(1022) Bed bugs

We are in the age of uber, grab and a b & b. In a sense it is wonderful about sharing the planet's dwindling resources. Yet, what about bed bugs?

I well remember that to go to the fifty cents Saturday morning movie one has to bring a stack of newspaper to cover the wooden bench. That was in the mid-seventies. Else the unlucky person(s) would have a row of bumps to show and to scratch.

In the early eighties a college friend of mine spent a year earning money teaching English in Taiwan. She had much fun learning Taiwanese Chinese ways. After living frugally for a year, she had a nest egg to go backpacking in China, India, Indonesia, Thailand... By the time she came to visit me, she looked like a very poor and dirty hippie woman. After a stint in Java living on US$1 a day, her hair was full of lice, her clothes were full of bed bugs. Lucky Jennifer found an empty flat in Singapore to de lice and de bug. She shampooed her hair twice a day with medication, the next day she cropped it real short. Before that meeting, I had never seen her with short hair. Simultaneously she would boil all her clothes and bedding in turn over a stove. Don't ask me how she found a utensil big enough, she probably borrowed a converted kerosene tin like what my mum had for boiling dumplings in the fifth month of the lunar year. I truly admire that kind of guts my white friends have. Until today I have seen less of Asia than her, and you cannot assume I don't like to travel.

Of late, with a lot of traffic and lots of people staying in homestays, I kept hearing of homes being invaded by bed bugs. There was Wendy, a professional translator. All the bed rooms in her house were infected. Believe it or not, she even changed all the bed room furniture in every room. No cure! Apparently bed bugs hide in books and can survive for months without a drop of blood. They eat human skin fragments in an occupied or empty house.

There is Delia, my daughter's youth group friend, her home was invaded twice. It took pest control to rid the last bug. The interesting part is Delia and her husband had not travelled for at least four years. They have young children under the age of four. My husband said that all it took is to have a part-time cleaner lying on one of the beds for five minutes to transmit a few bugs. What do you think?

My brother's sister-in-law spent at least $10,000, changed her master bedroom ceiling, every stick of furniture in two bedrooms. Prior to the bug invasion, she went to a few Asean countries with her family. They chose low price accommodation. Normally it is alright if we aren't particular about comfort. All we need are: a clean bathroom, fresh sheets on the bed and a ceiling fan. Yet who would
have thought that a budget trip would lead to months of fighting with nocturnal creatures which would be difficult to rid of.