The Zoo

When I first told people that I would be living in Costa Rica, most people assumed that I would be living in the rainforest, swinging from tree to tree like Tarzan. I must confess that when I got my assignment, I pictured the same sort of thing (loincloth and all). However, when I arrived at my site, I couldn’t help but liken it to Detroit with palm trees. In my barrio, there aren’t many trees at all, just concrete-slab government built houses and half paved roads. We don’t have monkeys swinging from trees; we have sneakers hanging from electrical wires.

Regardless of the setting outside of my house, I found it to be a jungle inside. My host family had quite the collection of pets: two dogs, four kittens, four rabbits and a rooster. At first, I found this charming, until the latter of these pets woke me up every morning at dawn. I can’t tell you how terrible it is to wake up every morning with a cock in your ear.

The kittens were gradually taken in by my host sister, Joseline. One day a little orange kitten would be at my feet; the next day I’d find a little black one. Once I woke up to find four of them scratching my legs as I ate breakfast. Ania’s attitude toward the whole thing reminded me of my late Mom-Mom’s approach to pets: “Get away! Get away you annoying cat! GO AWAY!” She would then take a quick look around to make sure nobody was watching, and toss a bit of food down to the cat, “here you go, eat sweetie.”

Regardless of whether or not Ania liked the cats, they were quite the financial burden. She could barely feed the mouth of her daughter; to feed four cats was not feasible. So one morning Joseline and I were at the breakfast table, eating our normal breakfast of toast and coffee, when Ania asked us if we noticed anything different about the house. Joseline and I looked around, looked at each other and shrugged. “We are missing a few cats, aren’t we?” Joseline immediately darted her eyes around the room, and then opened them up wide. She looked at Ania who was coyly smiling, then bolted for the bathroom and slammed the door.

Bairón and Memo were laughing hysterically. I could faintly hear Joseline sobbing in the bathroom. I watched the two rolling on the floor laughing, and could picture the scene in my head: the two of them gathering up the kittens in the middle of the night, driving down an empty road, laughing as they tossed them off a bridge. I do not know if this actually happened, but I would not be surprised.

Luckily for Joseline, they let one cat stay. It was the one they called Negra, but had to change to Negro once its balls dropped.

With all of this animal chaos, you can imagine the look on Ania’s face when I told her I was bringing Necio home with me. Luckily she didn’t care. She probably figured that it would be one more mouser in the house. Little did she know that Necio is afraid of mice.

One evening, I was laying in bed with Necio, talking on the phone with a friend back home. Suddenly, out of the corner of my eye, I saw something crawl out from under my dresser. I glanced over and said to my friend “whoa! How could a crab get so far inland—.” The hair on my arms stood on end, and I told my friend that I would call her back. I got out of my bed, grabbed a magazine, and walked over to get a better look. My first instinct was to crush it with my magazine, but I took a few seconds to look. I had never seen a tarantula before.

I stared at it for a while, then took a shot at it with the rolled up magazine. I missed horribly, and it skittered back underneath my dresser. I looked at Necio purring comfortably on my spot in bed. “You are supposed to kill these sorts of things!” I yelled at him. He closed his eyes and kept purring away. That night, I slept like Andy Dufrane during his first night at Shawshank.

The next night, I was laying on my bed reading when it crawled out again. We locked eyes. Neither of us moved for a while. As we stared, I could just hear him speaking to me in the voice of Hal from 2001: A Space Odyssey. “Dave. Dave. Dave, you shouldn’t have done that, Dave. You shouldn’t have tried to kill me Dave.” He slowly backed into his lair. Again, I slept poorly.

This happened for several nights in a row. I would try to kill the tarantula that I began to call Hal, and he would eventually come out to stare at me and threaten me in that monotone computer voice. Sometimes, Necio would walk over to it, sniff it, and go about his business. Worthless.

After about a week of sleepless nights, I finally wised up and bought a can of raid. I emptied about half of the can into his lair and hoped for the best. The next day, I got home from teaching to find a funeral march of bodybuilder ants carrying away the deceased Hal. While I was glad that I could finally sleep, and wouldn’t wake up one day to find a tarantula on my face, I couldn’t help but feel a bit sad for the guy. I gave him a quick salute before sweeping him and the ants out of my door, into the yard.

Not long after the Hal incident, I awoke in the middle of the night to a rustling sound next to my bed. I was sure that it was a mouse. I jumped up and got my flashlight and a t-shirt to use as a net. The rustling continued. I cleared away a few papers, and shone the light on the culprit. I was relieved and allowed myself a chuckle. For there, hopping around my art supplies bin, was a big fat bullfrog.

I threw my t-shirt at the guy, but he hopped out into the depths of Hal’s lair. I cursed and got back into bed. At least I didn’t have a mouse running around near my bed. A frog I could live with. But after a few minutes, I heard a rustling on my dresser. I arose once again, shirt in hand. I flipped on the light switch to find the big guy hopping around my deodorant and sunscreen. This time, I was able to trap him with my shirt. I released him into my back yard. A friend once told me that if cats bite into frogs, a chemical is released that could kill the cat. I tossed him as far away from the house so that neither of the cats would get to him.

Since we are now in the dry season, I have been coming across frogs in the house every day. I would jump into the shower, only to have a frog crawl out of the drain and start hopping around. I walked into the bathroom the other day to find a big one doing laps in my toilet. Initially, I would catch each one and release it outside. Necio may be a pain in the ass, but I surely don’t want to see him poisoned.

Then one evening, I woke up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom. I switched on the kitchen light to find Necio and a frog, side by side, eating cat food from Necio’s bowl. The two looked totally at peace. They even seemed friendly with each other, like two friends sitting at a bar. It reminded me of the time I caught a mouse in a bag of bread and gave it to Necio only to have him look at me, puzzled, as if to say “what the hell do you want me to do with him?” I shut the lights and left the two to their late night snack.

Now, I let the frogs hop freely around my house. With my new pets, I have noticed that there are far fewer mosquitoes in my shower, and I am yet to find a cockroach. They are like nature’s exterminators.

I may not be in the jungle. However, I have found myself in my kitchen surrounded by geckoes, spiders and frogs, all doing the job that Necio is supposed to be doing. Sometimes geckoes fall off the ceiling onto my head. The frogs are consistently bumping into me in the shower. At moments like these, I just smile and say “Ahhhhh, Peace Corps.”