So, I would like to share these things. Don't judge me for not writing regularly, I know you will not, because, well, so few of us are writing regularly enough anymore to even bother reading this. You've already judged I write no longer, and are gone. Verily:
1. Lulu.
2. Office.
3. Termites.
These are in chronological order. My favorite is the first.
Lulu is our new baby cow. She is the cutest thing I have ever seen and I mourn often throughout the day that she will not stay cute for long, but will soon be nothing but a cow--large, ugly, ornery. But for now she follows me and lets me pet her alot and jumps around in that way Disney always led us to believe baby animals do in farmyards. She is scared of the big turkey and scatters all the chicklets. Her eyes and nose are wet and her fur is pristine white and chocolate fluff. Despite the dirtiness of everything around her (it is, afterall, a barn yard) she is always clean. It's magical. She is magical. I love her. She likes to sleep by the wood pile.
Second, I went to my locked up office in my school yesterday to teach a couple girls some drawing basics (they found out I can draw and immediately decided to have art tutoring instead of English tutoring.) to find the door still locked but the room ransacked. We are on the second storey of a massive Communist-built cement cage of a building. There is no climbing in through our window, but it has happened before (and before I had school materials to lock up) that some gang or other of students jimmied our lock and wrote naughty words in Russian on the floor. This time the wrote nothing, but tore up some posters and knicked all my pens/pencils/markers and chalk and candy. They scattered my books all over the floor and up-ended a bag of garbage in one corner -- taking the bag. Such bags cost a leu a piece. One leu = 8 or 9 cents.
Lastly, and most like a horror film: I woke up this morning to strange noises. Small, but definite. At first I tried to block it out and return to the very nice dream about travelling in a car, but was too curious to do it. I had to look. What a weird sound. Like a dry rain falling in the third of my room dominated by my computer, printer and collaging supplies. Ie. my work zone. Flying ants in the answer. Flying ants of all sizes. Thousands of them. They were not there at midnight when I hung up the phone and turned off the light. Not one. They were just starting to land on my bed and figure out how to flap their wings when I woke up. They were so young they were still slightly damp and couldn't quite do it yet.
Assessed, I cleaned the area of things like extension cords and hardrives, magazines and glue. I moved the furniture and runner carpets, squishing as I went. The more I squished the more appeared. After a couple minutes everything was clear, but the clearness seemed only to invite more bugs to fill the wood-floor-void! Yep, seems pretty obvious now. Anyway, thus prepared I went in search of Maria. "How do I kill alot of bugs at once?" I asked her. She laughed and asked "termites?" I said yes. She opened a cupboard and shook a couple empty aerosol cans, finding them empty, put them back on the shelf. Found one nodded at some sound she heard, but I didn't and marched to my room, "Don't be scared!" she instructed. "I'm not scared, I'm angry" I replied, " I don't go in their space and overrun their things!" Ok, I couldn't figure out how to say "overrun" in Romanian, but that was the general idea. She sprayed them a couple times before there was just air coming out of the can, but she got a shot at the floor and a shot at my curtains (literally crawling with them, I'm glad I put on my glasses by this point or I would have thought myself delusional).
So, sprayed and empty she told me to sleep in the living room with Karen, the previous volunteer for this village who is staying with us a week and had asked me YESTERDAY if I had seen the termites. "no" i said. "oh, you would have seen them by now -- they must have sprayed this year." Karen woke up when Maria and I came in. Maria explained quickly and Karen apologized for cursing me.
This was three hours ago now, and there are no bugs in my room at all now. two sprays and they all went into hiding. The magazins are open finally so I'm off to spend the last of my June allowance on Raid.
3 comments:
You can't find someone to give you a foot rub while you're reading?
A few things.
One, you'd think Romanian would have a lot of words for "overrun," considering their history.
Two, don't spend a lot of time in a room that has just been sprayed with Raid equivelent, give it 48 hours to air out.
Three, you might prepare some surprises for your students at the end of the next school year when you leave your office unattended. I can give you some ideas.
Four, look up the original meaning of the word "cute" and get some insight into Disney's "magic."
Five, your floor might collapse because of termite efforts.
Six, it's always easy to get foot rubs, but finding the right people to give them is the hard part.
Seven, love your blog! It's a pleasure to read. You should post a link on facebook. Too late! I just did. Hey, widen your reading audience. It's worth it for you and for them.
Bob O --
How would you like to be an agent? I've gotten myself a manager/social secretary here, but could use the help on other fronts.
Besides, it seems you're already half there!
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