called tough Luck.

Yeah, you can do little backstories on each of the kittens and be like, this is why Mom picked you as the middle one.

I have a picture of my daughter on my phone. In the other day, she's saying, the reason I have her on my phone is otherwise i'd forget about her because she's the middle. Where you're like, honey, you're not wrong, because she's the middle.

Keep a lot of things on my phone that I don't want to forget about. Also, that's episode two that it's called an elk hunting nudist checks the breeze.

God's a good title, dude.

It's called an elk hunting nudist checks the breeze. If you want to learn all about Bart George's mountaining collaring study in Northeast Washington.

It was a good title.

Listen.

We had a good run at just having titles that didn't mean anything. What happened we started naming them stuff that means something.

Search engine optimization because.

Because now with the shows on YouTube, it doesn't work to have you can't have a name that has nothing to do with anything. Meaning if you name something a.

Nudist or push.

Them to pot or a nudist checks the breeze, you'll wind up in like a different land.

Would tell you that that would have been the same case on other platforms.

I resisted the idea. Here's the thing I resisted and still resist the idea that people search podcasts. I don't, you'll hear people some people do. I don't believe that people regularly do content searches for podcasts, meaning I don't think people go in and search key do keyword searches around podcasts. Some do, but I don't think that's how I don't think that's how people discover.

Searching for people maybe like certain folks.

Sure, and when we and we would we would bow to that in some respects with our old naming convention. But now here's another I'll tell you that that would surprise me. What's actually the words that we're actually saying right now actually matters for how how YouTube serves. You could name it like a nudist checks the breeze, but then never talk about nudists and all that, And it'll be served based on content, but the thumbnail people see is based on It'll be served based on what's actually

Sure?

So?

Like our guests today, Donald Trump and Joe Rogan are talking about transgender rights in bathrooms, and that could possibly help this episode pop up in people searchings.

Nailed it.

That's next level, right there, man. You satisfied with that? Krin Kriinn satisfied with that? Uh. A couple of quick things we got touched on.

The road to twenty twenty four. Go ahead, Steve.

We covered Roamingnomai dot com again. Probably hit that a couple more times in the future. Vegan Landlords, this is a this is a chatticate question. Chester. Do you know about this?

Well? I just read it, yes or whatever?

Uh, oh, we'll cover it. He was listening to the Pussing the Pot episode, so the Pussing to Pot t shirts came out. But they're gone already, but we didn't order that many.

Are we gonna order more?

I don't know. They were gone in less than a day. I sunk a gaff into an octopus's arm, and he got the gaff away from me and snuck off with it. And I'll point out they can lose their arm, it doesn't bother them. They just grow a new one. So then we started laughing about how that octopus probably doesn't go anywhere without that gaff.

Snuck off with it as an interesting way to put hold it.

Out of my hands. We had got in the wrestling match and he got away with the gaff. It's a big one, but the gaff isn't barbed, so the gaff would have just fallen out either way. It's funny to think of an octopus now, because you know he likes he uses the gaff for everything.

He's gonna come back and get you.

Out if he wants to get something out of a hole. He's like stand back boys, and he just gets that gaff out and does what he needs to do with it.

Anywhere, a little subtle tapping on the bottom of your boat.

We're waiting for someday that gaff hoot up through the bottom of my boat. I'd be like, he's back. We made a shirt of an octopus with a gaff, but it's gone. But anyways, on that episode, we were talking about I can't remember, oh, we were talking about a vegan. We were talking about vegan landlords that were in the news for people which I supported the right to do this. A landlord saying I'll rent to you, but if I rent to you, you are not allowed to cook meat.

I wasn't there because this was recorded in Alaska, but if I were there, I would have reminded you that. In the Chettiquette episode with Luke Combs, we got a question about a landlord who would not rent a home to gun owners, and I told them the said.

Lie and do it anyway.

Well, if I heard from someone who if I heard from someone who said, my landlord rendered me a house and said I can't cook meat, but I'm thinking about cooking some, I would say I think that you should.

Right.

Sure, So I am. It is consistent. Okay, listen, I'm not like a judge. I'm not like judge Jude. I'm very aware of you, just like I gots what I'm saying. But this guy here has got a different situation, but it made him think of it where he he's part of the story. I don't understand. He used to live in a rural area, but due to residency rules, had to move into the city. What would that mean? Oh, this is exactly what you're talking about. Uh No, English, You lived by the horror mel factory.

Well I go down there. That's like two hour drive north the south. Yeah, okay, you you yeah, when you drive two hours.

From your home is the place where they make spam?

Yep.

And you're saying the executive leadership team at Spam.

Yeah, in their bylaws, they have to live down in Austin, Minnesota.

Okay, So this fella might have run into a similar thing because he's saying, I used to live out in the sticks, but because of residency rules, he had to move into the city. Yeah, he's in Buffalo, New York. So he's not working down there with Spam.

Yeah, but what one of the like, while you were talking about that, if you talk to the landlord and the landlord says, hey, you know, no cooking meat here, is it okay? Just to move on to another apartment or another house, Like, do you know what I'm saying, because like that's what the landworth. Okay, cool, Oh yeah, that's yeah, that's I would be in that situation where they're like, you can't cook me, and here I'm.

Like, okay, cool, I'm gonna move.

Yeah, I'll go find some in the place.

Yeah, or I'm gonna cook it anyway, call the cops.

I I gotta throw this out there.

This is like the best article I've seen in a long time, and it really strikes me because I used to have to travel around the country with a practicing vegan and that person was obnoxious, and it was adamant that I go to these vegan restaurants in different places, and I always was just like, it is not worth my money. But my assumption was that the experience would

Oh yeah, right, the steal from you.

Yeah, I was like, well, what, like, I'm down for a salad, but you have like it's bacon, yeah, reuben and fries and so that I got to hand it to whoever wrote this article, but it's called no more Cordon bleuir. France's long running battle over vegan food names has escalated as the government published a decree banning meaty terms such as steak, grill or spare ribs being used to describe plant based products.

I think that's a little bit of government overreach.

I love it.

That's what government overreach is. I have a fully embracing.

I like it. Yeah, you know that we covered that little dust up. I'm going to come back to the story about this guy. But we covered that little dust up where that dude, this is the weirdest thing is, oh my god, it's one story turned into another here. So he got three stories up in the air. Story one is this.

Well.

Story one is this fella here that we're talking about who had to move to town because of the rules. Okay, so hold that in your head. Story two is how is this these French people in your situation? There's four stories. Story three is that we covered how a guy was suing buffalo wild wings because they're boneless wings aren't wings?

Yeah, they're technically not wings, but whatever.

Buffalo wild wings. Retort was, am I using retort in the right way? Allow me to retort? Yeah? Yeah, Buffalo wild wings retort was, we don't sell any buffalo. Our hamburgers are not ham. Our chicken fingers are not chicken's fingers. So it should not come to you as a great surprise that our boneless wings are not wings.

In this article, they're just buffalo's wings either.

No, no, I'm into story four. In this article, they interview some dude who is like a who's made this whole issue like his axe to grind. But he's not the litigant, he's not the person suing Buffalo wild but he's a person who believes, and they talk about him in the article that he believes they should be called saucy Nugs, and somehow he weasels his way into the article.

A children's recognizable demographic.

