Cricket Head on a Stick Story
This post is part of the Cruel Kids, The Animals I Know and How to Neuter a Cow series.
Weather-wise, my childhood in Việt Nam seemed to have only two types of days: scorching hot or torrential rain. People don’t call it the “Jungle of ’Nam” for nothing.
Once in a while, the sky stayed a cloudy silver as if it was about to rain, but never did. Those were the perfect days to go cricket hunting in the fields.
Fun fact: crickets are probably the “horniest” critters I have ever known. Not that I know many horny critters, but I am pretty sure they make only two sounds. First, the males chirp to call for females. Second, there is the quiet rhythmic sound they make during mid-coital moments. This made them easier to find.
Crickets lived in small caves or under dried grasses and shrubs. Catching the latter was simple: lift their hiding spot and grab quickly. The cave-dwellers were trickier. You could not simply dig with a hoe, since you might cut the cricket in half. Instead, you brought a bucket of water and flooded the cave until even the stubborn ones got flushed out.
Crickets were fun as pets. They could “sing” and they could “fight.” All my friends had crickets, and the best part was pitting them against each other. Cricket fights were simple: drop two into a bucket and watch them gnaw and kick until one ran away, leaving the victor to chirp in celebration.
Two things we did as kids with crickets were very cruel, though we did not think much of it at the time:
- To get a cricket riled up for a fight, you tied a hair around one of its hind legs and spun it in the air until it was dizzy and ready to go “beast mode.”
- When one of your best crickets was tired or losing steam, you used a “throwaway cricket.” You ripped off its head, stuck it on a toothpick, and taunted the tired fighter with this terrible version of a “cricket head on a pike.” I am not sure it did anything, but for some reason we all did it.
These days, people are frying up crickets as an alternative protein source. I have not tried one yet, but given the chance, I suppose I would try anything once.
Go back to the series index or continue to the next part: Frogs and the Drum Story