An Old Man Mistook Mindy Kaling for Malala Yousafzai at a Party

1 minute read

Mindy Kaling, 35, is not one of TIME’s Most Influential Teens of 2014, but that didn’t stop an elderly man from believing as much.

While attending the after-party for The New Yorker Festival, The Mindy Project star was stopped by a reportedly intoxicated octogenarian who thought she was Malala Yousafzai, the New York Times reports. Earlier this month, about two years after a member of the Taliban shot her in the head on her way to school, 17-year-old Yousafzai became the youngest Nobel Peace Prize winner ever for her education activism.

“Congratulations on your Nobel Prize,” the man told Kaling at New York City’s Boom Boom Room (“Is this where the Beyoncé elevator incident happened?” Kaling asked earlier) before expressing admiration for how she survived a gunshot wound to the head.

“Did he really think I’m Malala?” an incredulous Kaling asked after the man left. “And that if I were, I’d be at the Boom Boom Room?”

She also quipped, “That’s the best thing that’s happened all night.”

[NYT]

More Must-Reads from TIME

Write to Nolan Feeney at nolan.feeney@time.com