Roach runner

What India trip is complete without my fleeing a room in utter terror thanks to Mr Muchad? This time was no different. A different house... a different setting. S and I were just going to turn in for the night. I went to adjust the AC and I'd taken off my contacts. So you know what that means. I couldn't precisely see small things. Which means I couldn't see very clearly that the big, brown blob was indeed a cockroach. All may have been well if S didn't actually call my attention to it... as they say ignorance is bliss. But once he did, in a matter of milliseconds I'd fled the room.

A few minutes later, S came out to assure me that he had chucked the intruder into the attached bathroom. After a few minutes of coaxing, I entered the room tentatively, still bleary-eyed. In one quick motion, I dragged the doormat and stuffed it into the crack under the bathroom door. Convinced that the roach was locked in, I went to bed, a cautiously peaceful woman. It was bout 5 minutes later I was jolted into full alert by the click of a light. It was S going to the bathroom. Was he kidding me? I snapped up and grabbed by glasses, this time to make sure my vision wasn't handicapped and trained my eye on the bathroom door. Nothing. But it in that instant, in that second with the light flooding out from the bathroom door, I knew there was something that wasn't supposed to be. Some movement. Some muchad. I spun to my left and realized in horror that my intuition was spot on. I saw the monster cowering by the wardrobe door, shrieked and fled once more. Turns out S had let the beast be and tried to fool me into sleeping. And as I would have it, only one of us could be in the room - me or the roach. Turns out, it was the roach.

AppRoach

Why is it that sooo many of my posts revolve around my entomophobia? Maybe 'coz of the phobia itself.. But whatever the reason... the insects, especially the one starting with C have wreaked havoc in my life at many important moments showing themselves at places they are least welcome.. like the wedding.

So, we were done with all the thaali tying.. and for anyone who's observed the typical TamBrahm wedding (or been in it themselves), they know that the homams all involve the men primarily and the bride has nothing better to do than symbolically hold hands once in a while and stare at the crowd to catch the many familiar faces and nod thanks to all the pouring congratulations. There we were.. seated in the pristine setting among a blazing fire, melting ghee, many veshti clad vaadhiyars and a lot of smoke and sweat. And the vaadhiyar pulls out the dried varati (cow dung cakes) to feed the fire... and guess who's seated on top of that? None less than 5 huge cockroaches. While they scatter in all directions (3 in mine) from the heat, my panic surges in a microsecond and I realize that I have lost my voice... The priest is trying to calm me down.. and I am caught in the dilemma of fleeing the mandapam lest they get into the madisaar and of drawing some significant attention which would do something to rid them. My F-I-L was shocked at my panic and S (busy with all the homams) hadn't a clue why I was screaming frantically and half jumping on his lap. They dispersed without much ado. Thankfully they weren't the muchad variety. Even then I marveled at their making their presence felt shortly after the most important moments of my life... Some species just don't get that they are never wanted... Hmph.

Roach Rundown

I patted down the final 1-rupee stamp of the day on the invitation envelope. I marveled at the work me n my dad had done. Mom asked me to count them up. 76 invites. 1 hour. Not bad at all. My granny handed me the mug of my nightly milk which is a kind of a habit here in India. I stacked all the envelopes to my right and then proceeded to sip my milk. My dad was sitting right opposite me and suddenly I caught the movement and the fear that ensued in his eye. In an instant, I'd jumped up, spilt half the milk - half on the ground and half on the stack of envelopes and fled away to the bedroom and banged the door shut. That movement could only be caused by the flutter of what we called a muchad - the baleful, disgusting flying cockroach. People who know me enough know that I am absolutely terrified of cockroaches of most varieties when they are big and the fear multiplies when they can fly. I stayed in with my ears trained on what was going on outside. My dad who is as petrified as I am had fled some place with a view where he could guide my patti - the only heroine in the story - capable of catching the monster. I heard the shouts of "anga paarungo.. on the curtain.. on the kitchen door, ulla", etc. before I heard the clang of vessels from the kitchen. It was inside there now. A few minutes later I heard Patti's triumphant knock on the bedroom door to announce to me that yet again she had won.

I walked out and surveyed the damage that I had wreaked during my escape from the roach. 5-6 addressed invites completely ruined, 3-4 that required drying and 5 unaddressed new ones completely ruined. Of course they say, don't count your chickens before the eggs hatch.