Joe Rogan Experience #1925 - Sonny, from Best Ever Food Review Show

Joe Rogan 0:00 (drumming) Joe Rogan podcast, check it out.

Narrator 0:04 The Joe Rogan Experience. (metal music)

Joe Rogan 0:06 Train by day, Joe Rogan podcast by night, all day. (metal music) What's happening, Sonny? How are you?

Sonny Side 0:14 I'm good. I'm great. Um, I'm happy to be here. I gotta say, to start off, I wanna say thank you so much for having me here, uh, in the first place. By all accounts, I should not be here right now.

Joe Rogan 0:23 Why is that?

Sonny Side 0:24 And I say that because, not to be too grand- grandiose from the start, but the way I grew up, I grew up white trash from central Minnesota, super poor family, one of six, failed college three times, and now, somehow years later, I have the most viewed, most followed travel show online or otherwise, and I'm on the motherfucking Joe Rogan Experience. So-

Joe Rogan 0:43 How did this all happen?

Sonny Side 0:44 ... thank you.

Joe Rogan 0:44 How did ... Y- you're welcome. How did you get on this, uh, journey of food exploration?

Sonny Side 0:48 Um, gosh.

Joe Rogan 0:49 You have a really fun show.

Sonny Side 0:50 Thank you.

Joe Rogan 0:51 It's really fun to watch.

Sonny Side 0:52 I, yes, I was very stoked. You know, when you reached out to me for the first time, I was in Egypt with COVID. I was going through one of my worst travel experiences ever. And, uh, God, how did it start? (sighs) I mean, everything starts, obviously, where I come from in Minnesota. Growing up, um, I, I was quite directionless. I didn't know where I wanted to ... I didn't know what I wanted to study. Uh, I didn't really have any guidance. I didn't really have any mentorship. And so, hence the reason I failed outta school so many times. Um, in high school, I was really into filmmaking because we had a- fortunately, we had a filmmaking course there. But it's just not something I, I pursued afterwards. And so around the age of 24, I felt like I was pretty rudderless. I tried doing a couple things. You know, I did radio for a while. I was at 104.7 KCLD, the, I think the hundredth market in the country, not bad, doing 11:00 PM to 5:00 AM, uh, making minimum wage. And so I tried getting-

Joe Rogan 1:49 Minimum wage on the radio?

Sonny Side 1:51 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:51 They really pay you minimum wage?

Sonny Side 1:53 (laughs) Yeah, well, if they would've paid less, they probably would've.

Joe Rogan 1:55 (laughs) They could've.

Sonny Side 1:55 Are you surprised? I, I mean, radio's kinda infamous for not paying any money.

Joe Rogan 1:59 Yeah, but minimum wage sounds crazy.

Sonny Side 2:02 I, I guess they saw it as like they're doing me a favor by teaching me a, a trade or a skill.

Joe Rogan 2:07 Hm, okay. Maybe.

Sonny Side 2:09 Yeah. And so, um, I, I, I tried to get a j- uh, getting a job doing that. That didn't work out. And so I was at a point in my life where I, I just thought, "I need to do something." I'm still youngish. I was 24, and, uh, I, I wanna travel. I wanna see the world. I wanna figure out something before I actually develop a long-term career, uh, 'cause at that point I had nothing. And so I had a friend. My, my brother had a friend who lived in Korea. And at the age of 24, I moved to Korea to teach English. And to me, it made sense because, uh, I could go there. I could travel. I could, I could see the world. I thought it would maybe last an hour and then I would come back. But I ended up staying there for eight years. And so I ... Maybe I'm giving too long of an answer.

Joe Rogan 2:52 No, it's okay.

Sonny Side 2:52 Is this too long of an answer?

Joe Rogan 2:53 N- no, don't worry about it.

Sonny Side 2:54 All right, I gotta take a deep breath.

Joe Rogan 2:57 (laughs)

Sonny Side 2:57 (sighs) Let me reset a little bit.

Joe Rogan 2:58 (yawns)

Sonny Side 2:58 I gotta calm down. (smacks lips) So I went to Korea. Korea was really challenging because it was my first time in a different country, and I'd really only been in central Minnesota at that point.

Joe Rogan 3:09 Oh, wow.

Sonny Side 3:11 And, and so it was something completely different. And this is Korea in 2008. Like, there, uh, aren't really smartphones. Maybe the iPhone 1 had just dropped. YouTube still sucked. I mean, it existed, but it was barely usable. It was just, uh, cat videos and Charlie Bit Me at that point. And so there, there's very little guidance online. Um, I went there to teach English. You might be asking, "How did you teach English after failing out of university three times?" Well, uh, (laughs) you can do, uh, some underground, under-the-table English teaching in Korea. Uh-

Joe Rogan 3:40 Did you have to learn how to speak Korean?

Sonny Side 3:42 No, eventually I did, but no. Um, so people, k- k- Korean ... Folks in Korea are very desperate to learn English, and, um, as you may know, people there study their asses off. They're, they're, they're very hard workers, and they're very hard studiers, maybe to a detriment. Like, kids go to school so much. They study so much. They get tutors and things like that. And so when I went to Korea, (clears throat) I, I was gonna be a tutor. And to tutor people, I had to ... Sorry, give me one second to take a sip.

Joe Rogan 4:22 (laughs)

Sonny Side 4:24 I'm freaking out a little bit still. Have ... Is this the first podcast you've done? Uh, it's like, you know, I did a couple practice podcasts.

Joe Rogan 4:30 (laughs)

Sonny Side 4:30 I just feel like it's so-

Joe Rogan 4:31 What's a practice podcast?

Sonny Side 4:32 I feel like it's so quiet in here. I'm like, "I can hear my voice so well." Um, in, in Korea, um, I wanted to get a, uh, a gig teaching. A- and so to teach, you would think like, oh, it's gonna be difficult to teach people if you don't have any experience, uh, or any credentials teaching English. And that wasn't the case at all, because when you speak to people, you know, they'll say something like, "Oh, today I go to store." And you go, "Oh, I know how to solve that." You s- no. "Today I went to the store." And so I'm teaching people conversational English. And, um, I'm doing that for maybe 40 or 50 bucks an hour, which seems pretty good, especially in 2008, except for it takes, uh ... And maybe you can do two or three lessons in a day because you need to take the subway. You need to go around the city. And you need to, to go where the people are. You do the lesson. You come back. And so eventually, I learned how to get a full-time job in Korea, which was what was really necessary. I, (smacks lips) I reached out to a school, and I find out the code word is, um, "Can you pay cash?" So with many schools, you need to have the right kind of visa. They wanna see that you have a, a, a proper degree, which is understandable. Um, and so if you just asked, uh, "Can you pay cash?" some would get your point. They would say no, or they would say, "Oh, yeah. Cash is fine. We'll do cash." And so eventually, after being there for about maybe six months, I finally figured out how to make a full-time income teaching English in Korea at a kindergarten.Um, and, uh, I know some people might judge that and say that's not okay to do because I don't have a proper degree in teaching English, but really, to teach English in Korea, all you need is a four-year degree in anything. I could have had a four-year degree in interior design and also taught kids English. And so living in Korea was... Uh, the, the show I do now, there's no way I could have done it if I didn't have all that time living abroad for so long. And living in Korea was the first taste of living in a society and a culture completely different from the USA. Uh, in the USA, um, you know, we have a very individualistic society here, and Korea is much more of a communal society. People care a lot more what other people think. You know, I, I tried dating a Korean woman one time. Challenging, because she's not just looking at what do I think about the dynamic of this relationship? She's looking at, um, "What are my parents gonna think? What are my friends gonna think? What are my coworkers gonna think?" And so on. That's just one random example, but being steeped and immersed in this different culture gave me enough experience to... Uh, it gave me perspective, and it's perspective that if I didn't have that, I, I couldn't make the show that I make today, because the show would be a much more judgmental show, i- if I wasn't so used, used to and, and, uh, accustomed to being among other cultures. So, after a number of years in Korea, I, I switched to filmmaking, uh, my interest to filmmaking,

Sonny Side 7:34 and I, I started making my own content. Uh, I didn't really have anywhere to publish it. The idea-

Joe Rogan 7:39 Like what kind of content? What'd you start doing?

Sonny Side 7:41 So, I, uh, I... Back then, I would read all these self-help books, and I was really obsessed with this idea of just improving myself, uh, getting better. I, I felt really unaccomplished because three of my siblings had four-year degrees. One was... uh, had a PhD, one was in law school, and for me, uh, I'm, I'm the loser in Korea who doesn't have a degree, doesn't have a job, doesn't have a skill. And so I, I wanted to build up a, a skill in filmmaking. This is what I was really interested in high school. I was like, "I can do it again now." Maybe I'm 20-

Joe Rogan 8:14 Filmmaking like making movies, documentaries? Like, what kind of stuff?

Sonny Side 8:18 So, I guess in the beginning, I wanted to be good at whatever I could be good. I wanted to be good at everything.

Joe Rogan 8:22 Mm-hmm.

Sonny Side 8:23 And I didn't have a direction quite yet. So I created... Uh, I read this book called Talent is Overrated, and in that book, they talk about the 10,000 hour rule. I'm sure you've heard about it-

Joe Rogan 8:33 Mm-hmm.

Sonny Side 8:33 ... in Malcolm Gladwell's book. And the, the 10,000 hour rule is just essentially you need 10,000 hours of practice, deliberate practice, to get to become master class at something. Even people talk about this with comedians too, or, um, I think Louis C.K. has talked about people needing at least 10 years-

Joe Rogan 8:49 Yeah.

Sonny Side 8:50 ... to, to get good or even decent. And so I, I broke it down. I, I looked at filmmak- filmmaking systematically. Like, how can I week by week, day by day... week by week, day by day improve at this and get better at this? Um, I created something called The Soul Filmmakers Workshop, which was a place where I could bring my films. Maybe they were little comedy sketches, short documentaries, stuff I did for clients, corporate work. And people could come and tear apart my content, and then that would help me to improve and get better over time. And so, over a number of years in Korea, I was able to transition from teaching English to doing filmmaking full-time, uh, for clients. And so at, at this point, I don't have any really artistic, uh, goals in mind. It's just I wanna figure out if I ever get, uh, deported from this country, am I gonna be able to go back to the USA and have a skill, or a job, or a trade I can fall back on? And eventually that answer was yes. Luckily,

Sonny Side 9:50 I never got deported. But living in Korea for eight years was one of the most nerve-wracking things I'd ever done, because I was there on a tourist visa. And it's not something I've talked about a lot, but a tourist visa means you get to stay here for 90 days. As an American, you don't need any visa ahead of time, but you land. On the spot, they give you a visa for 90 days, and then within 90 days you need to leave the country, but you can come back right away. But I did that for eight years straight.

Joe Rogan 10:19 So you just kept leaving and coming back?

Sonny Side 10:20 Right.

Joe Rogan 10:21 So where would you go?

