23 Flees in Coxim

An Adventure with Fleas

I had a 12 hour layover in Coxim (Pronounced Kosheem), Mato Grosso, Brazil while waiting for the Cuiaba bus.  Coxim was the administrative center which includes the town of Pedro Gomes where I was serving in the Peace Corps. The only bus out of Pedro Gomes left at six in the morning and took two hours to arrive in Coxim at eight AM. Although it was 35 miles away, it took that amount of time traverse the potholed gravel road.

Coxim is located about 200 kilometers north of Campo Grande. Source: free.dirctionswhiz

In 1966 Coxim was on the only north-south road between Campo Grande and Cuiaba. It circuited the massive Pantanal swamp that occupied most of the western part of the State. It was a stopover for people wishing to travel to either place.  I had to wait until eight that evening for the next bus. 

I proceeded to entertain myself by visiting various friends I knew in town. Over the past months I had made many contacts in Coxim and among them were some young educated southern Brazilians who had come from Sao Paulo to this outpost to staff the local branch of the Bank of Brazil. They were always looking for interesting people to visit with and I must have been one of those.

Elhio, one of my banker friends offered his small apartment as a place for me to relax and take a rest. At two PM, during the heat of the tropical day I decided to take him up on his offer and took a nap on his bed. Elhio’s apartment was functional; a shared bathroom, down the hall, clothes strewn around and I could tell it had been a while since he had gone to the Laundromat.

About hour later I woke up scratching. Something in his bed liked how I tasted! Itching all over I finally realized that Elhio’s fleas had just finished a meal. I decided that this was not the best place for me to be resting.

Common flea. Fleas Home, fleas, /cdc.gov

As the late afternoon began to cool off, people became active in the street and I joined a group playing basketball at the town park for a few hours.

One of the basketball players invited me to join his family for a dinner of rice and beans and roast beef. After dinner I went to wait for the bus. I stowed my bag in the overhead and settled into a seat and went to sleep, knowing that this would be an all night trip and I would arrive in Cuiaba in the early morning.

About an hour into to trip, I awoke to find myself itching all over again. Whatever I picked up from my friend’s bed had stayed on my body and now they were taking their next meal.   

Fortunately, I had my Peace Corps medical kit with me and it had some flea powder that I dug it out and shook around on me and inside my clothes. It worked! the flees stopped biting!

Peace Corps medical Kit

As I was relieved from the fleas, it seems that the fleas found an alternate host!  The guy next to me began scratching. I was about to offer him my flea powder when he decided that I was not a good one to be sitting next to and got up and moved to another seat, taking the fleas with him!