Well “raising the bar” technology hasn’t picked up anything interesting lately. (You best keep-up the chatter about putting a Mozambican in the White House people). So I suppose we at MOVING TO AFRICA should make another broadcast… if we can keep the bugs out of the system long enough to transmit.

This just in: Moth’s Love Maputo!

And Moth Month has been extended... This is great news for all you moth connoisseurs out there (Steve, you’re missing it!). Maputo moth’s, while not exactly everywhere, certainly have taken a keen affection to our apartment building at Rosas di Mozambique. Possible attractions: Maybe it’s the open-aired stairwells that stay cool during the day, Or more probably it’s the massive concrete protection from the Oceanic winds. But c'mon, who are we kidding? It’s the super sexy incandescent lights that illuminate each and every floor, all night - every night.

Now I’m no big bug expert… but if I can recall the fundamental workings of a bug light… let's see, bugs like light, right? They think it’s another bug of their opposite “persuasion” no? It’s just there, constantly giving them “the sign”, except bigger, brighter and way more often than your average bug. Am I off base here? How can they resist? They can not.

Anyway, that’s what we got: A retirement-home for sexed out moths. They travel from far off places and end up at our building, like it's some giant truck-stop for moth's. "Next Rest Area... is Across the Atlantic." So they come, they rest, they stick to the walls, to the halls, to the ceilings and the doors. They don’t move unless provoked… however provoking them seems to include simply leaving your flat to get to the elevator. Man, these things are big and ugly and everywhere! (They call them "night-butterflies"). But they are the exact antithesis of butterflies: dark, dusty, big bodied, big eyed, flying all *censored*eyed unless you’re around- then straight at ya! Our tactics: We’ve left them alone, we’ve battled them over minor turf wars in our quarters. They are a fierce yet mindless foe. Where one dies, another will take its place… like in our A/C unit. They seem to like that best. The slats in the fan are like a series of little bunk beds for them (or probably more like little luxurious condos for them). Besides the ants have the table… best leave that to’em. We do. Don't want to upset the balance too greatly now do we?

So the moths have been with us so long now... I can't really imagine life without them. I mean, just to give you an idea of what we are talking about here, when we leave the apartment at night, we open the door and on average we see roughly 150 moths flying wildly around the light in front of the elevator. They encircle us while we try and lock our door. They dive bomb us while we wait anxiously for the elevator to arrive. Occasionally they sneak on the elevator and hitch a ride. (I swear their goal is to hitch a ride in your hair). In the mornings you see them hanging like mini-vampires sleeping soundly after a night of debauchery. They are quiet, waiting for the night to hurry up and arrive again. In the afternoon you can find them crawling along the walls and floors, vying for position closest to the light of love, knowing it will once again turn on and begin to beckon to them as soon as the sun goes down. Some are actually frighteningly pretty. (I swear the U.S. Air Force got the idea for some of its aircraft from these African moths! Some even come equipped with their own camouflage). Others are just simply as gross as an enormous bug can be. Most are roughly the size of a large cicada! (Ever lived through a "year of the cicada"? I did in Ohio. Not fun). But again, we're no experts (just "ex-pats" - if you're from Boston) ... but some of them actually look like little kamakazi-pregnent-moths that once they hit against you will pop open and a million baby-moths are going to fly out. Haven't quite documented this yet, but it's a theory we have going... you'd just have to see them to know what we're talking here.

However, I must admit that recently it does appear that the Fall season has finally descended upon us here in Maputo.(So we do now suspect the moths will be leaving us soon). It got entirely too windy one night...we could tell from the sounds our apartment admitted during another of its noisy voyages out to see... and it went from a 92 degrees that day to 75 the next and has stayed there ever since. Instead of shorts and t-shirts, we now need to wear long sleeve shirts and maybe even pants at night. The local Mozambicans however, have fled deep into their closets, only to have emerged with an arsenal of fleeces and jackets we didn't know existed in all of Africa!! It's just so cute to see an entire population of people wearing winter hats (and yes gloves even!) when it is barely 2 days past summer and a chilly 72 degrees.

So the moths do seem to be dissipating some what... but that's ok, because during this insect dolldrum, we can always fall back on the security that armies of miniature ants are constantly making their marches up and down our walls. No matter what happens they will always be with us. Yup you heard me. On our walls. In our sinks. Or anywhere for that matter. These little buggers (smaller than any other ant you have ever seen) are everywhere. It's simply part of life here in Maputo. (New arrivals are afraid to talk about them because they think their apartment must just be really dirty and they can't get rid of them). But the funny thing about these ants is, if you don't look for them... you might never know they were there. But once you see one, you look for others, and you find they are in fact, every where.

All you need to do to start an immediate ant farm in Maputo is leave something out. Anything. A cup of coffee, a glass of water, a crumb of bread... or even a bag of "Jelly Belly" jelly beans that were sent to you by your mom. For example, let's just say you might be sitting on a whicker couch, watching a really bad b-grade movie on your computer (that you've seen 3 times already) enjoying some jelly beans... then after a while, you get sleepy and knowing how the movie ends, you decide to go to bed. The next day however, if you find that bag of jelly beans near the couch and begin to indulgently eat some for breakfast (though not quite the same as fudge-striped cookies & pringles)... make sure you actually peak into the bag first. Because as Jamy can attest... ants also like Jelly Bellies.

Next thing I know there is one screaming Jamy on my hands. I follow her cries into the bedroom and find a strewn bag of candy (now on our bed) with about 4 million ants marching around on our sheets! Jamy is freaking telling me to "do something about it!" because she is busy. Then I realize that she is freaking out because she had just been eating the jelly beans and fears that mixed with all the gelatinous sugar that is stuck in her gums and teeth, there are most certainly little ants pinned and concreted into the mixture and "wants them out before they begin marching up and down her esophagus."

So, only about 2 minutes has transpired since the ants were discovered in the bag of jelly beans that was left on the couch. But now they are not only in Jamy's mouth... they are making substantial progress on a hostile takeover of our bed. I'm not kidding! These things already have lines drawn and are making heavy advances towards the holiest of hollies: our pillows. I explained to Jamy that "this was war" and she needed to come out of the bathroom (with or without the toothbrush in her mouth) and help me take back what was is rightfully ours. We quickly devised a plan to get the top sheet off the bed and onto the floor (without "spilling" the ants) while the other grabs the oh-so-cleverly named can of "dyant" and douses the newly inhabited sheet with the stuff.

These little buggers can get everywhere. And I swear that some have even made it into my laptop. So my mac has had some bugs in the system... However, I rest easy knowing that, there are still more bugs in MS Windows than in all of Africa.

But no post about bugs would be complete however, without at least one or two actual photos of bugs.
(Click the photo for a closer look).

This was taken in the stairway right next to where the elevators are:

Once they're settled in like this, they're fine. It's when these military camo-moths are out cruising on patrol when they are most menacing.

Seaking of military moths, this here is something José sent me from DC. It's a photo taken by one U.S. soldier in Iraq while another is holding, what they call "camel spiders". José went on to provide me with a quote from one of the soldiers:

"they chew the dead skin off the camels and humans....they would gnaw on the soldiers' boots! and they are transluscent, and ugly and nasty...."

And with that, I close with the thankful thought that at least we don't have those here in Maputo
(wars or spiders that look like that).