Sonny Side 10:22 So I, I really got it perfected, and I, and I could do it for the least amount of money possible. I went from Seoul, uh, in the north of South Korea, all the way down to Busan in the south to an island called Tsushima in Japan. And so I could do... I could wake up at 5:00 AM, go all the way to Japan, and come back by evening. The nerve-wracking part wasn't the trip itself or the amount of money it cost, although that was a burden too 'cause I didn't make that much money. But at immigration, on both sides, they would always ask, "Hey, you're teaching. You're a teacher, right? You teach." Even in Japan, going into Jap- into Japan, they would say, "What do you do?" And I'd... and I would have, like, a whole list of stories and answers lined up in my mind 'cause it was so anxiety-inducing, um, especially coming back to Korea, 'cause this is the stamp I really need. I need 90 days more of freedom when I land in Korea. Um, I shouldn't say land. When I pull up at the port 'cause I would take a ferry. If I get the stamp, I get 90 more days to figure out my life, to move forward, uh, and to, to, to, to have freedom. And standing in line for immigration, I'm looking, okay, there's an older guy over here. This lady looks nice. This young, young guy looks like he's got something to prove. And I would rehearse my story. "What are you doing here?" "Oh, I'm, uh, I love Korea. I love Korean, uh, I love Korean food." Try to get them on my side. Uh, "I, I plan to go to university soon, uh, in Korea. I hope to study here." And then eventually would get through. But sometimes-

Joe Rogan 11:49 Were you speaking to them in Korean?

Sonny Side 11:51 No, in English. So everybody... I would say in most places you go around the world, at immigration, they're gonna speak English. And a couple of times, they, they took me into the side room, and that's really terrifying. Especially 'cause... It wouldn't be as terrifying now 'cause now I have resources, but back then, I'm completely broke. And so-... one time they took me to the side room, they go, "What are you, what are you really doing here? You're teaching. You're teaching, right? Just tell us where you're teaching."

Joe Rogan 12:15 Why did they think you were teaching?

Sonny Side 12:16 Because a lot of people do what I was doing.

Joe Rogan 12:18 Hmm.

Sonny Side 12:19 They go there, they teach under the table, they don't have to pay any taxes, they just get paid cash. They leave every 90 days, they come back. Like, I've rented a- an apartment in Korea w- you just needed a passport. They weren't like, "Show me your labor contract. Show me your visa." They're like, "All right, you got key money, you got the m- the deposit? You're good to go." (sniffs) And so I lived, I lived doing that for eight years. While I'm doing that, I'm building up this, uh, the- these film skills, this, uh, this ability, uh, to do filmmaking. And eventually, I go from making corporate videos to wanting to make content for myself. So this is where YouTube comes in. Making corporate videos sucks, because clients have no idea what they want. When you make a corporate video, most companies, especially at that time in Korea, they'll say, "We want a video. We want a video introduction. We gotta interview everybody." If you have-

Joe Rogan 13:14 How do you even get in contact with these people? Like, 'cause you speak English.

Sonny Side 13:17 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 13:17 I would imagine most of them speak Korean.

Sonny Side 13:20 So there's a fascinating, a fa- a fascinating expat culture in most countries around the world, I'd say.

Joe Rogan 13:26 Really? So you ran into a lot of Americans over there?

Sonny Side 13:28 There was a ... There's a, a place called Itaewon. Um, you, you might have heard of this tragedy recently in Korea where a bunch of people got crushed during Halloween.

Joe Rogan 13:35 Yeah.

Sonny Side 13:36 Uh, so Itaewon is known as like the foreigner neighborhood. And, and people, the, uh ... All the foreign restaurants from around the world are there. Um, tons of foreigners live in the neighborhoods around there. So there's a, a huge expat community, um, there in Itaewon. And, and so much so that you see, like what I had, I had the Seoul Filmmakers Workshop, people had the Seoul, um, Stand-up Seoul. So people did comedy locally. And in fact, they would invite some comedians from here. I think Kyle Kinane came once. Uh, James Adomian came once. And so they would fly over comedians, and the audience is, of course, all people who speak English. Some of them might be Korean who speak English. But there is between Yongsan, Yongsan, uh, is where there's a huge military base next to Itaewon, and then there's all the expats and teachers who are there too. So there is a gigantic community of foreigners there. And for whatever reason, uh, Korean folks, some of the business owners there, especially in media, are interested in working with filmmakers, with voiceover artists, actors who are from outside of Korea.

Joe Rogan 14:39 Hmm.

Sonny Side 14:40 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 14:41 Pretty cool.

Sonny Side 14:42 It was pretty cool.

Joe Rogan 14:42 So you were finding your way.

Sonny Side 14:44 Well, and so I, I was able to find my way in i- i- it's like that was my film school. Like, I didn't go to a proper film school. I wouldn't have had opportunities here, um, you know, for example, doing corporate videos, doing Red Bull video. I did videos for Red Bull in Korea. I ... At my level, I wouldn't have been able to do that here in the USA. And so I got to take part in, in things and, and jobs and experiences that I wouldn't have been able to otherwise.

Joe Rogan 15:10 And so along the way you say, "I wanna make some food videos."

Sonny Side 15:14 Yes. So I'm, I'm getting sick of doing the client work. I wanna make content for myself. I've, I've read Gary Vee's first book, Crush It! (laughs)

Joe Rogan 15:22 (laughs)

Sonny Side 15:22 And I wanna, and I wanna crush it. And, uh, I loved the book, and it's, it taught me about content marketing, and that's something I started doing. "Hey, instead of a corporate video, let's make you m- weekly videos or monthly videos. And from there, you can, uh, offer value to the people watching, and then you can have a call to action." And, um, I- I just t- I just thought, "Well, I could do this for myself." And I had a couple of different ideas, but the idea that stuck was doing food. And at the time, I had a couple of channels that really inspired me. I, I listened to h3h3, who did comedy at the time, and then I listened to ... I watched a channel called jacksgap, and he had these very wander-lusty travel- th- travel videos that he did as a young kid from the UK who would go to India, who would go to these interesting countries, and it felt so remote. And at that time, um, maybe this is 2014, 2013, there's almost no travel content on YouTube. And if there is any, people are just trying to emulate what already exists on the Travel Channel, which is what I didn't understand at the time 'cause all the shit on the Travel Channel was so dry. It's just like, "Today, we walk in Cairo, a city thousands of years old, rich with history." And I was like, "This is so fucking boring." Why not mix something more spon- spontaneous, a little bit more humor, um, the pacing, the pacing of YouTube, faster pacing, um, and, and make a completely new travel format that people hadn't seen before. Now, it took me a few years to get it right, but that was the initial idea, that was the inspiration at the time.

Joe Rogan 16:55 So where was your first video? Where'd you do ... Where'd you go?

Sonny Side 16:58 Oh, that's a good question. So I've, I've made a few different pivots since I started. If you look at my first six, eight videos, they're still online. I mean, my first video's just about a grilled cheese. My, my first few videos were in Korea, but I was just covering international food. I was, uh, doing nachos, and burgers, and a Jucy Lucy. And at some point, I mean, that ... I guess that was just a practice. It was like, "Can I do this? Can I edit a video?"

Joe Rogan 17:19 Mm-hmm.

Sonny Side 17:19 "Can I be in front of camera?" And I just thought, "Nobody's gonna watch about a ... Is a cheeseburger good in Korea?" That is not international content. So early on I decided, and, and I wasn't shy about it, I said, "I'm ... I really liked Andrew Zimmern's show growing up." Before I moved to Korea, I, I worked at this job. I'm bouncing around a little bit, but I worked at this job at, at a home, and I would have to stay overnight at the home. I didn't have cable in my apartment, but at this home, four guys lived there. They're assisted living folks. And one guy would have seizures at night, potentially. Maybe once out of every four times, he would scream. You'd grab a magnet from the fridge, rub it on his chest. Somehow that made the seizure go away. When that wasn't happening, I was watching Andrew Zimmern, uh, Bizarre Foods and Bourdain's No Reservations back to back on the Travel Channel. And this shit was so inspiring to me. As someone living in central Minnesota who just had very few experiences ... It's not like there were a lot of international restaurants. Maybe there's one sushi place that was also like a Thai place and an Indian place. Like, all the Asian stuff just gets mixed over here.Um, and... So I... I took inspiration from those shows and that's another thing that helped me want to move abroad in the first place. And so... I forgot your question. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 18:41 (laughs)

Sonny Side 18:41 I was on a roll there.

Joe Rogan 18:42 It's... It's basically... You were on a roll. It's just, how did you get started? Like, what... what was-

Sonny Side 18:46 Hmm.

Joe Rogan 18:46 What was the inspiration to start making food v-

Sonny Side 18:48 Sorry.

Joe Rogan 18:48 Were you always, like, a food enthusiast or is this just-

Sonny Side 18:51 Yes. Well, so I... Oh, so I love that... I loved watching that show. I remember watching Andrew Zimmern when he was in Taipei, Taiwan and he was eating something called Stinky Tofu. And he ate something that was so smelly, so intense that he couldn't even handle it, and he had to spit it out. And, uh, to me, that was just fascinating and the story behind that. And so, I made this pivot early on in the channel. I said, "I wanna go explore more bizarre foods, exotic foods, foods that seem way out there." And for me, the reason is that those types of foods just have an intrinsic story attached to them.

Joe Rogan 19:22 (sniffs)

Sonny Side 19:22 If you're eating something strange, bizarre, exotic, um, however you wanna term it, um, uh, there's, uh, naturally a story of, "Why are people doing this?"

Joe Rogan 19:31 Right.

Sonny Side 19:32 Attached to it. Recently, I was in the Faroe Islands.

Joe Rogan 19:34 Why were they eating a Stinky Tofu?

Sonny Side 19:36 So, Stinky Tofu is... Uh, there's a lot of cultures around the world that like to ferment food. And for some reason that... that fermentation process, they... I mean, they have almost like this goo or a batter that they put the tofu in, and they'll let the live bacteria saturate the tofu over time and it just gets incredibly putrid, uh, and smelly over time. And I... I think people developed a taste for it, um, and it's... it's hard to say why, but I guess there's-

Joe Rogan 20:03 Did you try it?

Sonny Side 20:04 Oh, yeah. No, I went to... I made a point of going to the same restaurant that Andrew Zimmern went to, ordering the same food and showing like, "Yeah, I got it. I could eat this." The same food that he spit out. And I... I sent him that video on Twitter and he laughed, he thought it was funny. It was all, you know, in... in good, uh, spirits. And so-

Joe Rogan 20:22 What is it like?

Sonny Side 20:23 Oh, it's really stinky.

Joe Rogan 20:26 (laughs)

Sonny Side 20:27 I mean, it's... it's tough. It's like-

Joe Rogan 20:28 Like what? Co- compare it to something.

Sonny Side 20:30 (sighs) Ev- yeah, everybody wants to compare stuff to like, "Oh, it's like cheese. It's like a... a stinky cheese." It's kinda like that, but it's also like rotten mushrooms. Really intense, putrid... Uh, it's like you taste it up through your nose. I... I think it... it gave me PTSD.

Joe Rogan 20:48 Really?

Sonny Side 20:48 And that... And I don't wanna make light of PTSD.

Joe Rogan 20:50 It was that rough?

Sonny Side 20:51 But it was... It was pretty bad.

Joe Rogan 20:52 Did you finish the bowl?

Sonny Side 20:53 I... I... I ate the whole thing. Yeah. You know, I made a decision at that moment that really helped me. I literally had anxiety before eating this. So, it's tofu, but they make it into a sandwich and it's... So you've got a Tofu bun-

Joe Rogan 21:07 This is it right here.

