Fear and Loathing in Hoi An

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Hoi An, 4th November 2008

I've just spent the last two days doing absolutely nothing, and it's been great! I've wandered the streets of Hoi An, sat in the temple courtyards reading my book, and had a few Larue beers with my dinner looking out on the lights reflecting in the river. I've kind of taken a weekend from my travelling, watching films till the wee hours and sleeping in. Only crack in the gloss is all my mosquito bites. People seem to find that after a couple of months away, they somehow become immune, no longer need their mosquito repellent and just don't get stung. I, however, get stung more and more! You say: Impossible!! And I say: I got stung bloody 7 times last night alone! And that was WITH mosquito repellent on, and with enough vitamin B in me to keep several people smelling foul to mosquitoes. Awful little creatures.

Oh, and then of course there was the giant cockroach which decided to have a good search of my rucksack last night. I saw it crawling around on the top of it and was trying to gently lead/push it into the bathroom so I could close the door, at the same time wondering if I should try to catch it under an upturned mug, but it seemed too small for its long legs and even longer 'antennae', so I felt sorry for it and didn't try to incarcerate it. It somehow refused to go into the bathroom, and instead crawled into my bag, leaving me to only half watch my film while trying to keep an eye on my bag as well, so I'd know it was definitely out of there before having to put my hands in it this morning to pack my stuff.
When it finally came out and I managed to scare it into the bathroom, I made the mistake of trying to further coach it into the drain, not realising that the buggers fly!! And fly it did. Right back into my bag!!!
So I spent a very restless night worrying that the cockroach was going to crawl all over me in the night and concentrating hard on not scratching my new mosquito bites. The one good thing, though, was that in the name of revenge I left all my vegetarian principles behind and killed the little bloodsucking pest in cold blood! Ha!

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