The Cockroach Strikes Back

For the past one week, it was hell in my room... After the discovery of the first cockroach since my return to Taiwan. I had much forgotten about these horrible things (actually, I've gone to a theropy for cockroachphobia before... the only problem is that it seems like they increased instead of decreased my fear of cockroaches). It was big, black, climbing on my walls, oily and staring right back at me with menance (shuttering at the thought). My immediate reaction was pacnick (while projecting a mental image of the cockroach flying into my mouth) and then scream. Call it the first actual concrete example of cultural shock (since the Europe I lived in simple had such a low population of these things...) or a maiden in distress... I screamed, the only problem was, either my screams were not loud enough or the prince just went to bed, no one came to my rescue as I came up with weird ideas such as spraying the damned cockroach with my table wash solution (cockroaches are afraid of soap water, I think... cuz it desolves the oil on their body which is necessary for survival). Of course, the cockroach went somewhere unheard and disappeared. I sprayed the whole closet behind this disappearance with pesticide, thinking that (how foolish) the cockroach would be dead by now (the fact that I sprayed enough to kill myself seems to apply so.

It didn't die.

Several days later, prefereably last night, the 14th of August, 2006, a new movie was playing in my room. It was "The Return of the Cockroach". As I was taking pictures to send to my beloved, Ivo, I was shocked by the entree of "Buzzzzz... (extra sharp on the Z)" then "Slap" the Cockroach looked at me right in my eyes as it stood cleared of shades on the bookshelf right above my table. (Or, in other words, it was on my table!) I gladly accepted a feeling of fright, then disgust, then revolt and finally produced something like... "AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH"

For every cause, there is an effect. For every action, there is a consequence. I wonder why we humans seems to never remember that anyways. Suppose we are just built so, that creates more adventure and excitement in life --> hence I am writing this...

The effect of the scream was tremendous, the consequence was equally disturbing. My sister came rushing with her slippers in hand as she watched me spray pesticide in quantity (also some on my table explaining why I am feeling a bit sick sitting here) around my room chasing after the cockroach (who bested my spray) while screaming like a maniac (the fact that I was already spraying it, already attacking it, already trying to kill it, or that it is running away, it is frightened, it is more afraid of me than I am afraid of it never occurred to me for the one and half minute that I scream and scamed and jumped and leaped. It ran away, or at least, it disappeared somewhere, AGAIN! (My sister stood with awe at her sister, finding new things everyday, eh, sis?) The consequence --> "Do you know how late it is? Do you know how big the scream is? Do you know how frightening it sounded?... etc." a.k.a. My mother thought it was a murder case and she thought that the neighbors would all agree with her and then call the police and they will come and they will find that nothing is wrong and they will have to go through all this trouble just because her daughter is cock-phobic and screamed in the face of a very large, disgusting looking, black, flying cockroach and then she will loose her face. Okay... I should have tuned the screamed two notches down, but before the discovery of a "dead" cockroach... or seeing it actually coffined and taken away, I should not be able to live one night in peace in this room and that is a more frightening thought at the moment then having the cockroach.

Luckily, we discovered the cockroach (or more like I discovered) flipped over, kicking (supposively individual nerve points instead of the central nerves system) and after much discussion with a friend online who claims to be the authority of killing cockroaches, we decided to leave it for dead (and I was to leave the room for over-pesticide... getting sick and dizzy). This morning, August 15, 2006. I cleaned out my first cockroach. This might be the only benefit of having your parents walk in your room at un-announced hours, they check the cockroach for you and then all is peaceful. I threw something like 6 kleenex on top of the cockroach, some kitchen wash solution (oil-free enforced) and swept the whole thing into the toilet (after careful observation).

All is peaceful up on the closet front. From this day so forth, no food, whichever type, should appear in this room without the consent of the room-owner (ME), no soap. The floor is to be cleaned daily, and, well, everything is to be cleaned daily.

Ivo love, why can't you move to Taiwan and safe me? Or better yet, ich fahre nach Berlin, where there is a much lower count of cockroaches... but if I remember correctly, there's lot of rats... Does that mean another front must be opened while I escape from one? (DIZZY)