YouSaid · the spoken record

Sarma Melngailis

lines on the record: 316
first: 2022-05-23
most recent: 2022-05-23
sittings or episodes: 1
sources: podcast

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

“Helplessness set in because you're kind of powerless there. You have very little contact with the outside world. You have these limited phone calls. And so for people who had kids and a job and an apartment, it's like one by one those things are lost or their kids are now being looked after by their abuse of ex-husband or something like that. And so watching that is just gut wrenching and then also knowing that the only reason they're unable to get out is because of you know a thousand dollars, two thousand dollars, in some cases $500. There were people.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So, most of the people at Rikers are there in transition. They've been arrested, but not arrested, but not convicted or awaiting trial. So you could be perfectly innocent and you're stuck there. And that happens to a lot of people. Or you could be arrested over some kind of comparatively petty thing or nonviolent thing and stuck there because you don't have as little as $500 to pay bail, which is completely messed up and unjust. And I think most people, most reasonable people agree that it's unjust. It's different when you're there and you see those people and you see kind of the anguish. And whether, I mean, I have no idea if they're guilty of what. I mean, I usually don't know what people are there for or what the situation is, but you watch the sort of.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yeah, during COVID, I felt sick to my stomach thinking about people stuck there. And again, so Rikers isn't like a long-term prison. Most of the people at Rikers are awaiting. Trial and they've been arrested but not convicted. And then if you're convicted and you're sentenced to less than a year, then you put on a different color uniform and you go upstairs to a different dorms. If you're convicted and sentenced to more than a year, you're sent to one of the upstate prisons”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yes, and in a very kind of almost poetically interesting way, the dorm room where I was when I was there for the three and a half months was one of the ones that faced Manhattan. So I could go across the room and look out the window and see the whole Manhattan skyline. Which”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“In Tennessee The food there and some of the conditions. Food made when I got to that I was extradited and transferred to Rikers and when I got to Rikers I felt like it was like the four seasons in comparison. So, and I really kind of appreciated a lot of things about. About New York when I got to Rikers, even though there are a lot of things that are very scary about it”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Not necessarily clowns, but there is a video on YouTube that I I got to the chapter where we arrive in Pigeon Forge, and I'll never forget, although I have forgotten, but I remember being like Weird Felt like we had entered a different universe driving down this strip and just looking at everything on either side. And I'm wishing that I could remember in more detail like the names of the places or what was there because I wanted to describe it in this chapter. And I was like, I wish somebody, I wish there was like a video of somebody going down the street kind of showing what's on one side. And then the other side. And I was like, there probably is. And there is on YouTube. Like I found it and I watched the whole thing.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“In the film, I told them, I told them you have to go to Pigeon Forward, you have to go there, you have to go there. And I think I was pushing them because it was going to potentially be the end of the season. It's like a summertime or it's a tourist destination and it's so bizarre and weird and trippy that Don't even seem real.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Not good, but Rikers was. When I got to write, because I was arrested, I spent, I think about 10 days in a Tennessee small town Tennessee jail. Oh, pigeon forge is also the weirdest place on earth.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Know what would happen at Rikers is when these things would happen where one of us couldn't think of something, and you're like, oh, who was that actor in that movie and that thing? No. And so what we do is like somebody would be on the phone and you'd be like, hey, who are you talking to? Can you ask them to look up on their phone? Like, so we'd ask people on the phone or somebody would go make a call. And you'd have to call somebody and ask them to Google the cast of a movie or something like that. I think you would find jail. Don't ever get arrested or try not to, but I think you would find jail fascinating.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So, I think that In some psychological way that I don't understand, he probably did in some way halfway exists in this world where he was this. You know, like fighter, and he would say things like it's because of people like me that people like you can sleep at night, which is probably a line out of a movie that I've never seen. I feel like a lot of things.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“But, you know, conveniently, if he say in some world he actually did work for Blackwater, one of those places or... I wouldn't be able to just call someplace and verify it Anyway”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I don't know if he said he was a Navy SEAL or that he implied that he worked with the CIA or then it was like he worked with black ops that you know is by definition under the radar right okay so I mean that's obviously a huge red flag now going forward is like if somebody First of all, if somebody tells you that information pretty quickly is itself a red flag. But”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Some way He wanted to, you know, because he wanted to be his own. You know, he never built anything or created anything or accomplished anything in his life. Yet, you know, so in his own brain, if he could turn himself into a movie superhero.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“And then there's also the layer of to what extent is this person in some way also delusional themselves and sort of believing their lies because people have asked me that and I've wondered the same thing to what extent did he believe some of the stuff he was saying and I think probably there was some sort of delusional aspect, almost like he was sort of halfway aware of playing his own Sort of virtual reality game, you know, like. He was in some kind of metaverse in his brain.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“It's been said sometimes that the more fantastical the lie, the more believable it is because you don't believe that somebody would tell that lie. And I think something also that Mr. Fox, people like him are capable of doing is going out and lying in very brazen ways that normal people would be terrified to do. So that kind of also makes it more believable. So, if somebody could go out on a world stage and lie. And not kind of. Feel weird about that, or even knowing that it's a lie that can be pointed out as being a lie.