malariainsomnia

Mosquitoes. The warriors of the Amazons. The only place in the US that compares is St Simon's Island, Georgia where old wooden churches are built on top of mangrove swamps.

At least in Georgia, they speak your language.

Here they are organized and tribal. They are bigger, or worse, invisible and then only identifiable by the fever you develop three weeks later; malaria, dengue, la uta.

One afternoon while a bunch of us were camping along Rio de Piedra, Mario developed chills and then fever and had to forgo the southern hemisphere astros for the warmth of his tent. 'Rub alcohol on your forehead', 'drink some tea' were the remedies, and the following day he was well... For 48 hours. Because then the symptoms repeated themselves. Chills and fever, then gone. I didn't look at the confirmation on my Peruvian friend's faces as I said out loud, "These are the symptoms of malaria."

Well, that was 3 weeks ago and for better or for worse Mario didn't get any more strange fevers or the number 1 tropical disease. Not this time. I won't say he wasn't a little disappointed.

I, on the other hand, having received strict mandate from the prestigious Duke travel clinic, am taking Mefloquine, malaria's drug nemesis. It says to stop taking it if I go crazy, aka, get paranoid, think the world is against me, have exploding diarreah.

None of that. But it does wake me up at 3 a.m. every morning, before even the roosters who wake up before the barking dogs who wake up before the motos who wake up before the riotously loud salsa music next door, which is WHEN I'd like to wake up. But instead I am wide awake at 3, debating the topics of free trade and fair trade (look for this in an upcoming blog entry).

There is nothing to do at 3 am. My mom says that is sacred conversation time. My dad says it is ice cream time.

I can't sleep so I think about sacred ice cream.

I have a friend who got malaria in Africa in the 90s. She is normal and has normal children. The Peruvians say there is no malaria here. That they haven't seen a tourist case in decades. I leave the jungle in 5 days and from there on will be in climates and altitudes unfriendly to the insect picante. In the meantime, my active nonviolent strategy will be the drug mefloquine and sacred ice cream.