The Day of the Insects

Before coming to Japan, I was warned. The country, especially in the south, had a problem with bugs. That is to say, bugs of the worst sort claim the country as their own. The fact that there are also humans nearly everywhere has apparently been no deterrent. One might even say that it encouraged them.

Where I live, the south, is prime territory for an encounter. For instance, in the entrance to my apartment (the outside entrance, not the inside) are three large spider webs. And I seriously mean large. Each web is the size of a grade school child. In fact, I'm not entirely sure that such a child hasn't previously been caught in one of these webs. I allow them to live, however, because they are preferable to the hordes of flies and mosquitoes that the webs' residents consume every day.

There are two bugs in particular that I was warned about: the mukade and the suzumebachi. Each one is devilish in its own way. The first, the mukade, literally looks like a demon. It's a giant, red centipede with pincer-like horns (in addition to its actual pincers) and a black exoskeleton that looks like demonic armor plating. I have not yet met with one of these creatures and I hope that I never will.

Here in Japan, summers are hot. Really hot. Mostly, it's the humidity that gets you, but things are made even worse by the fact that use of air conditioning is frowned upon. At home, I don't care. I use it anyway, or else I would be constantly sitting in a pool of sweat. I love the heat, truly I do. But I don't love sitting in a pool of my own sweat, soaking through my shirt, chair, and rug. I've been in hot places before, even hotter places than Japan, but I've never sweat so much in my life. It's like being in a sauna everywhere you go.

Anyway, all of this is to say that classrooms, with around 30 hot bodies in them, get very hot in the summer without air conditioning. So people tend to keep the windows open and make liberal use of fans. The idea is to get a cross-breeze going.

Bugs often will fly in and out of the room. Butterflies seem to be the most common of these. A couple days ago, though, something else entirely flew in. And worse yet, it couldn't seem to find its way out again.

At first, I thought it was a bee. Every bug that you know of back home is larger in Japan, so it was probably just a large bee. So went my thought process. And, I figured, it was probably just passing through. Wait a minute and it would be gone. Well, three minutes later, it wasn't gone. Worse still, the entire class had ground to a halt. The teacher seemed paralyzed and the students, well, the students had essentially become a screaming mob.

I realized that, just like the teacher and the students, I was doing nothing about the situation. Was I going to be scared of a creature that I am 1000x the size of? Was I no different from a third grader? Well, put like that, I decided it was time for action, time for a gaijin smash. There didn't seem to be a fly swatter of any sort, so I grabbed the text book. I would have used my hand, but I wanted to avoid getting stung. This turned out to be a smart idea.

The bug flew near me and I swung my textbook, but missed. The students screamed as one as they realized what I was doing. "Stupid gaijin, aggravating the giant insect!" they seemed to say. Well, I thought, if I don't do it, then it ain't gonna leave. So I chased it to a window on the other side of the class room. As I continued to swat at what I thought was a giant bee, I finally understood the babbling of the students. They had been saying "suzumebachi."

Now, let's pause here for a moment and head over to wikipedia. What does it have to say about the suzumebachi? First of all, it clearly points out that this insect is not a bee, it is a hornet. An Asian Giant Hornet, to be exact. More importantly, however, it says that "Each year in Japan, the human death toll caused by Asian giant hornet stings exceeds that of all other venomous and non-venomous wild animals combined, including wild bears and venomous snakes." Yeah, that's right, the suzumebachi is deadlier than wild bears and venomous snakes.

A few more points from the wikipedia page for your perusal:

1) Its venom is potent enough to kill you even if you're not allergic to it.

2) Its venom is potent enough to dissolve human tissue.

3) Due to the fact that its mandibles are so incredibly large, it can bite and sting you at the same time.

4) It is a hornet, so it can sting you as many times at it wants, just in case it wasn't satisfied the first time around.

5) When it stings you, the chemicals in its venom attract other suzumebachi, so now you get to deal with a whole horde of them instead of just one.

So I think you'll understand why, when I heard the word "suzumebachi," I dropped the textbook and went for a weapon with a slightly larger reach. A fellow teacher passed me a broom and I wondered why no one had given me one earlier. I guess fear is to blame for that, too. Anyway, I eventually managed to trap the killer hornet behind a glass pane and slowly push it outside.

I returned to the front of the class, unharmed and a hero to thirty-odd third graders. Later that day, I noticed that my preying mantis friend had returned to my bike basket. It made me glad to know that he was safe. After all, suzumebachi like to eat those guys too.

~Jeffles

Farewell, Dear August

I have been in Japan for a month. I know this because August has ended and when I arrived, August had only just begun. This also means that summer is over.

For the last week or so, I've had a regular companion on my way to work. I was half-way to work one morning when I realized that there, on my bike's front basket, sat a preying mantis. At first I thought it was just a withered, curled up leaf. In fact, that leaf was two preying mantises (mantisi?), gettin' it on in the summer heat. That's right, my bike was defiled with insectoid love juices.

The next time I saw the "withered, curled up leaf," it was without its special friend. I've heard that a preying mantis will eat its lover after sex. So when I saw my lonely companion, I was a little concerned. What happened to the other one? I never found out.

The remaining preying mantis joined me on my morning bike rides to work a total of six times. By the sixth time, it was almost a friendly sight. Twice it had climbed up towards the handlebars, as if seeking comfort in my proximity. Now, I wouldn't call myself particularly squeamish, but I'm also not that fond of bugs. So even though I felt I was getting on somewhat friendly terms with this preying mantis, I was also well aware of its warrior reputation. Sadly, I must report that I rebuffed both of its advances and did not allow it to climb upon my hand.

This morning I noticed a brown, curled up leaf lying at the bottom of the staircase, twiggy legs sticking up into the air, motionless.

I have read that a preying mantis only lives for 8 or 9 months, so I won't mourn the little fella's passing. It was probably his/her time. It did, however, make me feel even stronger that something was coming to an end. I usually get this feeling at the end of the summer, but this time it seems a little bit different. This time it seems as if I'll never have a real summer again. My guess: that's because I won't.

Today I am the only person in the office. The other ALTs in my town have all started teaching at their schools, but I start tomorrow. As we have spent the last month, all of us, sitting here in this office, our sudden separation is undoubtedly fueling my sense of the "end times."

On the positive side, I expect that tomorrow I will have a renewed sense of adventure. Tomorrow I begin to teach. It will be a new experience for me and I fully expect to be both freaked out and completely immersed in my surroundings.

But for now, things are ending and that's a little sad.

~Jeffles