Sonny Side 21:07 Yeah, okay. So you've got a To- Tofu bun on top and on bottom. Oh, I was so cute back then-

Joe Rogan 21:12 (laughs)

Sonny Side 21:12 Wearing my little Muscle Man shirt with no muscles. And there's tomato and there's some vegetables inside and a bunch of sauce, and when you eat it, um, yeah, it just has-

Joe Rogan 21:23 It's good to see the different iterations of the bandana too.

Sonny Side 21:26 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 21:26 You sh- you started off with a headband.

Sonny Side 21:28 Yes.

Joe Rogan 21:29 What's the story of the-

Sonny Side 21:29 No, that's also a bandana.

Joe Rogan 21:30 What's the story with the bandana?

Sonny Side 21:32 Um, it's not that good of a story. I sweat a lot.

Joe Rogan 21:35 (laughs)

Sonny Side 21:36 Yeah. That's the shortest version of the story.

Joe Rogan 21:39 (laughs)

Sonny Side 21:41 Uh, I live in Southeast Asia. I... I live in... I... I live in Saigon, so Vietnam is my home. It gets real humid over there, so it'll get like, uh, you know, 90% humidity, 100 degrees.

Joe Rogan 21:50 So you just got accustomed to keeping sweat out of your eyes?

Sonny Side 21:52 E- e- yeah. What do you do, like when you work out? Like, it seems-

Joe Rogan 21:54 I sweat from my eyes.

Sonny Side 21:55 It seems like there's... Well, that's one of the options. Otherwise-

Joe Rogan 21:57 (laughs)

Sonny Side 21:57 ... you can wear a basketball headband, which isn't that good of an option. You could wear a baseball cap, I guess. Uh, but bandana just worked for me. And then I was so intent on it not becoming like, uh, a symbol of the show. I... I didn't wanna be called a douchebag.

Joe Rogan 22:10 But it's your thing. Well, you're not a douchebag, you're a nice guy.

Sonny Side 22:12 Oh, thank you.

Joe Rogan 22:13 Don't listen to those people.

Sonny Side 22:14 And, uh... (laughs)

Joe Rogan 22:15 (laughs) Just 'cause you have a bandana, you've-

Sonny Side 22:16 I just gave in-

Joe Rogan 22:17 ... become a douchebag?

Sonny Side 22:17 Well, yeah, 'cause it's like who's this guy with his... what do you got this fabric around your head for?

Joe Rogan 22:21 (laughs)

Sonny Side 22:21 One... one guy wrote like, uh, "What? You gotta tie that around your head to keep your brains in?" It's like, "All right, fair enough." Um, and eventually, I just gave in. And I... the point I knew I gave in is we went to Japan and it was actually cold, and I'm like, "Come on, I'm still wearing the bandana. I'm not sweating-"

Joe Rogan 22:36 (laughs)

Sonny Side 22:36 "... at all. I... But I gotta wear it now."

Joe Rogan 22:38 It's just your thing?

Sonny Side 22:40 Yeah, so I... It's just become... Now... So listen, when I'm outside of here, when I'm on the streets, I... I don't wear it. I'm not desperate for attention. I wear it for the show.

Joe Rogan 22:48 Oh, interesting. Okay, so-

Sonny Side 22:50 Or if I work out. Actually, when I work out, I do wear it. Um, I wear a different color though.

Joe Rogan 22:54 Okay. So-

Sonny Side 22:55 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 22:55 ... red is only when you're working?

Sonny Side 22:57 I save the red ones for work. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 22:59 (laughs)

Sonny Side 22:59 I got the whole rainbow pack.

Joe Rogan 23:01 So back to this Stinky Tofu sandwich.

Sonny Side 23:03 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 23:04 What kind of diarrhea does that produce?

Sonny Side 23:06 You know, I... (sighs) People always ask about diarrhea.

Joe Rogan 23:08 It must be phenomenal. (laughs)

Sonny Side 23:10 And here's the secret, it's like there's... In the Avengers, there's this, uh, the scene with the Hulk where they're asking like, "Oh, you can control your anger now." And he goes, "That's my secret. I'm always angry."

Joe Rogan 23:22 Right.

Sonny Side 23:23 Right. So I always have diarrhea.

Joe Rogan 23:24 (laughs)

Sonny Side 23:26 I... And I don't remember the last time it was just like a nice, really solid one. So back to the tofu-

Joe Rogan 23:32 Have you ever gone to a doctor?

Sonny Side 23:34 Um-

Joe Rogan 23:34 It might be an issue.

Sonny Side 23:35 It might be, but then what... what... Uh, you know, I got a brother allergic to milk, I got a brother allergic to gluten, uh, what's-

Joe Rogan 23:41 That's pretty normal.

Sonny Side 23:41 What? Is he gonna say stop eating this stuff? I'm not gonna stop. This is my job.

Joe Rogan 23:45 All right.

Sonny Side 23:45 The thing about the tofu, this is what I was gonna say. Um, and this was a pivotable... pivotal moment for me, a realization which is I... I literally had anxiety before walking in there. I was like, "Oh my God, what if I eat this and I throw up? It's gonna look disrespectful." I... I... then I didn't show up Andrew Zimmern. And I looked at it this way, I said, "I need to eat this food. I need to put my mouth around this sandwich and I need to have the perspective and the mindset of a local person."

Joe Rogan 24:09 Mm-hmm.

Sonny Side 24:10 I shouldn't be like someone on Fear Factor, trying to get it down and just, ugh. I... I need to accept it, I need to try to enjoy it, and I want... I need to think about what would local people enjoy about this, and that worked. And that's what I do anytime I'm eating something pretty unusual around the world. It's not always something I'm pumped to eat, but when I was in... with the Datoga tribe in Tanzania and they've just ripped open this cow, they've got blood in one cord and then gastric acid from the small intestine, essentially liquid green shit, and they're tearing... tearing off pieces of raw liver.... I wasn't, this wasn't in the outline. The, it's just happening, and they're like, "Uh, w- we, we gotta roll." They're doing it. "We gotta roll now."

Joe Rogan 24:54 So, they dip-

Sonny Side 24:55 I, I do it.

Joe Rogan 24:55 ... the liver into the gastric acid?

Sonny Side 24:57 Into both, yeah.

Joe Rogan 24:59 That is wild.

Sonny Side 24:59 They, they double d- And let me tell you, they double dip. So, they go blood, gastric acid. They toss it down, and i- it's one of the most strange experiences I'd ever had, but I loved it, because I loved how the people there were so into it.

Joe Rogan 25:13 Mm-hmm.

Sonny Side 25:14 And, and for them, too. You know, people talk about y- you never wanna be overtly disrespectful on camera, but oftentimes, people are aware within their own culture if you're, they're eating something strange.

Joe Rogan 25:25 So here is you doing this.

Sonny Side 25:26 Oh, yeah. That's a different one.

Joe Rogan 25:27 Oh, that's different, okay.

Sonny Side 25:28 So-

Joe Rogan 25:28 But similar.

Sonny Side 25:29 But that's right. So, this is also, I mean, we're watching a video here with the Maasai, also in Tanzania. In, in Tanzania, they have a very interesting way to kill the goat. What you see here is that the blood has pooled inside, and I'm scooping out the blood with my hands. It's still warm, and they s-

Joe Rogan 25:45 It's coagulating, too.

Sonny Side 25:46 They slurp it up. Well, and they, you gotta try to get it all before it coagulates too much.

Joe Rogan 25:51 (laughs)

Sonny Side 25:51 And if you wait, if you hesitate, like, "Oh, I need to get in the right head space," it's gonna be gone. They're gonna eat it all.

Joe Rogan 25:56 Geez. There's a l- a lot of Native American tribes that would take raw liver and, and squirt bile on it.

Sonny Side 26:03 Mm.

Joe Rogan 26:03 Yeah, they would squirt, like, gallbladder juice on it, and...

Sonny Side 26:06 Have you had bile?

Joe Rogan 26:08 No.

Sonny Side 26:08 It's the most bitter thing you'll ever taste. The, all I can compare it to is if, you know, when you were a young man, if you dry heave to the point of just throwing up stomach acid-

Joe Rogan 26:18 Yeah.

Sonny Side 26:18 ... it's that.

Joe Rogan 26:19 So, why would they want that on their food?

Sonny Side 26:22 Remarkably, cultures around the world develop a taste for the extremes in different directions. I mean, there's the four main tastes that people talk about, whether it's like sour, savory, sweet, um, places like stuff that's really salty or, or bitter, in the case of bile. In Northern Thailand, they will take the buffalo bile and drip it over their rice, their sticky rice, over raw buffalo meat. Th- it's just a, but it's a taste that they've acquired over time.

Joe Rogan 26:48 And they look forward to it?

Sonny Side 26:50 Oh, yeah.

Joe Rogan 26:50 Have you ever talked to a doctor, like, is, or a nutritionist? Is there some sort of a reason to do that? Like, is, is there some nutritional benefits to putting that stuff on your food?

Sonny Side 27:02 Bitter in part, uh, sorry, uh, bile in particular?

Joe Rogan 27:04 Yeah.

Sonny Side 27:05 I've not talked to a doc- I don't know that many doctors.

Joe Rogan 27:07 That would be an interesting question to ask, like, why would tribes do that? Like-

Sonny Side 27:11 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 27:12 ... maybe there's some sort of a secondary, not just a taste thing. Maybe there's some sort of a benefit.

Sonny Side 27:17 Yeah, I've seen it a few different places around the world. In, in Vietnam, I experienced it, too. Mostly in Southeast Asia, but, yeah, some folks just really love the intensely bitter flavor.

Joe Rogan 27:29 Hmm.

Sonny Side 27:30 Yeah, it's an interesting question, because I guess if you're looking at the lens of, um, evolution, like, um... Oh, what do you call it? Through evolution, like, uh, looking at soc- societies and cultures through, through, like, evolutionary biology, you might assume, like, well people ate things 'cause they were the right things to eat, but sometimes they ate things because they were available.

Joe Rogan 27:51 Right.

Sonny Side 27:52 And, uh, with that one, I couldn't tell you.

Joe Rogan 27:55 But, I mean, d- do they ever eat the liver without all the other nasty stuff connected to it, just raw liver? 'Cause raw liver itself is difficult.

Sonny Side 28:04 Yes, agreed. Yeah, so it was nice to be distracted by the, the green poop juice on there.

Joe Rogan 28:10 (laughs)

Sonny Side 28:10 Uh, no, oh, so at that time, they ate, uh, you know, so the... To back up a little bit, this Datoga t- tribe was super interesting. We're way out in the middle of nowhere in Tanzania. They had these beautiful huts with a flat roof, grass growing off the top of it, and in this tribe specifically, it was the woman's job to dispatch the animal and to butcher up the animal. And so, the way they kill it is, 'cause this is a whole different topic we could get into, but the way people dispatch animals around the world varies greatly. And here, they would take the cow. They would tip it on its side or on its back, and then they would, um, essentially suffocate it. They would put different logs, like wood, long pieces of, of, of wood or branches into its throat. It would take about 10 minutes, and then-

Joe Rogan 28:54 Jesus.

