Comedian Max Amini is known for his spontaneous jokes. He has a recurring element in his shows wherein he interacts with his audience members and plays on whatever he observes about them. At one of his shows last month, Max noticed that a woman of Indian origin refused the seat next to her to another woman even though only her bag was kept on it. His wholesome reaction made the audience and his viewers both laugh and cry, and the video blew up on social media.
The incident
In the video, Max asked a woman in the front row, ''So wait a minute, I asked if anybody's sitting here and you said no.'' The woman, whose name is Ritika, said that since her father passed away last year. , she bought a seat for him wherever she goes. That is why she refused to give it to the woman.
Max acknowledged the sweet gesture and then went on to make a series of hilarious yet wholesome jokes about 'Father's Love'.
Max stated that he too believed that when someone passes on, they stay with you, revealing his Iranian lineage and that he lost his father in 2015. He said that he would never do what Ritika did because ''my father's soul would be so unhappy. !''
Max imitated what his father might have said in an Iranian accent, ''Max Amini, why are you wasting money? What did I teach you? You buy seat for me? Stupid! I'm in heaven having a great time!”
His jokes visibly made Ritika tear up in remembrance of her own father, and also elicited a combination of tears and laughs from the rest of his audience. He told Ritika, “You hear that?” I just heard your father laugh!”
The reel has received 1.5 million views on Instagram since being posted on June 15, as well as more than 850 thousand likes and 6000 comments. He captioned the video, ''Fathers are always trying to teach us in the only way they know how, even if they're not around! Happy Father's Day weekend, everyone!''
Entrepreneur Shervin Pishevar commented on the video saying, ''You just made me cry while laughing! That's a very hard thing to do. You're a comedic genius, my friend. To do something so perfect on the fly is on a different level, my brother.''
It also received heartfelt appreciation from many Instagram users, for both his spontaneous comedic ability and to appropriately make jokes on such a sensitive topic.
dealing with grief
However, funny as it may be, this instance does make us think about the importance of letting go and dealing with the traumatic incidents of our lives. Even though everyone has different ways of dealing with grief, many do not successfully manage to process these feelings even after several years.
'Letting go' is one of the most profoundly difficult acts that one has to practice at some point in their lives. It is not so much about forgetting or burying these scarring incidents but more about acknowledging them and deciding that they do not define who you are.
When the burden of grief eventually lightens, you find a renewed sense of energy, where you are no longer anchored to the past.