Oh, Rats!

It was a normal night. The girls had just returned from dinner, the boys were having Bible Study. Anne went home to her apartment to enjoy a book and an early bedtime; Erika and I were at the Mak Staff House, checking e-mail and chatting on the phone. Anne called – she had unexpected visitorS at home...the three of us soon found ourselves here.

Chasing rats. Anne found the first one in the bedroom when she got home and locked it in there. She then called us for reinforcements. We sadly don’t have this kill on video (the movie above documents our second friend), but it went a little something like this. Anne had 2 crutches to use as weapons – one for her and one for…Erika thankfully volunteered promptly. I was, can you guess, terrified. I couldn’t even go into the bedroom to watch them stomp it with the crutches. I instead opted to stay outside and scream in unison with them and hold a bottle of 409 (not joking) because for some reason, I thought it would be the appropriate weapon to use…when the rat opened the bedroom door itself to come into the kitchen/living room to attack me??? Still not sure…But in all honesty, it’s probably due to the fact that since coming to this country, I have used 409 to kill all ant trails I find in our apartment (which were many in the beginning but few to none now that we have set up trusty ant hotels from the States).

Erika stomped it with her crutch in the corner of the bedroom (sidenote: rat blood splatter was later found on Garrett and Anne’s mattress…sick).

Girls: 1

Rats: 0

Erika and I returned home to tell the medical group visiting for the week of our rat TAIL. Get it? Ha. Phone rings again. Anne on the line. “I found another one…in the oven.” Erika and I thought it was a joke. Erika actually thought Anne had baked us cookies for our help, and we would open the oven to find perfectly golden brown chocolate chip cookies. Again, ha. Just in case though, we brought a group member to witness and film.

As you know, and saw above in the film, ANOTHER fuzzy friend was living in Anne and Garrett’s OVEN. This one was FEISTY. It jumped, not even kidding, 2 feet in the air to escape the death trap of the crutch at every attempt. I had no choice but to be in the same room as the rat this time, so I chose to sit on a tiny ledge and film (thus, I am BEHIND the camera, filming poorly – many apologies – and commenting obnoxiously).

I was soon enlisted to share in taking the rat’s life. Assignment: throw a notebook at the corner of the water heater to scare the rat into harm’s way. My feet obviously needed sufficient protection for this hefty task (sarcasm), so I decided to put on Garrett’s size 12+ work boots. Outcome: failed miserably.

My throw was weak because I was too concerned in jumping up to the pull-up bar above me to keep my feet off the ground when the rat came pouncing out...

Long story short, our husbands came home and saved the day.

People: 2

Rats: 0

Codetel Blues

Long time no talk. I blame it on this country. We have been in our apartment for over a month, had Internet installed soon after, but don’t be fooled, we don’t actually have a connection. Just an ugly modem and telephone sitting in our living room that daily reminds us that Codetel (the beloved Internet company) is sucking us dry financially and not providing any sort of service at the same time. Loveliness.

On a lighter note, I will catch you up! Time is literally flying by here. Halloween has passed, Thanksgiving is quickly approaching and Christmas is already all over this country. Dominicans love them some Christmas décor – starting in October. I was still recovering from last Christmas when I walked into the grocery store here and Christmas trees and garland had thrown up everywhere. Feliz Navidad!

Speaking of holidays, we did indeed celebrate Halloween here – a weekend early. We had a medical team in town for doctors’ visits for the students and their families over the real Halloween, so our team threw down a Murder Mystery Dinner the weekend before. It was hilarious. The theme was 80’s island, so obviously I was in heaven. Anne, Robin, Holly and I visited what is a REAL clothing store here to find our costumes. Our finds should give you a glimpse of Dominican attire.

The premise of the game – everyone is e-mailed a character and information about the storyline through the murder mystery dinner website. For example, Charlie was Jamie Buffett (our specific game was Margaritaville - clever). Notice his costume was manmade – clearly, he kept it for less than 12 hours. So, you enter into the game knowing little and you are handed cue cards and scripts to lead you in what to talk about with whom to hopefully discover who the murderer is. The whole night was right up my alley, and I secretly loved how everyone was forced to stay in character. Made for many a laughs. Which are good for my weary Codetel soul.