little devils with wings

we went hiking with friends on Sunday, and i wore shorts. i knew that i may have made a mistake in choice of outfit when i saw that in our group of 34 people, i was the only girl wearing shorts while all 25 of the other girls were wearing pants.

within the first 15 minutes, i got 3 mosquito bites on my left leg. i had already applied lotion containing citronella oil (a natural oil that's supposed to repel mosquitos), but apparently that wasn't enough to deter the little blood-sucking devils from helping themselves to a juicy bite of my leg. evil little s%#@&s!

i know, everyone falls victim to mosquitoes every so often, but i swear i'm allergic to mosquito bites because i have the worst reactions nearly every time. after the initial bite, the area surrounding the bite would usually swell up to the size of a giant avocado and the entire area would become painfully itchy. it gets so swollen that when i press down on it, it feels hard. and it hurts. when i stand or walk, the blood rushes down to my legs and the swollen area surrounding the bites actually starts throbbing. did i mention that it hurts like hell? it gets so incredibly itchy that when i try to scratch it, i only succeed in making it even more itchy and all the more painful. (sorry if i grossed anyone out! just thought i'd share my pain.)

so over the last three days, i've been in perpetual pain with two large avocado sized swells on the back of my left thigh. it's been so itchy and painful that it woke me up in the middle of the night and has prevented me from leaving the apartment on the 2nd day. i've tried everything-- i've put an ice pack against it, taken a Benadryl allergy pill, used 2 different kinds of itch creams and 1 hydrocortisone cream with an unnerving "Poison" warning sticker on the box-- all to little effect.

two very painful lessons learned:
1. Hong Kong is infested with mosquitoes, especially along hiking trails.
2. wear long pants to go hiking, no matter how freakin' hot it might be outside!