Last week was our tech trip to visit some of the current volunteers and learn about agricultural techniques in different environments. One day in particular, we loaded into vans and camped in the rainforest. We ended up sleeping in tents under a pavilion (which I thought was fairly redundant until it started raining harder than I have ever seen it rain and suddenly our open-air pavilion had four liquidly walls). I felt pretty good about the pavilion after that. The next morning we went on an amazing little hike through the rainforest to look at some of the native flora and fauna and of course take a peak at the lemurs. Apparently, no one informed the plants of Madagascar that giant, healthy cacti do not live in the rainforest and no one informed the marine life that it was supposed to live in the sea. Tree crabs were living in harmony with tree frogs, and snails in giant conch shells frequently interrupted the paths through the woods. It was all very confusing.
Anyway, when we finished marveling over the misinformed marine life, one of my friends stopped me and asked me to take a look at her eye because she thought there was something in it. It took me a few seconds to figure out that the giant slimy black thing that was attached to the white of her eye was a leech, and I may or may not have had to turn around and become interested in an imaginary bird really quick so I could look horrified for a second, BUT then I was feeling ready to tackle the situation. The leech was slimy enough that her eyelids closed over the top of it and it was already securely fastened to her eye and getting bigger all the time. It was definitely going to be a two finger job. Obviously I told her all about the big LEAF in her eye that we should probably try to get out soon. Despite all logic, I managed to convince her that we should probably not wait until we get to a bathroom (with a mirror). For some reason, she allowed me to stick, not one, but two clean-ish fingers in her eye and hold her eye open with the other hand for a solid half minute or so while I fished around for her slimy friend. BRAVE GIRL. Anyway, the end of the story is that I finally got ahold of the thing and ripped it out and told her the truth. And we both bonded over our newly developed fear of leeches in places we didn’t know it was possible to have leeches.
On a side note, I also have to share some signage with you because it may or may not have been one of my favorite things. This was the sign (written in “English”) on the way into the park:
“For reason achaiments of the pipelines on this road
, Disturbances will be provide.
Thank you for your comprention.”
(You’re welcome)
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