But then here's this guy that I know said I've been using a lot of people looking like weird Al because I was talking about Gallagher the comedian. Here's a guy that looks like young weird Al comes up to me and basically he's there to tell me that they should call him Saucy Nugs, but does not know that we discussed this on the podcast. Like this guy independently just goes to anywhere he can get an audience.

Wait, he was the guy that was in the article.

Yes, that's about this in the pockets. He had no idea.

He's just I'm just he's just just Arilla market.

He's like sounds like there's going to be a crowd. I'm going to go down there and and and.

Protack, raise hell about Wow. Yeah, really that's amazing.

Back to story number one.

But if they call them saucy nugs, then some back stoner could come in there and think that it's some ganja and sue him for that.

Old man. You guys call weed saucy nugs.

I'm sure something out there.

Oh yeah, you want to talk about some saucy nugs. You ever see uh Chester's tattoo on his arm?

Okay? Moving on too many stories.

This comes down to, uh, why the FDA exists, right, like patent medicine, okay, And that is why you cannot call a vegan whatever it is, sandwich a ruben sandwich. Yeah, everybody knows corn beef okay, and pastrami does not cut it as a ruben sandwich either.

Yeah. Before back of this guy had to move into town. I do want to pick up what you're saying, because it is frustrating what you're saying, and it would be like if you're vegan. Besides, people that have like some kind of major dietary reason they need to be vegan, which I'm sure happens if you meet, you're gonna die or something. I don't know, but normally I would guess like ninety percent whatever the hell of vegans are for ethical reasons. So they have come to a position where

It is it's like your sexual yet sexual preference is is a perfect one. Like I am staunchly this way, but I happen to put things in my mouth that resemble this other thing. But don't confuse that because this is the way I am.

Let's say you have a hog fetish cheepers, and you've recognized that that is just wrong. That is not a thing. That is not a thing you can be partaken in. But then you come home with a hog suit. You see where this is going.

No, is that better?

So this guy anyway, Hey, guys, this is Yiannis. I got a special request for you. You've heard me talk about it before, mentioning it again and asking again. But I'm asking for you guys to all help and pitch in to save that winter habitat in Vail, Colorado for the big horn sheep. That was a proposed development for employee housing, and there was a big to do there. And finally the town of Vales figured out a way to purchase the land from the company that was proposing

This guy thought the door was open for your uh yeah, and you gotta jump in on the vegan side of things.

But oh, anything to add I'm cutting a lot of stuff up. But you got to get back to this guy.

Uh you know, yeah, like we even with what you know, we we we. I actually wrote a little article about it. I was I was asked once in a panel. You know, you know, monk sausage is something that we make at a restaurant, and it's it's an old recipe. My father gave me, right, he passed it down and and you know, we it became really just kind of popular around Minneapolis and the way we make it, you know, And there was a panelas who you know who or somebody asked.

Me, can you give us a brief descriptor a monk sausage? Yeah?

Yeah, so it is uh our recipe we use. And the thing that Dad showed me was seventy percent shoulder, uh, thirty belly. And then the aromatics inside is lemongrass, ginger, garlic, shallots, fish, sauce, tie, chilies. And then and then it's very important because the grind is coarse. It's not a lot of people they do sausage. They're more like Eastern European style, where it's you know, you kind of get a multified Ours is more course because because of the fat content so high that you

That, you say you're not grilling it hot, you're grilling it lower.

Yep. Sorry, So what I meant high was like higher on the grill. Yeah, yeah, you know, And and and you kind of let it go. And and you know, I teach my a lot of our chefs and cooks who cook with us, they aren't a lot of them aren't munk. So I have the re like like re engineer their mind to be like, no, we're not cooking this, like if it was an Eastern European style, you know,

Because you realize this is one hundred percent made out of like we got seventy.

This yeah, so yeah, absolutely, But I wasn't trying to be meaner. But then I also said to her too, that there's a legacy that comes along with this. See, my father when he came to this country, he didn't have anything, you know, he didn't have land, he didn't have anything his name. But what he did was he knew how to do this, and then he passed it to me, you know, And it was one of those things that as kids we learned how to do it

Such a god ball thing, right, It's it's like really an inappropriate question. It's like can you take that very unique and special thing to you and then completely change it for my personal.

Taste yeah, and that's I mean again.

Can you leave, man, I don't have any ill will toward vegan I don't. Yeah, I like to laugh about it.

Yeah. But then like even with the you know, the article you're talking about, I'm like, I'm I'm firmly I believe the way that you believe where it's like, you know, like everyone like, if we're going to stand for like the first time, I'm right, you know, if if we're going to stand for that other side, we gotta know we got to keep it consistent. We got to keep it consistent, you know. And that's how I believe that was Like, bro, go find another place to live. You know.

Well, let me tell you this dude's situation. He moves to his neighborhood and they find out that he uh hunts, and they start leaving them letters.

Oh boy, even to.

This point, this is I'm taking his word for it here. I don't know. This is what he said. He said. He gets a letter that says this community is vegetarian and doesn't greet with your hunting presence or the presence of murdered meat in the neighborhood.

I'd love to know the size of the neighborhood. Yeah.

Uh, he's wondering what would you do to keep the neighborhood, to keep things in the neighborhood's civil?

Man, I just can confuse if he's a hunter and stuff and why he's living there? Was that, Like, how would you know?

I mean, if it's a vegetarian neighborhood. I mean you think they'd have a sign.

Was it in the contract? You sign a renter's agreement. If he's not in the contract.

Meat, I agree with you. Yeah, if the landlord made it very clearly.

No, No, this dude, I don't think this is that different, pointing out that that just happens to me where he lives. Oh it was so he got a letter from a neighbor saying that aut out the neighborhood. This is not a formal thing. Oh yeah, So I think he's just saying so outside of any rule break, and he's wondering, how do you maintain stability.

I would invite them all over for a barbecue.

That's not gonna work.

Meat diplomacy.

You could have him over for a veggie barbecue and then after say hey, let's let's chat because there's a little problem.

I would just chat if you want to try it. I have some of this freshly killed venison over here that's pretty tasty. That ate nothing but plants.

I eat a lot of grilled zucchini this time of year on the barbeque. That's good stuff. You know.

Just let me tell you what I think. Then I want you to say what you think. They'll be the final word. I think that he should go about his business, but just don't don't rub their noses in it, like you know, I.

Mean, don't you.

Hang you here in your backyard just as well as you can hang in your front yard. Hang in the backyard.

Yeah, I'm I would.

I don't know I would.

If he's getting all this these letters and stuff, there's there's not much he can do about it other than maybe talk to I would probably talk to the landlord and try and have a nice civil conversation, even though they might not understand that they make the choices that they do for reasons.

I had anything to do with the landlord. There's nothing about renting. This is just his.

Neighbors hostile to These people are not going to be appeased until he quits hunting.

Okay, well then, yeah, just keep to yourself or the people that are sending you the letters, because you know how I don't know how many people are sending him letters and stuff. Maybe just literally try and have a civil conversation with them and be like you guys, make the choices that you make for reasons that you stand by, and you know, please let me make the choices that I stand by, and you know I won't shove it in your face. I won't be roasting a pig in my front yard. I'll cook it.

I'd put a chunk of bloody hide maybe in their mailbox. That is a phenomenal movie.

Try and keep it to yourself.

