My name is Joe Wong. But to most people, I am known as “Who?” which is actually my mother’s maiden name, and the answer to my credit card security question.
Joking aside, I want to reassure you that I am invited here tonight. And I was padded down for guns. I don’t know how long the Supreme Court will continue to allow this.
I grew up in China. Who didn’t? Most of my childhood memories are ruined by my childhood.
When I was in elementary school, as part of the curriculum, I worked at a rice paddy next to a quarry where they use explosives to break rocks. That’s where I learned that light travels faster than sound, which is almost as slow as a flying rock.
My dad was a grumpy guy. But occasionally he tried to cheer me up with jokes. When I was 7 he said to me, “Son, why is tofu better than centralized socialist economy?” 5 minutes later, I said, “Why?” He said, “Because I said so!”
In 1994, I came to the United States to study at Rice University in Texas. I was driving this used car with a lot of bumper stickers that are impossible to peel off. And one of them said, “If you don’t speak English, go home!” And I didn’t notice it for two years.
We always wanted my son to become the president. We try to make him speak Chinese at home and English outside in public. Sometimes I had to say to him in public, “If you don’t speak English, go home!” He said, “Why do I have to learn two languages?” I said, “When you become the president, you will have to sign legislative bills in English, and talk to debt collectors in Chinese!”
After I graduated from Rice, I decided to stay in the US because in China I can’t do the thing I do best here, being ethnic. In order to become a citizen, we immigrants had to take American history lessons with questions like: Who’s Benjamin Franklin? We were like, “Ahh.., the reason our convenient store gets robbed?” What’s the second Amendment? We were like, “Ahh.., the reason our convenient store gets robbed?” What is Roe vs Wade? We went, “Ahh…, two ways of coming to the US?”
Later I read a lot about American history. So much so that I started to feel white guilt.
In America, all men are created equal, but after birth, it depends on their parents’ income for early education and healthcare.
I read on Men’s Health magazine that president Obama every week has two cardio days and 4 weight lifting days. I don’t have to exercise because I have health insurance. I live in Massachusetts where we had universal healthcare and then elected Scott Brown. Talk about mixed message! I think there was a movie about him. It’s called “Kill Bill”
We have Mr. vice president Joe Biden here tonight. I have read your autobiography and today I see you. I think the book is much better. They should have cast Brad Pitt, or Angelina Jolie.
We have many distinguished journalists here whom I consider as peers. I once wrote for the campus newspaper. Journalism is the last refuge for puns. Only in a newspaper can I say, “I was born in the year of the horse, that’s why I’m a neigh-sayer (nay-sayer)”
This is my first time on CSPAN, a channel I obvious always watch when I couldn’t handle the demagoguery and sensationalism of PBS and QVC. If I still couldn’t go to sleep after watching CSPAN, there are CSPAN2 and 3!
I was just thrilled to be invited to tonight’s event. I showed the White House my jokes about the president, and that’s when Obama decided not to come and started the immigration reform. Take that Stephen Colbert!
Obama has been accused of being too soft. But he was conducting two wars and they still gave him the Nobel peace prize, and he accepted it. You can’t get more bad-ass than that! The only way you can be more bad-ass than is that if you took the peace prize money and gave it to the military.
I finally became a US citizen in 2008. Thank you! America is number one! That’s true! We won the World Series every year!
2008 was the year of the presidential election. But I believe the apathy among non-voters is the real problem. I immediately registered to vote for Obama/Biden. (Turn and face Biden) You are welcome. You had me at “Yes we can” That was their slogan.
After getting them elected, I felt this power trip and started to think maybe I should run for president myself. I have to explain a little here. I had always been kind of a morose and pessimistic guy. I feel that life is like peeing into the snow in a dark winter night. You probably made a difference, but it’s really hard to tell.
Now we have a president who is half black half white. That just gives me so much hope because I am half not black half not white. Two negatives make a positive.
So my fellow Americans, you may be thinking what is your campaign slogans? You see, I spent 10 years in the past decade. You too? I understand that Americans are suffering. My campaign slogan will be, “Who cares!”
If elected, I will make same sex marriage not only legal, but also required! This will make appeal to young voters because when I was young I was really scared about marriage. I was like, “Wow! 50% of all marriages end up lasting forever!”
I will eliminate unemployment by reducing the productivity of American workers so that two people have to do the job of one, just like the vice president and the president, the Olson twins.
Despite heart diseases and cancer, most Americans die from natural causes. If elected, I will find a cure for natural causes. It may not be covered by insurance because of pre-existing conditions.
I have a quick solution for global warming. I will switch from Fehrenheit to Celcius. It was 100 degrees and now it’s 40! You are welcome!
I’m great at foreign policy because I’m from China and I can see Russia from my backyard.
On foreign policy. I believe that unilateralism is too expensive; open dialog is too slow. If elected, I will go with text messaging. I’ll text our allies just to say hi; and text our enemies when they are driving. “OMG you are making nuclear weapons! But U R doing it wrong, LOL!”
I would like to thank Radio and TV Correspondents’ Association for giving such an incredible honor! This is the first time I wish my 3 year old son knew what I was doing.作者: 步從容 時間: 2010-4-13 10:26
Joe Wang的單口相聲在美國能贏得哄堂大笑，在中國卻沒人笑， 呵呵
So a Chinese Guy Walks Into a Bar, And Says He's Irish—Get It?
It Might Depend on Where You Live; Comedian Stumps the Crowd in China
By CAROLYN CUI
No comedian wants to bomb in front of a big crowd. But Joe Wong, a chemist turned comic, is having a tough time with an audience of 1.3 billion.
