Actually, I take that back. I was hilarious today. I led my favorite song in teaching and started dancing. The mothers were going wild to see me making a fool out of myself. They started doing this Malawian thing that is kind of like a whoop that involves moving your tongue sideways back and forth really quickly.
What was even funnier than a white girl dancing, however, was the car ride home. We took two cars- one full of azungues (white-ies) and the other full of our nurses. The idea was that they and we could get home quicker that way. Except that we had Makwinja, one of the Malawian drivers in our car because he's on our way (of course the nurses loved that and were calling him azungu the whole time).
Annnnnnyway: the azungus were in the black truck (which has the only music system) and I asked Indi to turn up the music: "Grinch- pump my jams!" is actually what I said.
[Side note: Indi is the only doctor here right now. He runs the study that I am doing and he is a fellow in emergency medicine and infectious disease. But even though he is kind of my boss, he never ever acts above me or anyone else. He's just a part of the team and we all tease each other mercilessly. We call him the Grinch because he eats raw onion and makes curmudgeon-y jokes sometimes.]
Lacey was trying to explain to Makwinja what the Grinch was. "He's a monster [blank stare]. Ummmm. Like a beast [blank stare from Kwinj]. Grrrrrrrrrr [makes scary face] [met by blank stare from Kwinj]. Like something children are afraid of... [tries to think of Malawian example]....like the thing in N'Darande that people are saying kills women!"
At which point Makwinja looks shocked and then breaks into peals of hysterical laughter while looking at Indi.
So to recap: Lacey told Kwinj that we call Indi a woman-killer (and, we decided, probably a rapist).
Then Indi, trying to explain about the bad jokes, says "I am always saying terrible things to these girls when no one in around." Not exactly helping his case.
I was too busy dying laughing in the backseat to make any sort of rectification or meaningful contribution.
Note: this was on Wednesday and, to my infinite amusement- Makwinja is still obsessed with this. Friday during our car ride he was like, "Hayley, I want to teach you something. Chi-pants. It is the name of that man in Ndarande who has killed those women."
So now we have taken to calling Indi Chi-pants. Appropriate it is not. But still hysterical.
Here's a pic of Chi-pants and the Kwinj:
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