The War on Roaches

Okay…it’s been awhile. We have lots of excuses but none quite as significant as just plain laziness. But now we’re rejuvenated from our trip back to the states, and hopefully this blog will be too.

I won’t talk too much about our trip to the U.S., but the trip back was awesome, and we’re so glad we did it. It was great seeing everyone and welcoming a new member to the family. Sarah played her special auntie card whenever possible so she could hold our beautiful niece, Celicianna, at every possible moment. The food was another highlight, but I don’t want to torture myself by reminiscing about what I can’t have. Suffice it to say the people and food were amazing and hard to leave.

After 45 hours of traveling from San Francisco to Jalalabat, we were happy to be home in our apartment. However, to our chagrin, our apartment had turned into a safe haven for cockroaches. They were everywhere—bathtub, cabinets, refrigerator, toilet, and oven. We moved quickly. First we assembled a coalition of the willing (Sarah and I), and then we smoked them out of their holes with our aerosol Raid on high density targets, killing what we thought was the majority of the little, photophobic evil doers. We knew we didn’t get them all but thought we had at least broken their will to stay. After the aerosol Raid, we adopted a clear, clean, and hold policy, in which we cleared all dishes, glasses, cleaning products and the like from the harboring areas, then cleaned everything from top to bottom inside to out, and then we outlined the area with a poison pencil (it looks like chalk but leaves a poisonous powder behind) and Combat traps. Satisfied with ourselves, we declared an end to major combat. However, this war didn’t have the necessary initial funding or forethought. We were so happy with our aerosol Raid we didn’t put enough thought into the exit strategy and therefore failed to acquire the necessary number of Combat traps to sufficiently secure the perimeter, thus letting the safe zones fall to the insurgents. So once again we are fighting the insurgency from counter-top to counter-top and probably not killing them as quickly as they are multiplying. I guess we should rethink our strategy.

Besides the cockroaches, though, we are really happy to be back to work in Kyrgyzstan. We’ve missed our volunteer and local friends here, who after one more year we may not see again. After our vacation, we are seeing the country with fresh eyes, and are really looking forward to spending the next year tackling old problems with fresh ideas.