diff --git a/.travis.yml b/.travis.yml
index 29f694ef2..bdcd00179 100644
--- a/.travis.yml
+++ b/.travis.yml
@@ -168,7 +168,7 @@ matrix:
         - DOCKER_IMAGE="quay.io/pypa/manylinux1_x86_64"
         - PY_VERSION="cp27-cp27m"
         - DOCKER_BUILD=true
-        - TEST_IN_HOST=true
+        - TEST_IN_HOST=false  # travis's python 2.7 uses ucs4 (mu), so this test fails.
         - MATRIX_EVAL=""
       cache:
         directories: