Smuggling kids in suitcases!

The following is not the first smuggling-kids-in-suitcases conversation I've had. But my training villae family thought it was hilarious, so after my host-sister Fatou asked if I'd take her 2-year-old son Pate to America when I went home, I took the opportunity to repeat it.

Fatou: When you go home to America, take Pate with you.
Me: Okay.
Fatou: Okay?
Me: Okay.  I will put him in my baggage. Because the fare is expensive, but if I put him in my baggage...
Fatou repeats what I've said to the other women sitting with us.
Fatou: But America is far. Won't he die? In the baggage?
Me: No, because I will put Pate in my baggage and I will put food in my baggage and I will not [I pantomime zippering the suitcase shut] and the wind will come.
Fatou repeats what I've said to the others, except she uses the actual Pulaar word for "close" instead of pantomiming it.
Me: But if Pate cries, or if he talks, the people will hear, and they'll come and see him and say "Ah! You have a child in your baggage!" and it will be bad.

So now my suitcase will have Sarjo and Sainey (my training village brothers) and a monkey, and Pate, and a chicken--a few weeks prior to this conversation one of the boys in the village told me that when I return to America I should take a chicken with me.