The long hot summer has given way to autumn, the evenings are fresh and cool and at long last there are no mosquitoes around to make life a misery. Like everyone here we have mosquito nets on our windows, and we never open a window in the evening; but somehow one mosquito finds its way into the bedroom most nights, probably through the air-conditioning.
I know the insect is there only after it has sated itself on my blood, usually from the knuckles, the most painful place. I find it clinging to the wall in a bloated torpor, and spray it to oblivion, but this is merely an act of revenge. The damage has been done.
Mosquitoes can breed in anything from a fish pond to a discarded drink can. The area where we live provides thousands of procreation sites in the shape of plant pots, which the locals stack in rows in front of houses and shops and water every afternoon.
The insects swarm at dusk, seeking their victims by infra-red radiation, carbon dioxide, and chemicals which are emitted by the body. For some reason they like me, or my chemicals. Once while sitting recklessly in a garden at dusk, in shorts, I got 63 angry red mosquito bites (I counted them) the size of pennies on the back of my legs. I'm told I should take yeast tablets to produce an odour which apparently repels the insect.
At least in Beijing city the mosquito bite is relatively harmless. In rural China and all across south-east Asia it is a more serious matter. About one in 50 mosquitoes in the region carries disease, particularly malaria. Worldwide some 2.7 million people will die this year from malaria, more than from AIDS, according to the World Health Organisation. And the situation is getting worse.
It is exactly a century since the English scientist, Sir Ronald Ross, discovered that mosquitoes transmit the malaria parasite, which grows in the female mosquito's intestine and enters the human when bitten. It incubates in the liver from where a horde of new parasites rampage through the blood stream, causing anaemia. The victim suffers fever and can die within three days if the body's immune system is not strong enough.
The female is deadlier than the male. It sucks blood from humans to collect protein for its eggs, using mandibles as sharp as fine serrated saws to cut the skin so it can insert its proboscis. The mosquito's saliva has a chemical preventing the blood from clotting and it is this which stings.
In the last half-century an array of drugs and pesticides almost wiped out the mosquito in badly-affected countries like India. But by the mid-1970s it was back, stronger and with altered genes, and these mutant mosquitoes are resistant to DDT, the most common insecticide.
Experts at an international conference in Hyderabad, India, this year described the near-term outlook for mosquito control as grim, with the possibility that the insects will develop immunity to a new generation of pesticides.
Mosquitoes are also responsible in south-east Asia for dengue fever which can result in a horrible death with bleeding from the orifices and for which there is no cure, and Japanese encephalitis, also a potential killer. Chloroquine, once the wonder drug for fighting malaria, is now virtually useless, certainly against cerebral malaria, the most deadly type.
In India last year three million people fell to mosquito-induced illness and over 3,000 died. Even in squeaky-clean Singapore, the mosquito strikes down hundreds of people with illness every month and things are getting worse.
There are about 30 cases of malaria a month in Singapore, and this year so far three deaths. The number of dengue fever cases has risen to nearly 600 a month, 21/2 times the rate of last year, with one death. In the 1960s, the disease used to appear only once in five years.
Singapore's Environment Ministry staged exhibitions all over the city this month to show how to prevent mosquitoes from breeding. Mosquito inspectors seek out offenders who let water collect in old tyres or on building sites, and impose fines equivalent to £20. From this month the fine will be doubled.
Some say the smoking mosquito coil is the best deterrent, but in neighbouring Malaysia the public has been advised the fumes can cause asthma. The Malaysian Paediatric Association president, Dr Azizi Omar, said: "Just imagine smoke coming from the coils throughout the night and with nowhere to go. The effect is the same as standing outside in the haze." Unfortunately the smoke haze over south-east Asia has had little noticeable effect on the mosquito population.
There are coils, electronic mats, sprays, creams and lotions on the market in Beijing, but everything I've read suggests that the best way to stop getting bitten is by using a mosquito net. Treated with biodegradable insecticides, it also kills the mosquito on contact.
But for now we don't have to worry. The only thing they can't stand is the cold, and winter is coming.