This Was Funnier in China | Laszlo and Jesse Appell

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**Laszlo Montgomery** (1:01)
Hey, all CHP listeners all over the galaxy. Laszlo Montgomery here. Last week, I braved the drive downtown to meet with Jesse Appell. He's a thousand times more famous than your humble narrator, so no need for an intro. I read his new book, and we enjoyed a nice 30-year-old white tea and discussed some stories taken from the book. The conversation is unedited and contains one hour of raw conversation. 97.6% of Jesse speaking and 2.4% of me. Therefore, you're in for a treat. There's only one F-bomb in there, and it wasn't uttered by me. Don't be alarmed that there's only been six episodes released since last summer. Actually, I have never been more productive. Patreon and CHP Premium subscribers are begging me not to be so prolific with all the hours and hours of new shows that they're getting to try on first. This has been the best stuff that's ever come out of the CHP in my utterly worthless opinion. Details are in the show notes accompanying this interview with Jesse, and I've also included links where you can check out Jesse's book, This Was Funnier in China, along with links to Jesse's teahouse where many CHP listeners get all their tea and tea accoutrements. The book is This Was Funnier in China. I hope you enjoy the program.

**Jesse Appell** (2:25)
How is everybody doing? Welcome, welcome, welcome to a very special live stream we have here at Laszlo Montgomery of The China History Podcast fame. You want to give a little quick introduction? Who are you?

**Laszlo Montgomery** (2:39)
Laszlo Montgomery, The China History Podcast fame.

**Jesse Appell** (2:43)
And so we're basically going to do a little bit of a different live stream than normal. We're going to be drinking tea and talking about my book.
We have the book, buh-buh-duh-buh-buh. We have the book, buh-buh-duh-buh-buh. This was Funnier in China, which is coming out in February. This is all about my time living in China as a Chinese comedian, learning about Xiangsheng, traditional Chinese comedy, stand-up comedy. And Laszlo is going to interview me here about his experience reading through the book and talking about China and comedy and we'll all chill together and it'll be a lot of fun. So, let me, here, let me, I have a second copy of the book, which we can stick up somewhere.

**Laszlo Montgomery** (3:23)
Yeah.

**Jesse Appell** (3:24)
For a prop. Prop purposes. Ah, there we go. And while we're doing this, I figure it's worth breaking out the really good tea, right?

**Laszlo Montgomery** (3:32)
Yeah. 30 year old by child.

**Jesse Appell** (3:35)
Yeah. So we're going to have the really old 30 plus year old white tea. And I'm going to show you this. Take a look at those leaves.

**Laszlo Montgomery** (3:44)
Oh, wow.

**SPEAKER_1** (3:45)
Smell it.

**Jesse Appell** (3:47)
Yeah. Very nice. So I give you guys a little quick look at what the leaves look like for the 30 plus year old aged white tea, which is...

**Laszlo Montgomery** (3:56)
Yeah, they pretty much look like tea leaves.

**Jesse Appell** (3:57)
Definitely my special occasion tea. And what more special occasion there could be than talking about Chinese comedy in my new book coming out and with a very...

**Laszlo Montgomery** (4:07)
Having me drive all the way to this...

**Jesse Appell** (4:09)
Exactly.

**Laszlo Montgomery** (4:09)
This neighborhood here.

**Jesse Appell** (4:10)
You came in all the way from Rancho Cucamonga.

**Laszlo Montgomery** (4:12)
Take my life in my hands.

**Jesse Appell** (4:13)
Exactly. So, let's get started then. What do you think? How do you want to do your intro?

**Laszlo Montgomery** (4:20)
Well, I think that let's read the intro right from the book. Let's do it. I don't know, there's a couple of my listeners probably never heard of you. Yeah. But Jesse Appell is a comedian whose original comedy works have passed half a billion views on Chinese and international internet sites, earning Silver Viewership Award Plaques from both YouTube and Bilibili. He has been featured on the front page of the Boston Globe with Tom Brady and the Pope, and has appeared on a veritable alphabet soup of media, CBS, TEDx, BBC, PBS, and NPR in the West, and CCTV, Beijing TV, Shanghai TV, and China Radio International in Asia. He's also the founder and head tea guy of Jesse's Teahouse. There we go.