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Which is that they're sort of, you know, somebody was about somebody who was watching and watched that person sort of leverage people's tendency to want to believe that something amazing and cool is about to happen versus like this is just a really ugly, pathetic lie. So I think that a lot of the things that Mr. Fox that he put forward, I couldn't understand it from the perspective of it being a lie because it just seemed too weird and crazy. So I think that this happens sometimes where you believe somebody because it seems so weird that they would lie about it. I think there's somebody has...”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Seems like a very kind person, and he's very open about it. And when he was talking to Joe, he said this thing that, and I use this quote in my book, And again, I'm paraphrasing because I don't have it in front of me, but it's like he says something about how we want to believe the lie. Because we'd rather believe that it's something amazing than just that ugly and pathetic a lie. And whatever he said was said in a much better way The point is, like, that's, and so he was explaining it in the context of the way that an illusionist or whatever they're called is able to pull off certain things.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I think he's a mentalist or an illusionist named Darren Brown. And it was on a Joe Rogan podcast, I think Joe interviewed Darren Brown. I think Sam Harris interviewed him. I got really intrigued. And then I was looking for other podcasts or maybe Joe interviewed him like right after. I may have gone looking for it. But anyway, it was in the conversation with Joe where Darren explains he's somebody I would love to meet a mentalist and an illusionist because they understand a lot of the ways in which the mind can be manipulated. So I feel like they would, if they looked at everything about my situation, they would be able to understand better how he was able to get me to believe things or go along with things. Because Darren Brown is pretty fascinating what he does. And he's really...”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“He acted like he had lived many lifetimes and had all kinds of Wisdom from having Lived all these prior lifetimes and being aware of it.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Slowly over time. And a lot of those things too are things that Conveniently, you kind of can't disprove So it's almost like people believe in God or religious people believe certain things. And so one could argue why is it that much crazier for me to have... Been open to the idea that maybe Leon, maybe we do live forever. In some way Lot of religious people have similar beliefs.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“All of that was always really vague intentionally, like a lot of what he talked about was always very vague. But a lot of that stuff was very vague. And again, like.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So it was very infuriating when he would take my phone and look at it. And it got to the point where Not only did I feel like everything I said or wrote Email digitally or whatnot would be read, but he got me to the point of feeling like I was being watched all the time. In a non explainable way”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, I mean, the conditions were different later on, but in some sense, I didn't want my phone because everything, like I was in a state of shock and it was just like, take it, fine. Like I give up. Like, I guess I'd given up. And so. Yeah, I'd given up, so there was no, like, I wasn't gonna fight back on anything before when he would take my phone and look through it, it was infuriating. And he sort of forced me to get used to it. And this is, again, something that like people who've been in cults would understand because it's like they condition you to not. React negatively to things that you would normally react negatively to. And like if I was in a relationship, like if somebody I would never, ever look in somebody's phone. And if somebody did that to me, I would be like, goodbye. So, I'm pretty sensitive about that. And, um,”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, I was conditioned to it before, because before he was always checking my phone, which Was wildly infuriating, and I feel like”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“No, and then he had my phone and my email. I did later on I got a brand new phone with like an empty phone with no existing numbers in it or whatnot And so that he and I could communicate when I went to the grocery store or something like that.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“No, so I didn't know that. I mean, the thing is the restaurant was operating and he took me away and then like people weren't paid and it all sort of fell apart.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yes, but I think that it's not a so I think that regular people have gambling addictions and it's a horrible tragic thing and can destroy their lives. I know people who've had regular people can have a gambling gambling addiction, which is explained in the way that addictions are explained. For him, I don't think it was so much an addiction as like a thrill seeking because he could win money, lose money, and he didn't really care whereas somebody who has an actual addiction and then all normal people with normal human emotions, you know, would either be elated and relieved or devastated to lose a lot of money. And for him, he didn't really care. It was more, again, I think it was more just like a game.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I assume he must have known ahead of time, but he made it seem like, oh, funny we ended up in Vegas. Funny how that happened. But now when I see all the places that we stopped, they were all places with where there were casinos So, there's a lot more casinos around the country than I knew. Ah,”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“For a certain type of appearance, I think I'm always. Afraid of that in um Committing to things like if it involved going to a big public event.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yeah, I could, but now Yeah. I did think about how one day if I did some sort of a book tour or something that I imagine this Leon and I in a car.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I had always wanted to do that, and now, again, I feel like it's one of those things that sort of like ruined for me because a lot of”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“We don't talk about it as much as one would think that we would because I feel sickening because I feel like it's my fault and I think she also feels sick over it. And so we don't talk about it as much as we want. And then there are other things where, like, I could ask the questions, but I just don't want to because I don't want to put her through that or, you know, it's not really necessary to ask the questions, but there are things that I'm sort of curious about.