The red trail meandered from my elbow down towards my forearm and back again. I couldn’t see the one on my back but Georgi, my girlfriend, told me it was even longer. They were both itchy as hell. We had been living together for about three weeks and I have to say I wasn’t that pleased with the arrangement. They had just arrived unannounced, they weren’t paying any rent and they were treating the place like a restaurant with free food. Parasites can be so thoughtless.
I had picked up my travelling companions in Cambodia on Serendipity beach. The internet told me it was probably through cat droppings in the sand. There were a lot of cats on the beach so this was my working theory. We were on the move every other day so rather than interrupt our travels for a hospital visit we decided to wait until we reached Manila. In the interim we attempted worm removal recommendations from the online community, none of which worked. Although putting cayenne pepper on the spot where the worm was and then wrapping it in plastic for the night really pissed them off.
By the time we reached Manila we had settled into an uneasy coexistence. I was biding my time while they were moving through my body as rapidly as they could. The owner of the backpackers we were staying in recommended a clinic close to where we were. We grabbed our books and headed off.
The clinic was clean and modern, and everyone was super-friendly. We waited about an hour to see a doctor. The receptionist beckoned us into a white tiled room where we were greeted by a cheerful guy who spoke almost no English. Through sign language and the big red tracks on my arm and back we managed to convey something of my plight. Our doctor had clearly never dealt with parasites before. After much consultation with his colleagues he decided that the best course of action would be to surgically remove the bastards. With no other options on the table I decided what the hell. We started on the back. They shot me full of local anaesthetic and then my doctor dived into his work with a smile and a scalpel. They hacked out a triangle wedge, sowed, me back up and sent me home. The idea was that if the worm was gone then we could do the same on my arm, if not then they were all out of ideas. We hopped on a plane to Palawan to spend ten days in El Nido lazing on beaches and drinking the local beer. Parasite number 2 or back worm as he was called still seemed to be with me. His trail continued to make its way across my lower back. As nice as the the doctor was I didn’t want any more of me surgically removed. We decided that our best plan of action was Australia, which was the next stop on our journey.
We touched down in Sydney and sought out the nearest hospital. Our doctor was completely taken with my parasites. He knew what they were, prescribed a pill and sent us on our way. Before we left though he asked me if he could take a picture for the hospital website to train their junior doctors. They didn’t see many cases like mine and the red trails were classic parasite, which is why somewhere in Australian cyberspace there is a picture of my arm.
The pill took about three days to kill my two friends and when they finally shuffled off their mortal coil I was filled with a sense of loss. They had come to be a part of me, a conversation piece, something to look at. Every day I would inspect their route nodding my approval. I didn’t miss the itching though.
