MOSQUITO V CROCODILE (WHICH ONE IS WORSE?)

To be honest, I’d never seen more mosquitoes in my whole life than last night.

Mosquitoes that had lain dormant through the long drought now hatched and rose from the forest floor in clouds so thick they filled our mouths and nostrils. I learned to draw back my lips and breathe slowly through my teeth so I wouldn’t choke on mosquitoes. When they’d covered our hands and faces with red welts they flew up our sleeves and needled our armpits. We scratched ourselves raw. There were always more mosquitoes rising up from the road like great columns of smoke, always moving ahead of us, and we dreaded them.

Alright, alright, it was not that bad. I just quoted the paragraph above from Leah Price’s account on a fateful night in Congo—from the Poisonwood Bible I was eagerly reading last night. My boss’ wife lent the thick novel when I was spending nights at the hospital, knocked out by two mosquito bites that carried dengue virus, and it almost killed me. However, I only had time to read it 7 months later, with the mosquitoes buzzing around me I could not help picking up the mosquito swatter with my right hand while my other hand held the book where my eyes laid on. Really, you don’t have to be as skilled as Maria Sharapova in swaying the racket here and there, to kill thousands of them (ok, ok, here I am exaggerating again, hundreds), without even have to look at them. The racket rattled vigorously, piercing the silence in the dead of the night, and those stinking animals were falling to the ground with roasted bodies. But boy did they ever cease to exist? No! I now regretted leaving behind my repellant in Jakarta.

Now mosquitoes have risen to the top of my least fave animal list, along with the ugly crocodiles I once saw piling up on top of each other in a crocodile farm. I felt sorry for them to have such a boring life only to end up being made bags. But I even feel sorrier for any naïve girl that had been fooled by an ugly crocodile who disguised himself in a form of a charming prince.

Mosquito vs crocodile, which one is worse? You tell me, cos they both are the same revolving to me.

HENRY’S FIRST JOURNAL PAGE

“today my aunty come to my house at 08.30 and my father change audiotape in his car she wants to follow me to tasikmalaya this night I watc the fast and the furious tokyo drift she has a television but broken my aunti picked up her softlence in her eyes no doubt if she don’t pick up her softlence her eyes cant breath but if she don’t pick up her soflence she can see well she always use a glasses on her eye
Signed, Henry.”

Ha, that’s some of my nephew’s first entry on his first diary in his 7 years of life. He begged for a company before going to bed and I asked him for one more minute to finish journaling, and five more to take off my contacts before lying down with him. He was so inspired that he decided to also write his own journal from now on, and of course he was astonished to see me pluck out a stuff out of my eye balls, which was a good opportunity for me to lecture him on how important it is not to watch TV too close and not spend the whole day with his playstation. However, I didn’t tell him that it was really reading that make your eyes go bad.

By the way, I don’t know his English grade is, but he got 2.5 (0 is the worst and 10 is the best) on Mandarin subject, despite his grandfather fluency in it. And sure thing, he still has to work on punctuation marks.

THE BRIDGE (s)

These bridges are scary, but we survived crossing them somehow. One of them reminded me of a particular song by my fave singer Lenny LeBlanc, that we played again and again during that trip (among with other 5 tapes we took with us).

The Bridge

When I was a boy growin’ up down on the Emerald coast
Fishin’ with my brother is what I remember the most
Now we told stories and dreamed a lot
On the way down to that favorite spot
There it was so tall and gray
We were scared to death
but we couldn’t wait to cross

The bridge to the other side
To a place we were sure was paradise
And the bridge rumbled and it swayed
Even though we were afraid
We still crossed over the bridge

A few years later it was time to leave my home
Traded my school days for a life out on the road
They said I had what it took
Things you can’t learn from a book
And if I did just what they said
I could go all the way across

The bridge to the other side
To a place I was sure was paradise
And the bridge rumbled and it swayed
They said I’d had it made
When I crossed over the bridge

All that I’ve seen and done
Has left me with this thought
I pray that my children
Would find the faith to cross

The bridge to the other side
To a place that I know is paradise
And I pray that if they’re ever lost
They’ll see God made a cross…the bridge

ANIMALS ON SURVEY

Among them were some bunnies in the boonies, some buddy-buddy lambs (anyway we accidentally broke a lamb’s leg with our car, oohhh!), fish in the bathroom, and a dead big fish that I french-kissed!