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yes. Yes, so I think because for me it was more just my circumstances were so Crappy, but also had an awareness that even in Rikers, I knew how wildly lucky I was to have family, a support system, you know, opportunities. And like I'll always be okay one way or another. I felt lucky that I have that. But, you know. Also, I want, you know, the shame of everything that happened. And, you know, will I ever be able to crawl out from under it and rebuild something? I don't know. So there were certainly times where, especially when I would learn something new, like reading the emails between Mr. Fox and my mother, I just wanted to.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I think that the type of pain that one has experiencing that leads to that is something that most people, and I don't, like people don't understand, but it's not a selfish thing. It's just like quite literally becomes intolerable from what I understand”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Think that Know just having a sort of relentless optimism. And I think too that Sometimes people assume that suicide is the result of circumstances, which may be in some cases it is, but I think one of the things that that book explains well is that very often it doesn't have anything to do with circumstances. It's just the pain. The darkness visible, you know, because people like to, so when somebody commits suicide, people will very often criticize them like it was a selfish act. If they have a family, which most people do, but especially if they have kids. And I think that. Everybody's quick to sort of call the person who killed themselves selfish and, um.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Kind of a wimp, so I'm afraid of all of the gruesome ways. But, um, One of the things I remember doing is. Sort of hoarding medications Which I had when Around the time and before he took me away. Because I wanted, like I wanted the safety of an out.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Ask the police to do it, well when they knocked on my door and came in, it was like a repeat of getting arrested. So I sort of weirdly flashed back to that and then burst into tears, which isn't the appropriate response if you're trying to diffuse If you're trying to discourage the people coming to do the wellness check from taking you to the hospital, starting to cry is not the right reaction.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“No, I don't even like, I just don't inevitably know, but I don't really want to know the whole thing. It's just annoying. I've always people ask me this all the time, and I always thought because of the way everything that happened was such a kind of a slow build and there was so much nuance and it's kind of really hard to understand that it could only really be done well in like a breaking bad type of series long like a long series. Where, like, you would be taken through these kind of gut wrenching, icky, slow build things. And then that would make it all make sense. If it was done that way, it could be done accurately. But the reason why I think So, I made these stupid jokes, and then somebody did a wellness check.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“And that will be they'll get a bajillion things wrong. And there are also a bunch of people profiting off of it. And like, thanks, guys. You know, so it's infuriating for all kinds of reasons.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“About somebody's making a fictionalized drama and it's frustrating because for all kinds of obvious reasons, it's like, Annoying”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I didn't. It's sort of one of those situations that Comical and tragic because Would actually make a really good, it's weird how I do this sometimes. Like it would make a really good scene in a filmed version.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Then, not knowing that. If I had handled it the right way, if I had immediately, if I had sort of understood what was going on and handled it the right way immediately, I probably could have gotten out of it. But they err on the side of taking you to the hospital no matter what.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“It was, yeah, I mean, I was sort of making jokes about how bad I was feeling, but in a hyperbolic way. And so then suddenly somebody told somebody. And then the lost in translation, and then they were worried that I might kill myself, and then did a wellness check and then tried to call me and I was in the shower, so I didn't answer the phone. Then somebody called the police to do a wellness check on me.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“No, it just was interesting to look at, and also I think. I have a tendency sometimes to be sort of jokingly. Hyperbolic or sarcastic, and it's gotten me into trouble one. One time Locked up in the Harlem Psych ward for a day. Because of my hyperbole in sarcasm.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“No. We took a tangent up on a tangential. We started talking about exactly, yeah, about the G chats. And I think. It was, I guess it was trying to understand how I was able to be sarcastic and make jokes at his expense. Dirt while all that stuff was going on.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I never got to hear that because the version I watched didn't have the end credits, but I knew that they used that song at the end. Paid a lot for it.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Right. Yeah, and then also, I mean, it made it seem like if I was laughing with him that I don't take anything seriously, you know, that I don't take what happens seriously or.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I only watched, like, I still haven't watched it. I only watched the film once. While people were looking at me for my reaction and I was crying and it was really weird and strange and surreal and I haven't gone back to watch it again I feel like I'm just going to get more annoyed but I will eventually. And when the ending happened, I immediately blurted out like I hate that. I hate that ending. But I sort of assumed. A lot of people saw it for what it was. They saw that it was like. Director doing a weird thing, and that it was kind of just weird and off, and like that doesn't make sense But so it was basically you joke.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Because it implied all kinds of things that were completely not. True, and it also just didn't make sense, and it confused people. And so”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Prior experience where I had to do the same thing where, like, if you're able to be very Cold and not allow somebody to push your buttons, then you're taking away their power. And then that feels empowering or it feels like reclaiming a little bit of your power. So in my talking to him, I always had a reason. You know, like there was always like I didn't want him to hurt Leon or I wanted information or I wanted to know where he was. I'd rather let him think that, you know, maybe he could still manipulate me one day or whatever. It was like safer to keep that there than to not know where he was and if I was going to like be walking Leon and turn the corner and he's standing there and you know like it If there's a crazy murderer out on the loose, you'd rather know where they are than have no idea. So there are a lot of different reasons.”
2022-05-23 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #288 – Sarma Melngailis: Bad Vegan · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source