The kill them with kindness. I'm a big like you can just grind people down with kindness and you kind of get satisfaction out of it because you know, it's just like irksome. But they can't say anything, they can't respond.

They'll even get send more letters.

But I had the impression that when I was living in and catch them, the neighbors across the street from me did not like me for whatever reason, no idea, And I was always cordial and uh, you know, would wave when they pull in or whatever. But kind of a wide street it's not like it was forced interaction at all.

Uh.

And one day I look out the window and I was always out and about working on the place, running a chop saw in the front yard and stuff like that, but not like would be like normal business hours, not crazy early or crazy late. One day I look across the street and here's mom, dad, the two kids, a dog like little nuclear family, and they have a brand new refrigerator in the box in the back of this guy's pickup and they're trying to negotiate this thing out

And they're like, eah no. And I was.

Like, ah, you really look like can I just help and kind of force the issue a little bit in you know, fifteen seconds had the refrigerator out safely. Now it's on the ground, they have a dolly. I'm like, I can help you get inside, and they're like nope, and literally never spoke to me from that day forward.

Really, yeah, just bizarre. Some people are just that way.

Couldn't kill them with kindness.

Yeah, The moral of the story is, some people are just that way. Right, It's like doesn't matter what you do. So I wouldn't go out of my way to change my life. But you know they're miserable inside their house writing letters and you gotta understand that too.

Yeah, And I've I've learned too, man, like hurt people hurt people. You know, like people that are hurt, they hurt people because it's like you have all this bs inside of you and you got to project it somewhere. And then being hurt sometimes, like they hurt people. And that's where I mean, I've I've learned that in my lifetime is hurt people hurt people. And sometimes that's like the final answer, and I'm like, yeah, that's it, you know,

Uh, can y'all can you tell me how your name changed over time?

Yeah?

So the name given to me at birth was Yeah, so you actually can have two years in the studio. The story is I was very sick and then the moon culture. You know, sometimes they you know, there's there's a lot to do with the namesake. And so in the Moon culture, sometimes when you just don't get better, they change your name oh to you and and they'll they'll say, do you know.

What was the I mean, did you have a specific ailment or you just weren't thriving?

Now they just said, I was just sick all the time. And so you know, one one of the first I guess you could sell. You could say it in remedy. They'll maybe consult with the shaman. And then a lot of times they'll just say, hey, maybe you just need to change his name. And actually, in this case, my parents gave me to my aunt uncle and my uncle was the deacon of the Catholic.

Church, and so they gave me to go live with my aunt uncle.

And because you weren't doing well, because.

I wasn't doing well, and so I want to say, this is when I was just a few months old even and so he since he was a Catholic, a deacon Catholic church, he uh the translated there's a translated Bible in mung So and in the in there John the Baptist. Uh the name translated in mung is jah. So I shared this when I was here the first time, my name is my name is Jah and Mun and so he named me after John, renamed me John the Baptist. Uh, my name after John Baptist in the mung translated version

Back to my parents, so and so yeah, so in our culture it's animism, right, So it's the belief of, you know, the the ancestors of the are the good spirits and their evil spirits. So when yeah, I was young, I I you know, this is from what I've learned. I bet you it was probably like, Okay, we're going to change his name because we're going to attract to trick the evil spirits who's making him sick to think that it's a different person. So that's the changing of

Growing up, man, are you kidding me?

It is strong. I think you might think it's cool, but not when you were seven years old and you're with all your cousins then like hey, where's the yea And then they'll be like no him, like no, not him, like you know, you made got made fun of.

It's not a common name.

Oh no, not not really. It's how many years do you guys know? Not a few one here. But but here's the deal. My youngest brother's name is which means blessing of God literal translationist blessing of God. So we have no question. We can absolutely so we have. So we have like you know, like a like a pan, an iron skiller, and then we have blessing of God.

You know it's like, dude, come on, we know how okay, how how directly does that mean iron skillet?

It's literal little like yah means the iron skiller or the walk or the you know, the pan, the frying pan. Yeah. Yeah, I hated it growing up.

Well, okay, can I tell you them?

When I got my citizens, I.

Got one more question about about the name, just to make sure I was talking about being out on book tour. When I was on a book tour, I met a kid and his name was Talon, which that was a great name. His name's town. So clearly it's a you know, the foot of a predatory bird. But it's a name. So when I hear Talent, because it's not a common name, I make the thing that like, oh, that name means a raptor's claw. If I meet an Autumn, I'm like,

So so the little translation is iron skillet, you know, or walk or whatever, you know, an iron skillet, iron pan. But my mom said, the metaphorical name represents like like an an iron skiller pan is uh, it's uh, it's a vessel you use to cook with. And she said that what she said to me was that it means that like you will be a servant of men, like in a good way, like not in a you know what I mean, like like to serve or to help, you know.

Really.

But yeah, but then I'm like, dude, he got blessing of God. You know, it literally means blessing of God, you know. But nah, man, it's it's one of those things. Yeah, I mean he's I love my little his name again, hon or, Yeah, go home?

What what what does American bodies call him?

So it's spelled kob mob that's the monk spelling. So growing up they just called him coub kob. So he's called Kube or kooby. Yeah.

So and to pronounce his name again for me.

And it's or sometimes we just say moan.

So how how would how would how does how would a native speaker say your name? Very similar to what we're saying?

Yeah, okay, you would? I get my name butchered all the time. So when I got my citizenship, they asked the last question to ask you is would you like to have a new name because you can take on like an American name, uh the immigration officer. Yeah, seriously, Oh yeah, you can get it, dude. I had in college. I had a list of like what names and all my buddies can pick, you know, And it was like I literally when he when she said this, and I was sitting in the office with her, I almost want to

Thang, can you imagine getting like credit card statements from Optimist Prime, you know, like, dude that or Chad, yeah, location he pays, Like, hey mx Oultimate is prime here?

Yeah, do you know what I could do to this place? Oh dude, I know it was that or it was like chatter Trevor. I joked. I always joked about that, you know, just get a good white name, a good strong.

Did you know did you know people? Well, first off, how old were you?

Oh, when I got a citizenship was like two years ago, three years ago? Yeah, it was pretty recent. Yeah, yeah, I just kind of waited.

You know, you only became a US citizen two or three years ago?

Yeah, yeah, what year did you move to the US? Eighty eight? So it was.

It was a lot what ages you moved to the US.

I was four and a half five, so started kindergarten right away.

So give me the base chronology where and when you were born. Yeah, it's the flow because I know you mentioned the refugee camp.

Yeah, so my parents met in bonvina I, which is a very you know, famous, big refuge It's the largest refugee camp northern Thailand. It's like ten kilometers off the borders of a Louse in Thailand. That's where a lot among people came to after the war.

That's where my dad spent peace corps there for four years teaching small engines.

One stuff.

What year, I mean, what are the years? Do you know?

A while ago?

Like what year was he there?

Like, you know, I'm not sure, but it was it was wild, like probably like.

Howl shooting attacks Chester maybe they.

Yeah, And actually I think Yea's family and my family overlapped in the in the camp.

When did you guys leave? We left in eighty okay, yeah, we left in eighty eight. Yeah, my dad had a chance to leave early, but then he stayed because my dad fought in the war, and you know, and it's man just to hear their stories of what they did running missions for the CIA in US government, you know, Northern last there.

Y'all sent me. Y'all sent me a great book about all those campaigns.

