My parents emigrated from Egypt to Germany when I was four years old. We lived in Germany for four years before making our way to America. While in Germany, we had our families come and visit us. It made the separation a little more bearable.

Two years into Germany, my mother took my brother and I to Egypt for the summer. I was very excited to see my grandparents, who had been the loves of my life. My first night in Egypt was very disorienting. I threw up (a mixture of the heat and vertigo), freaked out at the amount of flies at the airport that just wouldn't leave me alone, and screamed like a banshee when I saw my first ever bors* chillin' on the ceiling in my bedroom.

* (A pinkish/beige lizard that crawls on walls and ceilings in desert climates. They come in different sizes and make a clickish kind of sound. To this day, when I hear that click, and I've heard it only once in Aswan since, I freeze up and run to the nearest exit).

I came from Germany, where the only insects or lizards I saw were of the cartoon variety. To be six and wake up to a lizard just hanging out on top of you, unaffected by your screams, was horrifying.

My grandmother came flying into the room when she heard my screams, followed by my mother, aunt, and uncle who all laughed when they realized what it was I was screaming about. I felt like I was stuck in a nightmare; here I am, a six year old girl, scared shitless. And what does my family do? Laugh! (They did the same thing when I was scared by the family dog, and this is where my fear of dogs, regardless of size, comes from).

My grandfather, the most handsome man in the world, ran into the room, took me in his arms and calmed me down enough to tell me that the lizards can't hurt me. They may be all around, but he promised they'd never fall on me or crawl on me. I couldn't really be calmed, so he went into his room and took out his BB gun. We went back to my room and he shot the bors down. The rest of the summer was spent with me screaming and he coming to my rescue.

Fast forward two decades later.

I'm on vacation in the Dominican Republic with my boyfriend. We're staying at a quaint hotel in the mountains, one of the most beautiful places I've ever seen. It had been a hot day and the cool AC in the room felt like heaven. I jump in to take a quick shower while they boyfriend gets a drink at the bar. He comes back into the room dripping with sweat and jumps in the shower himself. While unpacking, I see something moving from the corner of my eye. It's a lizard! Green one, big, long one and I do the only thing I can do when I see animals that scare the shit out of me; I scream like a banshee. I jump on the bed, only to jump back off it. What if there were lizards in the bed?? I continue screaming, imploring my boyfriend to rescue me. He at this point runs out of the shower, soapy and wet, ready to knock someone out. When he saw that I was in one piece and that no one was in the room attacking or raping me, his eyes followed my pointing finger. When he saw that I was screaming about the lizard he gave me a look that I will never forget.

I didn't care. I demanded he get rid of the lizard. He managed to chase it out the window and went back to the shower without saying another word to me. Later, when we were checking out, he told me that a glass was missing from the window and he didn't tell me because he knew I would demand to move to another room. I had been sleeping in a room for two days with broken glass that would've let a lot more lizards in. It was then that I gave HIM a look he'll never forget.

I have NO idea what I would do if I saw this in my room.