Sonny Side 28:54 ... uh, uh, eventually, it would pass away. Then, these same women cut it open. They get to butchering. They have their first initial feast. Uh, they get dibs, which you don't see in most cultures, especially in Africa. Usually, s- stuff is gonna go to the guys first. They take what they want, then they mix the rest of the bile, blood, and organs all together, and present it to the men.

Joe Rogan 29:16 Phew. Why do they kill the cows that way?

Sonny Side 29:19 So, I'm really... Uh, this is something you, uh, you may have seen in my videos, that I, I don't really shy away from how the animals are dispatched or, or how they're killed. And I think it reveals something about the culture and about people, and I, I just find it fascinating-

Joe Rogan 29:33 Mm-hmm.

Sonny Side 29:33 ... 'cause it's different every place you go. Um, with the goat that you just showed, with the Maasai, they killed a goat, and they, they also, they suffocated it. So, they put their hands a- on its nose and mouth, and they held it there for, you know, three, four minutes until it stopped moving. And I asked the guy in the interview, "Why are you doing this? Doesn't that seem cruel?" And he said, "It would be far more cruel to slash the animal's throat, to, to cr- uh, uh, to make it suffer from that, and then to have it also suffer from dying afterwards." So, it's kind of, like, two points of suffering, compared to one.

Joe Rogan 30:07 Hmm.

Sonny Side 30:08 I mean, (sighs) it's a tough question. Would you rather have your throat slashed or have someone suffocate you to death?

Joe Rogan 30:14 Well, throat slash would be quicker.

Sonny Side 30:16 It'd be quicker, but it would feel so traumatic and insane, like, oh my-

Joe Rogan 30:19 You don't think it's traumatic to get suffocated to death?

Sonny Side 30:21 Well, I do think that they're both pretty bad.

Joe Rogan 30:23 Yeah, they're both pretty bad.

Sonny Side 30:24 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 30:25 Yeah, so they just have come up with some sort of a moral reason.

Sonny Side 30:29 Uh, yeah, exactly.

Joe Rogan 30:31 Yeah.

Sonny Side 30:31 And it's also about blood collection. So, if they, uh, they want the blood to pool within the body.

Joe Rogan 30:36 Mm-hmm.

Sonny Side 30:36 So, I think it, it's moral, but I, I think it's, uh, practical, too, because then they can cut the body open, the blood's pooled in there-

Joe Rogan 30:42 They don't-

Sonny Side 30:42 ... and they can scoop it out to, you know-

Joe Rogan 30:43 They don't waste any of the blood-

Sonny Side 30:44 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 30:44 ... 'cause they eat the blood. Now, when the women get first dibs, what do they choose?

Sonny Side 30:49 Organs.

Joe Rogan 30:50 Organs?

Sonny Side 30:50 And it's, it's, all over the world-... organs.

Joe Rogan 30:53 Really?

Sonny Side 30:53 Organs are always eaten first. And liver is one of the most valued, uh, any place you go. Also, with the Maasai, the Maasai are really interesting. So, I, I've heard you talk about the Maasai before. The Maasai are really famous for eating milk, blood, and meat, almost exclusively. At least it used to be that way, and now, you know, corn, um, corn flour, a- and, like people mix corn flour with water. It's called ugali, at least in some countries, th- uh, but that's eaten all over Africa. And so, that's more pervasive now, but it used to be just those three things. And the blood, you, you might think, "Oh, so to collect blood, they just, when they kill the animal, they eat the blood." No. The Maasai will take an arrow, put it into a live cow's neck, drain some of the blood, then seal it up with some shit, and then drink that blood. Or mix that blood with milk.

Joe Rogan 31:41 Why would they seal it up with shit?

Sonny Side 31:44 Yeah, so to me, that seemed, uh, not like the cleanest choice.

Joe Rogan 31:46 Right.

Sonny Side 31:47 But maybe the shit's sac- uh, saturated with piss? Which helps to, um, keep it clean? I don't know. I was kind of sh- I was shocked when I saw it. I, I, I, I'm not sure.

Joe Rogan 31:58 They're using animal shit?

Sonny Side 31:59 They're using animal shit.

Joe Rogan 32:00 Yeah.

Sonny Side 32:01 Uh, or the, the cow's own shit. And so, that did stop the bleeding. Um, and so they have this really peculiar diet. And-

Joe Rogan 32:08 So here they're doing it here.

Sonny Side 32:09 Oh, yeah. So I got, this got demonetized, that's for sure. They don't... YouTube doesn't love when you show arrows going into a cow's neck. The worst-

Joe Rogan 32:15 It's a strange looking arrow, too. Like, what's on the head of it?

Sonny Side 32:17 It's got like a, basically like a little razor blade. Um, the worst part about shooting this is that they were fucking bad at it. I was like, "Do you guys still do this all the time? 'Cause why has it taken you 20 times? At least be good at it."

Joe Rogan 32:32 Yeah, they're, so they're just trying to get into that vein.

Sonny Side 32:35 Yeah. And, and they tie it off like a heroin junkie, so-

Joe Rogan 32:38 So there it is.

Sonny Side 32:38 ... the vein gets all big. And the point I wanted to make, getting back to the liver, is that the way they section up meat is really interesting among the Maasai tribe, and many other tribes are like this too. So, what, how they separate the meat is that each quarter, each piece goes to a different group. And so they have ribs, they have front quarters, they have hind quarters. Some might go to pregnant women, some goes to young women. But the liver, the liver always goes to the older men.

Joe Rogan 33:06 Hm. How interesting. It's so interesting that we don't eat liver over here, or very rarely.

Sonny Side 33:12 Or that, that is usual-

Joe Rogan 33:13 It's unusual for people over here to eat liver.

Sonny Side 33:15 That is looked down on too.

Joe Rogan 33:16 Yeah.

Sonny Side 33:16 Like, "Ew, liver." It's like a hackey joke from like '80s or '90s TV. Like, "Oh, liver and onions? Gross." Um, liver's great. And what I find that there's a lo- I find there's a lot of food in the US that people just don't know how to cook well.

Joe Rogan 33:32 Mm-hmm.

Sonny Side 33:32 And it's just not part of our culinary lexicon here.

Joe Rogan 33:37 Right.

Sonny Side 33:37 And this is something I talk about a lot. I, I find it very lame that in the US, this country of extremes, this country where people are so into, whether it's entrepreneurship or extreme sports or fighting, we're so extreme with everything. But then when it comes to food that's a little bit outside of like, salads, wraps, burgers, sandwiches-

Joe Rogan 33:55 Yeah.

Sonny Side 33:55 ... people are like, "Oh, I would never eat that. I would never eat that." And it's said with pride, not like, "I wouldn't eat that 'cause I'm a pussy." They're like, "Oh, I would never eat that." And that's something I don't really understand when it comes to how many Americans look at food from around the world. And so, I mean, part of my show, really the point isn't to be like, "Ew, look at this icky weird food." It's to try to create some understanding and empathy for people around the world, and, and understanding as to why are people eating this way?

Joe Rogan 34:24 Mm-hmm. And so, when these cultures, it seems like they all go to the organs first.

Sonny Side 34:31 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 34:32 Like, and you see that in animals too, you know? And you see that in lions, you see that in wolves. Like wolves, the, the alpha male always gets to eat the liver. And what did they have any sort of explanation as to why they do this? Did you ask them?

Sonny Side 34:49 So, I, I've seen this dozens of times at this point. I've, I've not asked. I, and I have my own-

Joe Rogan 34:55 Excuse me.

Sonny Side 34:56 ... my own assumptions. My assumptions would be, meat is easier to preserve, period.

Joe Rogan 35:01 Mm-hmm.

Sonny Side 35:02 So, um, people have tons of different ways of preserving meat. Um, mostly, you know, drying, turning it into some kind of a jerky. Um, but I don't think it's as easy to take a liver or a heart or something like that-

Joe Rogan 35:16 Right.

Sonny Side 35:16 ... and preserve it. I, I also think it probably has the most flavor, because people love getting in on the, uh, so the stomach too, the intestines, and this is really powerful, potent, gamey parts of the animal. Um, and, uh, again, I think people... I- in many places, they've developed a taste for those really intense gamey flavors.

Joe Rogan 35:36 Yeah.

Sonny Side 35:36 Have you had like beef tripe or beef-

Joe Rogan 35:38 Yeah, sure.

Sonny Side 35:38 ... intestine?

Joe Rogan 35:39 Yeah.

Sonny Side 35:40 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 35:40 Yeah, I like menudo.

Sonny Side 35:41 Right.

Joe Rogan 35:41 The Mexican dish. It's filled with tripe and-

Sonny Side 35:44 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 35:44 ... all kinds of stuff. And I've, I eat a lot of liver. I eat liver pretty often.

Sonny Side 35:48 Yeah. And, and so menudo can have a lot of gamey flavor to it.

Joe Rogan 35:53 Yeah, for sure. Yeah, sometimes it smells like a barn.

Sonny Side 35:56 Y- yes, exactly.

Joe Rogan 35:57 That's how I know it's good.

Sonny Side 35:58 I ate, I ate zebra, I ate zebra liver and kidney when I was in South A- uh, South Africa recently.

Joe Rogan 36:03 Yeah, I saw that video where you shot a zebra.

Sonny Side 36:05 Yeah, I shot a zebra.

Joe Rogan 36:07 That was heavy.

Sonny Side 36:08 That, I, well, I wanted to see if I could pull it off. But the liver, the liver, it tasted like a horse barn.

Joe Rogan 36:16 (laughs)

Sonny Side 36:16 And it, so I don't know if that's like manure or like sometimes it can taste, uh, something can taste like the animal's fur, like if you scratch the animal-

Joe Rogan 36:22 Mm-hmm.

Sonny Side 36:22 ... and smelled it. Sometimes it'll have that kind of a flavor to it.

Joe Rogan 36:25 Yeah.

Sonny Side 36:26 Um, yeah. So you watched that video. What'd you think?

Joe Rogan 36:28 Y- well, um, I've always wanted to know what zebra tastes like too, because I know people that have hunted zebra and eaten them, and they said it's very good. And it makes sense. I've had horse before in Montreal.

Sonny Side 36:38 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 36:39 There's a great restaurant called Joe Beef in Montreal, it's one of my favorite restaurants. And, uh, the first time I went there, they served us, uh, horse meat.

Sonny Side 36:47 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 36:47 They served us, uh, like it was a horse tenderloin. And I was a little weirded out. I was like, "Whoa." But in Canada, horse is normal to eat, in a lot of parts of Europe, horse is normal. It's a normal food to eat.

Sonny Side 36:59 Yeah.... yeah, I think, I think they're trying to make it illegal here if it's not illegal already. But, I mean, I'm sure you could get it in Texas. You c- it seems like you can get every type of exotic meat here in Texas.

Joe Rogan 37:10 Definitely can get zebra.

Sonny Side 37:12 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 37:12 Yeah.

Sonny Side 37:12 Really?

Joe Rogan 37:13 Yeah, you can get zebra here. You can hunt a zebra here. A friend of mine asked me to shoot a zebra on his l- uh, property, 'cause he has an evil zebra that's killing the younger zebras.

Sonny Side 37:20 See? Th- they must be culled, some of them.

Joe Rogan 37:22 Yeah. That's the-

Sonny Side 37:23 Some of them.