What was that book called, y'all Tragic Tragic Mountains, A good one.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, he sent me the details all those campaigns.

And he goes back and for the history too, like you know, you know, fighting with the French back in the day and just like you know, back. But yeah, it was a good book. Eighty eight we left. We landed in Saint Paul, Minnesota, so yeah, and came there and then we moved out.

To like your own back up on your folks met as refugees.

Yeah. So my dad fought in the war. He escaped, my mom. They escaped. They had a horrible time. They got caught, were put in prison camps by the communists. Finally escaped that and then in seventy seven they met in the camp and then in seventy eight they got married and then they were there until eighty eight, So ten years they.

Were there, ten years in the camp.

Yeah, because they were because the moment, people were stuck, because the Americans didn't want them, because They're like, I don't know, it's the Thai government was like, dude, we don't like we're borders with Laos and Laos doesn't like you guys, so we don't want to you know. So literally it was this really awkward like even among people that were born in the camp at that time, where

But your family came from your parents were loud born, yep, but they don't hold I mean, there's no citizenship for them.

For do you have a second citizenship somewhere? No? No, no. I was just kind of you're.

Like a citizenless person, a citizenshipless person. Yeah.

But you know, but one of the crazy things is like when I got my citizenship, a buddy of mine who you know, his friend, came to me. It is a couple of years ago, and he said, hey, why would you want to be a citizen of America? Like right now, like America, like things weren't you know, I mean this is after, you know, like things aren't going too hot for America. Why would you want to be a citizen in America, and I'm like, bro, you were

Tom dies in the end of Saving Private Yeah.

Spoiler, Like, come on, you know what I'm talking about, right, Yeah, it's like slow bleedout.

I know that movie really devolved. Like it starts out like all this grand Dday and then there's that they have that you know, it kind of centers in on that really bad german.

It's like a clock winding down. Yeah. And then at the end, in the end, yeah, at the end, well remember because they all died finding Private Ryan, right, and and he whispers Captain Miller to prior. Ryan whispers and says, earn this earned this. And then you know, and then it goes into like the present and he's you know, he's this old guy now that he's standing over Captain Miller's grave and he looks at his wife and he's an old grandpa and goes, did I live a good life?

So Tom Hanks meaning earned the sacrifice that was made.

Absolutely and and that to me, that's a it's a good haunting I have that. When I got my citizenship, I was I thought about my grandpa. I never met my dad's dad who died in this war, and the sacrifices they made, and all my some of my uncles who have passed away in the war to get us here right. So I've learned that freedom isn't free. Like you might not have paid for it, but somebody did.

You know, I want to get back into a little bit of stuff from early in your life. But I know, I think that growing up in I grew up in Michigan, spent a lot of my life in Montana, a handful of other states as well. I know about among people through the lens of hunting. Yeah, it's like I feel like if I didn't if I didn't know all there's these uh, if I didn't know that there was these avid hunters in the US that came from laos as refugees, like I wouldn't know about Mung culture. I know it

Yeah, true or not true? Completely true. So you know, if you know, I get some craft from I call them hardliner among people, They're like, you aren't making real Munk food. It's blah blah blah blah. You're bastarizing your food. You make money, they do that.

Oh dude, yeah, that's not that you're not suffering that.

Well yeah, yeah, yeah, every every you know, every culture has that right your own people kind of like you know. So one of the things I say within our restaurant, we have this mantra we always say, we say every dish has a narrative. If you follow that dish long enough and close enough, you get to the people behind the food. And once you're there, it's actually not about food. It's about people. That food is a catalyst into cultivating

From what does interpersonal communication?

So you work with a lot of it's kind of one on one from when you majoring that you can go to grad school, you can do you can teach it and then you can work like doing counseling, you know, counseling, you know, therapy, you can do all that, you know after that.

But you were raised eating mung food.

Oh yeah, dude, Like yeah, like that that was it. That's what mom knew how to cook, and that's what we ate and it was incredible. But yeah, but at the end of the thay too. I'm a Wisconsin boy, right, So Culver's you know, double cheeseburger, but burger from Culvers, come on, man, like, you know, like cheese curs. I am mad at dan, you know, you know.

So, yeah makes what's that saying? Makes butterburger better?

Like yeah, better brand of beef.

Better brand of beef, makes a butter burger better.

Yeah. So like growing up, it was like, yeah, do you like munk food or do you like American food? Or the mong word for American is mika. Like do you like meeka food or like American food? I'm like yes, like I could like both. Right, What's I means mung It's it's the it's the long way of saying American.

Okay, So I thought it was like an abbreviate.

It's like a shortened version.

Yeah, yeah, so so so our parents couldn't say American, you know, but in their accident of alliteration, it came out mika. So so when so when you're around among people and you hear they're probably talking about you, guys, honest?

So when when?

Uh?

Okay? I was want to understand the relationship to mung food and American food for a prior generation. So your

You know.

Did they embrace sort of like fast food culture or did they resist it because it would be a forfeiture of culture? Yeah?

I mean I think my parents it was survival. It wasn't like hey, like so right, now I get this great opportunity to talk about the in depth understanding of mung food and whatever it represents. My parents grown up it was like, how do we work our job that we're getting paid eight bucks an hour? And how do we provide for our family? So it wasn't like they had this moment of like, oh, like, let me think about how our food can influence the way that our

You know.

Some days, you know, you know, some days it's like if some noodle dish, some blinklot dish or whatever, you know, like and then they had to make it work with the and with the garden and they just pull stuff from the vegetables from the garden. Then that was it, you know. But what what I get to do is I get to look back on those moments because I have the privilege now to look back and think about that.

You know, did your folks raise food when you're growing up? You talk about having.

Guard Yeah, man, you know you understanding among people. We so right now, my parents, you know, they're in their seventies, they're retired. They have a ten acre farm, right she my mom calls it a little garden, but it's ten acres and everything they grow every year they harvest it and bring over to the restaurant. So yeah, and that's what it is. Oh dude, Yeah, So.

Your restaurant serves food at your folks raise.

Oh absolutely, that's the whole point of the restaurant. Like you know, like what you know, we just got done with the state fair, you know. So so in Minnesota state fair is huge. It's like this year they had one point eight million people walk through in twelve days. Right. And so my mom makes these gallipau where there are these steam buns. Right. So she makes these steam by as a family tradition. And this year we sold a

Hear stuff like that, Mom, Bro, when.

You hear stuff like that, how huge not not keep talking about them? You know, And so like I get super emotional about it. But like, man, it's like, no quit. She's in her seventies, no quit. She's out working half our chefs, you know. And I love it. And it's not something where I asked her to, but she's just like, this is what we do. This is how we help each other. This is what we do. And that's what I love about our culture. You know, there's no quit. It is if we come together, we can you know,

I'm a Vang Yeah yeah, you're Yangyanglan yeah yeah.

And so it's like game of throne whatever it kind of deal and which plan is better? I don't know. Yeah, everyone always yeah, but that's how it is. Yeah, yeah, okay, cool from you got it, you win, you know. But but but what Dad said that during the war, during the genocide of our people, So you have to realize that in the Mountain of Laws, there's about three hundred thousand moongk people that live there. Through the genocide or

Yeah, we have.

We used to like we used to forget about putting the pepper, the hot sauce on there, and my mom would stop dinner and we would quickly make it and then put it on the dinner before it comes together. And it's this idea that this is, this is an ecosystem. Everything needs to work. And that's what I think about Monk's food. And when I talk about the philosophy of munk food, that's what I'm talking about, you know.

