Flying Cockroaches!

Last night I was welcomed home by a huge cockroach on the ceiling of my bedroom. And by "huge" I mean the body was at least 2 inches plus antennae that were a few inches long. My housemate came up with a spray bottle of bleach and a fly swatter to help me capture it under a bowl, but it outsmarted us, hiding sort of inside the bottom of the bookcase I'd pulled away from the wall to help us get to it.

So I decided to push the bookcase back up against the wall and just pretend it was trapped in there now. The only other option required too much effort (emptying out the bookcase), and I was tired. Plus, I thought cockroaches didn't bother me. No big deal to have one in my room, right? Even with my bed being on the floor. Besides, it had been a long day with very little sleep, so I figured I'd crash so hard that I wouldn't even notice if it ended up in bed with me!

But I was wrong. I didn't have the nerve to turn on the light when it happened, but I'm pretty sure there was a cockroach on my arm at least once, maybe twice, in the middle of the night. And then around 4:30 in the morning, I turned on my light. And there it was, up on the ceiling, not too far from my bed. I won't get into the details of the chase that ensued before finally capturing it, except for one thing: this cockroach flew across my room.

I'd never seen anything like this! I didn't even know that cockroaches could fly. Not really. My housemate had mentioned that they could fly, but I didn't believe it! Until it happened, and in a big way, all the way across my room. I stood there for a moment, eyes wide, in disbelief, and then laughter took over. And clarity; it was time to go downstairs to get a bigger bowl and the bleach (spraying a cockroach with bleach just slows it down enough to trap it under a bowl). I couldn't have a flying cockroach in my room, at least not if I wanted to go back to sleep.

And today I'm still laughing over the whole thing; I've actually been laughing a lot since yesterday morning, but perhaps that'll be another entry, a "Sheng Zhen in Daily Life" story.... Back to flying cockroaches: When I told my housemate about what had happened, she told me a funny story.

Her daughter and nephew woke up one night screaming and yelling. She and her ex-husband went into the room and asked what was going on. They said there was a flying cockroach. But it was nowhere to be seen, so her ex told  them to calm down, saying it wouldn't hurt them and to just go back to sleep. And then out of the blue, the cockroach flew around the room in a big circle and then landed right on his forehead! And of course he started freaking out. I like that story.

And that's all I have to say about cockroaches for now. Other than that seeing one fly actually is pretty cool.


© 2013 Rebecca Clio Gould. All rights reserved.