In Continuum.

First of all, I love puns. Pun sounds cute, like a snack or a cute little brother. Here is how I see it: Pun is the second child of the family of four, with Punk being his elder brother, and Puny and Pink being his younger sisters. Their parents are Funk and Kink, and Pun is the smart and studious one of the family, the one in the best schools and the best college. OK, enough of my strange and imaginary characters, let's get right down to business. Four Tet got it right with that infectious song that goes "Oh no no, no more mosquitoes!" It's true, I truly despise mosquitoes, though I used to think that houseflies are the masters of all irritants in the world. They are like Salonpas sprayed to the eyes, only they have wings and they can never be gotten rid of unless you squash them with a fly swap. Till this day, I know of no effective ways to get rid of houseflies as they buzz around your eyes and ears, though that is not to say that they actually do any direct harm to you. They fly around animal stool and then land on your chicken rice, but the harm isn't exactly direct either. Mosquitoes, however, they tend to inflict direct harm on you in the form of a small bulge in your skin that itches like crazy, not to mention the small quantity of blood they suck without asking for your permission. At times, they are worse than houseflies, I swear. 

After the recent ant infestation in my house (which was successfully terminated after leaving four ant traps along their trail as well as burning them with a lighter), I had a mosquito problem. I blame it on the fogging downstairs, which has merely drove the mosquitoes upwards rather than killing them. It's kind of like driving all the child rapists from one state to another in a country instead of locking them up. The problem is still there, and they are not going away anytime soon. Imagine a comfortable weekday morning, and you have about two hours more of sleep before you have to get up officially for school. That was me, last week, on Monday when the night's dreams were still lingering in my head. The horrors began with a low humming from outside the window, like a small plane in the skies circling overhead. Then the wind blew in from the windows and brought the curtains up like wings, and that was when the awful stench drifted into my bedroom. They were fogging downstairs, spraying the estate for the umpteenth time in the past month, spraying poison out of those black tubes and then making the estate look as if it has caught on fire. The chemicals floated up into my room and I choked while trying to close the window. It was too late, though, my house was then filled with insecticide. Great.

So for the rest of the day, I had the horror image of stuffing insecticide puffing tubes down the foggers' throats, though it really isn't their fault. I needed someone to blame, I wanted someone to be responsible for making my room smell like a high school chemistry lab. I also wanted someone to blame for all the mosquito bites that I sustained in the past couple of days. i would wake up in the morning with bites all over my legs or my arms, and it came to a point whereby I couldn't take it any longer. Over the past couple of days, I have relied solely on those small aluminum mat to expel mosquitoes from Baygon. You know, you slot that little blue piece of aluminum, thing, into the holder and then plug it into a common socket. It'd then fill your room with a distinct smell, and the mosquito would go away in no time. It has been working pretty well so far, though they keep coming back over and over again. I'd have to check the flower pots in the balcony, since my mother has the tendency to neglect such things around the house. I mean, she even attempt to have water lilies at home in a giant bowl of water - that was a mosquito cesspool, right there. 

My war with the mosquitoes have been waging on for a long time now. It began with my hatred for houseflies out in the fields, when they'd just not leave you alone. Still, the most that they did was to fly around my face and to irritate the living daylight out of me with the flapping of their wings. They never actually caused any harm to me, though they do look so repulsive on closer inspection. Nothing beats the mosquitoes and the sandflies out in the fields, however, they were the bane of any human being's existence. Mosquitoes used to come in swarms, they don't hunt alone out there in the jungle. I remember this one time when I was sitting out in the dirt in the evening, when I thought I heard a platoon of men charging from another side of the road. But it sounded very distant and soft, but it was definitely there. So I waited for some sign of their bursting out through the bushes, but they never came. That was when I figured it out: it wasn't a platoon of men, but the sound of a horde of mosquitoes around me. That was when I noticed the thin mist around my head, a swarm of mosquitoes just waiting to suck my blood out. I've been beaten so many times in the past that I have already came up with my own defense for those winged horrors. 

It begins like this. My standard uniform would be sprayed with insect repellant all over, especially in areas like the inner thighs, the chest area, around my neck, my lower back, as well as my butt. Then I'd apply the SAF insect repellant on the exposed skin, such as my hands and my neck, and maybe a little bit in the face area, especially the forehead. With that done, I'd proceed to put on my jacket, no matter how humid the night may be in the jungles, I'd put it on. I'd tighten the sleeves around the wrists and around my waist, then I'd pull the zip all the way up to my lips so that only my face is exposed. I'd then tighten the hood to minimize the amount of surface area I have exposed to the wild. This layer of fabric then has to be sprayed with insect repellant again in the vital areas, and then I'd proceed to paste mosquito pads all around the jacket. I'd usually paste one on the hood above my forehead, then one on my chest just to get them away from my face area. When it comes to sleeping in the middle of the night, I try to tuck my arms into the pockets just so that they'd not be too adventurous and dive in for a bite. This usually takes around five to ten minutes to complete, and that was what I did every single night out in the fields. A lot of trouble and a lot of work, but it was worth it. I sustained very little bites out there, and it was all thanks to my preparations. 

I suppose the mosquitoes at home never actually met the ones that I killed in the past. I have this sadistic treatment to mosquitoes that I capture, and they'd usually hope to be dead once they are in my hands. Mosquitoes in Taiwan tend to take elevators, and I kid you not. They travel to different floors via the elevator, and then they'd infest the homes slowly and feast upon the residences. I usually live with my aunt and uncle in Taiwan when I go back, and they have three of those electrical rackets that are used to swap and kill mosquitoes. In the case whereby the mosquitoes are alive after being electrocuted, I'd carefully pick them off the metal grills, then torture them until they are dead. I'd either cut off their wings and set them free, or cut off their "needles" or "straws", and let them fly out of the window. I'd like to see how they suck blood without those, it'd be interesting to observe. I'd cut off their legs as well, and have them fly around ceaselessly without any rest. If they do not die from blood loss, they'd probably die from exhaustion, and that'd be fun to see too. Then there are times when I don't feel so patient with these winged horrors, which is also why I'd exterminate them with a hard and swift slam of a slipper. They'd be squashed right underneath, and that thrills me to no end, however cheap it may seem. 

I am, by no means, cruel to animals. I love animals, I love them too much. Mosquitoes, however, I cannot care for. If those foggers downstairs want to do a better job at getting rid of these pests, they really should find a better way because, whatever they are doing surely isn't working very well. I should really start to leave dead bodies of mosquitoes around the house, just so that they'd learn to stay away from the mosquito graveyard that is my home. You could try, try your very best. Even if you enter with a stomach full of blood, you shall never leave my home. Just you wait, mosquitoes. Just you wait. Oh no no, no more mosquitoes.