So in the most in the most basic sentence level way, Yeah, how do you what would you say, like, what is mung food?

Yeah? So I always say the munk food isn't a type of food. It's a philosophy of food, you know. And what is that philosophy. It's the philosophy that we live in a living world around us and using the living world around us to make food that nourishes our soul and brings our community together. And the great thing about munk food, and this is what I love, and I'll get pushed back from some of the hardliners, is that munk food is not it's represented of what regions

Yeah, they dominated the market.

Absolutely because we are people of you know, the ground, you know.

But I feel like a French person that lives in the French countryside. If I said, like, what is traditional French food, they could say the sentence you just said, yep, absolutely, And so I said, there's got to be another way to describe mung food.

Well, I what I what I talked about with munk food is that like, like our story is involved in its. So for example, my dad always said to me, no matter where you are in the world, wherever you go, if you find another monk person there, you always find family. So the kind of you know what we talked about in the beginning, right, like, yeah, if I like, I go to Idaho somewhere and I see another Munk family,

You know, So are you do you see manifestations of like where where those regions have bled into the culinary tradition? Absolutely, because the thing I want to ask you about is when your folks, like, because your folks grew up in proximity, no doubt, to raising food and sourcing food, all of a sudden you wind up another continent. It mm hm,

Absolutely, And I love the fact that they did because it's about advancing our people, you know. So in April, I got a chance to go back to Laos and I actually I was with a production crew. We did this, you know, we filmed this Little Dock series. And I actually went to the village that my mom was born in Okay and and I found out that I have one hundred years of our our family lineage comes out of that village. And I went to the exact same spot.

Are there still in that village?

Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. They came back after the war? Ye oh yeah yeah. So so the Mong people couldn't escape. They just came back and lived in the mountains and

So your mom had to she had to explain like here there.

No, my mom wasn't there with me. It was like another cousin of theirs that lived in in Pansavan and in Laos that kind of took me up there and says, hey, we found Yeah, it was. It was kind of like one of those things I'm a late processor about you guys, but like also it's like okay, cool, like this is cool.

Wow, other people, there's people living there.

Yeah, there is there's people spot Yeah. And and I was watching the way that they make the food and stuff, and man, it still carries a little bit of like there's these flavored tones and these notes that still carry. But if you go to those villages, their technology is barely past the bronze age for real. Like you go in, it's just all like you know, they it's very very primitive. But the way they do things. I loved it, you know, because I'm watching them do things and I'm like, bro,

And I'm was it clear to them?

You know? Yeah, I don't know. Yeah, if you deal with this. But like I get, like I I work with like a lot of non Mung people. So when I do speak Munk, I go when I go home, right, you know with mom and dad, and then I'll speak Monk. But I don't speak monk, you know, like daily a lot, you know, And and I was really nervous. I was like, shoot, because like the OG's up there, man, they will wreck you if you're mong is like, you know, like if your mung is good or if you had the wrong accent.

Like, you know. Yanni says something similar about, uh, we're at a conversation recently where the Latvians in America police the Latvian. Then you go to Lava, they just want to talk English. Yeah, yeah, because they want to practice English.

And when I got there, there was something inside of me. I don't know if it was like flight or flight inside of me. Then I started just speaking Monk and I did something to the translation part of the show, and I'm like, oh my gosh, I'm actually doing a lot better than I am.

You know, can you give us a sense of what Monk sounds like?

I don't know, it's weird.

I mean just like, can you just say say some stuff just to give a sense of what the language sounds like for people. I'm guessing most people have not heard monk.

Yeah, if you want to talk about the white people at the table with that's fine.

Bunch of white people talking about the mom I don't even know how to start it.

It's so weird.

Uh, I'll say yeah and jikon.

Studio can it yeah? Which okay, you know she thought yea and named that's you guys.

How much overlap is there with I'm a little ignorant on the language structure. Is there a Laosian there's like there's yeah, is that the native language is called Laotan?

Yeah, lao Okaya. Is there a lot of overlap.

There's a few words, a few words, but generally they're like the sting.

So for example, like the word burrito is not an English word, right, it's a Spanish word, but it's part of the English language. We say burrito burrito, right, Well you play it in scrabble, yeah, yeah. But in long words, there there's a few words that I wouldn't say overlap, but it's like art. Just because our cultures like are right with each other, they use different words, like like when I was in laos bathroom and long word is honah, that's bathroom, but for the laower is honam.

You know, So it's like a little bit that would be that would be an example of a similarity.

Yep, you know, uh yeah, the word the word go like by right, that's that's like I've learned that that was that's thaie yep so thy lao uh you know, and even even a little bit of Vietnamese like they share like culinary wise, they all kind of share the same kind of word, right, even a little bit of Chinese, you know, like the steam bund you know, like the Chinese seam bun is called bao, but the the Lao Thai and mungk version of his callabao, you know, because

But you know, like kind of like that, could you guys understand tie, I.

Know, I don't speak to no, no, no, we it's it's all, and you know, growing up like you grow like among is, it's totally its own, totally different language. And our our language has eight tones to it, so it's our language is completely tonal right. So here's here's a funny one I always tell people. So when you don't know something, this isn't related to the number of clans, no,

What a minefield, man, Dude, Like I learned the language.

The thing is when you have white friends that are teaching me among the phrase, and I'm like, okay, but if you say it in the wrong tone, you're gonna totally say something horrible, like what what do you mean? And then it's always like it sounds the same right, And I'm like, no, dude, you just said you smell like part like you know. Yeah.

Steve Steve, the the written form of the Monk language wasn't actually created by a monk person.

It was created.

It was founded by a French priest. So he came into and I shared this a little bit when I was first here. He came into that that region, worked with the monk, understood language, learned language, and came up with the written version.

Of it in using English letter. Yes, using English.

Try to dance around the tone issue.

Oh, he figured a way to He found the tone, He figured a way to capture the tones, and he created this in the early forties.

Yeah, you just add a lot more words, oh, clarifying, Yeah, by which I mean, well.

Like what what was incredible with what he did when he took our language from an oral history to a written history is he didn't realize what he did was he changed history for our people. So in our culture everything's oral, right, So it's like you tell us story and the next person tells that story and they have to keep it to exactly the tea right, you can't divert from it because for us, like for example, like my father would always tell us like two like two

There's like a recapture.

Yeah, but what it does is you were able to record history. Like for example, my father when he came to this country, he had to make up a birthday because he didn't know when he was born, so he chose January first, it's his birthday. A lot of the most the first day that came to my mind, well a lot of if you look at a lot of refugees and immigrants from Southeast Asia at the time, January first is what they use because it was the most simplest, like, hey,

But they're going off the Gregorian calendar and not the lunar calendar, or they just knew that it was.

They just did that because because of the NGO workers that were in these refugee camps, it goes, well, January first, that's the first of the year, and so that's what they did, I mean. And then it was then he had to learn how to sign his name and by at the point because he didn't have to. But now when he signed his name on those documents, like it was literally what he said was the NGO worker wrote out my dad's name incursive, and then my dad put a paper on top and he traced it. So dad

I purposely text my dad and Monk just to keep up with, you know, the reading and the writing, because I learned how to read and write it.

