A Bunch of Burts

After the scorching temperatures of April, we have warmly welcomed the cooler breezes and mercury readings that have come with many days of rain and wind and storms. The overcast and sometimes drizzly days remind us of home and make us a bit homesick. I know, most people look forward to the sun and not overcast skies, but we are a bit strange that way. Well, at least I am.

Zach likes it too! He is getting drenched in some very heavy rain!

We have discovered that with the rain has come an alarming multitude of bugs! We had a fie dap, a power outage, earlier this week. When we arrived home around 7:30, no power at all, so we went around finding candles and dispersing them throughout the house. As I carried the only light in the house, I was attacked by every flying bug around! They were crawling in my hair, down my shirt and in my face. yuck! After the lights came on, it appeared that every crawling thing in Chiang Mai had decided to move in under cover of darkness! Thankfully they generally stay downstairs.

We have also been amazed to discover the ingenuity and hardiness of ants. Our house is made of concete, from the foundation to wall to floors, and yet, the walls seem inhabitated by many hordes of ants, which have become more brazen the longer we live here. We daily have an ant battle in the morning, among other creatures. That is the real reason I have Greg get up before me! Oh yes, and the bit of extra sleep too!

We are often amazed at the places the ants get into and the tunnels they disappear into that seem to have been dug into the cement walls. It should have been no surprise then when I found ants in my eggs. I do not mean just walking all over the eggs, but they had drilled into an egg and were eating it!

God has certainly allowed us to acclimate to many things here, and the insects are no expection. When we first arrived, a couple members of the family who shall remain nameless, (right Ema?), freaked out at the sight of every gecko and lizard and bug they saw. But now we can all brandish the broom to kill the cockroaches and gleefully wipe out a column of ants with the best of them.

Earlier this year, Ema’s class put on a play about the Pied Piper and I thought to myself, he can get rid of hordes of rats and a whole town of children, how about masses of ants? But wouldn’t you know it, he is never around when you need him, and probably so booked up, he now has an unlisted number!

I do not have any pics of the ant battalions, but here are a couple of other interesting bug pictures.

What appears to be some kind of moss or lichen are many little fuzy bugs. They have a sort of moth-like body, but instead of wings, have fuzzy white ‘hair’. When you touch them, some kind of white powdery stuff comes off on you. They jump too! We have been told that they are delicious too, but will take that as fact without requiring empirical evidence.

This one jumped onto Zach, you can sort of see the shape better here.

Need a place for a science project? We have some great bug studying opportunities here!

This entry was posted on Sunday, May 27th, 2007 at 12:43 pm and is filed under Ema, Family Events, News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.