Joe Rogan 37:23 ... thing when you talk about animal preservation and wildlife management. One of the things th- that people who are not in the know must take into consideration is that when you have older males that are no longer viable, so they're not breeding, but they're still dominant, and so they attack the younger males to keep the younger males from coming up and challenging them eventually, and they wind up killing all these younger males. And the only way to preserve the younger male population to keep them healthy is to kill this very aggressive older male.

Sonny Side 37:54 Right.

Joe Rogan 37:54 They actually have to do that with rhinos sometimes, even though rhinos-

Sonny Side 37:58 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 37:58 ... are endangered. Like, that was the story of... I don't know if you remember that story, but there was a big deal, it was on CNN many years ago, uh, where there was an endangered rhino and there was an auction to shoot this rhino because they had to kill it, because this one large rhino who was no longer viable was killing younger rhinos, and he had already killed at least two. And they were very concerned that, you know, they have a small population of them already, and so the only way to solve this was to either A, move this animal somewhere else, or shoot it.

Sonny Side 38:32 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 38:32 And so, uh, they decided to auction it off w- and I think... What's the gentleman's name?

38:39 Cory Knowlton.

38:39 Cory Knowlton. Cory Knowlton, who had been on the podcast before, I actually had him on to talk to him about this.

Sonny Side 38:43 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 38:44 He, uh, I think he wound up paying a quarter million dollars to go over there and seeing and following him, followed him around, but what was really interesting was their perspective was educated. They learned along the way. They're like, "Okay, we had this idea that people are going over there and they're just shooting a rhino 'cause they're an asshole and they wanna take a poster with it."

Sonny Side 39:05 Right.

Joe Rogan 39:05 "Or a photo with it, rather, and put the head on their wall," but there's a lot more to it and then that money is, the $250,000 is the money that goes to wildlife conservation over there.

Sonny Side 39:16 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 39:16 It goes to protect against poaching, it goes to protect habitat and keep the maintain, you know, the, the structures and the fences and all sorts of different things they use to keep these animals healthy. But they have higher, uh, higher numbers of all these animals that were, at one point in time, endangered. They're b- much higher than they've ever been before, specifically because they're valuable.

Sonny Side 39:39 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 39:40 It's, it, it, it can be very conflicting to a lot of people, 'cause you think of wildlife conservation as, "Well, what we need to do is protect their habitat, give them more food, keep people away from them." But that's not really profitable. And the way to make sure that their numbers are high is actually to make them valuable, and the best way-

Sonny Side 39:59 (clears throat)

Joe Rogan 39:59 ... to make them valuable is people pay a lot of money to go over there and hunt them, which sounds so counterintuitive.

Sonny Side 40:06 Right. Yes. So, uh, we had the opportunity to do a different story about three years ago in Africa, and I just didn't think I was ready for it th- I, I wasn't ready for it then. And at this point, I wanted to take on the challenge. I wanted to see, can I do a video that's g- people are, some people are gonna hate? And can I try to educate people along the way and educate myself along the way? 'Cause there's a lot about game reserve hunting that I didn't know. And so specifically what we did in that video is, is going to a game reserve. So, somebody privately owns all this property in South Africa. It was maybe five miles by three miles. And they have a certain... Uh, so I'm so naive in the beginning, uh, and I'm like, "Oh, so, like, if you don't shoot the zebra, then will a lion get it?" And it's like, "Uh, there's no fucking lions in the fence, dummy."

Joe Rogan 40:53 (laughs)

Sonny Side 40:53 It's like, they don't, they don't-

Joe Rogan 40:54 How big is this preserve?

Sonny Side 40:56 It's three by five miles.

Joe Rogan 40:57 What is that in acres? Do you know?

Sonny Side 40:59 Oh, no. I'm so bad at acres.

Joe Rogan 41:01 Okay.

Sonny Side 41:01 I've been abroad too long and I've never bought land here, so I'm not sure.

Joe Rogan 41:04 Got it.

Sonny Side 41:05 Um, so they ha- have a certain number of animals on their property. You tell them ahead of time what you want to shoot. I mean, they literally have, it's like a menu. They're like, "Here's the animal list."

Joe Rogan 41:16 Hmm.

Sonny Side 41:16 "And here's the price for each animal." They even have, uh, baboons. They have vervet monkeys, which are these tiny little, I don't know, seven-pound-

Joe Rogan 41:24 People hunt, hunt these?

Sonny Side 41:25 ... monkeys. I don't know that people set out to do it, but if some cynical bastard on his way to get, uh, some other creature, if he saw the vervet monkey, he could be like, "How much is that again? Let me check the menu. Oh, 40 bucks?" It's 40 bucks, by the way.

Joe Rogan 41:39 $40 to shoot a monkey?

Sonny Side 41:41 To shoot, to shoot a monkey.

Joe Rogan 41:42 That's weird.

Sonny Side 41:43 And so they have this menu and, to me, uh, pff, I looked over the, uh, the animals. I didn't wanna shoot something that just... Uh, this is gonna sound bad. It's tough 'cause I am still a YouTuber. Um, I was, I've also, uh, I didn't, so I didn't want to shoot an animal that was just brown that blended in with everything. I also went to safari recently in Tanzania and I saw zebras and they looked juicy. There, have you seen a zebra's, like, hindquarter?

Joe Rogan 42:09 I did on your show.

Sonny Side 42:10 Oh, see?

Joe Rogan 42:10 When you guys smoked it.

Sonny Side 42:12 Juicy.

Joe Rogan 42:12 Yeah.

Sonny Side 42:13 And I thought, "Okay, this will be interesting." Um, uh, on the menu, that's a thousand bucks, by the way. The-

Joe Rogan 42:19 A zebra's $1,000 to shoot?

Sonny Side 42:21 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 42:22 Damn.

Sonny Side 42:22 The most expensive one is the buffalo, the Cape buffalo, $10,000.

Joe Rogan 42:26 Hmm.

Sonny Side 42:27 And what surprised me is after you shoot it, you don't get the meat. You can mount it if you want. You can get the, the mount or the, a rug or, or whatever would be made from the animal, but you don't get to keep the meat.

Joe Rogan 42:38 What do they do with the meat?

Sonny Side 42:39 They, it's their property still. So-

Joe Rogan 42:41 What?

Sonny Side 42:42 They, yeah, I know. I was, like, how does that, I paid $10,000.

Joe Rogan 42:44 Well, you can't bring, I don't believe you can bring meat from Africa back to the United States.

Sonny Side 42:50 No, you can't anymore, and especially ever since the Cecil the lion debacle years ago.

Joe Rogan 42:55 Yeah.

Sonny Side 42:56 Um, so somebody, I think it was a dentist in Minnesota actually-

Joe Rogan 42:59 Mm-hmm.

Sonny Side 42:59 ... where I'm from, he went there, he shot a lion.

Joe Rogan 43:01 Yeah.

Sonny Side 43:01 He posted the picture, it got on the wrong websites. And then this guy, I think, had to shut down his dental practice.

Joe Rogan 43:06 Mm-hmm.

Sonny Side 43:07 ... eh, they changed laws from that point. And so, they wouldn't let you bring any lion mounts, and perhaps maybe not certain types of meat, or maybe not any meat at all. And so, it's, what's interesting is I talked to the game reserve guys when I got there, and I thought some questions would be layup questions or even dumb questions. And I said, "What kind of animals are not okay to hunt?" And they, these two brothers look at each other like, "Oh, shit."

Joe Rogan 43:30 People?

Sonny Side 43:31 This is a tough one. (laughs) Yeah, and, uh, basically people. Uh, 'cause I thought y-, I thought for sure they would say, "N- lions are not okay." But they said, um, there's every type of hunting basically you can imagine in South Africa.

Joe Rogan 43:45 Well, there was an issue after the Cecil the lion thing where they no longer had lion hunters going over there because they didn't want to get attacked, and even people that wanted to hunt lions wouldn't go over there. And so they had to wind ... They culled some large number-

Sonny Side 43:58 Right.

Joe Rogan 43:58 ... of lions because if you don't do that-

Sonny Side 44:01 Supply.

Joe Rogan 44:01 ... then it decimates the antelope and the, the, all the, the different, the different game species that the lions eat and kill.

Sonny Side 44:09 Well, okay, so that's tough because I know that they had too much supply, and-

Joe Rogan 44:13 Yeah.

Sonny Side 44:13 ... demand was no longer there, and so that was a problem. I don't know for sure that those lions are mixed in with other live valuable creatures. I think they could be-

Joe Rogan 44:23 I think they do it differently in different game parks.

Sonny Side 44:25 For sure.

Joe Rogan 44:26 Yeah.

Sonny Side 44:26 And some of 'em would've been private, and maybe when it's time to hunt, they relocate the lion. I believe that does happen.

Joe Rogan 44:32 Mm-hmm.

Sonny Side 44:33 So, what I found was it's, there's a lot of gray area. Uh, I brought my friend Greg out there. He's a avid hunter i- in Minnesota. He's been to Montana to hunt, uh ... What do you hunt in Montana? I wanna know.

Joe Rogan 44:45 Elk, deer, mule deer.

Sonny Side 44:46 Mule deer. And it's like, so is this hunting? Is it not hunting? He's like, "Eh, it's not really hunting," to him.

Joe Rogan 44:54 Right.

Sonny Side 44:54 And so there's a lot of gray area too because they, the zebra populations, even the zebra I hunted, they, they said that was nearly extinct years ago. But because of this, you know, this purple, uh, personal interest people have in the animals being around, they'll help tr- try to breed them and-

Joe Rogan 45:10 Yeah.

Sonny Side 45:10 ... make sure they're healthy, make sure they have enough water so that people can come and shoot them.

Joe Rogan 45:15 Yeah, exactly what we were talking about before. Um, this is, uh, like again-

Sonny Side 45:18 (coughs)

Joe Rogan 45:18 ... it's a very, very controversial topic, you know?

Sonny Side 45:22 Yeah. And I mean, and that's why I wanted to, to go for it. And I, I think, I think we did a good job of presenting their case and their point of view and, and just logistically how it works. And, um, I, I think it's a fascinating topic, and I probably wouldn't do it again.

Joe Rogan 45:38 Well, I mean, it's a food source for those people. I mean, zebra is something that's traditionally eaten over there, and it's, uh, according to you and according to people that I know that have eaten it, it's very delicious.

Sonny Side 45:50 Oh, the zebra was fantastic, except for the, the organs. The organs were weird 'cause yes, it was like a horse barn, but I still kinda liked it. It's-

Joe Rogan 45:58 Have you ever seen Louis Theroux's, uh, piece on African hunting?

Sonny Side 46:03 No.

Joe Rogan 46:03 Very interesting. You know Louis Theroux, the, um, documentarian from, uh, England?

Sonny Side 46:09 Uh, maybe if I saw his work-

Joe Rogan 46:10 Really interesting guy. He, he's a, he was a great podcast guest too. But he, uh, did this whole thing where he stayed over there for several weeks and really annoyed them. And, uh, you know, like really just constant questions, constant this, constant that. And this guy who was running this game park basically laid it out to him, like, "The only way these animals survive is if they're worth something."

