Yet Another Plague...

The more I read of the Bible and the more I see of Sudan, the more I see very clear comparisons between some of the ancient civilizations and this one…namely in the matter of curses and judgments. Disease, violence, famine, floods, and starvation are all common in the Bible. You might remember reading about a termite plague earlier this year. Well, over the last few weeks, we have been experiencing another kind of plague—frogs.

There are literally frogs everywhere. With almost every step you take, some poor little frog jumps out of the way of your foot…and sometimes they accidentally jump INTO the way of your foot. Every day, we go into our shower and squeegee out the frogs before showering…only to find the remnant hanging out in the corner, ready to jump at you the first time they get splashed. Most of these frogs are small (none really big enough for frog legs! :)). They are just little guys, and they really won’t hurt anything. But they are just plain annoying at times. For instance…

The other night, Jennifer and I were hanging out in the room before bed. I was sitting at the computer and she was reading a book. All of a sudden, I saw something fall and then Jennifer jumped up in a panic, throwing the book and her bedding in her haste to get away from the attacking creature. Fearing the attack of a scorpion (a man on our compound was stung by a scorpion four times last weekend!), I jumped up to help her. She finally said, “A frog just dive-bombed me!”

We searched the room for the frog to no avail, so we went back to reading and working on the computer. About thirty minutes later, I saw the poor frog jumping up in the corner near Jennifer’s bed, shooting straight up into the air behind her head. Again, we got up and searched for the frog. Jennifer eventually found him hanging out on the wall behind her bed. She pushed the bed back against the wall so he couldn’t attack her from the air anymore, and again, we went about our business.

Later that evening, I intentionally put my mosquito net down thinking, ‘If I go ahead and put the net down NOW, then the frog won’t be able to get to my bed during the night.’ After turning out the lights and preparing for bed awhile later, I began to get under my mosquito net. Just as I was tucking my head under the net, I felt something fall squarely on my neck. In a panic, I immediately flung the poor creature off of me and hurried out from under the net. In my panic, though, I had accidentally flung the frog underneath the net and onto the mattress. So, for the next several minutes I chased the frog around my bed, trying to catch it in a plastic cup, until I finally caught it and was able to toss it outside.

I’m not afraid of frogs, which is a definite plus. The Dinka are often afraid of them. Perhaps we should be afraid of them. If the frogs here are all of the dive-bombing, attack-from-the-top-of-the-mosquito-net type, then maybe we should be more afraid of them. Can you imagine a plague where the frogs are constantly committing aerial attacks? Anyway, I just reread Exodus chapter 8, and I found verses 2-4 to be most applicable. :)