Bed bugs, mozzies, cockroaches and other delightful companions !!

When we go to Kisumu to do our project next February, we are taking mosquito nets with us, so should be safe while we sleep from mozzies ... but I suspect we may well encounter other crawling and creeping and flying beasties !  

There is reported to be a world wide increase in bed bugs   and the experts are predicting a positive plague of them ! 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-11165108

I remember (sorry, reminiscing again !) one house we lived in near Kisumu had bed bugs in the old mattresses and beds left for us (government accommodation ... a lovely old colonial style house) so once we had suffered mysterious bites and itches, bugs were diagnosed !  So we burned the mattresses, and fumigated the house by using some sort of bug killing smoke bombs; and washed the bed frames with paraffin and bought new mattresses ! 

Cockroaches are another matter ... they can and do even exist in English houses, or blocks of inner city flats.  They are nasty and crunch if you accidentally tread on one in the night !   But they are almost impossible to get rid of ... we spent years trying, so the alternative to being completely free of them is to eliminate all you can, then ensure that all food is well covered or in plastic boxes in the fridges ... and yes, cockroaches can live in fridges ... and just ignore them. 

Mozzies (there are at least two varieties in Africa) ... and it is the Anopheles type that carries malaria; the other one, Culex, is harmless, except both sorts make you itch when they bite.   The harmless one rests in a hump-backed posture; the Anopheles rests with its body straight, and at an angle of about 45o to the horizontal !  
 

(I do hope I'm not alarming my fellow companions going on this project !  I expect my English friends that I know are blog readers,  will be horrified !)


I'm not sure about other creepie crawlers that we might encounter in Pandipieri.  I only ever encountered scorpions in the bush; snakes might be seen, and indeed my Luo 'son' Joseph was bitten by one in Kisumu once.   Its possible that hyaena's may scavenge in the shanty town, and pi dogs are best avoided as they can carry rabies.


HOWEVER, be assured that we are unlikely to encounter anything too nasty ... the mosquito is the most dangerous animal in Africa, and we will be protected with bed-nets at night, insect repellent by day, and anti-malarial drugs internally !   And I lived in Africa for about eleven years and have lived to tell the tale !!