Sonny Side 46:33 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 46:33 And even then, you have to spend so much money to keep them from getting poached 'cause while they're over there, they're constantly finding animals that were, had been snared, and then the meat had gone to waste 'cause they didn't get to the animal before, you know, it died early, and then-

Sonny Side 46:46 Right.

Joe Rogan 46:46 ... was rotten. And it's, uh, it's very conflicting 'cause we like to think of Africa as this just wild, amazing Narnia place-

Sonny Side 46:55 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 46:55 ... where all these animals are running free, and you can go there in a Jeep, and they won't kill you.

Sonny Side 47:00 Right. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 47:00 (laughs) You know, but, but the reality is a lot of those animals are there because they're valuable to people to go over and hunt.

Sonny Side 47:07 Yeah, or to look at.

Joe Rogan 47:08 Yes, or to look, but much more to hunt.

Sonny Side 47:10 Like the Serengeti. Hmm.

Joe Rogan 47:10 It's much more valuable. That's why a Cape buffalo is $10,000 to hunt. How much does it cost to take a picture of one?

Sonny Side 47:16 Right.

Joe Rogan 47:17 Yeah.

Sonny Side 47:17 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 47:18 And so do they eat the Cape buffalo? So, if someone j-... 'cause one of the things about buffalos, um, is, uh, my good friend Adam Greentree, he hunts them up in Australia. Uh, they're, they're invasive. It's a Asian water buffalo.

Sonny Side 47:32 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 47:32 Enormous, like, very scary buffalo. And, uh, they're so tough you could barely eat them.

Sonny Side 47:40 Really?

Joe Rogan 47:40 My friend Cam went over there to hunt, and he said he was chewing on one piece of meat for 30 minutes.

Sonny Side 47:45 Well, I think it's all about preparation then. Um-

Joe Rogan 47:47 Oh, sure, you have to re-... but they're in the h-, they're in the woods, you know. They're out there in the field, so-

Sonny Side 47:52 Okay.

Joe Rogan 47:52 ... there's not like a smoker and-

Sonny Side 47:54 No pressure cookers.

Joe Rogan 47:55 ... there's no brining. Yeah, there's no pressure cookers.

Sonny Side 47:56 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 47:56 There's no electricity.

Sonny Side 47:58 Um, I, I didn't find it to be exceptionally tough. I, I find it to be just very similar to beef, typical beef. And, in fact-

Joe Rogan 48:05 How-

Sonny Side 48:05 ... even buffalo meat is also called beef.

Joe Rogan 48:07 What do they, how do they pre- how do they prepare it?

Sonny Side 48:09 Well, so what, (clears throat) what's interesting is we did the zebra on the game reserve, and so it's a couple of, uh, Afrikaner dudes cooking that stuff up.

Joe Rogan 48:17 Mm-hmm.

Sonny Side 48:17 And then with the buffalo, the idea was to take the meat from there and donate it all to a nearby village. And so this was cooked up by, uh, Khoisan people. Khoisan are these legendary trackers from s- the southern part of Africa. And these, these are the folks that, I don't know if you've ever heard of these stories, but they would just track down animals till the animals were exhausted-

Joe Rogan 48:37 Yes.

Sonny Side 48:37 ... and fell over.

Joe Rogan 48:38 Yeah.

Sonny Side 48:39 And so, of course they're not still-

Joe Rogan 48:40 Persistence hunting, they call it.

Sonny Side 48:41 Yeah. Uh, they're not doing that anymore, but, um, we're still ... we're with the Khoisan, and they're cooking up, uh, in the way that they prefer. So, they did a, a stew which was kind of braised for hours and hours and hours, and that was soft and delicious. That was really good. And then they grilled it, and they grill, they grill it till it's like black. And this is something you'll find pretty much in all of Africa. No one's eating medium rare steaks in, in most of Africa.

Joe Rogan 49:05 Do you think they do that because they're worried about contaminants or-

Sonny Side 49:08 Yes.

Joe Rogan 49:08 ... parasites?

Sonny Side 49:09 Yeah, I, I think the idea is like, don't get sick, cook everything all the way through all the time.

Joe Rogan 49:14 Mm-hmm.... did you try to cook one medium-rare?

Sonny Side 49:17 No. (laughs) No, but the, like I said, the zebra, we e- we experienced like that, but-

Joe Rogan 49:21 Yeah.

Sonny Side 49:21 ... the... But even that, like, really well-done buffalo wasn't that tough, not like I was chewing on it for 10 minutes.

Joe Rogan 49:29 And it... But it's similar like a well-done steak?

Sonny Side 49:31 Yes.

Joe Rogan 49:32 So, when they have a buffalo, I mean, that, that must be able to feed an enormous amo- amount of people. It's a huge animal.

Sonny Side 49:40 Yeah. So, I mean, a lot of it we just put into a freezer-

Joe Rogan 49:42 Hmm.

Sonny Side 49:43 ... for them to, to use later, for people in the... I mean, there's one freezer in the community. It was a vil- a village of about 60 people, so they'll be eating that for a while.

Joe Rogan 49:51 Hmm. And so when you hunted the zebra, this is, uh, the, the, this is... What kind of zebra is this again?

Sonny Side 49:59 It's called a-

Joe Rogan 50:00 Mountain zebra?

Sonny Side 50:01 Mountain zebra.

Joe Rogan 50:01 And the mountain zebra was at one point in time protected?

Sonny Side 50:05 That's... My understanding that, i- is that it was at least, uh, you know, nearing being a vulnerable species. The numbers were quite low, uh, and, um, I, I believe they weren't allowed to hunt it for some period of time, until the numbers came back up.

Joe Rogan 50:17 And when you hunted them, did they have a specific zebra they wanted you to target?

Sonny Side 50:21 No. Um, so they ha- they have a group, um, and... So, for me it was exciting, and maybe it's like... Um, maybe this sounds too cold, but if... I don't know, it's like paintball, but on another level.

Joe Rogan 50:33 Mm-hmm.

Sonny Side 50:33 Because you kinda know you're gonna get an animal, a- and you go through a couple of fences, you get into the reserve, and you, uh, you have a tracker. A- and so you... I'm guided the whole time, which is what I would prefer. I, I hunt maybe once a year, and I do it for the show. And so, eventually they triangulate... You know, they send out the Khoisan guy to, to rustle up some zebras, and, uh, maybe three came by and they were basically like, uh, "Whichever one you can get is fine." They all looked about the same size, so it, it didn't seem like they were pushing me to shoot a specific one. It wasn't like they had an outlier that was, um, creating trouble for them.

Joe Rogan 51:09 And what does the terrain look like? Are the zebra aware that you're there? Are you, are you hidden?

Sonny Side 51:15 So-

Joe Rogan 51:15 D- do you have to follow, like, general principles of hunting, like stay downwind of them?

Sonny Side 51:19 Yes. Yeah, yeah. And we had to, uh... They ran away from us several times, and even when I shot it, maybe the first... Oh, uh, you said you watched that one, right?

Joe Rogan 51:28 Yeah.

Sonny Side 51:28 Yeah. I mean, I hit it... I got a lotta shit for that. I hit it in the leg, uh, and it... But I was about 250 yards away. It's rocky. The terrain is rocky. There's a lotta shrubs, and so there are things to hide behind. But yes, if they catch your scent, then that's gonna be an issue and they'll, they'll bolt.

Joe Rogan 51:42 Yeah, so you had to do a followup shot?

Sonny Side 51:44 Yes. And luckily I was able to do that quickly, but, um, again, uh, I, I... It's like buck fever. It's-

Joe Rogan 51:50 Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Sonny Side 51:50 I'm doing my best. It's like I don't feel nervous, but my body doesn't care. My heart's beating like crazy. And, you know, if you're off by one millimeter, by one hair, it's like-

Joe Rogan 51:59 Yeah.

Sonny Side 52:00 That second shot, they could've told me, "Oh, you missed by, like, 15 feet," and I would've believed them. Uh, it w-... But it was, like, dead nuts on.

Joe Rogan 52:06 Yeah.

Sonny Side 52:07 And, uh, so I'm happy about that, 'cause you... Uh, ha-... You can't predict how a hunt is gonna go, and you just don't want the animal to suffer too much.

Joe Rogan 52:15 Was that the first time you had killed a large animal like that?

Sonny Side 52:18 Yes.

Joe Rogan 52:19 It's a weird feeling, right?

Sonny Side 52:20 Yeah. Yeah, and I'd... You know, I did hog hunting in Alabama once, and I g-... Where I, I scoped myself and I had, uh, I had to get f-

Joe Rogan 52:28 Hmm. Yeah.

Sonny Side 52:28 I had to get four stitches. It's funny, uh, I, I, I, I scoped myself. I had to get-

Joe Rogan 52:32 Let me just explain what scope yourself is. When you're looking too close to the scope, as the rifle goes off it kicks-

Sonny Side 52:38 Right.

Joe Rogan 52:38 ... and the scope comes back and slams you in the forehead.

Sonny Side 52:41 Yeah. So ideally, you should have your eye an-... I don't know, maybe three inches back from the scope-

Joe Rogan 52:45 Yeah.

Sonny Side 52:45 ... to have the full view, uh, and I didn't realize that at the, uh, that at the time. I was like, "I'm gonna get right up on this-"

Joe Rogan 52:51 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Sonny Side 52:51 "... fucking scope." And then it kicked. I... What's funny is I got two practice shots that day, and then I had to go to the hospital, and then my head was swollen and I would, had to wake up the next day at 5:00 AM, and yeah.

Joe Rogan 53:03 Oh, man.

Sonny Side 53:04 I started bleeding immediately.

Joe Rogan 53:04 You ko- you scoped yourself hard. Oh, boy.

Sonny Side 53:06 And I, I point to my forehead and I go, "Bro, what the fuck?" (laughs)

Joe Rogan 53:12 Yeah, you can see it happen here.

Sonny Side 53:13 And so the next morning, this is a lotta pressure. I'm like, "I-"

Joe Rogan 53:17 Mm-hmm.

Sonny Side 53:17 "... I have a permanent scar on my head now. I have to get a fricking hog. I can't leave this place without shooting an animal." And so, uh, luckily I got, I got two the next day, but, um, that also was a... This type of exhilaration, and, and it's a weird feeling. It was, uh, even a stranger feeling with the zebra because it's a mix of accomplishment and, and duty, I would say. Because when I had just injured the animal, I was like, "It's my duty, it's my obligation to put it down as quickly and efficiently as possible."

Joe Rogan 53:47 Right.

Sonny Side 53:47 But I can't just go crazy and j- just start shooting like, uh, like, crazy.

Joe Rogan 53:51 Yeah. B-... Is it a different feeling... I mean, wh- what does it feel like to, to eat an animal that you just shot? It is a different feeling than just eating meat, like you have this connection to that meat now.

Sonny Side 54:02 Oh. Yeah, so I know you're more versed in this than me, a- and I guess... I, I do feel like, you know, tracking down an elk or going hunting for days would be, um... You'd, you'd feel much more-

Joe Rogan 54:15 Accomplished.

Sonny Side 54:16 ... accomplished.

Joe Rogan 54:17 So this was more like shopping-

Sonny Side 54:19 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 54:19 ... with a rifle.

Sonny Side 54:20 It's something in between.

Joe Rogan 54:21 Yeah.

