Visitor at home

This is a story from a few days ago.

Around dinner time, my Ibu(host mom) gave me some noodles that were very hot. She then went into her bedroom as I was sitting in the living room on the floor about to eat but waiting for the noodles to cool a bit. I began to take my first bite when a delivery person arrived with a package.  My Ibu was getting money for the package when all of a sudden my Ibu yelled from her bedroom “CHLOE Awas!”

Now at the time, I didn’t know that “awas” meant “look out” in Bahasa Indonesian… now I’ll never forget that word again.

Based on her tone and the fact that she never yells my name, I decided against having my first bite of noodles and instead set my bowl down and stood up. Suddenly, the curtain by the bedroom door moved and out slithered a black/gray snake. Probably 4-5 feet in length, moving very quickly. At first it started towards me, coming as close as about 2 feet from me. Luckily it turned towards the front door. The door was closed because it was the evening and instead slid under a cabinet.

By then, my host family were all out in the living room. My little host sister and I went out of the house and sat at the neighbors house. My host mom and dad, my host mom’s sister and her husband and the delivery person all worked to get the snake out of the house. This room about 10-15 minutes and they were finally able to get it out.

After everything, I talked to my Ibu to find out how the snake got into the house/found. Turns out the snake fell from the ceiling onto my host dad’s back and he threw it off and then my Ibu yelled for me to look out. The whole time my little host sister continued to sleep until my Ibu yelled.

Very long and adrenaline packed evening,

I can now check off snake in my house off my Peace Corps bingo card… hopefully just a one time thing.

I'll put a picture of the snake down below, please skip it if you do not like to see that.