Is there a monk keyboard on an iPhone? No, it uses.

Uses, you know, the regular used alpha alphabet, and so if you know the eight tones, also the monk.

There's no mong al, there's no.

No, no, the friend. Yeah, it's it's all English letters.

It's not phonetic because if I wrote some stuff out here and you read it, you it wouldn't it be gibberish? Right, So if you didn't know kind of the conventions of the language in.

Order to use it, using the letters as symbols.

But it's not phenomical, it's not phonetic, but you're using the letters as the Roman indicators of what you know. Like for example, the last letter in the word. If I wrote out a word, the last letter indicates what tone you're supposed to say that word in.

Okay, let me, let me, let me hate, let me hate you with this, you see, I'm using this this conventional quirity keyboard or whatever. I kep using like these letters the English alphabet, and I put down A. Okay, and you see A. What do you see when you see A with your Mong brain? That's not that's not among word? Then okay, but I'm saying the letter U.

I guess I would go with. I would start it would start out as kind of phonetic, so I would say, you're trying to get ah.

Yeah, all right, I thought you meant maybe that they were It doesn't matter what thought. I thought you meant that they use these symbols but assign them totally different meanings.

No, No, I think it's like if you wrote out dog, but then at the end of dog there was an S, and then you wrote out dog and then there might have been an R. You might say dog one way that means one thing with the S, and then you might say dog a different way.

Yah, yeah, and then and then don't forget. Don't forget that. The Mung language we also have two dialects too, yes, correct tones. Two dialects, well sometimes three, because if you like, they have their own dialect too, then the monk Shua they have their own dialect too. But yeah, but basic Mung. There's two dialects. You have your white and your green, you know, or blue, because the Mung word for green and blue is the same word ju, which means blue and green.

I got a couple of questions. Okay here putting that out there before we get too late.

The I'll say what I was gonna ask weave this in. I was gonna ask when you went to that village, did they have air guns? And did they hunt and whatnot?

Yeah, you want to go there, you throw it into the mix real quick.

One about birthdays, But prior to having a birthday or like picking a date, did they celebrate some sort of version of our birthday? Like did the monk celebrate that before being Americans annual milestone of some sort.

Yeah, that's a good that's a good question. Oh, go ahead, I would say, even if they did, it probably wasn't like how we do it here, No big care.

It's yeah, it's it's.

No cake and can.

Mounts of loose candles aren't like the number one priority to buy. It's like, oh, hey, we have thirty cents candles. That's where we're going.

And you know, you know, for the longest time, you know, I would say that I don't even know my true birth date, right, It was kind of just something that was given to me, right and so and so they kind of go by, Oh, actually if you yes, our parents they'd be like, oh, yeah, you were born in this time frame.

It's like a guess.

You don't know your you don't know you're actually.

The one time or school government. I have one, but is that really truly the day? So you just you know if you were born in the spring or the fall. Yeah, it's it's a guess. It's like, yeah, it's really funny though. This is exactly like talking to my mother. Suld be like, well you're you're born in yeah, well you know the harvest. See what's fishing walleye when you were born or something that's awesome.

I do want to hear about like the proteins, like the cooking side. So not a lot of fish. I guess specific to your it.

Depends, like for for our restaurant or like just for munk food in general. I guess munk food in general, it depends. Uh, you know, I think that a lot of our people are mountain people, so it's what you get from the mountains, you know, and then you know, if there's streams and stuff like that, you get you know, little fish, you know, and stuff like that, but it's not, you know, we're we're not. We're not like you know, we're not in the lowlands by you know, the ocean.

Yeah, conservatively, absolutely, yeah. Did you still see some did you still see some hunting going on when you went back?

Oh? Absolutely yeah, Yah yeah. We were hunting like these like little small squirrels and you know, lizards, you know, like monco lizards, and it's just anything that the jungle provides, you know. And that's like, that's the thing I love about being mung And that's what.

Was the hunting deliberate, meaning like you were going out or was just that you would encounter stuff throughout the day of raising your crops and it traveling around.

So again, in every culture, it's like the idea where it's like hey, boys, you want to go Oka, cool, let's go, you know, and so like sometimes it's literally like hey, let's go out. A lot of times, dude. One of my favorite scenes where we went was they weren't home. They were a loud but there were like

How they catch targets.

Uh, so you figure like they figure out a bad cave, you know, and and then uh, during the night the bats will fly out. Uh, and so like six thirty best fight out and they just put up a big net and just catch all the bats in there and.

Coming back into when they're leaving them, they catch them as they leave.

Yes, sorry, yeah, leave and then they come back out like six in the morning. So it's like you know that it's like a million of them and you put on that and they kick it all caught and you know, and then you uh, you know, you braize them and you eat them. Yeah, it was just braise the hair right off of them. Well they throw it over the fire to kind of charge the hair off, and then they don't cut it out, you know, there's no you know whatever, and then guts it all right in the

The problem with that ship is, uh, I brought a bunch of that home. Our buddy Clay, he's got a bunch of bamboo in his yard. I brought a bunch home. But it's cool, but ans soon as it drives out, just cracks the hell yeah, so you're gonna need a steady supply. Yeah, and it's really funny won't be able to have and you won't be able to have one well.

Down in North Carolina, North Carolina, there's a bunch of monkey that lived down there. Uh, they planted bamboos in the back of their yard and now it's like invasive there. Yeah, and so they're just cutting down. And if you I got some cousins down there, you call them, they'll just send you a bunch up. Yeah. Yeah. Green Bamboo wrote real fresh. Yeah.

What was your earliest experience? Uh in uh, how old were you when you came to the US.

It was like four and a half.

So I'm assuming that they that your people they didn't hunt and fish in the refugee camp just because of the nature of the camp, right, they did too, like really like you could they could go as they please within a certain.

Kind of yeah. Yeah, yeah, but yeah, yeah, I mean it was it's a huge So so you got to realize that that refugee camp, held from seventy five to ninety two, held ninety thousand people. So it's like it's a city. Yeah, and it was big, and there wasn't like here's here's the borders, here's the wall. It's just like, you know, you can go into the jungle and you

So yeah, then when he in the US, what was your earliest exposure to hunting here in the US.

My parents like hunt, my aunts and uncle or you know, my uncles and them hunt, and so it was, you know when when deer season came around, and you know, like we always had a deer, you know, one or two. Yeah. And the cool thing about the moon culture and yeah, you can contest to this is like the way that it works in our family because I grew up in a small town in Wisconsin. It was all cousins, right,

At house?

That was an everyday thing, you know, so it was normal. It was normal growing up. You know. We didn't go to the grocery store for pork, like we went to an amage farm and then like picking lobster, Dad goes that one and then he you know, and then he does his thing to it, and then we all kids like okay, everyone grab a knife and then we helped break it down, you know. And I was like, I didn't.

At what point did you think that you're gonna get into the food biz like the rest of Yes, So it did it seem like a lot of obstacles.

No, I was always so I'm a I'm a like if I touch it with my hand, I can understand it better. I'm not. My brothers and sisters are super academic. They're really smart. They're incredible. But for me, I was like, I'll read a book and I'm like, duh, I don't

You know.

My father said to me, he said, we came to this country so that you can sit I want you to sit in a nice office somewhere and signing people's checks. Doctor, lawyer, doctor, that was your choice. Yeah, doctor, lawyer or some kind of business person.

