Rats for lunch, rats for tea and rats in one's fishermans pants

A series of rat stories from people who don’t like rats

Boy

At night the rats sprinted the length of the building with Olympic enthusiasm. They skittered above the flimsy ceiling and beneath the rickety floorboards. They dodged beneath my bed and scrabbled up the walls. I'd foolishly left some peanut brittle in my pack and this attracted every rat in the place. I could hear rats above and below and to either side of me, all frantically scuttling after the scent of sugar and peanuts. In the end I chucked the candy out the window and it banged loudly on the roof of the toilets, provoking indignant protests in Laotian. At this point, however, the rats left me in peace.

American Boy

In the same village during the night I didn't sleep that much because of the noises. It was a kind of swish but I didn't figure out the source. In the morning one of the first words I heard waking up was the date cursing since in the night time some strange animal had gnawed her cap that she had left on the floor. Which animal remained a mystery, but the next morning it was the fat girl’s turn, in fact her handbag got holed by the same animal who reached and stole my goddam chewing gums. Ironic or what?

Girl, Girl, Girl

We almost forgot about this, till the day we were on the way back to Luang Prabang sitting on one of the trucks Lao people use as buses. A lady got on carrying a big stinky box that she put right in front of me. It was so stinky that I almost felt to throw up and one man was laughing looking at me. Still giggling he opened the box and picked up a big black flat stinky dried rat!!!!!!!!! Shit!! It is was so disgusting! Maybe not still happy he showed me the box full of such crap rats.

Organic Eco Girl

The rooms, with walls of woven bamboo, overlooked a ricefield and fishponds and were spartan but clean. While it was charming to look out of our window and see water buffalo grazing and hear the frogs at night, the rat that decided to visit us at night wasn't so welcome. But that is part of visiting the countryside as well. All the noise we made in searching for him convinced him not to return for a second look around so the rest of our stay was peaceful.