Jungle fever

When I first announced to my mother that we were moving to Malaysia she had a panic attack accompanied by visions of her precious daughter residing in a terrorist-infested, cholera-ridden slum. 

It took quite awhile to convince her that Malaysia is perfectly safe (far safer than the US actually) and relatively disease-free. Personal safety is something that I have thought about very little since moving here, but for someone who previously rarely got sick - illness has been a fairly constant companion.

Most sickness is exactly what you think (and expect).  Food poisoning. Street food is generally perfectly safe in Malaysia. Common sense rules apply - if there are rats, unclean surfaces, and no soap then you give it a miss. Obviously.

 But, every now and again you get burned.  When we first arrived here we were both mildly ill about once a week (and we lost a ton of weight) but nearly two years in - I can't immediately recall the last time I had a nasty stomach bug.

Early on we went to India - I was there for nearly a month and survived without a single case of 'Delhi belly' as they call it.  This is probably a world record. So after India I was feeling a bit smug. I thought if I could get through India without getting sick, I could eat literally anything, anywhere.

Oh, how wrong I was.

Cambodia has certainly been the worst to date, to this day I don't know the exact source of poisoning, but I lost 7 pounds in 4 days and at the time - I probably would have been okay with just dying.

Unfortunately though, it's not just about dodging stomach bugs.  Malaria has largely been wiped out in peninsular Malaysia and in other developed pockets throughout the region - but it still abounds in much of Borneo and less developed countries like Myanmar.

Dengue fever is still a very real threat and one that thus far we've successfully avoided.

Food-related illnesses aside, I still do tend to just get sick here more often.  I'm currently coming off a viscous cold that has been lingering for nearly a week.  Locals have all sorts of theories on illness, but the most popular source of sickness seems to be air conditioning.  It's ironic, because this is a nation of people who do everything they can to avoid leaving their indoor hovels and love to crank their air conditioners down to sub-zero temperatures.  But then you get sick and they say, 'too much air conditioning, lah.'