The Great Ant Massacre

For the past month or so there's been a marked increase in the ant population in my hut. They especially enjoy living under and on my spice shelf and under and in my food trunk. Lately they nestle their larvae amongst my packets of ramen and tea.

The other night I heard something rustling in my "kitchen corner." I got up to check it out, assuming it was something like a cricket or a lizard. It was a huge swarm of tiny ants all over the floor and in my shelves. I cringed inside but went back to reading, ignoring the problem in true Senegalese fashion. (I'm so integrated!!)

Later I got up to make tea, as I often do when I'm bored. While waiting for the water to boil the little turds kept swarming up my legs. Then I had a brilliant idea:

Operation F Off:
Enemy: Ants
Allies: Spiders
Weapons-of-choice: Boiling water, woodash

I grabbed my kettle of boiling water and ambushed the ants under the trunk. I pushed the trunk aside and drenched parents and larvae alike in scalding water. My heart softened and my resolve faltered when I watched survivors struggling to pull their mangled offspring to safety under the cement floor. Moments later their pathetic little lives came to an end under my flipflop.

The trunk ants were in retreat. I launched a counter attack on the shelf ants. I water bombed the base of the base of the shelves, forcing the ants to crawl up into the spider webs. (The spiders and I had struck an uneasy truce.) In a final stand I used my knowledge as an agriculture PCV and threw a layer of woodash over everything. Ants have soft bodies, and wood ash has microscopic jagged edges so in theory ants can't walk across it. I question this as they still manage to get seeds out of my veggie pepenieres.

I sighed and retired to my bed, satisfied that the enemy had been subdued at least for the night. The has been but one small battle in a never ending war that I can't win.