Sonny Side 54:21 Shopping (laughs) with a rifle.

Joe Rogan 54:22 Yeah, yeah.

Sonny Side 54:22 It's something in between. It still... Um, it, it felt like a sense of accomplishment for sure, and the meat was incredible. I guess I was most taken aback by eating this type of meat that I'll, I'll never probably eat again in my life, and just having the privilege of trying that.

Joe Rogan 54:36 And is that, like, a common cuisine amongst the people that work in that ranch that you went to?

Sonny Side 54:41 No, not at all.

Joe Rogan 54:42 No?

Sonny Side 54:43 So, you know what's interesting in South Africa is the, um... Oh, no, what is the animal? The, the animal with the spiral, um-

Joe Rogan 54:52 Oryx?

Sonny Side 54:53 ... horns. It's not that one.

Joe Rogan 54:55 Oh, there's a ton of 'em.

Sonny Side 54:56 I know.

Joe Rogan 54:57 Yeah.

Sonny Side 54:59 It's not coming to me now. (clears throat) There is su- some game meat that's widely available, even in grocery stores in South Africa. Uh-

Joe Rogan 55:09 Hoo- which one?

Sonny Side 55:09 Kudu.

Joe Rogan 55:10 Kudu.

Sonny Side 55:10 Nice.

Joe Rogan 55:10 Yeah, kudu's supposed to be very good.

Sonny Side 55:12 Thanks, Jamie.

Joe Rogan 55:13 And eland.

Sonny Side 55:14 Yeah. It, it was incredible. But you'll find kudu in the grocery store, so it's really-

Joe Rogan 55:18 Hmm.

Sonny Side 55:18 ... um, all over the place. And so people might be eating kudu, um, but not the more...... um, like rare game meats, um, especially people in the villages and so on.

Joe Rogan 55:30 So, these people that you hunted with, this is the first time they had eaten zebra as well?

Sonny Side 55:35 Oh, that's a good question. Um, you know, I didn't ask 'em. Uh, uh, I'm, I'm assuming not, because they have zebras there and people hunt the zebras. And, you know, if you're gonna have a game reserve, you need to be good at cooking.

Joe Rogan 55:48 Mm-hmm.

Sonny Side 55:49 A- and at hunting.

Joe Rogan 55:50 Yeah.

Sonny Side 55:50 It can't just be one or the other.

Joe Rogan 55:52 The people that I know that have gone over to Africa-

Sonny Side 55:53 (coughs)

Joe Rogan 55:54 ... say that the meat stays there, but you eat it the entire time you're there.

Sonny Side 55:58 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 55:58 So, the meat does go to these villages, but also you get to eat as much meat as you can while you're there. I just think, l- legally, you're not allowed to leave Africa with meat.

Sonny Side 56:09 That sounds correct. By the way, I brought you meat.

Joe Rogan 56:11 Oh. What'd you bring?

Sonny Side 56:12 Speaking of bu- ... You might wanna throw this away immediately. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 56:16 Really?

Sonny Side 56:16 Well, hold on. Okay, this still might be good. I, I was gonna put it in a Ziploc bag from Target yesterday.

Joe Rogan 56:21 Am I ... Is there phantom smells or am I smelling something?

Sonny Side 56:23 You might be smelling something. Um, this is yak meat.

Joe Rogan 56:27 Yo.

Sonny Side 56:28 From Nepal. This has been dried. If you wanna chuck that in the trash right after I leave, that's fine.

Joe Rogan 56:33 Dried yak meat from Nepal.

Sonny Side 56:35 Yeah. So, we took out a whole yak when we were in the mountains, in the Himalayan mountains. Um, this was just a few weeks ago. And so, one of the ways they preserve the meat ... It's interesting, 'cause they dry it, but how they dry it is they, they have a big, um, hearth or fireplace-

Joe Rogan 56:50 Mm-hmm.

Sonny Side 56:50 ... in, in their home. And then above that, they'll hang the, the raw meat. And they don't do anything special. The meat just gets, uh, dried out over time because of the fireplace. And so-

Joe Rogan 57:00 Oh.

Sonny Side 57:01 ... I have that one, and then I have one more that you're probably gonna wanna throw away, 'cause I looked at it this morning and-

Joe Rogan 57:06 (sighs) (laughs)

Sonny Side 57:06 ... it's a little bit moldy.

Joe Rogan 57:08 Is it?

Sonny Side 57:09 This ... Uh, you wanna take a guess?

Joe Rogan 57:12 Okay.

Sonny Side 57:12 And you can give it a sniff too. That might ... This is gonna really confound you. I think you're gonna be confused by this.

Joe Rogan 57:17 Yeah, it seems like a-

Sonny Side 57:18 It's a little bit off, but it's not gonna hurt to smell it. But the smell is gonna help you figure out what that is.

Joe Rogan 57:27 I don't know.

Sonny Side 57:28 Does it smell more like land or sea?

Joe Rogan 57:32 Smells more like land.

Sonny Side 57:33 Really? Okay, so ... Well-

Joe Rogan 57:35 I think.

Sonny Side 57:36 That is, uh, whale meat.

Joe Rogan 57:38 Oh, Jesus, dude.

Sonny Side 57:39 Yeah, I'm not sure if that's-

Joe Rogan 57:40 Really?

Sonny Side 57:41 ... allowed in the US. (laughs) Well, so let-

Joe Rogan 57:43 Whale meat.

Sonny Side 57:43 Let me explain. I went to the Faroe Islands about two months ago. They dry the whale meat, but again, uh, it's been in my suitcase for a while. You can probably chuck that. Um, but whale meat is fascinating. Um, uh, I ... They also eat dolphin there too, which I wasn't aware that you could do, legally, anywhere.

Joe Rogan 58:02 Is there a little knife over there? Uh-huh. Where's that little knife? It's still in here. Yeah, but where's the little knife that Santino had yesterday? Uh, I pushed it back over towards you. Oh. Probably ... There it is. Thank you. Oh, there you go. So, uh, so you were saying that they dry this out. And what kind of whale?

Sonny Side 58:21 It's called a pilot whale. So, this is a very controversial food in, on the Faroe Islands. And in fact, if you go there ... You know, I was going there to film, obviously. If you ... Yeah. All right, he's slicing it up now.

Joe Rogan 58:35 And, and did you just eat it, right f- like this?

Sonny Side 58:37 Yeah. It might, it might leave a little taste in your mouth.

Joe Rogan 58:40 I'm gonna put that aside for now.

Sonny Side 58:41 Yeah, okay. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 58:42 I'm gonna think about it.

Sonny Side 58:43 You know, I would say to, like, p- uh, get the bark off, get the outer layer off, and maybe take a piece from the inside, or not at all.

Joe Rogan 58:50 Okay.

Sonny Side 58:50 So, it's very controversial food because people like whales.

Joe Rogan 58:53 Yeah.

Sonny Side 58:54 Whales are smart. They're cute. Um, this is something that they've been doing in the Faroe Islands for hundreds of years. In fact, it's one of the ... It's one of the oldest records of any country. They, they keep these ... They've kept these insane records going back hundreds of years of these, um ... They call it ... It's called a grindstibup, something like that. It's, uh, it's like they, they get the whales and they bring them to shore. Have you heard about this?

Joe Rogan 59:17 No.

Sonny Side 59:18 Fantastic. So, I was just there. I was hoping to see one in action. I was told if you see one and you approach them and you film, they will destroy your camera, 'cause they've had so many issues with protestors there.

Joe Rogan 59:28 Hmm.

Sonny Side 59:29 Uh, among them Sea Shepherd, who is trying to put an end to the whaling.

Joe Rogan 59:32 Yeah.

Sonny Side 59:33 So, the whaling they do there is far different from the whaling that you're gonna see in a place like Japan. Japan, I think they're hunting blue whales. They're, they're hunting whales that are actually vulnerable species, and they're doing it under the guise of research, and they put, like, "research" on their boat, as separate, like-

Joe Rogan 59:48 Right, but then they're selling the animal.

Sonny Side 59:49 Yeah, and then they sell it. Oh, my gosh, and some people there ... I mean, somebody took me on a market tour in Japan, and they were like, "Well, the meat is left over. They don't wanna waste it after their research, so they sell it here." And I'm like, "You buy that? You, you believe that?" And she did. So, what they're doing is different in the Faroe Islands because they're not going out to sea. Uh, and so, they're never f- ... Their method of getting the whales is never gonna lead to their extinction. The whales populate the Atlantic, and the Faroe Islands is just a tiny, small collection of 18 islands in the middle of the Atlantic between, like, Scotland and Iceland, and they've got 50,000 people. So, when a pod of whales comes by and somebody spots them, they kinda sound the alarm. They ... First of all, they'll get some boats together and try to guide them to one of the bays. At this point, this is what I love, this idea that everybody is so, uh, into, um, the grind, this, this event that happens, that you could be in your corporate job in a, uh, in a, in a room talking about, uh, quarter four sales, doing your, your report, pitching to your team, and then you could get a phone call, "Hey, the whales are here. Let's go." Everybody, when the, when the alarm goes off, p- if you gotta leave church, if you gotta leave work, you do it. It's understood. Yeah, go get the whales.

Joe Rogan 1:01:06 Really?

Sonny Side 1:01:07 Yes.

Joe Rogan 1:01:07 Even today?

Sonny Side 1:01:08 Even today.

Joe Rogan 1:01:08 Corporate jobs?

Sonny Side 1:01:10 It's ... I, I met ... I went to the most normal family's home ever and I did a fridge tour, like on Men's Health on YouTube, and it was like all, like, "Here's a whale that we got from l- earlier this year. We got about 300 pounds." It was so interesting. And this is like the most n- normal corporate white-collar guy ever. And so they all get the call. They go down there, because the amount of meat you get depends on how much you help out. They have a very detailed system for how to allocate the meat.... the process of actually getting the whales, though, they, they steer the whales towards the shore. Then, once they get close to the bay, they start clanging on the boats and making noise and trying to throw off their sonar. Eventually, the whales get close enough to the shore where people can run out from the beach and hook the whales in their blowhole and start pulling them up.

Joe Rogan 1:01:58 What?

Sonny Side 1:01:59 This is our video that's gonna be coming out.

Joe Rogan 1:02:00 Oh, my God. This is horrific.

Sonny Side 1:02:04 Well, yeah. That's-

Joe Rogan 1:02:04 Holy shit.

Sonny Side 1:02:05 That's why it's controversial.

Joe Rogan 1:02:07 So, all of these people... And, uh, these people were wearing, like, modern clothes and, I mean, th- these do not look like tribal people. They look like anybody that could be in fucking New Hampshire.

Sonny Side 1:02:20 Yeah. Exactly.

Joe Rogan 1:02:21 And they're just slaughtering these whales.

Sonny Side 1:02:23 So-

Joe Rogan 1:02:23 And they're slicing their necks. Oh, my God. This is horrible.

Sonny Side 1:02:27 So, what makes it horrible to you?

Joe Rogan 1:02:29 That they're whales. I mean, just whales, to me, are li- it's almost like killing a Golden Retriever.

Sonny Side 1:02:35 Hmm. And I'm not-

Joe Rogan 1:02:37 This is rough. Yeah.

Sonny Side 1:02:38 I'm not saying you're wrong or right.

