Dream on

Malaria is nothing to joke about in Africa. Before I went to Tanzania, I saw the Embassy doctor in Dhaka and asked for advice. The map she pulled out to show where there is a malaria risk in the country was all colored in red, as in all high risk.

There are just three anti malaria medications and none of them comes without side effects. I was given Doxycycline, which is just a regular antibiotic. Doxy is the type of malaria medication that you have to take everyday.

People warned me I’d have crazy dreams “in living color.” I never comprehended what they meant when they said they dreamt in color. I always thought I dreamt in color. I still do think that, but the colors I saw in my dreams on the malaria meds were way more intense than my normal dreams. When I awoke from my first dream I thought that if it was preserved on a film it could really win some movie award. My dreams have never felt more real, too. I felt like they taped into some part of my brain where memories that I rarely think about are kept.

Many people complain about the doxy, to the point of switching to a milder type of medicine. What did it for me was the Dar es Salaam nurse confessing that her doxy dreams included running a very profitable brothel from her garage. I guess I did not want to break any anti trafficking law, even in my dreams , so I decided to just take the chance and rely solely on the bug spray.