DISCLAIMER: This article is not meant to propose any controversial viewpoints or offend anyone. Its purpose is simply to retell a humorous incident.
Everyone does crazy things at camp, right? What about full on dressing as the opposite gender and going out in public to do a list of actions that gender would do? Because that definitely happened at my camp this week.
It started out as a simple suggestion for our staff to take videos of us doing crazy, funny things. I figured it would be something simple, though, like singing while doing handstands or running through the kitchen screaming. Then we got split up into groups and given our challenge.
"One team member must dress up convincingly like the opposite gender and perform 4-5 actions that gender would do." Well there were four girls and one guy on our team, so we obviously made him do it.
On the day of his "change" we took him to Goodwill and bought him a lovely pink dress to wear out. Of course, it had to be long because he refused to shave his legs (I don't know why), and he made us pick up men's shirts to hold in front of the dress on his way to the fitting room. It took about 20 minutes for us to get in and out of Goodwill, because he kept saying things like "Do I really have to do this?" and "How do you put your arms through this thing?!" Apparently guys don't know how halter tops work.
After this, we tried to take him to Belk to get his makeup done; two of us went in to warn the ladies that he was in fact a guy and that we were trying to do it for a video. The conversation went down a little like this:
"Hi, we need to make our friend look like a girl. Can you do his makeup?"
"A friend? A guy?"
"Yeah..."
"Does he want to look like a girl?"
After which we definitely got judged and told we needed an appointment and to buy two items. We decided to do his makeup ourselves.
His first stop for public appearance was the JCPenney in town. The first two ladies that saw him just stared until they got an explanation to which they thoroughly laughed at my poor friend. We took him over to the bras to get measured (40D, by the way) and then to the shoes to try on some heels. The only problem was that they only went up to size 11, and he probably was more like a size 14.
My favorite part of the entire day, though, was taking him to Walmart. 4:00 is like the elderly prime time for shopping, and they filled the store. The moment we started walking through the parking lot we got stares. One little old lady looked him up and down as he walked past her. We took him in to make him pick up some tampons, got lots of confused and judgemental looks, and went to the register to pay. While we waited in line, you could tell our cashier was obviously avoiding looking at him. When we got up and explained exactly why he looked the way he did, she laughed and said, "Experiments are good. I work at Walmart; nothing surprises me."
The experience was hilarious. The reactions on people's faces were priceless. Little challenges like these are great to bring you out of your comfort zone and make you learn to laugh at yourself. Of course we looked like absolute freaks, but it was fun and made for a great story. So if you ever get the chance to walk around your town looking like an idiot, please take it.
