This is hidden brain.
I'm Shankar Vedantam.
In the 2002 rom.com, my big fat greek wedding, an american woman of greek ancestry falls in love with a very vanilla american man.
Tula and Ian's different backgrounds become apparent on one of their very first dates.
What do you do for Christmas with your family?
My mom makes roast lamb.
And.
And I'm greek.
Right, right.
So what happens is my dad and my uncles, they fight over who gets to eat the lamb.
Brain.
And then my aunt Vula forks the eyeball and chases me around with it, trying to get me to eat it because it's gonna make me smart.
Later, Ian invites his girlfriend over to meet his parents.
Rodney, didn't you once have a greek receptionist?
No, Harriet.
She was, uh.
Just a minute.
Oh, no, no, she was armenian.
Is Armenia close to Greece?
Not exactly.