horrific moment # 481

I have become used to things in Thailand. No toilet paper? I have a hose. Ants in your rice? Take them out. Fork falls on the ground, wipe it off. Brush your teeth with the water, just don' swallow it. Dogs everywhere, no problem. No rules of the road...who needs them anyway!?

But last night the most terrible thing happened to me. Anyone who knows me know I have had a constant psychological battle with geckos since the day I moved here. In Canada I didn't like mice, bats, spiders or anything that isn't a pet, really. So coming here, and the thought of animals that I don't know touching me makes me cringe.

I remember at my first apartment in Phuket when I would come home late at night the geckos would be festing on the flis on my door. I wouldn't go inside. I would simply wait until they went away...most often quite a long wait.

But last night was the worst ever. As I got home around 7pm, I was holding my glasses in one hand and a plastic bag with dog food in it in the other one. Somehow, somewhere, from the heavens, a gecko fell from the sky and ran INTO my shirt, up my sleeve, ran around for a bit until I realized what was happening. I screamed like in a horror film, threw the glasses and the dog food, and then the gecko made its way into my skirt, ran down my leg, and stopped. It turned around, looked me in the eye, and I do believe it smiled before running away into the night.

I showered three times and hardly slept a wink last night.