all you can eat buffet

yesterday i got eaten alive by mosquitoes - again. except this time, they ignored my ankles and decided to hit my back instead. i now have 10 bites on my back. they itch like crazy! and it's very lovely of course!

it's insane how much mosquitoes there are here. and deet does nothing to them, so i'm really happy they they don't carry any illnesses. it seems that everyone gets bitten as well. you see women's ankles and quite often they're covered in old or new bites. some people even scratch themselves enough to leave nail marks and bleed... not a pretty sight.

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japan is really weird on the bug side of things.

there are no flies. not even close to garbage. i may have seen 2 since i've been here.

but everything else, there are a lot of. mosquitoes, dragonfly, cicadas, wasps, cockroaches, you name it.

and everything that exists here is gigantic. enormous. scary. butterflies that look like small birds. wasps that are 2 inches in length. weird hairry things with wings that stings. it makes me feel like i'm in one of those bad horror movies, like attack of the killer bee or something. reminds me of those movies i saw as a kid where the bugs were bigger than the humans...

and everywhere you go. cicadas sing. but not like back home or in quebec. here they sing louder, longer. it gets irritating. it kinds ruins the tranquility of a park or of the country. and their tune is different. it's really hard to describe because it's hard to comprehend. but with so many of them, the sound is intense. and for some reason, they're pretty dumb as well and will fly right at your head. perhaps that's why i've seen hundreds of them dead on the ground...