Commode Collecting

[Elisa Collins]

I've been back for about a year and a half now, but when I was living in the 
Philippines, I had all sorts of stuff in every room of my "apartment" ...not 
just the bathroom.  It was essentially an enclosed porch with three bedrooms 
and a bathroom through the 4 doors across the back.  Whenever someone from 
back home asked about it, I told them I lived in a zoo.  We had two large 
spiders (Pablo and Diego, both missing a leg), a stray cat, a rat that liked 
bananas, a black baby snake, a Lucanid beetle named Carl ( I actually kept 
him in a cage for a bit...until he chewed through the screen covering the 
lid), tokay lizards (ask a Vietnam Vet what he used to call them), small 
lizards that were commonly known as "house geckos", and twice we got to 
experience the joy of the termite swarm.  Someone mentioned that buildings 
in Costa Rica are often open up top, it was the same way in the the 
Philippines...the walls never quite reached the ceiling.  So as we were 
batting away at all the huge termites with our school folders, the numbers 
would go down, the geckos would slow down their munching, and as if we were 
in a video game, all the bad guys from the next level would rush in through 
the opening.  I'm just thankful there was no "level boss".

Oddly, the only leps I really saw were the ones I was rearing.  My 
instructor referred to them only as "yellow butterflies".  I have no idea 
what the species was, only that they fed on Thailand Shower and Golden 
Shower.

-elisa

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