Kitchen, Water and Porch

Those are the names of my three new pets- I’ve named them after the rooms in which I usually find them. The first two are geckos. Water is the spider that lives on the water cooler. There aren’t enough names in the world to name the ants and mosquitoes in the house, though since I kill those as fast as I can, I don’t think that I should waste time naming them. I’m undecided on naming the cockroaches- the main hindrance is that I can’t really tell them apart, hence they have no names.

So yes, I’m guessing that you get the picture that I live with a lot of bugs. A LOT of bugs.

When I’ve talked about bugs in emails and chats, I love the fact that people have asked me why I don’t just close the windows or door. Thank you everyone for thinking I’m really that stupid. I’m not. (I swear I’m not.)

There are two things to consider when talking about my many-legged roommates.
1- Homes here aren’t sealed in the same way that American homes are. For example, our front door- which is a screen door- doesn’t actually touch the floor- it’s about an inch form the tile. So closing the door wouldn’t really help. Which of course begs the point of why don’t I just install a strip of rubber so that there is a seal. (See, I’m not an idiot.) That brings up the issue of windows and more importantly, the roof. Trust me when I say that I can guarantee the roof isn’t perfectly sealed. (One important note is that our house is nice, but it’s not a luxury, luxury house. So there are houses here that I imagine are sealed completely, but I seriously doubt those are bug free. Why you ask?)

2- These are tropical bugs. These aren’t your wimpy little American variety. They have a tenacity and stubbornness (not to mention intellect) that would make Shrub envious. I think that they’re smarter than half the population of the US- and more ingenious and devious. If they want to get into a room, they will, regardless of what the human inside the room does. It fascinates us how long it takes them to find food. One of my roommates pointed out that you can leave food out in the US and it takes at least an hour for the ants to find it- sometimes overnight. You drop or spill anything here and by the time you get back with a sponge it’s already covered with bugs and it’s already half-gone.

Which brings me back to Kitchen, Porch and Water, my new friends. (All of whom happen to eat the annoying bugs.) Porch is still a little scared of me and runs away when I get close to him. Water is a cheeky little boy and loves to crawl up my arm every time I get water.

So no one fear, I’m making friends.