Bite Me

I have been bitten.

Two puncture marks four centimetres apart on my left ankle testify to the passage of a bloodsucking visitor last night. They don't waste time in Transylvania.

But immortality does not beckon just yet. No, this is not the result of Count Dracula's kinky foot fetish, but rather the nocturnal feasting marks of a coven of bloodthirsty mosquitoes.

Having unwittingly tenderized my own flesh by virtue of last night's chicken kebab and lager marinade, I woke up this morning to find seventeen angry swellings of various shapes and sizes covering my fingers, hands, arms, toes, feet and legs. One bite in particular, on the inside of my right arm, can only have been left by a rabid pterodactyl, or at the very least a mildly miffed bald eagle.

And boy do these buggers itch. As I struggle to contain my frustration, my superhuman efforts to refrain from tearing strips of my own skin off only serve to make me look like a sexual deviant in the delicious throes of an auto-erotic massage.

Sipping my wine on Piata Mica, the smallest and quaintest of Sibiu's holy trinity of medieval town squares, I am all too aware that the sun's slow descent behind the magnificent Saxon cathedral signals the opening of another all-you-can-eat buffet at Chez Jean-Marc.

Sure enough, within minutes I can sense the falsetto vibrations and light tread of the first hungry diner on the back of my neck.

Bon appétit.