Those days, in the mid-eighties the nights used to get really
hot and sticky. The fan would be whirring at top speed but would prove
ineffective in its attempt in cooling the room. Air conditioners were a thing
completely unheard of then. And to add further misery to my plight every night
I would indulge in a bitter fight with the mosquitoes. Come morning and I would
be left with red, blob like blisters all over my face, my hands and legs which
obviously declared who had won the battle the previous night. My poor Dad would
unfailingly spray from the can of Bagon Spray every night and it would leave me
with a joy so profound to see the sight of them dropping dead one by one, once
the poisonous fumes were inhaled. But the wretchedness of the whole situation was
that the wrath of those fumes would escape a certain breed of mosquitoes that were
expert in hiding in every nook and cranny available, and who made their
presence felt only once the rooms would get engulfed in darkness.
With limited access to television watching those days and
ground rules observed on playtime deadlines in the evenings, I would often be
left with a lot of spare time to indulge in. So, one of my favorite quirky
pastimes would be killing those low life brutes. It used to happen before
leaving for school, in the evenings after I came back from play, while having a
bath and so on and so forth. Thump, thump, boom, bam the noises were heard around
all the time. There was a day when I touched a record of killing 434
mosquitoes. Okay! I just made that up. But the fact of the matter is that I had
taken upon myself as a mean challenge to kill as many of those blood sucking
creatures and every single day for a week or so I used to diligently maintain a
count of the mosquitoes I had killed.
Most of the houses then had thin pale blue nets covering the
window sills. In the evenings when the sky would turn azure and dusk would
settle in there would be a shimmering dotted layer of grey which would cloud
the blue nets. On closer inspection it would turn out to be the mosquitoes that
would be clinging on to the nets as though their life depended on it, flapping
their tiny wings with all gusto. They seemed to be a talkative bunch with their
non-stop incessant buzzing.
I would immediately get on to the task of shooing those
little monsters with whatever little I could lay my hands on. Some occasions it
would be mother’s red duster lying around, on other days Dad’s morning
newspaper and there were times when my plain hands would do justice of killing
the pests.
One fine morning I had woken up earlier than usual and was
standing at the balcony enjoying the sight outside my window. The birds had
engaged themselves in some mindless chatter and the squirrels were busy scampering
up and down the tree tops chasing each other while playing a game of
peek-a-boo, displaying a devilish grin once they reached on top of the highest
branch, proudly flashing their bushy tails.
My morning reverie was instantly shattered when all of a
sudden I heard a grrrrring noise coming from the far end of the building which
sounded like an ancient car in its last stages moaning itself to a slow death. The
deafening noise made the birds flap their wings vigorously and the squirrels
ran to seek shelter within the narrow alcoves formed in the trunks of the
trees.
To my surprise, I caught sight of this lanky, young man
announcing his arrival with all pomp and glory by carrying a fog machine that
resembled a mini cannon. .
He wasted no time in aiming the nozzle of the fog machine at
every possible direction; it was aimed at the mangy growth of shrubs nearby, in
and around the drains, underneath the cars parked one besides the other, the watchman’s cabin; he even managed to point the nozzle inside the deep
crevices of the moss covered walls. With slow easy movements, he approached the
backside of our building and within minutes a gush of white smoke made way into my living room,
the bedroom and I could even see a thin film of smoke slyly seeping through the
closed door of the bathroom.
I darted out of the house with a spring in my step, my joy
knowing no bounds and followed my so called “Savior.” The thick foggy milky
white fumes came spilling out of the machine in full roar making me drench in a
complete mist of haze. For several seconds I simply stood there with a smile on
my face, letting the whole blanket of fog and mist envelope my mind and senses.
For a moment I pitied his job. Imagine roaming around with a
heavy weight and lugging it all day long in the trapped heat of the summer.
Also notwithstanding the fact was the constant drone of noise that accompanied
him. I would have happily traded his job
with mine, although at that point I didn’t hold any. My only job was to study,
and if that meant skipping the boring logarithms and geometry theorems, I
wouldn’t have minded trading it with the noise and slaving in the hot sun;
keeping only one goal in mind which was to put an end to the incorrigible
pests.
Later, the rest of the day passed without the sight of a
single mosquito around but I out of sheer habit kept looking behind my shoulder
every now and then trying to catch the familiar sight of the mosquitoes buzzing
around me.
So that was the end of my mosquito saga and that night in
particular I drifted into my first ever soundless sleep.
Leaving you all with a quote from the great Dalai Lama which makes absolute sense
So all you wonderful people out there, do you have a
mosquito story tucked in some corner of your memory? I would love to hear it.