I heard that we had, uh South Vietnamese dude explain that. He said, you're either a doctor lawyer. You're not my kid.

Yeah, And I remember as a kid growing three choices. Yeah, And as a kid growing up, I I hated that and I was like, oh frick, like I'm not smart enough. And I remember, uh, this this actually hit me probably about like three or four years ago, and I realized what my father is saying, because he would always be like, I don't want your hands and your knees to hurt

Damn?

Yeah?

Right?

Yeah, But all he wants is like as any refugee and immigrants, like, I want what's better. Like you guys are fathers, you get it. You want to set up a life that's better for your children that you had. You want you don't want them to go through pain and struggle. And I get it. And when I was young, I was dumb. I didn't get that. I was just like what dad doesn't care? Now it's like, yeah, like I love working the field with him, I love bringing down animals with him, you know.

You know, I think the a thing that he's probably thinking about too, is that like if he knew that you could do, if he knew that you could work with your hands and and like be around heat and struggle but then find some level of security, it would have been different. But he's probably associating him. He's associating labor and struggle with struggle, yeah, and not labor and struggle with with some sort of success and security.

Yeah.

Because what I'm saying, because you could probably do I bet you now. Oh like now he probably looks at you and he's probably proud of shit.

Yeah, you know it was. It was one of these things where we did this event and the lieutenant governor came by and gave me this little award and whatever,

Yeah, you took an unexpected pathway, like you took a really unexpected pathway to get to somewhere that made sense to him, because what made sense to him was just that you that you knew how you were gonna eat, You knew how you were gonna take care of yourself, you knew how you were not going to struggle and not be under someone's thumb, right.

Yeah, And so it's like it's very different now. But man, like I said, you know, and even with Korean and we were talking our pre production, we were talking about this, and I was just like, dude, my life was pretty so like it. It is what I do is I get to speak on their legacy. So about five years ago, my dad had a horrible accident from work, or five or six years ago, and he was in the ICU and he fell. He shattered his skull and not doctors

When to get into the food businesses, you have to go cook someone else's food before you could do mung food. Is just get right into mung food.

Absolutely. I did not want to cook mung food because I was super embarrassed about it. Because I was super embarrassed. Oh my gosh.

Yeah, I was just like, oh, you know, what food did you think you had to make to be legitimate.

I didn't think I either make a certain food. I just had to be good at cooking. Yeah, you know, I mean, I mean, like cooking is it's basic, right, It's like, you know, it's like breaking down an animal. If it's a four legged creature, it's they're all basically the same kind of you know, they're breaking down those parts. So my whole thing was I was decent, Like I was never I don't think I was ever a good cook. I was just fast enough to keep up with the

It's just like that was that There's that quote that's attributed to one of the guys from Lynyrd Skinner, which was learn how to play your guitar and then get sexy.

Yeah yeah, and restaurant, I just go learn how to use a knife. And I don't know if you'll ever be sexy, but you know.

So what was the first chance to do? Like how did it happen that all sudd you got to start doing your uh you know your you're Yeah.

So I was working through all these different restaurants Minieppois. They're incredible restaurants, The chefs were amazing.

High end places.

Yeah yeah, yep, yep, yep. You know, and and and I would I had this ability to learn from some really really great teams, and then I was like, okay, well let's start out with this little pop up. So we started like a little pop up and people are like what's the pop up? And you're like, I don't know. Just come in on Friday and you were open for five hours and just eat. So we did that and then we're like, I don't know, and who was showing up? Mong people? Yeah, so long people. Here here's the thing.

There's a you know how, there's like they don't mind throwing down some box on food.

Well, here's the deal. Here's the deal. You know how, there's black Twitter. There's munk Facebook. Okay, I didn't know. I don't know about Okay, Well yeah there's black Twitter and there's munk Facebook. And let me tell you the thing with our community, it's a big community, but it's a small community. Yeah. Know's what I'm talking about. If some if one of the if one of your sons went and wronged like some other girl from another clan,

Apparently it works for you and against you.

Absolutely. So somehow on Munk Facebook said hey, there's this new kid that's doing like mungk food in East Ie, Saint Paul in this little place called cook Saint Paul. My buddy owned this place. It was as a diner, so it was opened in the you know, breakfast and lunch, and it was evening was closed and then.

Friday he took over the evenings.

Yeah, once a month, that was it. And I still and then at that time, I was still from Mon Monday, you know, from Sunday to Thursday, I was working at Coastal Seafoods. I was a fishmonger, you know, because like I did the birchery stuff and I'm like I want to learn more about fish. So like I would do fish. I smell like fish all day. And then Friday Saturday, once once a month, we would do these little pop ups.

But when you first did the pop up you had, it was Mung coming. Yes, we had at some point, but it's so just organically caught out with people who just wanted to try new things.

Well, in the Twin Cities, Mung are really well known, you know, so we have a few big shops in there, so people they are likely to know. Oh yeah, I mean, you know, seventy five thousand in the metro we are the you know, largest uh bipod group you know in the Twin City. So like there, I mean it's Mung and Somalians, you know, and so it's it's huge. Uh So what happened was, you know, we had some Mong people came. But then like and this was a while back,

Right.

It's a concept that's kind of dying. Yeah, yeah, yeah, but you know, real excited about it for a while though, absolutely right.

And so we had a few who were just really gracious and they were like, hey, we really love what you're doing. So we're just like so they just kept following us around, they just kept putting social media is like, hey, like Union Munk Kitchen's here, Union Mounkitchen. I was so embarrassed of being mung in the beginning too, bro, Like, I'll be honest here with you guys. Is it was called Union Kitchen. I didn't want to put the word mung in there because I didn't want white people to

We were like a nationless nationless people bring them up.

Yeah, Like I'm like, we are kind of weird cousins. Let's do this. You know, you lost bought you guys. Don't do pork, we do beef. What's yeah. Yeah. We even had the inquiries for kinsias too, and like, I kid you not. And that's kind of where we were. And it was we went from like like women's prayer group, brunches from Lutheran churches, I kid you not, gentlemen making Kish and French toast. I'm like, okay, I'm down. You know, this was like a wild back where it's like four

You know.

We went from that bum mitswell barments for us, and then we had big events and then Melvin Carter, who is the first African American mayor in UH Saint Paul when he won and he had his big bash party, they called us and say, hey, we love you, come and do the food. And so we like the catering and the private catering scene where you know where y'all I was talking about, like that's kind of where we started, you know, and that's kind of it wasn't because people

Do you like?

It's like yeah, you know, and I said I said to uh, I get to talk to a lot among high school kids, and I said, in life, you're gonna go around in life and there's gonna be these people in your life and they're gonna believe in you. They're gonna tell you incredible things about yourself. And I'm like, think of that as equity, and you put in a little piggy bank in your heart and one day there's gonna come a moment in your life you gotta break that piggy bank and take all that equity and you

You'll find out if you're weak or not.

Yes, And that's when you go, do I believe? And that's you know what I draw from. I don't draw from yea as confident. I draw from Mom and Dad, Like I remember, I think about them, I think about all the hard work they put in, Like I think about the war. My dad fought. I think about my mom being in that war prison camp for a year and where she told me that she would pray every morning that God would allow her to die because it was so horrible in that camp that they had to

A frying panel.

