Memorable moments: Dad's bed bug fiction

Dad and I shared a deep love for the open road. In my late teens, we set off on some unforgettable road trips together—meandering along the Garden Route to Knysna, winding through the sheer rock gorges of the Swartberg Pass, and journeying north into the game reserves of Zululand.

Those long drives were a golden chapter for father-and-son bonding, set to an eccentric soundtrack. We blasted the Hooked on Classics orchestral disco hits on repeat, followed by rousing renditions of Pomp and Circumstance. Dad had his heavy video camera primed on the dashboard to record the scenery, while I was glued to the window with my binoculars, thoroughly obsessed with my new passion for birding.

Yet for all that warmth, I held onto one affectionate grievance from those travels.

During an overnight stay in Knysna, I pulled back my bed covers and discovered a massive, dead insect lying flat on the sheet. Growing up in Cape Town, where cockroaches weren't an everyday household fixture, I didn't recognize it.

"Dad, what on earth is this?" I asked, pointing at the carcass.

Dad leaned over, inspected the beast, and looked at me with an unmistakable glint in his eye.

"Oh, that’s a bed bug," he said casually. "Don't worry, that one's dead. But you'd better watch out—they usually travel in packs."

I was utterly horrified. I had heard dark tales of blood-sucking parasites, and the terrifying prospect of a pack of these armored, palm-sized mini-monsters lurking in the folds of my duvet waiting to drain my veins kept me awake with my eyes bolted to the ceiling. It wasn't until much later that I learned what a cockroach actually was and realized I’d been royally wound up.

Decades later, I emigrated to Sydney. I quickly discovered that Australian cockroaches were a completely different breed: monstrously large, terrifyingly fast, and endowed with the deeply unsettling ability to fly straight at your head.

But Sydney also had the real thing waiting for me.

Ally and I had rented a lovely flat overlooking the water, with the white sails of the Sydney Opera House visible in the distance. Ally’s sister, Kerry, had stayed with us for several months, occupying our spare room before eventually moving out.

Shortly afterward, my mum and Mike flew in from South Africa for a visit. To accommodate everyone, we handed them our double bed, Ally camped out on a mattress, and I volunteered to take Kerry’s old single bed in the spare room.

The next morning, I woke up in absolute agony, covered from head to toe in furious, itchy red welts.

Mum took one look at my speckled skin and gasped: "Oh no... that looks like bed bugs."

We hauled the mattress up and flipped it over. The underside was an absolute horror show—a writhing colony of bed bugs, completely blackened by thousands of tiny parasites and their accumulated waste. While Dad had joked about a solitary giant in Knysna, here was the literal definition of a pack feasting on me uninterrupted all night long.

The most disturbing revelation was that the infestation hadn't appeared overnight. They had clearly been biting Kerry for months on end, but because her skin simply never developed an allergic reaction to the saliva, she had lived alongside the horde in blissful ignorance.

It took three separate visits from a heavy-duty exterminator with industrial chemicals to finally eradicate them.

Scrubbing the bite marks in the shower, I found myself thinking back to that hotel room in the Western Cape. In hindsight, I almost wished Dad’s Knysna bedtime story had been true—because fighting off a visible, heavy-footed cockroach would have been far easier than waging chemical warfare against an invisible army.

Memorable moments: Mid-tackle realization

When I was in my early teens, I played a lot of rugby at school. Every Saturday meant a high-stakes match against a rival school, and to protect my teeth from the inevitable collisions, I always wore a fitted plastic mouthguard.

One afternoon earlier that week, I walked into the lounge at home and caught our family dog, Tina, enthusiastically chewing on something in her paws. I rushed over and pried it out of her jaws: it was my rugby mouthguard, dripping with warm, soggy dog saliva. Since I was in a massive hurry to head out, I set it down on the table and made a firm mental note to give it a thorough, heavy-duty scrub with strong soap later on.

Fast forward to Saturday morning. I was out on the field in the middle of a fiercely contested match against another school. The crowd was roaring, parents were cheering frantically from the sidelines, and the energy was intense.

I locked eyes on an opposing player charging toward me with the ball, dropped my shoulders, and braced myself to make a massive tackle.

Then, at the exact split-second before impact, my brain suddenly flashed back to the table at home.

Oh no. I forgot to clean my mouthguard.

It was sitting firmly in my mouth, right where it always was for a game. A sudden wave of utter horror washed over me, and it took every single ounce of my willpower not to spit the soggy piece of plastic straight onto the grass in front of everyone. But with an opponent flying at me and parents screaming from the sidelines, there was no time for sanitation protocols—it was far too late now.

Memorable moments: The epic spray

I have always struggled with seasickness. Over the years, two specific voyages have etched themselves into my memory—not for the scenery, but for the sheer, green-tinged misery of the experience.

The first was on my eighteenth birthday in Mauritius. To celebrate the milestone, our family chartered a yacht for a cruise. It was a choppy, restless day, and as the boat pitched, my stomach began its own rhythmic descent into darkness. I reached a point of such profound nausea that I actually had fantasies of diving overboard just to end the motion. I desperately wanted to be sick, hoping for that legendary moment of relief, but my body refused to cooperate.

