By Al-Yasha Ilhaam
I enjoyed watching a battle between man and beast this morning. Actually, it was about six men and the beast was a small squirrel, but still, there was a sense of danger and suspense in the confrontation.
I witnessed the squirrel running along the roof of a house over an open window, occasionally dipping into the room where, from my understanding, a child resided. Not that the child was in any immediate danger, but the effort to remove the squirrel produced the assemblage of a small stick-bearing militia and many concerned witnesses.
Eventually, the offending animal was chased from the house and pursued through a cocoyam patch in a neighbour's yard, only to meet his demise from the flailing sticks of the ad-hoc squirrel-killing committee.
I have had similar situations in the past. Once, a bat flew into my mother's bedroom window. After chasing the bat from her room, she called my uncle to come over and capture it. Well, I believe "Kill the m-----f-----r" was the request."
Anyway, I resolved to help my uncle to accomplish the task, until the bat started to shriek and fly towards us, whereupon I fled and locked my uncle in the room with the airborne rodent. From the other side of the door, I pleaded with him not to kill the unfortunate and misguided creature, but my uncle claimed self-defence as the bat attempted to bite him, and he stepped on it repeatedly with his highly effective Timberland boots before dropping it into the garbage.
On another occasion, I recall a possum taking up residence in a toolbox outside the house, and asking my husband to handle the problem. He called the ASPCA, which is an organisation which helps injured and lost domesticated animals, like dogs and cats. Which is what they told him; "a possum is a wild animal, and we handle domesticated animals, like dogs and cats." So he resolved to handle it himself, walking out to the porch with a blender and a rake. Yes, that is right; a blender and a rake.
So when I asked how he planned to use these items, he responded: "Are you questioning my methods?" Since there was clearly no method being employed, I replied I was not, and left him to figure out how to get rid of the possum, which he somehow did, presumably enticing the possum out of the toolbox with the promise of margaritas, then forcing it to do yard work until it got tired and left.
Since being in Cameroon, I have tried to make peace with the wild animals in our house, the wildest being the two kids. We also have our share of lizards, mice, roaches, ants, mosquitoes and other sundry creatures, and the landlady's dog is the prime suspect in the repeated scattering of the dustbin.
I have no fear of any of these, and even impressed some visitors once by smashing a fairly large bug with my bare hands. However, I have also seen some insects here which look prehistoric, nearly the size of Mothra, and this I do not attempt to crush with my bare hands. I leave FCFA 150 and a plate of plantains outside the front door as an incentive for the insect to vacate the premises, by taxi if desired.
Living in a tropical place has helped me to appreciate nature, and the idea that even the house is a natural environment of sorts. The American obsession with sterilizing, sanitizing and securing everything in sight meets with frustration in a place where the animals and plants grow so abundantly, and where I once would have fearfully called an exterminator to fumigate the place, I have instead accepted the comings and goings of all of creatures, great and small.
In fact, since my one-year-old son ate a cockroach the other day, perhaps the insects are the ones who should be afraid.
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