Battle with the Roach

Now I don’t consider myself a particularly apprehensive person. I’ve killed my fair share of mosquitoes, ants, flies, and even small American cockroaches without any qualms. But last night was special. Last night I had an epic battle with the roach! Yes, the roach.

I had finished a 2 hour session of MKSAP studying for my upcoming Internal Medicine Boards and had cooled myself down in preparation for sleep. Since the ambient temperature is somewhere around 90 degrees Fahrenheit in my room in Accra you must understand that this took some time.

So I was finally cool, in bed, the lights off, and trying to doze off to the sounds of Gnarls Barkley’s Crazy (indeed) on my MP3 player when I felt something on my arm. I brushed it away thinking it was a fly or mosquito or something of the sort. But within a couple of minutes, I heard and felt something fly rather loudly very close to my head. This I said I had to see. Thinking it was a moth, I got up, turned on a light, and examined the room. On the wall by the headrest of the bed was a cockroach. A 2 inch fat roach busily climbing the wall. My heart started to pound. As I said, I’ve killed lots of roaches before but not such a big one. I haven’t even seen a roach this big. It was so big and so nasty looking that I knew it and I could not exist in the same room!

As I contemplated my killing strategy it flew to the opposite wall. Oh hell no! Oh hell to the double no! Uh-uh! No way was I going to be able to sleep with this thing crawling and flying all over the room with no respect to my presence. I mean since when did roaches fly?

So the battle with the roach begun. I flung shoes because no way was I going near it. But I’m no sportsman so I kept missing and it kept jumping around. After several attempts and having run out of shoes by my side I decided to change my strategy. I said KChie, you’re a human, a million times its size, an independent woman remember, kill the damn thing so you can go to bed! Let me remind you that its 90°F and that my heart is racing. I’m sweating profusely at this point. So I gather myself together and slowly stalk the roach, with my eyes that is. At this time it is scuttling around on the floor and from my vantage point all huddled up on the bed I strike it down with my last shoe! VICTORY!

So now I’m staring at it contemplating how I’m going to get rid of it while trying to catch my breath! A minute passes, then another, and maybe another. I’m beginning to relax when all of a sudden the roach startles back to life and scuttles under the bed. I want to cry, people!

Now the roach is scuttling up the curtains behind the headrest of the bed back up to the ceiling. I jump off the bed and I ran and realize I’ve cornered myself in the adjacent bathroom of the boys’ quarters that I’m staying in. Just at that time, I can see the roach finally reaching its ascent and taking off, like a bazooka, heading directly at me with a vengeance! Aaaaaarrrrggggghhhh!!!!!!!!!!!! Have you ever seen a flying roach? A flying 2 inch roach? A flying 2 inch fat angry roach? Oh my, I was in trouble!

With quick thinking, I swatted it away with my slipper into the general direction of the bathroom door hinge then banged the door closed! The roach landed on the floor. With no hesitation and with no qualms about making a mess I pounded it and pounded it well to make sure it was dead! Then I leaped across it to my bed for safety to examine the spoils of war.

For 10 minutes I watched its lifeless body. I wanted to scream. That’s right! All this time I had not made a sound. See, this is how I know that I’m truly a quiet person. Someone could abduct me and I would just be too shocked to scream! I wanted to cry! I felt so shaken up. So miserable. SO HOT! My heart was still in my throat.

After getting myself together, I found scraps of paper, took in a deep breath, and picked up the carcass. Doing so, I swear I saw it move an antenna. I threw it away in the bin as fast as I could. No I did not take a picture of it! The one in my head is vivid enough!

After 30 more minutes of cooling down and watching the bin for signs of roach life, I turned off the light and lay back in bed feeling my heart pounding less and less. I’m sure my MP3 player was still playing music through the speakers, but I couldn’t hear it. I so wanted to be hugged, to have strong arms cradling me, rocking me gently to sleep. Someone to tell me I’m alright! No such joy! I don’t know how but I eventually fell asleep. I probably dreamt of monster roaches. I am scared the war is not yet over. This might have been a Mama Roach and there might be a battle with the roach part 2, the revenge!

Pray for me!