I was sitting doubled over, staring at the deck in a state of absolute "suffer-fest," when a well-meaning hand thrust a large plate directly under my nose. It was piled high with pungent tuna sandwiches and hard-boiled eggs. That was the breaking point. The smell was the final sensory assault I couldn't survive. I scrambled for the back of the ship and delivered an epic, birthday-defining spray into the Indian Ocean.

Ten years later, I found myself on a ferry from Israel to Egypt. The Mediterranean was in a foul mood, and the ship was tossing violently. This time, I wasn't alone in my suffering; the entire deck was a gallery of green faces. I retreated to the stern to reenact my eighteenth birthday, joining a line of fellow passengers who were all projectile vomiting over the railing.

What sticks in my mind most vividly, however, isn't the sickness—it’s the gulls. An entire flock of them hovered in our wake, shrieking with delight. They weren't just following us; they were diving into the sea to feast on our collective misery. It was a sobering reminder of the natural order: while we were experiencing the lowest point of our human existence, the seagulls were having the best lunch of their lives.

Memorable moments: The cockroach koan

In Sydney, the cockroaches aren't just pests; they are armored invaders. They are enormous, incredibly fast, and—for me—a source of primal horror. They seem to possess a sentient malevolence that defies the usual "it's more scared of you" logic.

One afternoon, I found a particularly large specimen lying belly-up on the kitchen floor. It was perfectly still, its legs stiff and its antennae frozen. It was stone-dead. I saw this as a golden opportunity. I decided to use the power of mindfulness to finally conquer my phobia using this harmless, discarded shell of a creature. I would be the "aware space" for my fear.

I hesitantly scooped the carcass up and placed it on my upturned palm. I stood there, breathing deeply, feeling the tension drain out of my shoulders. I felt the dry, brittle sensation of the legs against my skin—a mere physical sensation, nothing more. I focused on the horror, welcoming it, observing it without judgment. Breathing in, breathing out. Gradually, a great, meditative calm washed over me. I had done it. I had transcended the insect.

And then the sucker moved.

It didn't just twitch; it wriggled violently, its prehistoric legs suddenly churning against my skin with a frantic, tickling energy. The "corpse" was suddenly very much alive and clearly offended by my spiritual experiment.

The "aware space" collapsed instantly. Like a scalded cat, I let out a blood-curdling shriek. My hand whipped upward with the force of a spring-loaded trap, launching the creature into the stratosphere. My journey into Zen ended in a frantic, undignified dance across the kitchen tiles.

People say mindfulness can change your relationship with your fears. They're right. Before that day, I was merely horrified by cockroaches; ever since, my horror has been massively compounded by the knowledge that they are capable of playing dead just to mock my progress toward enlightenment.

Memorable moments: The bitter truth

On our way back to Cape Town after a weekend at the Breede River, Russell and I pulled over at a picturesque olive farm. As we strolled toward the farm shop, Russell stopped by a heavily laden tree, reached out, and plucked a plump, dark olive.

He popped it into his mouth and began to chew with a look of pure, Mediterranean relish. "Ooh," he hummed, nodding with approval, "the olives here are absolutely delicious. You have to try one."

I didn't hesitate. I reached for the nearest branch, picked a beautiful-looking specimen, and bit down hard.

The taste was instantaneous and catastrophic. It wasn't just "bitter"—it was a violent, astringent assault on my taste buds that felt like chewing on a piece of toxic chalk soaked in battery acid. I didn't just spit it out; I launched it. The half-masticated olive flew a good five metres across the grove in a projectile arc of pure regret.

Russell immediately erupted in giggles. He leaned forward, opened his mouth, and revealed his own olive—completely untouched and tucked safely under his tongue.

"Ha ha! Got you!" he crowed, finally letting the prop fall to the grass.

I stood there with a mouth that felt like it had been scrubbed with sandpaper, watching him double over with laughter. I’ve since learned that olives must be cured in brine or lye for months before they are remotely edible; unfortunately, I learned it the Russell way.

Memorable moments: The Franschhoek flush

On a road trip through the Cape with my friend Chrisel, we stopped to visit her aunt, Tannie Tia. She lived in Franschhoek and was the personification of "Old World" Afrikaans elegance—posh, sweet, and surrounded by silver tea services and smartly dressed help.

The atmosphere in the drawing room was hushed and refined, which was a problem, because my stomach was currently staging a violent protest. Chrisel and I had indulged in a massive Indian feast the night before, and the spices were now demanding an immediate exit.

I excused myself and retreated down the hall to the bathroom, where I proceeded to deposit what felt like a biological weapon. I flushed.

Nothing happened.

I waited, heart hammering, and flushed again. Then again. The water rose, the contents swirled, but the exit remained stubbornly closed. Panic, cold and sharp, set in. I looked around the pristine room for a solution. I spotted a small bin, emptied its contents into the sink, and realized the bathtub was my only hope. I filled the bin with water from the bath and began a desperate, manual "power-flush," praying to every deity I could name.

After several frantic buckets and a near-flooding of the floor, the evidence finally vanished. I was sweating, my trousers were suspiciously damp from the splashing, and I’d been gone for what felt like forty-five minutes.

