That’s Not An Insect…

By Mike Hytner on February 26, 2013 in Other

Creepy-crawly wind-ups: one of the most unappealing facets of Australian life, yet one that prevails pretty much everywhere. Indeed, for many Aussies I’ve met, it appears to be a go-to subject once they discover you’re one of those yellow-bellied Pommies.

They seem to delight in it. If I had a dollar for every scare story I’ve been told I’d be able to afford breakfast in Coogee on Sundays and public holidays. Consequently, even before I set foot on these wild shores, I knew exactly what to watch out for – and what damage the indigenous wildlife could do to me.
Aussies encountered over the years have delighted in regaling me with stories of huge man-eating insects that attack indiscriminately and, apparently, only target non-natives. Meanwhile, of course, the locals aren’t scared at all.

Oh no, they’ve seen it all before – bigger and better, and more dangerous too. It reminds me of that classic scene in Crocodile Dundee when an opportunist mugger brandishes a knife towards Mick and demands his wallet. All Mick does is snort his retort, “that’s not a knife… that’s a knife” while unsheathing his bigger, shinier, more dangerous weapon – a proper knife – and the would-be attackers, naturally, run off.

A huntsman, a white-tailed spider and a foot-long centipede. That was my personal sighting tally on a recent visit to a well-loved bush home – in the space of just 30 frightening, appalling post-dinner minutes. I was horrified. My hosts simply mocked me. “That’s not an insect…” they sneered.

Well yes, actually, it is. A bloody big, evil looking one and there’s no need to show me any “proper” ones, thanks all the same. I’ll run off now, if that makes my point of view easier to understand.

Yet in hindsight, perhaps the most horrifying part of the experience – even more so than when the huntsman (“come on, that’s just a huntsbaby”) evaded its intended temporary Tupperware prison, dropped off the ceiling and landed onto my head – was when I realised I had been unwittingly re-enacting an episode of Sex in the City, in which city-girl Carrie goes to her boyfriend’s countryside retreat and finds it rather difficult to adapt to nature. (Actually, scrap that, the most horrifying part of all this is I’m capable of referencing an episode of Sex in the City).

Am I really that much of a wuss (which, by the way, is brilliantly defined in the Urban Dictionary as: “A person who is physically weak and ineffectual. Often a male person with low courage factor”)? The answer is, lamentably, yes. And I don’t think I’m alone either. Or at least I hope I’m not – safety in numbers and all that.

For the record, the huntsman got away (no doubt to torment some other poor foreigner), the white-tail, somewhat regrettably, died in combat, and the centipede proved far less ferocious than its appearance first suggested, which should prove to me that my uneasiness in the presence of the little critters is entirely unfounded.

Yet I still find it difficult to shake the idea that most insects are potential weapons of mass destruction. The bugs aren’t to blame for that – they seem to be doing everything short of wining and dining me in a fancy restaurant to win me over. No, it’s the bloody wind-up merchants and their horror stories. I’m letting them win. And providing great entertainment in the process!