The Nairobi Fly

Mags woke up with a stinging feeling on her chest and because there was no mirror, asked Henry to look at it. It was a whitish blister that ran from the top of her sternum, towards her cleavage.

Fearing some unusual tropical disease, they decided to go into Arusha straight after breakfast – after all they had only been living at Makumira for a week and hadn’t sussed out any dangers there.

Dr Mohammad’s clinic was busy even so early in the morning and the routine was to speak to the receptionist who would ask what the problem was and which medical person you wanted to see. She then gave you a number and you found a seat to wait.

All the eyes follow you, which is to be expected because the wait is often long and there is nothing else to do – there is no magazine rack there.

The idea of waiting your turn had not quite arrived; whenever a patient vacated the interview room, very often someone would try to barge in. Sometimes they succeeded too!

Henry and Mags had become accustomed to this, the same was true at the post office, there was a melee at the teller window and even when you were talking to the teller, someone reaches over with coins and demands a stamp. Over the years queuing has become the accepted norm.

Nobody tried to barge in before Mags and Henry, and once settled in wooden chairs, Dr Mohammad asked what the problem was.

He didn’t really need to look at the blister, but he did, then sat back in his chair and smiled.

‘It is the same thing as this.’ He said pointing a blister on the side of his nose. ‘During your sleep you crushed a Nairobi Fly and it has released a poison that has made the blister. I can give you some paracetamol for the pain, but there is no other treatment, it will be gone in a day or so.’ 

Back at the nursery, Henry had a conversation with his nursery workers about the Nairobi Fly.

‘They are red and black,’ said Amani, ‘and they are bad!  When they walk on you they leave a trail of poison that makes your skin blister and swell.’

‘No,’ countered Mbise, ‘the poison only comes when the insect is squashed. They only walk on you at night time.’

‘Do you use any medicine?’ Henry asked.

‘It is painful so if there is paracetamol.’ Said Mama Veronica, but most had no availability of the medicine

‘Well it certainly looks like it left a trail of poison on Mags.’ Henry added.

As far as the locals are concerned, the only good Nairobi Fly is a dead one, so they kill them on sight, but that is not the way Henry operates so any he found inside, he released outside. From time to time one walked on his skin but left no mark because he either blew or shook them off.

Mags liked to keep the yard swept of leaves and that removed the Nairobi Fly habitat, even so they seemed to become active when the long rains arrived so perhaps that is part of their life cycle. So during the long rains, she inspected the bed before climbing in.

Having no wings, Henry guessed they are a type of beetle with their wings tucked into a hard covering, but he never saw them fly.

He smiled when he overheard his nursery workers discussing the Nairobi Fly’s attack on Mags. They were chuckling, not out of spite, but because of their erroneous belief that wazungu are not affected by local bugs.