I walked back into the drawing room, trying to look "refined" while frantically rubbing my trousers with my hands to hide the water marks. Tannie Tia looked up with genuine concern.

"Graeme, are you all right? You were gone so long."

"Yes, Tannie," I squeaked. "All good. Just... admiring the tile work."

"Oh, thank goodness!" she sighed with relief. "I was worried you’d gone into the other bathroom. That one is giving us terrible trouble!"

I sat back down, took a sip of my tea, and realized that in the world of high-society etiquette, the difference between a "triumph" and "social exile" is exactly three buckets of bathwater.

Memorable moments: Rot and romance

My neighbor Helen was stunning, and I’ll admit, I was eager to impress. During a conversation over the fence, she mentioned she loved coconuts. Naturally, I claimed to be a lifelong devotee of the fruit myself.

A few days later, she appeared with a gift. "I bought you a coconut!" she chirped. We stood outside her flat as she excitedly bored a hole into the shell, popped in a straw, and handed it to me. She stood back, watching with a look of pure, expectant joy, waiting to witness my tropical bliss.

I took the first sip.

The "cream" was... unique. It tasted distinctly "off," with a metallic, slightly fermented tang that grew more aggressive with every swallow. But Helen looked so happy—so proud of her selection—that I couldn't bring myself to break the spell. I channeled every ounce of my inner composure and drained the entire thing, hiding my mounting nausea behind a polite smile.

"Now," she said, her eyes gleaming, "let’s eat the flesh together!"

She grabbed a nearby stone and cracked it open on the pavement. We both leaned in.

The interior was a horror show. Instead of pristine white meat, the inside was a void of jet-black, fuzzy rot. It looked less like food and more like a biological experiment gone wrong.

Helen recoiled, then turned to me with a look of genuine alarm. "Graeme! It’s putrid! Why on earth didn't you say anything!?"

I just stood there, my stomach currently hosting a small colony of ancient mold, realizing that while I’d set out to be a "smooth" neighbor, I’d actually just become the world’s most polite victim of food poisoning.

Memorable moments: The Rajasthani quicksand

In 1997, I was on a grueling overnight bus journey through the desert of Rajasthan. In the middle of the night, the bus groaned to a halt for a toilet break. Being rural India, there were no facilities; the passengers simply vanished into the darkness to find their own "private" spots.

I decided to walk about fifty metres away from the road to ensure total solitude. I found a promising-looking patch of ground, stepped off the verge, and promptly sank thigh-deep into a thick, sucking sludge.

As I struggled to extricate my leg, an unimaginably foul stench hit me. I realized with a jolt of pure horror that this wasn't mud—this was the desert, after all. I had just stepped into a communal, open-air cesspit. I was thigh-deep in human excrement.

Desperate and gagging, I spotted a large open barrel of water nearby. I spent ten frantic minutes scrubbing the filth off my skin, only to be joined by a local gentleman who walked up and calmly began washing his backside in the same water. It was then I realized I was performing my emergency surgery in the local "bottom-washing" station.

With my pride in tatters and my trousers and shoes beyond saving, I threw them into the desert night. My own luggage was buried at the back of the bus, but Ally’s bag was within reach.

I spent the remainder of that long, dusty journey barefoot, smelling faintly of the "communal barrel," and wearing a pair of Ally’s very skimpy, very tight shorts. The bus driver didn't ask any questions about my new wardrobe, presumably because the smell was enough of an explanation.

Memorable moments: The Jaisalmer spit-shine

In 1997, Ally and I were backpacking through Rajasthan, India. We found ourselves in Jaisalmer, the "Golden City," and signed up for what we imagined would be a majestic three-day camel trek through the Thar Desert.

The reality was a bit more abrasive. Our camels were incredibly bad-tempered, and the seating was a masterclass in discomfort. However, the desert scenery was spectacular, and as the sun began to set on our first night, the vast, shifting dunes almost made the saddle-soreness worth it.

Our expedition leader, a local man of practical habits, began preparing dinner over the campfire. As he was plating up, he noticed one of the metal dishes wasn't quite up to his standards. With a loud, guttural clear of his throat, he delivered a hefty spray of spit directly onto the plate, then gave it a vigorous buffing with his filthy shirt sleeve.

We watched in paralyzed horror as he piled our food onto the "cleaned" surface. But, being young, exhausted, and absolutely starving, we ate every last bite.

The consequences arrived with the morning sun. As we set off the next day, Ally’s stomach decided to stage a full-scale revolt. She signaled that she had to get off, and the camel performed its awkward, jarring "press-up" maneuver to kneel in the sand. Ally dismounted, threw up, and climbed back on. A few hundred yards later, the process repeated. Press-up, dismount, vomit, remount.

Eventually, the sheer physical labor of the camel’s gymnastics became too much to bear. Ally simply said, "Fuck it," and began projectile vomiting directly from the height of the camel’s hump. I have never seen her so sick. We eventually limped back to the Jaisalmer Fort, where she spent the next several days in a darkened room, recovering from the most scenic—and hygienic—disaster of our lives.