Sammy Ramsey

They used to live their best lives just running around on a totally different continent.

Okay.

But in order to really tell its story, I need to take you back hundreds of years.

When colonists showed up on the west coast of Africa, they corralled a bunch of human beings onto these ships.

They stacked them like furniture and gave them no opportunities to behave like humans, to go to the restroom.

The cleanliness standards on those ships were pretty low.

And there were also some hitchhikers on those ships.

See, the American cockroach is actually from Africa.

And they climbed aboard those ships that had a bunch of unprotected food in various places.

And they found the slats of wood between the ships to be great spaces for them to wedge their bodies.

And when they got to the U.S., they set up a whole new population.

They didn't really have too much of a choice in the matter.

You know, a lot of people won't treat it with caring hands.

I think they'll weaponize it, you know?

And these roaches, as gross as they can be sometimes, are constant cleaners.

Making sure that they're getting rid of all the bits of foreign matter that could accumulate bacteria or fungi.