Because to Americans, Chechnya might as well be a suburb of Narnia.
AASIF MANDVIThe idea that I had anything to do with speaking about Islam or about the Muslim world was just absurd to my family. … I hadn’t been to the mosque in like 10 years.
More Aasif Mandvi Quotes
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People lament that there’s no roles being written for South Asian or Muslim characters. But their parents don’t want their children to go into the entertainment field. You don’t get it both ways.
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So I had this completely unrealistic idea of what America was — but I wanted to be there.
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I never consciously got into comedy. It was sort of one of those things where I was a theater student, I was acting, I was doing comedy, I was doing dramatic stuff, so it’s been something that I’ve always done and enjoyed doing and had an instinct to be relatively good at.
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Now the bigots have to get creative. Good luck coming up with slurs for Chechens. Go back where you came from, Ushanka head.
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Indian culture is essentially much more of a we culture. It’s a communal culture where you do what’s best for the community – you procreate.
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In America, people think being South Asian is still kind of exotic. When you go outside New York and Chicago and L.A., there are people who have never tried Indian food… they’ve never even tasted it!
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I think Islam has been hijacked by the idea that all Muslims are terrorists; that Islam is about hate, about war, about jihad
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Samantha Bee said to me when I first started on the “Daily Show”, she was like no – there is no – the only way you’ll learn this job is by doing this job.
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The idea that I had anything to do with speaking about Islam or about the Muslim world was just absurd to my family. … I hadn’t been to the mosque in like 10 years.
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I think politicians and comedians have a lot in common. One is a group of approval-seeking narcissists who will say and do anything to be liked… and comedians are always talking about politics.
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When you’re brown and Indian, you get offered a lot of doctor roles.
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We are Muslims. My father would pawn off his Muslim in-laws as Hindus just so that he could get free pancakes.
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From my parent’s generation the idea was not that marriage was about some kind of idealized, romantic love. It was a partnership. It’s about creating family. It’s about creating offspring.
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You can get samosas in any pub in England today, pretty much. So, “Gunga Din” has come back.
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I think that hijacks the spirituality and beauty that exists within Islam. I believe in allowing Islam to be seen in context and in its entirety and being judged on what it really is, not what you think it is.
AASIF MANDVI






