Ok, as I said I think I can finally talk about this...enough time has passed and the nightmares have subsided, sort of. Well, it wasn't quite that bad but I didn't think so at the time.
I guess first and foremost I should begin by telling you what a gagamba is or what it means in Waray. By the way, Waray or Wáray-Wáray or Samarnon (commonly spelled as Waray; also referred to as Winaray or Lineyte-Samarnon)is a language spoken in the provinces of Samar, Northern Samar, Eastern Samar, Leyte (eastern portion), and Biliran in the Philippines. You will hear more about their language and accent and the major confusion it caused me and Ma'am Becky one morning, but back to the gagamba which I'm probably stalling about. I do believe I had my first encounter with said gagamba, oh sorry, it means SPIDER. The gagamba and I had our introduction I do believe on my first morning at God's Town. My recollection, although his may be different, is we met on the shower wall. This was my first encounter with all things creepy and crawly in the Philippines.
Now, many of you are probably thinking ok, spider, we have those here and yes I would agree we have them here, I've had them in my house. BUT I'm not sure if there is more translation to gagamba, but if there is it should probably be, big SOB spider. Now I first described the gagamba to my roommate Ma'am Becky as being as big as my head. Ok yes that was an exaggeration at the time for dramatic effect, however to say he was a good 3 1/2 to 4 inches is probably not. Our first meeting went fine and I lived to see another day...
Then came one very, very dark late night when I just had to go to the bathroom. I do believe one of these adventures came during a brown out, meaning no lights in our room or the bathroom area. I had to rely on the wind-up flashlight we had. I ventured in, flashlight in hand and of course I decided to check out the area first! All looks good until there, under the toilet seat, all you can see are "LEGS", numerous legs. My first terrified reaction and probably burst, in albeit a somewhat hushed auditory exclaimation was "oh heck no". (heck is being substituted in case I have some younger readers) I went back to my little bed thinking, I'll just try and wait til day light. And try as I did, I just couldn't so I ventured back and he was still there, at least his legs (all of them) were still visible. So I summoned all my courage and lifted and dropped the lid. Success in the fact he ran, unsuccessful because I couldn't see where he went. So, I did what I needed to quicker than I ever had and high-tailed it back into my little bed, sheet over my head to protect me from any subsequent attack. Once again I survived to tell the tale.
Now surely on the next dark night when I just had to return to the bathroom he would not be there again, surely!! I mean he probably had a lovely family and should have been home with them in the middle of the night. Well no, this time as I shine the light to scope out the situation there he is, yes I am sure it was the same one each time. Trust me you just know your gagambas. There he was suspended just under the bowl. Just kinda hanging out, no where to go, nothing to do but terrorize me. "Seriously" I believe was my exclaimation this time. Then it hit me this bathroom not only had 2 shower stalls but 2 toilet stalls...I would just go down to the other one it was all connected, I didn't need to leave the room. So I pass the sink in the middle, open the door to that stall, shine the light and sadly, I still can't talk about the evil that was crawling on the walls in there. I do believe I found out later those might be the filipino version of roaches. All I know is they were big and more frightening then my friendly gagamba.
Now I of course would again attempt the waiting game but that wasn't happening. Back I go, and sure enough he's still "hanging out" under the bowl. Eureka, I'll flush and down he will go...and so I did and so he did NOT. "Seriously?" I'm getting more frustrated and now obviously making noise because I can hear from Ma'am Becky's bed, "do we have a problem in there?" Well yes, he's back. She has now joined me in the battle. Our plan of attack is to try and knock him off. We grabbed a colored pencil (do children really need the color green when coloring?) and the plan is one lifts the lid, one knocks him off. It was a nearly flawless plan, until he decided to jump off and run into a hole behind the toilet. It appears our friendly neighborhood gagamba actually did live in the neighborhood.
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