Noah's Ark

Recently, the amount rain compiled with the number of living creatures that we share this humble abode with has me wondering…is this actually Noah’s ark? Rainy season clearly means rain everyday, but what I certainly did not expect was for the rain to be inside our house. Depending on the direction of the wind, it rains through our windows, leaving rather large puddles of water on our floor. One time, it even rained on my bed, in turn soaking half of my blanket and sheets. I’m sure the beds got a little wet on the ark as well…

As for the living creatures that have joined us, here is a list of past and present animals that have made this place home:

**Bats in the ceiling

**Large Black Birds, which are also living in the ceiling

**Various small birds that eat our food scraps and nest in random parts of our roof

**Very dumb bird that flew headfirst directly into our front window and lost half of its feathers

**Lizards of various sizes that are found in our food storage, water storage, bathing basin, toilet room, and yes, even in a crack in our wall behind our dining room table

**Tadpoles, small frogs and large bull frogs that serenade us to sleep from their small pond, although occasionally do end up making their way to our toilet and water buckets

**Locusts at five distinct stages of development; larva, larva with wings, regular sized locust with wings, and huge locust that is ready to shed its wings, and locust in my tea cup that removes its wings and simply hangs out there…pleasant.

**Several species of ants: small black ants, large black ants, red fire ants, brown furry ants, flying ants, army ants, and all of which like to bite, are poisonous and form long lines so they can travel easily in very large numbers…

**At least four kinds of bees: Huge, fat, round, and loud bumble bee, large black wasp, small brown wasp, large yellow jacket-type-bee….All have been in and out of our house on multiple occasions and we have several hives within the confines of our house. And yes, I was stung for the first time this week by a small brown wasp living in the door to our water closet, and it certainly was painful. I have a large red welt on my forearm as a result. Lovely.

**Mosquitos: really this is the least of my concerns, even though I suppose I should be worried about malaria. But the presence of mosquitos is minimal compared to all these other insects.

**Red Millipedes and Black Millipedes. Are these actually in our house? Oh certainly…the more the merrier, right?

**Crickets and Grasshoppers are pretty much everywhere, and they get swept out of our house on a daily basis, dead or alive.

**Spiders: large, flat brown bui bui (highly dangerous, but we’ve killed at least 5 in our rooms alone and one joins us every night as we brush our teeth outside), the baby version of said bui bui that runs rampant all over the house, and what appears to be harmless daddy-long legs that accompany me in the shower room.

**Stick Insect that lives at our front door, and the praying mantis that has made an appearance in our home as well
**Bed Bugs…in the most literal sense of this term…simply, bugs in my bed. Where do all my bites come from? Bed. Are my sheets covered in small spots indicating bug deaths? Certainly. Is there anything I can do about it? Doubtful. I just tell myself they are tiny and harmless…and then life goes on.

**Flies, in every size, shape and variety. Some that bite, some that sting, some that simply buzz around your head until you swear you will lose your mind if it lands on you one more time…

Are you convinced that I’m living on Noah’s ark yet?
Or should I mention the animals in our yard as well?

**Herds of cattle, some with very large horns

**Goats of all shapes and sizes (often herded by the French teacher who lives across the street)

**Wild dogs that roam through the yard

So there you have it. I live on the ark and one day I think we might actually set sail with the amount of rainfall in our house and the number of creatures that we share our space with. We look forward to the day when we’re all on the high seas together…