I swear to God there is a moth as big as a hummingbird fluttering around my bedroom as I type these words. I know you’re all reading this and thinking, “It’s just a moth, geez!” But when you’re lying in a mostly darkened room in a village in Northern Uganda, the flapping of said moth’s wings sounds like a fucking pterodactyl, and the only thing keeping me from having a total psychotic break is the mosquito netting shrouding my bed.
I’ve swatted at the behemoth (pun intended) four or five times now, and I can hear the thump as it hits the wall or the floor. It takes a few seconds to regroup, and then heads straight toward the light of my laptop. I’ve been kicking and flailing and shouting “Get away from me!” for the past 15 minutes now, but the damned freak of nature just won’t die.
I share this in case any of you still think I’ve got lots of guts and an adventurous spirit for doing what I’m doing. What I’ve got is definitive proof of major brain injury at birth, because I have detested bugs and lizards and frogs, and all manner of creepy crawlies my entire life, and now I find myself swatting, squashing or screeching at them at least half of every day.
In 32 days, my contract ends. Wake me up when it's February 1st, cause I ain't coming out from under this mosquito netting until then.
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Greetings Rachel,
I was googling for an image of the monument in Senegal, and chanced upon your blog. I read your latest blog entry (at the time it was Criminally Content), which was short and sweet, not terribly informative. But, on nothing more or less, I suppose, than a lark, I used the index and ventured off to read the very first entry back in May of '07. Of all places, you were planning to move to Uganda? In the middle of 2007? Willingly?
Several hours (and probably 50,000 words) later, I've read your blogs through the end of 2007.
I have smiled, mused, winked, reminisced, laughed out loud (that's LOL, right?), and been moved to tears.
You rock.
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