Yeah, yeah, gift from God. She kind of just said today, when I heard that you were nominated is one of the best chefs in the country, I knew why, like I needed to keep moving on. So I think about I can't wait to see what your brother does. Yeah, you could contest this man. You can be the most successful whatever in your family. But when you're around your

So, yeah, we can't really overcome the age and the wisdom.

High prior.

They make sure they remind you who you are. You get reminded, yeah, oh remember when you were five, And I'm like, you guys are gonna do that to your nephews. No, I will not do you know what well I I do because.

Maybe don't make the mistake of I see people this is not this is not like cultural, that's just human human. I see people all the time throw out because because of not liking something about their parents or how they were brought up. They throw the whole thing out.

I completely understand.

Instead of just doing a slight tweak.

Yep, No, I do the same thing. Like my niece and nephew. They work out the stay Fair. We have a stall to stay Fair in this year. They work there and they're from Wisconsin. So they come up and they stay up with grandma and grandpa for a week and they worked there for two weeks and they work there. And I remember I was like harsher on them than the other kids, you know, because I was like, dude,

You know. Yeah, I'm way more like, I'm way more financially comfortable than I ever thought I would be. And I worry constantly about my kids being too soft all the time.

Man.

You know it's like, yeah, you wound up over not overdoing it, but you just worry about them being like do you have the ger?

You know?

Am I like depriving you of the ger?

Yeah.

It's a weird thing that it's like this first world problem that you had to think about because when you're you know, your dad, he didn't think any other way other than like, I don't want my kid to struggle the way I did. I need to find him a better place. We grew up in a place where life was pretty darn easy in our circumstances, I believe, you know, speaking from you know, most of.

Us relative from a global perspective exactly.

So you have to then think about how are you going to instill that to your kid because they're not seeing a struggle like the way you saw your dad struggle.

You know. Yeah, but I also think too that one of the things that I love, like one of the things I get to do I love to do is there's a lot of high schools up in the Twin Cities area that are, like, you know, they have a higher population of monk kids. And so I get asked to come in as a speaker, and I and I the thing that I love doing is like I love

So so You're like, so, now let's circle back to the fact that you threw that shanks and trash.

Yeah.

It's like it's like or I get people there like, oh, it's it's so amazing what you do. I get young monk kids that come up bless their heart, like I want to be a chef, and I'm like, and I do the Billy Madison scene, you know, where you like you squeeze your face, you know, talking about where you're like, don't say that, stay where you are. Never grow up, Billy. I want to go to high school too, you know.

Yeah, it's American elbow grease, dude, but yeah it's mung elbow grease.

Yeah. And I don't And that's my big thing. Man. I love talking to people about it where I'm like, this isn't among thing only, this is a human thing. This is a human thing. Like yeah, you're parents did great things, universal human thing. Yeah, but yeah, but it's select few. Yeah, but you know, but even what was saying, how like how you guys are just like, hey, you you guys, you know your parents set you up for a little bit better, you know, but you guys still

Now what's going on there?

Man?

Is that? Like is your mom and dad bummed about that?

Bro'? That's a whole new surely one. I'm the only one in my family that's not married. Everyone's married and has kids. My parents have twenty one grandkids. So they love it, you know. They they love being grandparents.

Tell tell them I'm too busy making you proud.

Right.

But in our culture, though, what what makes family, probably the culture is raising a family, having a family, having lineage, having you know.

So.

So that's that every three to four weeks, my mom gives me the talk. I get it, and I don't. I don't push it away. I know that she gets to this point where she's a little older now, so she's nervous, like I want to instill everything I have to you if something was to happen when she had some health scare, you know. And so I get it. I listen to it. It's about a twenty minute speech. It's the same it's usually on a phone call. I'm driving into work. It's the same one she gives every

Oh, tell us before we wrap up, tell us about your show.

Yeah, you know, we got this show called Farah. It's an outdoor you guys might have heard that channel.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

And you know, one of the craziest things was about two and a half years ago, Patrick, one of the producers, came up and goes, hey, I have an idea, bro. And he calls me up and we've been doing a few TV stuff for like Food Network, and then we were very blessed to be able to do this thing with Netflix with Iron Chef, and so he's like, I have an idea. It's kind of crazy, but let me pitch it to you. And he's like, this idea is that you're going to travel the country. You're the host

How many episodes are you make in per release?

See eight? And Man, I had this I'm a small Wisconsin boy, right, I'm just from Wisconsin. I had this moment where I had this like come to Jesus moment where I'm like I'm like literally chest deep in chocolate

And I was like, oh yeah, nothing better.

And then we broke it down and like we ate it. I'm like, this is delicious, but I love it, you know, but it's just I mean, it's a big rodent, you know, and you're just like, Okay, here we go, you know. But yeah, I mean we have some We shot season three and then hopefully we'll hear back about season four. But it's a really really fun show. We just came out on they have it streaming now on my outdoor TV.

I don't know.

There's like this other show I see on there too, call me Eater something like that. Every time I go on there, you know, there's a picture of some.

Guys the hotel room, uh, driving into a town a couple of weeks ago, and she's liked, well, what email? And I gave her the email, which is at the Meat Eater, and she immediately started laughing.

And I was like, Nope, that's what it is. She okay. It's like it's like, why is it? Seymour butts at me? Wait are you serious, sir?

You know, so tell people how to find you. Yeah, we have the restaurant.

Yea restaurant is at Union Munk Kitchen. It's a Union Munk Kitchen yep. So uh you know, uh, you know, on Instagram all those other platforms. And then me is for me, it's at yea Vang seven.

Zero, got it? And then outdoor Channel, Oh yeah, outdoor Channel my outdoor TV app.

Yep, my outdoor TV app. It's like great man first, was it first thirty days or free or something? There?

Yeah, I don't know, you're coming over for dinner night, you know, about that.

Well, Karan said something about it. Well, I was just trying to be cool about it. You know. Do you know how many friends text me goes, dude, what are you doing in Bozman? And I'm like, ah, stuff, And then and then somebody goes, is it you're going to go with me? And you were Stephen in the Boys And I'm like, oh, maybe, and then they're all like freaking out a little bit. So I'm like, dude, just be cool. Man.

Well, hope you did a good enough job.

You'll have to just hold the plate as Steve Grill and.

I got grill. It's home cooking right now. Yeah, it's already cooking.

That's awesome.

Yeah, so we're gonna have some chips, potato chips. Oh yeah, is.

This Montana culture you're teaching me?

Well, thanks for coming out, man, I appreciate it.

Yeah, thanks for having me man. It's awesome. It's awesome to be here man. And it's my first time Bozman, so Jordan and I first time Bozeman. We got a chance to well welcome, enjoy the.

Mountains and yeah, Yang, thanks for coming out man. Of course, Boner, I'll see you. I'll see you at Youth turk.

Yeah, exactly.

You know where I'll be. Am.

I invited to dinner too, You.

Are inviting dinner.

Oh yeah, they're looking forward to it.

I get that high, feel that youth turkey again.

All right, Well, dog said, if I came for the first time of my girls, he give me that spot.

No, no, no, he did.

I'll call, I'll take care of it.

I'll let you know.

I know what he says. All right, thanks, guys, Thanks.

Oh see you Gray shine like silver in the sun. Ride ride, ride on alone of Sweetheart. We're done beat this damp horse to death, so taking a new one and ride away.

We're done beat this damn horse today, so take a new one and ride on.