Hilo Days: Roaches … Eww

Before moving to our Kaumama home, we lived at what would later become known as “Obachan’s House” on Barenaba Street in Hilo, Hawaii. In my since-closed website, Hilo Days, I opened the narrative with a description of the neighborhood and of the house.

Here’s part of that story that deals with my trepidation when it came to nasty dive-bomber cockroaches that are so plentiful in Hawaii.

The “B.R.” Days, Part 1

The house occupied a corner in a right angle bend of Barenaba Street. We had a backyard of sorts. It wasn't really a backyard, just an area full of rocks and gravel with some grass poking through here and there.

The outside clothesline took up most of the space, but I guess the most interesting thing about the back area was the cesspool that lurked below the surface.

There was a small hole (about three quarters of an inch in diameter) where the cement floor of the downstairs met the cement rise of the house's foundation. This was the dreaded "cesspool hole" (actually, it was a drainage that led directly into the cesspool). God only knows what crawled around in this hole.

One day I saw something I'll never forget. I was taking a bath [in the downstairs furo], gloriously enjoying the soak, pretending I was a Navy frogman. I was dunking my head under the water and (ahem) making "nature bubbles" when I just happened to glance at the cesspool hole.

Something ... ye gods ... something was moving in the hole. It looked like two wires testing the air. A shiny thing surreptitiously peered out, then zipped back into the hole. It did it again! And again!

Mesmerized by this strange phenomenon, I forgot about blowing up U-boats with "nature bubbles" and stared intently at the hole. And then slowly, ever so slowly, a gigantic cockroach of a size as yet unmatched made a permanent impression in my preschool brain as it crawled boldly out of the cesspool hole. As if it owned the world, it started toward me.

I feel sorry for those who bathed after me. I confess. After all these years, I confess. I increased the volume of the tub water by a couple of ounces. I ducked behind the edge of the tub!  Gathering my courage, I peered over the rim, only to discover that the roach was gone.

But where had it gone? Did it return to the cesspool? Did it run under the washing machine? Or had it crawled up the side of the furo? I didn't wait to find out. End of bath. To this day, I still can't stand the dirty buggers.