Faldien Taladia
So by now you should know—I am not a normal man. Normal men watch rugby, fix cars, and argue about which braai wood burns longer. Me? I’m a strange cocktail: part phobia collector, part freak-show enthusiast, and part ghost-tour guide trapped in the body of a middle-aged guy with a heart condition.
Now, every six months I’m summoned to the clinic like it’s jury duty for the chronically ill. On this particular day, I walked into the waiting room and immediately realized: Ah, yes, Hell exists—and it has plastic chairs and thirty coughing pensioners.
Learning New Things During a Visit to the Doctor
I sat down next to an attractive middle-aged woman who looked like she was sitting on a hedgehog. Clearly uncomfortable. I tried to mind my own business, scrolling through Facebook (and no, Zuckerberg still hasn’t paid me for product placement).
Then she leaned over and asked:
“So, what are you here for?”
I answered honestly. “I have a heart condition. I see the doctor every six months for a check-up.”
She nodded gravely… then whispered like she was revealing government secrets:
“I have a swollen perineum.”
Now—pause. Do you know what a perineum is? I didn’t. In fact, I thought it was a Mediterranean spice. Like, “Ooh, sprinkle some perineum on the lamb chops, it tastes amazing.”
So I asked, “What the hell is that?”
Without blinking—without even hesitating—she said:
“It’s a sexually transmitted infection. Caused by herpes.”
I swear, the words left my mouth before my brain caught them.
“No shit!” I blurted.
And she replied like a Zen master of embarrassment, “No shit.”
Ladies and gentlemen, the weirdest duet in human history:
“No shit / No shit.”
Now suddenly, my heart condition didn’t feel like the most pressing issue in the room.
Am I safe? I asked.
She giggled. GIGGLED. And said, “Oh yes, unless we become intimate.”
Excuse me? Madam, this is a clinic, not Tinder!
Of Course I Couldn’t Keep This to Myself
So naturally, I did what any intelligent, level-headed man would do: I phoned my wife.
“Elhaam!” I said, like a child who just discovered fire. “You won’t believe this—I’m sitting next to a lady with a swollen perineum! Do you know what that is?”
Silence. Long, heavy, Oscar-worthy silence.
Then she asked, “Is the lady still sitting next to you?”
“Yes!” I said, like I’d just scored the winning goal.
Another silence. Then came the slow, surgical strike:
“Are. You. Retarded? Have you lost your bloody mind?”
I panicked. “No! Why?”
“Because, you imbecile, that is a PRIVATE matter. You don’t announce it like you’re reading the bloody weather report!”
“But—but she told me!” I protested. “She volunteered the information! She offered it up like a sample at Checkers: “Here sir, would you like to try our swollen perineum today?”
“Dimwit!” she snapped. “End the call. NOW. Before I end your life.”
So I hung up, sulking.
The lady turned to me, calm as a Buddha, and said:
“That call didn’t sound like it went well.”
“No,” I admitted. “I guess it didn’t. My wife’s way too serious.”
What I Really Learned
And that, my friends, is how I learned three important lessons:
1. The waiting room is not a place for sharing intimate medical poetry.
2. “Perineum” is not a spice.
3. Never, ever, under any circumstances, call your wife to report on a stranger’s swollen anything.
Because apparently, that’s “not normal.”
Who knew?