A DAY CLOSE TO NATURE

Oh happy day! Gone was the routine of waking up at 5 am and drove a lot to do/say the same things over and over again. Now it’s the time to play! For the sake of good pictures, I forced myself to smile when it was really painful to do so (I had three canker sores in my mouth, what a misery! –my lip were all swollen like Angelina Jolie’s, only not pretty)

CAVENTURERS

Here are some adventurers ready to enter the cave full of bats and their guapo. We actually paid the guide to NOT come with us hehehe….

THERE’S MORE WHERE THAT CAME FROM

Is another English phrase I learned during the trip. We could say it on so many occasions like giving/getting a hug, giving/getting candies or cookies, and.. farting (lol!)

Anyway, as I came across the pic of coffee trees, and found an old pic of us drinking at starbucks, I thought about the trees and what they might have said to us if only they could talk.

ONE SPECIAL EVENT

A night before her bday, we had dinner at a nice restaurant where there was also a bakery. I spotted some mini cakes and I wondered if I should buy one for Gina. Linda and I made a little bit plot when she was in the bathroom, but as we were heading for the exit door (passing those mini cakes and bread) she said, “Mmm..maybe we can buy one for my bday tomorrow”.
“Darn!” said Linda. “We were just talking about that.”
Anyway, I sneaked back to the bakery and asked if they could make some ‘real’ bday cake which size was bigger than a bite, and to my surprise, they said yes (remember, we were in the middle of nowhere back then). Then I realized I had no money with me to pay the down payment, but the owners were very nice and let me get away with it. I chose a round blackforrest tart and I told them to deliver it to our room the following day, and we swap our cell phone numbers too.
Back in the hotel Linda asked whether the cake would have Gina’s name on it and I thought it was a very good idea. They only could do it if we ordered the flowery love shaped pink cake with sticky icing all over it. Anyway, it was pretty, wasn’t it? Afterall, Gina always considers me a sappy love kind of girl hehehe

GHOSTLY HUT WHERE WE STAYED

The scenery and waterfalls were gorgeous, but it was freezing cold. I was wrapped in three blankets and snuggled with the gals, but still I was shivering…BRRRRRRR…

SURVEY KIT

(I feel like I should talking bout my last survey trip right now but alas, I haven’t been able to upload pictures successfully these days—so here is another pictureless post)

Things that should be in my travel bag before leaving on survey:

Bubble gum; weapon against ear pain during the flight.

Mosquito repellant; makes skin dry but don’t mind it as long as I don’t get dengue fever anymore.

Face paper; important to reduce the oil on your face during all-day long activity in the heat.

Balinese sarong; just in case the place where you stay doesn’t have decent blanket or sheet.

Anti-bacterial powder: effective to reduce the itch from the bugs (too bad I forgot this on my last survey so now I have lots of scars on my leg from scratching it too hard)

Journal: most important—I’m addicted to writing on it

Books: a great way to spend the time if your plane is delayed

Snacks: good strategy to anticipate stingy airlines who will only give you a cup of water, period.

Me and My Victim (A Sleeping Beauty)

Tee-hee! This is Silly-Willy-Nilly team in action on our last survey day!
“Do you have scissors?” I asked outloud, while my heart meant to say ‘comb’. We were driving back to the hotel from the library.
“What are you cutting?” Gina asked back, maybe suspicious that I would cut her hair wildly.
Anyway, she dozed off while I slowly plaited her hair. I tried my best to do it as neatly as possible like those professional hair ‘plaitters’ in Bali do, but alas, it came out a mess.
I tried to compensate (read, worsen) it by attaching a Swiss flag I got from our fruit salad the night before, and also with some colorful cotton buds.
I could hardly believe that she was confident enough to walk around the ‘oleh-oleh’ store with hair like that, though she felt like a walking thrash can (like she admitted afterwards).
And I could not stop giggling while following her like a tail. Nevertheless, the waitress at a café complimented her by saying, “Your hair looks cute, like a kid’s.”
Now, every time I need a good laugh, I just remember that moment, and giggle to my heart’s content.
Gina, you are totally a bule gilaaaaaaaaaa……………..