Invasion of the Siafu (safari ants)

So my roommate and I have been home sick with the flu for the past few days, but today we were both starting to feel better. I had just gotten out of the shower, when I hear her screaming in the hallway. So I run out to find siafu (safari ants) all over the wall/floor/everywhere. Our house has an extra outside door that we don’t use (it’s “sealed”- how well it was sealed is up for debate), so these ants are streaming in through holes in the sealant, holes in the wall, through the vent at the top of the wall- you name it, that’s how they are getting in.

Safari ants are nasty buggers, they travel in groups of hundreds of thousands, they can get into anything and they have these NASTY pinchers that hurt- a lot. They swarm over intruders. And they can be anywhere. If you saw the new Indiana Jones movie, siafu are the big bugs that carry off the Russian Soldiers in Peru (these just aren’t as big) Usually I see them on the path and can jump over them, or I see them in the grass when they get all over my feet- but you can deal with a few on you. They hurt, but it’s not that big of a deal.

So we have ants all over the wall and floor of our hallway, so Julia and I grab the Doom cans (doom is this crazy harsh insect spray for homes) and we try to spray all these ants but this is an aerosol, so all the ants we are spraying on the walls are now flying back at me and into my hair and clothes- so glad I showered before all this! After killing as many inside as possible and spraying a perimeter so the remaining ants cant get to the rest of the house (because they just dominate entire areas- nothing really stops them), then we went to take on the ants outside.

We are both wearing flip flops because once these guys get into your shoes, you cant get them out and they just bite and bite you. So we run around to the back of the house and there are siafu everywhere. I start spraying the ants but I don’t realize that I’m standing in a huge pile of them (they are hard to see in the grass) so I’m spraying the door, Julia is screaming (because she too is standing in ants), and all of a sudden my feet are on fire. Yup, I’m covered in siafu. So now I’m screaming, Julia already ran off, there are siafu everywhere and our neighbors are all laughing hysterically. What else can you do when your feet are covered in huge, biting siafu?? I just sprayed my feet with Doom (kind of had forgotten about the blisters I had)- so now my feet are REALLY burning, the siafu are still holding on, so I run to the front of the house to re-group.

One of our neighbors, who had heard the screaming, came out and said to pour boiling water over them to kill them. That meant returning the siafu. So we heated up the kettle, I put on my big rain boots (the flip flop idea was really not a great plan- sure you can find them easier but when they are swarming it doesn’t help) and we went back out. This time we were victorious (well for now). The boiling water killed a bunch and hopefully they are moving to a new place (or at least not coming in our house any more. Icky bugs.

Now I have to get all the Doom off me. Now Julia says they are coming in the front door- great! More later!