Fruit Flies and People

Do fruit flies like dish washing soap? We seem to have a worsening infestation in our kitchen, but as far as I can tell, they are attracted to clean dishes. When you walk into the kitchen and head to the sink you see them all there, sitting on our clean dishes. This, of course, makes us wash all dishes twice because no one wants to eat off a dish on which a bug has been sitting and doing God knows what. Seriously though, what could be attracting them? We wash our dishes immediately, we store all food waste in an air tight container and take it out to compost every night (then we thoroughly clean said container). Heck, we store all food in air tight containers because of the ants. The flies do not seem at all interested in the trash or the stove. Just the clean dishes. Weird.

Seems like bugs arrive only in swarms here. I haven’t see a flying ant in a while (tapping on wood and spitting over my left shoulder as I write that). But now we have fruit flies. Of course, the regular ants are always here and Bob has a wife now. Oh that is a good story. So I’m quietly taking my evening shower and washing my hair when suddenly, and much to my surprise, Bob’s wife jumps out of the lower faucet in the shower! Now, I know the cockroaches live in the drains, but I was not prepared to have a giant cockroach jump out of the drain.

I call her Bob’s wife because she is slightly smaller than Bob. That is sexist I realize (especially in the fact that I haven’t even given her her own name!), but this is what came out when my head hit the ceiling from my jump of surprise. I also understand that in the bug world Bob could actually be the female and Bob’s wife could be the male in their relationship. Bugs are cool that way.

We have a new, part-time roommate. I jumped to this topic from Bob because when I was talking to Ruth about the bugs in the house she mentioned her hatred for cockroaches and I told her I should introduce her to Bob. The jump from cockroaches to the new roommate is not meant as a statement about the new roommate.

Anyway, Ruth is from Ireland and she is here doing an internship with the psycho-social team. She is completely volunteer (no pay), but requested housing when she learned staying with her friends meant a three-hour commute both ways! But she works in Galle a lot too, so that is why I’m calling her part-time. Plus she is only here for three months and one has already passed. Yes, this is the person that was supposed to show up weeks ago, but they sent directly to Galle instead (after we cleaned the room, of course). Anyway, that all worked out because it meant the room was already clean for her when she did show up. She seems very nice. She is a nurse in Ireland and is studying disaster relief (thus the internship). She too isn’t doing exactly what she expected here, but three months enjoying life in Sri Lanka is still pretty good. She’d been to Sri Lanka before, so she already knows a lot about the place.

I met some Americans the other night. My dear friends Kristine and Joe put me into contact with a classmate’s of Joe who is Sri Lankan and he arranged a meal for me with some other Tuft Alums. It was lovely. The conversation was interesting and we ate at Mango Tree, which is quickly becoming my favorite restaurant in Colombo (Indian food). I just have to get them to understand that my bike is like a car and they shouldn’t worry about me using it to get to and from Colombo. I feel bad having them drive me home – I don’t live close to Colombo. Timing wise it takes about the same amount of time for me to bike the route. Anyway, the point of mentioning this is that this couldn’t have been better timed because I may now actually have plans for Thanksgiving. I was planning to make a pumpkin pie to eat by myself in celebration, but it would be better to share with others. Boy I’m starting to sound sad.

And speaking of sad, the last of the departing Aussies leaves tomorrow. I’m very sad as this Aussie is my work buddy. Yep, Jodi is departing Sri Lanka. She did get me a new work buddy before departing. SEDCO, the marketing arm of Sewalanka, hired Ben to help them. Ben is in Sri Lanka because his mom is the head of USAID, but he needed something to do. Anyway, it will be good to have someone to talk to. Plus I do still have Aya and everyday her English improves. I hope to soon have real conversations with her.

Wow, what started out as a short post on insects became rather long. I’ll stop here before I bore you all to tears (oops, too late) on the details of my life.