God, I wish I could have written about Holi, the popular spring festival here that just took place this past Tuesday. I would have loved to write about the bright bonfires lit the previous day, then the main act featuring the seemingly senseless way people throw colored powder at each other in honor of the young Vishnu devotee, Prahlada. Thanks to a last minute assignment to my spouse, I would be stuck at home with Axl and let other people get plastered with color and brag about it the next day. Wasn’t meant to be. Instead, I have dedicated this column to another earthshaking topic: the mosquito.
So far I am happy to be a part of Nepal. There is no doubt that the culture has hit me like a sledgehammer, and I can’t quite confirm I have recovered from the blow yet. I’m probably now recovering and gazing at those new planets circling around my head. I admit I have been feeling closer to all living things, which is not that difficult with the status animals enjoy here. With the exception of a few run-ins with a misguided monkey, and a few near run-overs of cows and dogs, I think Asia’s urban answer to the San Diego Zoo and I have harmonized fabulously.
That raw feeling of transcendentalism in its perfection has still eluded me, however. I have always said that if I could cut one creature out of the food chain it would be the mosquito. I am aware I would draw the wrath of thousands of different bird species (not to mention PETA) with that remark, and yet I stand by it. The sad thing is, it looked so promising for a while here in Nepal, my outreach program for our underappreciated parasites. You see, I am still a long way from enlightenment or wearing an orange robe under a shaved head.
I have a long history with mosquitoes. Even as a child, we were mortal enemies, except only one side did the killing. I could be lying in the dark, blissfully sawing wood and counting sheep when all of a sudden I would hear that high-pitched whine that would send my blood pressure into autobahn mode. I would be up more quickly than a bear in hibernation whose nose has just been scorched with a Bunsen. I would turn on the lights and not go back to bed until I saw that small red smudge on the wall, my revenge for lost sleep that translates into the end for one of God’s unfortunate creatures. I have lost hours, no, days and weeks of sleep to those little bastards, a good personal currency that can’t be easily recovered.
Like people, I have noticed that mosquitoes are different in every country. German mosquitoes are the worst. They have the most annoying shriek, combined with that German ingenuity that helps them prevent an early demise. That’s why I have always considered them the most satisfying to kill. I have seen millions of mosquitoes around the south coast of Ireland. They would swarm and form an army that would make a lot of beehives look like cuddly glowworms by comparison. Better yet, they would always keep to themselves and elect to hover around bushes and in the outdoors instead of paying me a nocturnal visit. Jordanian mosquitoes would attack you without hesitation…and die just as easily. Catching a Jordanian mosquito was as easy as setting fire to a California forest. My relationship with our lovable blood sucking critters here started off just fabulously. They would bite me, every one of them a little chunk, possibly in that euphoric state of theirs that prays for me to get malaria. However, I recall they would always let me sleep and at least shut up while stabbing me. Fair enough.
Unfortunately, one of them recently declared war and woke me up. Mistake on their part. Now I have to go after that mosquito and his entire family, his cousin’s next of kin, etc. Wait a minute, I have a simpler solution. How about killing them all? Now when a mosquito protests that he in fact is not from the Miller family whose ill-fated member had been audacious enough to rob me of sleep, but from the Smith family, I shrug. Sorry, you all look the same to me. Splat. Now I am on a mission. We had an understanding, a contract signed in (my) blood about them picking up their nourishment from me in exchange for much needed Z’s, and that trust has been irretrievably betrayed.
It’s kind of crazy when you consider that the mosquitoes here in Nepal will apply to your spiritual senses to avoid getting whacked, as in,
“The wheel, brother, the wheel. Remember about reincarnation. You will be one of us one day. Watch the karma.”
I nod and rub my chin, thinking this guy actually has a point before I paint his intestines with my blood on the wall. Splat. Sorry, fella. You have another mosquito to thank for that. Now it’s on.
So far I am happy to be a part of Nepal. There is no doubt that the culture has hit me like a sledgehammer, and I can’t quite confirm I have recovered from the blow yet. I’m probably now recovering and gazing at those new planets circling around my head. I admit I have been feeling closer to all living things, which is not that difficult with the status animals enjoy here. With the exception of a few run-ins with a misguided monkey, and a few near run-overs of cows and dogs, I think Asia’s urban answer to the San Diego Zoo and I have harmonized fabulously.
That raw feeling of transcendentalism in its perfection has still eluded me, however. I have always said that if I could cut one creature out of the food chain it would be the mosquito. I am aware I would draw the wrath of thousands of different bird species (not to mention PETA) with that remark, and yet I stand by it. The sad thing is, it looked so promising for a while here in Nepal, my outreach program for our underappreciated parasites. You see, I am still a long way from enlightenment or wearing an orange robe under a shaved head.
I have a long history with mosquitoes. Even as a child, we were mortal enemies, except only one side did the killing. I could be lying in the dark, blissfully sawing wood and counting sheep when all of a sudden I would hear that high-pitched whine that would send my blood pressure into autobahn mode. I would be up more quickly than a bear in hibernation whose nose has just been scorched with a Bunsen. I would turn on the lights and not go back to bed until I saw that small red smudge on the wall, my revenge for lost sleep that translates into the end for one of God’s unfortunate creatures. I have lost hours, no, days and weeks of sleep to those little bastards, a good personal currency that can’t be easily recovered.
Like people, I have noticed that mosquitoes are different in every country. German mosquitoes are the worst. They have the most annoying shriek, combined with that German ingenuity that helps them prevent an early demise. That’s why I have always considered them the most satisfying to kill. I have seen millions of mosquitoes around the south coast of Ireland. They would swarm and form an army that would make a lot of beehives look like cuddly glowworms by comparison. Better yet, they would always keep to themselves and elect to hover around bushes and in the outdoors instead of paying me a nocturnal visit. Jordanian mosquitoes would attack you without hesitation…and die just as easily. Catching a Jordanian mosquito was as easy as setting fire to a California forest. My relationship with our lovable blood sucking critters here started off just fabulously. They would bite me, every one of them a little chunk, possibly in that euphoric state of theirs that prays for me to get malaria. However, I recall they would always let me sleep and at least shut up while stabbing me. Fair enough.
Unfortunately, one of them recently declared war and woke me up. Mistake on their part. Now I have to go after that mosquito and his entire family, his cousin’s next of kin, etc. Wait a minute, I have a simpler solution. How about killing them all? Now when a mosquito protests that he in fact is not from the Miller family whose ill-fated member had been audacious enough to rob me of sleep, but from the Smith family, I shrug. Sorry, you all look the same to me. Splat. Now I am on a mission. We had an understanding, a contract signed in (my) blood about them picking up their nourishment from me in exchange for much needed Z’s, and that trust has been irretrievably betrayed.
It’s kind of crazy when you consider that the mosquitoes here in Nepal will apply to your spiritual senses to avoid getting whacked, as in,
“The wheel, brother, the wheel. Remember about reincarnation. You will be one of us one day. Watch the karma.”
I nod and rub my chin, thinking this guy actually has a point before I paint his intestines with my blood on the wall. Splat. Sorry, fella. You have another mosquito to thank for that. Now it’s on.
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