Joe Rogan 1:02:39 Yeah.

Sonny Side 1:02:39 But I think it's interesting to explore where that-

Joe Rogan 1:02:41 Well, I think if you lived there-

Sonny Side 1:02:41 ... the ethics exist for each person.

Joe Rogan 1:02:43 Yeah, s-

Sonny Side 1:02:43 So, for you, like, what is the line for okay to eat, not okay to eat?

Joe Rogan 1:02:46 Yeah.

Sonny Side 1:02:46 'Cause, like, I wouldn't... I mean, I have eaten dog, but I wouldn't probably eat it again.

Joe Rogan 1:02:50 Yeah.

Sonny Side 1:02:51 And I'm not that into it. But we all have these lines that we create for ourselves, so w- where's the line for you?

Joe Rogan 1:02:58 It's a good question. My friend, Steve Rinella, he went to Guyana, and, uh, the, the tribes people there were eating monkeys. And they, they cooked... I think it was Guyana.

Sonny Side 1:03:08 I ate monkey this year.

Joe Rogan 1:03:09 And he said it was like smoked turkey, like, the way they do it. Like, th- that's what it tasted like.

Sonny Side 1:03:15 Oh, wow.

Joe Rogan 1:03:15 And he said it was just... There was a part of you that's like, "What the fuck?" Like, "We're eating a primate?"

Sonny Side 1:03:20 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:03:21 Like, "This is, this is intense." I'd probably eat a whale before I'd eat a primate.

Sonny Side 1:03:24 Yeah. I mean, I, I did something similar this year with the Hadzabe, um, but t- just to finish about the whales...

Joe Rogan 1:03:32 Yeah, I'll... Bolivian jungle with, uh, simane hunters. How do you say that?

Sonny Side 1:03:39 S- uh, simane, maybe?

Joe Rogan 1:03:41 Simane? Simane hunters, and we ate monkey. Only got 35 likes.

Sonny Side 1:03:45 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:03:47 2014. (laughs)

Sonny Side 1:03:51 (laughs) So-

Joe Rogan 1:03:51 I wonder if he's shadow banned.

Sonny Side 1:03:52 After... Yeah. So, I mean, no wonder people... Uh, no wonder it's controversial. No, no wonder people get upset.

Joe Rogan 1:03:59 Yeah.

Sonny Side 1:03:59 It, it's... 'Cause it's in your face. It's not like a slaughterhouse-

Joe Rogan 1:04:02 But it also looks like so many whales. It's not like a couple.

Sonny Side 1:04:05 It's, it's... However many whales they can get is how many they kill.

Joe Rogan 1:04:08 (sighs)

Sonny Side 1:04:08 And so, they... Once they bring 'em onto the beach, they have this tool they use to, to kind of go into their spine quickly, and that severs the spine and it kills them pretty much instantly. And then, from there, it's just about moving 'em around, cutting 'em up, portioning up the meat. And then, you get a portion of the meat depending on how you helped and-

Joe Rogan 1:04:27 Hmm.

Sonny Side 1:04:28 ... you know, if you had a boat, you might get more.

Joe Rogan 1:04:30 Right.

Sonny Side 1:04:30 And if you're just cutting stuff up, you might get less. And, uh, i- it's a fascinating system. I, I understand why it upsets people, but it was interesting... You know, there's so many documentaries like this, what you, the footage you just pulled up. The difference is, nobody ever goes to their home. They just end it there.

Joe Rogan 1:04:47 Right.

Sonny Side 1:04:47 "It's in this terrible... Look at the whales." And so, I actually got to go into someone's home, look in their freezer, and eat a, a whale meal that they prepared, and experience that with them. A- and I guess my biggest takeaway was, it's so different from any other animal. It's got a big layer of blubber on the outside. There's skin which is about a quarter of an inch thick, and then the blubber must be, I don't know, three, four inches thick. And then, it's just protein, this dark red protein after that. And it... there's no taste you could compare it to. And so, it's not like, "Well, you know, just eat chicken instead. Just eat beef instead." You cannot replace whale meat. You can only take it away. And it's a tradition that they've had for hundreds of years at this point, so I understand why they don't really want people's op- opinions or points of view-

Joe Rogan 1:05:33 Mm-hmm.

Sonny Side 1:05:33 ... when it comes to this. And my biggest thing in going there was finding out, is this sustainable? And it... From a- from everything I could see, it seems this is sustainable. It's something that they could keep doing long-term 'cause they're not going out into the ocean to seek out whales. And so, I kinda get why they do it and why they're gonna keep doing it.

Joe Rogan 1:05:54 Well, I get why they're doing it, if you think of the fact that these people have lived on this island for who knows how long, probably thousands of years, right?

Sonny Side 1:06:01 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:06:02 How long have they been there? And, uh, th- that was probably a main food source to keep them alive for a long time. You know?

Sonny Side 1:06:09 Yeah. Yes, b- yes, and, and the, the weather you see there, I mean, it's very, uh, rainy, not a lot of sun. Um, they're not growing a lot of crops. They're growing basically potatoes. They got sheep on land, and then they just have very rich seawaters.

Joe Rogan 1:06:23 There it is.

Sonny Side 1:06:23 In the middle of nowhere.

Joe Rogan 1:06:24 Oh, yeah. Really in the middle of nowhere. So, it's between Norway and Iceland, right in the center. Wow. And how... And you said there's thousands of people live there? How many thousands?

Sonny Side 1:06:34 Fif- 50,000.

Joe Rogan 1:06:35 And, you know, city's there? Is there a city, a village?

Sonny Side 1:06:39 Yeah, I mean, they have a capital. About half the population is in the capital. I mean, but it just looks like a cute little village.

Joe Rogan 1:06:44 Hmm.

Sonny Side 1:06:45 It doesn't look like... I s- it's no metropolis.

Joe Rogan 1:06:48 And how do they prepare whale? Do you have a video of you eating whale?

Sonny Side 1:06:52 Oh, sorry. It's coming out this Sunday.

Joe Rogan 1:06:54 Oh, okay, well-

Sonny Side 1:06:54 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:06:55 There you go.

Sonny Side 1:06:56 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:06:56 Sneak peek, folks. So, when you ate it, what was your thought when you were eating this?

Sonny Side 1:07:02 Um, I, I guess I, I wanted to try to identify how it tastes so I could convey that to the audience. It tastes very beefy. Um, I, I didn't really have-

Joe Rogan 1:07:15 Beefy?

Sonny Side 1:07:17 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:07:17 Hmm. Interesting.

Sonny Side 1:07:19 Yeah, it... But-

Joe Rogan 1:07:19 Whale's a mammal.

Sonny Side 1:07:20 It is a mammal, and it, it breathes air.

Joe Rogan 1:07:24 Yeah.

Sonny Side 1:07:24 It just happens to eat a lot of fish.

Joe Rogan 1:07:26 And so, how do they prepare it?

Sonny Side 1:07:28 S- uh, you know, it's so funny. They, uh, they had, um, a couple different preparations. I'm trying to remember now. They had, they had a way of almost, like, they, they put it...... um, it's almost like a chicken-fried steak-

Joe Rogan 1:07:40 Hmm.

Sonny Side 1:07:40 ... where they were, um, simmering it in oil, and they, uh, created this, like, thick gravy around it. I think they maybe even put some beef bouillon or beef, like, flavoring on it. And, it just f- came out looking like a big, flat steak. And, uh, y- yeah, I wonder if you tried it, you wouldn't be like, "This is..." You would say there's something unusual about this steak, but it looked like a beef steak. And the meat is really remarkable, 'cause it's almost black. I mean, you can see it right there.

Joe Rogan 1:08:06 Yeah.

Sonny Side 1:08:07 Um, while I was there, I-

Joe Rogan 1:08:08 Let's hold it up to the camera so people can see what it looks like. So this is a pilot whale?

Sonny Side 1:08:12 Pilot whale. Whi- while I was there, I also tried dolphin meat too.

Joe Rogan 1:08:16 So what is that? That's, that's pilot whale with blubber?

Sonny Side 1:08:19 Yeah. Yep. Okay, so if you look at the plate here, this is, like, a typical plate that they would have. And it's, it's interesting, 'cause it's like all your macros. It's like potatoes for carbs, the black part is the protein, and then the w- in the middle, that part right there is all the blubber. It's very thinly sliced blubber. It's very, it's, so it's very rich, oily, but it's not oily like pork would be. It's like a th- it's almost like a more thin oiliness that can dissipate, eh, um, or dilute more quickly in your mouth.

Joe Rogan 1:08:47 And do they eat it raw?

Sonny Side 1:08:49 They have a... Yes. They have a few different ways of eating it. One way... So, uh, I mean, this isn't technically raw, but it's dried, so it's not cooked. Um, so they have dried, um, n- uh, but then of course they cook it too. And then the blubber you can eat raw. They slice it, but just like you saw there, they slice it very, very thin.

Joe Rogan 1:09:05 And so, that's just how they get their source of fat? 'Cause this, this meat looks very lean.

Sonny Side 1:09:10 Yeah. Um, but, uh, you know, it's something that they don't eat every day. It, uh, maybe they eat it once a week, and they're also very aware of the mercury levels, um, that are, that are in the seafood, and, and they wanna be careful about that. And so, uh, people like it, they wanna have the right to do it. The, the other tricky thing is, it's not like it happens every day. It might not even happen once in a year, because it depends on if the whales come to the island or not, or come near the islands, and if they're spotted, and if they're able to corral them and bring them into the bay.

Joe Rogan 1:09:41 Hmm.

Sonny Side 1:09:41 So-

Joe Rogan 1:09:41 So it's just a normal part of their culture.

Sonny Side 1:09:43 Absolutely.

Joe Rogan 1:09:45 D- w- is, what is the, the food that you've eaten that conflicted you the most?

Sonny Side 1:09:51 Um, monkey was challenging. Yeah, so, uh, y- you brought a monkey earlier. I went to hang out with the Hadzabe tribe, um, earlier this year in, in Tanzania. And the H- I, I think you've h- you've heard about the Hadzabe, right?

Joe Rogan 1:10:04 Yes.

Sonny Side 1:10:05 Eh, just for the people listening, the Hadzabe are, I think they're known as the last hunter-gatherers in Africa. They, uh, Tanzania, the government there has an amazing program to help them keep living the lifestyle that they're living. There's maybe, I don't know, 3 to 5,000 still living the traditional way out there. They're usually in tribes of, let's say, five to 10, and they are obsessed with hunting. Everything is about hunting. And even when I asked, like, "Who is the chief here?" Or "Why is the chief the chief?" They said, "'Cause he's the best hunter." And I'm like, "Really? Does anybody wanna contest that?" Uh, no. They're like, "He's the best hunter. He's the chief. He makes the, the decisions." But of course, as I've seen with many tribes in Africa, they're very cooperative, and they have ways of eating and working together that ensures that there are no fights or conflicts, or reduces the, the amount that there might be. So when I was with them, I planned to go there for three days. I didn't even bring my crew. We, we had just shot three different countries back to back, we got COVID in the middle of it, and I told them to leave. I shot it on a phone and a camera, and, and I basically just shot it by myself. And I, uh, th- usually we try to plan our videos out a lot, as much as we can, to tr- be efficient with our time, but in this case, I can't say,