Trevor Noah: Lost in Translation Page #5

"Ebola!

Ebola!"

I was like, "Yo, dude,

calm down, man.

"Calm down. It's just AIDS.

You're safe, buddy.

"Calm down.

It's okay."

Everyone was so stressed.

The plane was tense.

No one wanted food nor snacks.

We finally land at the airport.

The plane is taxiing

to the gate,

and everyone,

everyone was waiting

for that seat belt sign

to go off. Everyone was just--

Like, it was more than normal,

'cause already--

I never understand why people

are in a hurry on a plane

to get out of their seat, like,

'cause you can't go anywhere.

Whenever a plane lands,

everyone's just in a--

"Come on. Come on. Come on."

You can't go--You're gonna go

there. That's where you--

You literally go there.

"Come on, come on."

Boop!

Yeah.

You can't--I don't understand

why people are in a hurry to go.

You know who's even worse?

The people at the window.

You have no right

to be in a hurry.

You're sitting there like,

"Come on, come on.

Come on!"

Boop!

Yeah. Oh, that's good. Yeah.

Yeah, pass me my luggage, pass

it to me now. Right now. Yeah.

I'm glad I didn't sit down

for two more minutes.

This is much more comfortable.

Just stay in your seat.

Just wait.

Ebola made it worse,

a hundred times worse, you know,

'cause now everyone wants to

get out of the plane.

Coughing, sneezing,

you can feel the tension.

And as we're about to leave,

the air hostess comes back on

the P.A., and she goes,

"Ladies and gentlemen,

back in your seats, please.

"Everybody back in your seats.

Unfortunately, right now,

"we have a health and safety

official

"that needs to come on board

just to make sure

"that everything is A-OK,

due to Ebola.

"We're just gonna make sure

that everything is fine.

"So please stay in your seats,

ladies and gentlemen.

Again, apologies for the delay."

She says this

and then this man comes on,

the health and safety official,

right.

And he has with him a list

of all the African passengers

and a thermometer, right,

a digital laser thermometer.

And he comes on

and his job is to scan

all the African passengers

and get their temperature.

And I think the way it works

is, like, if you're very hot,

then you've got Ebola, right.

So he's got the list

and he walks around,

scans the passengers

and gets the thing,

walks down, takes their names

off the list,

gets the temperature,

gets the names,

temperature, names.

Finally gets to where I'm seated

and does the weirdest thing.

He scans the passenger

opposite me,

moves to my aisle,

looks at me, looks at my name,

looks back at me.

And then he just shrugs

and walks away.

[laughter]

Nah.

[laughter]

Almost as if

I wasn't African enough.

[laughter]

I've never felt so conflicted

in my life.

You know, because

don't get me wrong, right.

I never want anyone to think

I have Ebola.

[laughter]

But I also don't want anyone to

assume

that I can't have Ebola.

[laughter]

You don't know me.

You don't know

what I'm capable of.

I could have all the Ebola

in the world.

- I'm there

trying to cheer myself up.

Like, "Chin up, Trevor.

You could have Ebola.

"Chin up, kid, come on, come on.

Come on, you could have Ebola."

And he walks to the back

of the plane,

scans the rest of the

passengers, gets to the tail,

and he realizes

he's now missing a name.

So he looks back through

the plane,

can't figure out

what's going on.

I know it's me. I know it's me,

but I'm not gonna help him.

No. He had his chance.

He had a good Ebola man

and he let him go.

And so I watch him panic,

and as he panics,

the air hostess comes back

down the plane.

She goes, "Hey, what's going on?

I need to get the people out."

He goes, "Yeah, I know. I got

a problem with the Ebola list.

I can't figure out where the--

where the passenger is."

And she's like, "Yeah,

I gotta get the people out."

He's like, "Look, I know.

This is killing me as well,

but I just gotta figure out."

She's like, "Yeah, yeah,

"if I don't get them out,

I'm dead. I'm dead.

I gotta get the people going."

He's like, "Yeah, I know.

Just calm down.

Just give me a second,"

and now--

now you can feel the tension

building on the plane.

People start whispering,

there's murmurs going around,

'cause some people are hearing

pieces of the conversations.

Like broken telephone as it goes

down the plane,

all they're hearing is,

"Yeah, yeah, Ebola. Ebola.

Killing the people. Dead, dead,

everybody out of here. Dead."

You can feel the tension.

People start looking

at each other.

The guy opposite me

didn't even hide it.

He was like, "It's you.

It's you! Ebola, it's you!"

I was like, "Dude,

I do not have Ebola.

Stop saying that.

Stop saying that."

He's like, "It's you, damn it.

It's you with your coughing."

I was like, "If you don't

shut up, I'll cough on you.

I'll cough on you now."

He was like, "What?"

I was like, "I'll cough...

[coughs]"

He was like,

"What, I'll kill you."

I was like, "I'll kill you

first. [coughs]"

Aah!

Everyone on the plane

starts losing it.

The people are going crazy.

Everyone is stressed.

People want to leave,

and in the middle of the chaos,

in the midst of all of this,

I'll never forget.

A Middle Eastern man

maybe four rows behind me

dressed in very traditional

garb,

he stands up

and he sticks his head

into the conversation being had

between the air hostess

and the safety official,

and he goes,

"Excuse me. Pardon me.

Sorry to interrupt.

"I couldn't help noticing

what you are talking.

"I just want to say

maybe you want to check.

"I noticed that gentleman over

there was coughing little bit,

"and then he never liked

anything [indistinct].

"Yeah, I thought

he was wearing a hood.

"Something about him,

I don't know.

"Something just made me

a little bit uncomfortable.

"I thought maybe you want to

check. There, I said.

"You know--you know

what they say, see something,

"say something, yeah.

Just maybe you check there."

[laughter]

I'm like, "Really?

Et tu Ahmed."

[laughter]

[cheers and applause]

How the wheel has turned,

my friend.

You quickly forget

there was a time

when Muslims were

the black people of the sky.

[laughter]

And yet, now

you have deserted me.

'Cause I thought

he'd be on my side.

I thought if anyone understood

what it would be like

to be stigmatized,

it would be that man.

You know, I thought

we shared something.

I thought he'd look over and be

like, "Don't worry, brother.

I got your back."

Instead, he sold me

down the river,

threw me under the bus, like,

"Hey, it's your turn now.

I'm free, b*tches."

[laughter]

And he was. I don't blame him.

He was.

'Cause Ebola was one of the

craziest things I've ever seen

in terms of the human condition,

how quickly we're taught

to panic.

You know, one minute

I'll be flying

and I'll see people

of Middle Eastern descent

getting pulled, you know,

random selections

beeping through the machine.

And then Ebola happened,

and all of a sudden

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