Snakes and other critters

Sunday 2^nd November 2008

I was talking to one of the teachers last night about an incident on the day of the big flood. Marcus and his girlfriend were on their way home after shopping, only to find the road blocked by all the Saturday traffic diverted by the floods. After being unable to move for some time in the pouring rain and desperate to get home and dry off before school, they decided to ride through the flooded road. Apparently, they’d been home for half an hour when Marcus heard screams from Mai downstairs, where their bikes were drying out. She’d discovered a snake inextricably wound around the spokes of a wheel of her bike, probably in shock after being caught there in the floods. She was so distraught that neighbouring people came to see what the commotion was about and mechanics from the garage across the road took charge of the bike.

The last that was seen of the hapless snake, it was being put to death in the time honoured way. Mai told him that it was the most venomous snake you can encounter here and if bitten she’d have been dead before anyone could help her! It must have been flushed out of its natural habitat by the floods, which is one reason why I don’t wish to go wandering around the countryside!

I’ so happy to live in this clean modern house with tiled floors and walls that can barely harbour a gecko, although it’s good to see these small lizards, only 2-4 inches long, whose main function is to eat insects and they’re really quite attractive.

I was invited to join Mark and some of his best students for breakfast this morning at a new place they wanted to go to, and yes, it was The Garden. It was nearly 9.00 by the time we all got there and we didn’t leave till after 11.00. The music was still as noisy, but Mark has gone so deaf he couldn’t hear much anyway and we enjoyed a meal that was hardly breakfast, more of an early lunch; beefsteak and chips for Mark and a tasty Asian dish of noodles with seafood for me. That's Mr Nhan ordering from our very miserable waitress. She never smiles but the service wasn’t bad. Maybe she has something to be unhappy about They all wear a green patterned uniform very similar to a dress I brought, which raised a smile the first time I went there.

After that I went with Mark to set up the TV at KTV in preparation for Movie Club. He’d asked for a large TV set to be moved from the wall of the Canteen to the Library as it wasn’t being used there, but nothing had been done about it, so he decided to move it himself. As usual, if you want something doing, do it yourself! Naturally this took more time than he’d anticipated, so we had no option but to stay there till 1.00 when students started arriving for the film show. This week’s offering was ‘Cast Away’ with Tom Hanks, who really should have got an Oscar for his dedicated performance. About a dozen people turned up, most of them late, which is usual here, even for classes.

We eventually got home about 4.00 to find Judy Cinderella sweeping the floor. She’d arrived just before we did and while dinner was cooking and we were having a drink in the kitchen, Mark suddenly spotted a snake under her chair! Not a big one; more like a worm, very thin and probably about 7-9 inches long with thin yellow bands. I didn’t get the tape measure out to check. It was having difficulty moving on the smooth tiled floor and how it could have got there is a mystery as the back door had only been open since we came in. I wondered if a bird could have dropped it flying past our back door and the wind had carried it in; who knows? And after all my talk about a pest-free house! I’ve been browsing the web for concise information on snakes in Viet Nam, but without much success. Judy’s taking it home in a box to show her father.