1:17 am

Why am I awake writing this? It’s been one of those nights—thankfully they aren’t too frequent—where at some point I realize there is no way I’m getting any sleep. Sometimes it’s due to vivid Mefloquine nightmares involving things crawling on my mosquito net or dropping onto my face. Tonight it was reality. I recently lost a cat that had been an excellent hunter, both of mice and large insects. Over the past week I’ve come to see just how much he did to keep the cockroach population under control in the douche (latrine). Their numbers have increased exponentially, ballooning in an outpouring of unbelievable numbers during the last day. With the help of Lily, and for a while Dave, we battled in that douche with cans of Yotox, a foul-smelling, surely carcinogenic spray, bleach, a strange chalk they sell here that promises to poison roaches that walk through it “in one to two hours”, flip flops and a shovel. An hour’s time made it clear that we were losing the battle, despite the 100+ bodies in and around the douche. I’d already resigned to using the yard as my toilet some days ago, but now the awful bugs were making an endless exodus into the shower, the yard and the house. Tomorrow, we said, tomorrow we’ll try this icky black grease that Peace Corps gave us during training called Gresil Noir. But for tonight, I set my tent up around the corner of the house, in the farthest point from the douche. After carrying my net outside I saw a sizable roach on the outside and killed it, hoping to myself that none of its siblings made it through the not-so-challenging entrance. My zipper is broken, and I’ve been trying to order a replacement tent from REI’s website, but it turns out the model I have has been discontinued. So for now I either clip the opening shut with clothespins (takes a long time and lets lots of bugs in), or drape an ill-fitting PC issue hanging-style net over the opening. I could just use the hanging net, but it’s getting much too hot to sleep inside. Anyway, I settled in with a book, headlamp and iPod, as usual, and started to drool my way to sleep. I awoke to a sharp poke on my left arm and reaching across with my right arm, felt the unmistakable texture of a large, round form with stiff, brush-like legs. I screamed, and in under a second had found my light and began slamming the bug with my book. In order to kill it I had to mash its body into my bedding using Three Cups of Tea, which, if you read my last blog, still has dried dog vomit on it. I didn’t cry right away. I tried to calm myself by putting on my iPod but the battery was almost dead. I hung my headlamp from the top of my net, hoping to discourage any other roaches that might be hiding in my bed from making an appearance. I tried to read on in my book, but the scene kept replaying in my mind and I thought about how I was probably touching the place on the book where its guts squished out. “That was one,” I thought, recalling a deal I made with myself several months ago. I’d spent another sleepless night after seeing a snake in the douche and then a scorpion in the yard that literally scared me sh**less. I decided back then that I should give myself a limit, since daytime challenges seem to be surmountable and it’s the nighttime ones that threaten my sanity. Three things in one night—that would be my limit. The snake and scorpion were two, if that prowler had chosen the same night rather than a different one to invade my yard… I’d have been done. So tonight was one, and even though I’m now inside, resigned to spending the rest of the dark hours awake, the thought that brought tears to my eyes was, “is this really worth it? Is anything I’m doing making enough of a difference for me to be here, teetering on the edge of my sanity?” Times like this I don’t know. I pray that I am. I pray and cry and grit my teeth, pulling my new kitten close, hoping that I will find some way to make it through all the nights it will take to grow her into something that can protect me. Hell, if I make it through this night alone, that will be a miracle.