When the 40-year-old Mr. Wong played the "Late Show With David Letterman" last year, people cracked up when he walked out and said, "Hi, everybody….So, I'm Irish." That appearance launched him on a tour of clubs around the U.S.
Yet in China, where Mr. Wong grew up, people were puzzled from the start. "How come the first sentence, 'I'm Irish,' can make Americans laugh?" one viewer asked in the comments on a subtitled video circulating in China. Because everybody in America is from Ireland, someone theorized. "It has nothing to do with that," said a third. It's because being "Irish itself is hilarious."
China Central Television, the biggest TV network in the country, deemed his success in the U.S. curious enough that it dedicated a special program to him in December. The peg: He's the Chinese scientist who makes Americans laugh. While CCTV declared that Mr. Wong's success proves "humor has no boundaries," it concluded the program without showing any of his jokes.
Mr. Wong's first live gig in Beijing, in late 2008, was "not successful," he says. In America, he says, it's funny to poke fun at yourself. But in China, there's no humor in misfortune. The audience struggled to grasp the punch lines, and Mr. Wong recalls looking out on the blank faces of a "polite but serious" crowd.
"That was an unfunny routine," says Ding Guangquan, a Chinese comedian, who invited Mr. Wong to perform there.
One of the jokes he told at Beijing's Haidian Theater, Mr. Wong says, was about parking: "I'm not good at sports, but I love parallel parking. Because unlike sports, when I am parallel parking, the worse you are, the more people are rooting for you."
That didn't get as many laughs in China as it does in the U.S., probably because Chinese drivers park wherever they want to, he says.
A widely followed blogger in China on cultural issues, He Caitou, says he decided not to recommend Mr. Wong to his 500,000 subscribers. His jokes are impossible for ordinary Chinese to get, he says. "If jokes need footnotes, it won't be funny at all," he says. "Except for his look, how else can we relate to him?"
Mr. Wong came to the U.S. in 1994, at 24, and earned a Ph.D. in biochemistry at Rice University. In 2001, he saw his first stand-up show. He was fascinated, but "only got half the jokes," he says. He took adult-education classes in stand-up comedy and started performing, while holding a day job as a researcher for a pharmaceutical company.
Mr. Wong isn't the first, of course, to find humor doesn't translate. Judy Carter, an American comedian and author of "The Comedy Bible," says she bombed when she did a gig for a Chinese audience in California. To set up a joke, she opened with "I just broke up with my boyfriend..." A collective sigh of sadness emanated around the room, she says.
Before a recent show in Hong Kong, Ms. Carter's hosts gave her a few rules of thumb: no physical comedy—it's not ladylike; no joking about the economy—too depressing; no riffs on marriage—too personal. And absolutely no dog jokes, lest she cast aspersions on Chinese eating habits.
She settled on a neutral topic—frustrations with newfangled technology. "Everyone hates technology," she says.
For generations, Chinese have enjoyed "Cross-Talk," a scripted routine typically with two comedians verbally jousting, eventually winding its way to a punch line.
But Cross-Talk is slowly losing its audience, says Wu Wenke, director of the folklore institute at the Chinese Academy of Arts in Beijing. Some productions that were once big hits are now considered vulgar and are banned by the government. Cross-Talk shows are "a disappointment," says Mr. Wu.
Younger audiences are starting to warm to the stand-up style, with a Chinese twist. There are footnotes: after the punch line comes an explanation of why it's funny.
In Shanghai, Zhou Libo's stand-up show has become a top event. His repertoire spans global warming, growing up poor and, that perennial crowd-pleaser, China's emergence as a global economic power.
He jokes about China's massive purchases of U.S. Treasury bonds: "I am really confused about why a poor guy lends money to the rich. We should just divide the money amongst ourselves," he says. "But on a second thought, each of us would only get a couple of dollars!" Then Mr. Zhou adds: "Because the population is so big."
While Mr. Wong has been panned in China, he has fans among English-speaking Chinese. On an Internet forum for Chinese living abroad, one person said his jokes accentuate stereotypes. Others defended him, with one saying he shows that not all Chinese are "paper nerds."
Last month, Mr. Wong performed before Vice President Joe Biden in Washington, earning a standing ovation at the Radio and Television Correspondents' Association dinner. To prepare, he read Mr. Biden's biography, he told the crowd, and, after meeting him, declared: "I think the book is much better."
Mr. Wong's approach is scientific. He tests hundreds of jokes in small venues: "Just like screening out cancer-related genes, sometimes only one out of 100 jokes is funny," he says.
And maybe even fewer in China.
Back home, Mr. Wong's dad is among those puzzled by his success. Huang Longji, who lives in an industrial city near China's border with North Korea, says he is proud of his son, but a career in comedy isn't what the retired engineer expected for his son.
"It's just like a black hen lays a white egg," he said.作者: 步從容 時間: 2010-4-13 11:00
相關(guān)新聞:中國土產(chǎn)“博士笑星”黃西讓美國副總統(tǒng)笑翻了(視)
去年，40歲的黃西參加了《大衛(wèi)萊特曼秀》(Late Show With David Letterman)的演出。當他從幕后走出，并說“大家好……所以我是愛爾蘭人”時，人們爆笑不止。此次演出開始了他的全美俱樂部巡演歷程。
上個月，黃西在美國華盛頓舉行的美國廣播電視記者協(xié)會(Radio and Television Correspondents' Association)宴會上為美國副總統(tǒng)拜登(Joe Biden)等人表演，贏得了觀眾長時間的起立鼓掌。為了準備這場演出，他閱讀了拜登的傳記。在與拜登會面后，他告訴眾人說，我覺得書要好得多。