It was supposed to be a pleasant but uneventful couple of days. A quick trip to Singapore to renew my Malaysian visa, see Joyce and her family and check out any goodies that Singapore’s outdoor and camping shops might have to offer.
Instead, I got intimately involved with some wildlife. Bedbugs.
Staying at The Inn Crowd hostel, (where I’ve stayed comfortably and happily in the past), I was eaten alive on the first night. I reacted to the bites with massive swellings, all itching furiously. I gave up counting when I reached fifty. The next day, the dorms were fumigated and I went to bed still itching but feeling optimistic. Chomped again. These bugs were huge. They stomped about in broad daylight. I picked them out of my underwear before getting dressed. I bought de-lousing lotion. I found their babies scurrying about in my washbag, rucksack, socks.
Mortified to be coming back to Caroline’s flat in KL with possible hitch-hikers, I unpacked on the balcony. Sprayed everything with deadly, revolting ant-spray, soaked everything in extremely hot water, washed everything. Washed it all again. At double the temperature stated on the labels.
Being a Science teacher and a mother of an inquisitive child, Caroline has a microscope at home. So the nasties we’d found were soon being examined. In fact, for the next few days, I rushed to the microscope with every speck I found anywhere. Couldn’t tell if the itching was from old bites or new… but found myself in the unusual position of being overjoyed to find I’d just been bitten by a mosquito, or that I had ants in my bed.
My paranoia is subsiding now… though there could be eggs that survived the insecticide and hot washes, just waiting to hatch…
Instead, I got intimately involved with some wildlife. Bedbugs.
Staying at The Inn Crowd hostel, (where I’ve stayed comfortably and happily in the past), I was eaten alive on the first night. I reacted to the bites with massive swellings, all itching furiously. I gave up counting when I reached fifty. The next day, the dorms were fumigated and I went to bed still itching but feeling optimistic. Chomped again. These bugs were huge. They stomped about in broad daylight. I picked them out of my underwear before getting dressed. I bought de-lousing lotion. I found their babies scurrying about in my washbag, rucksack, socks.
Mortified to be coming back to Caroline’s flat in KL with possible hitch-hikers, I unpacked on the balcony. Sprayed everything with deadly, revolting ant-spray, soaked everything in extremely hot water, washed everything. Washed it all again. At double the temperature stated on the labels.
Being a Science teacher and a mother of an inquisitive child, Caroline has a microscope at home. So the nasties we’d found were soon being examined. In fact, for the next few days, I rushed to the microscope with every speck I found anywhere. Couldn’t tell if the itching was from old bites or new… but found myself in the unusual position of being overjoyed to find I’d just been bitten by a mosquito, or that I had ants in my bed.
My paranoia is subsiding now… though there could be eggs that survived the insecticide and hot washes, just waiting to hatch…
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2 comments:
we know your interest in nature but thats ridiculous! Take plenty of bug powder on upcoming trip!!
I'm sure there'll be more than a few little bedbugs to worry about in Africa!
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