Rats are jumping!!

Houston, we have a problem, is one of the iconic lines you’ve ever heard, but that was for a space problem and well that anecdote is for another day, I have one closer to home. We have been run over by rats in the outer quarters of our farm.  The rat here is not be mistaken for oh cho chweet Jerry of the famous childhood cartoon partner, nor is he the Ratatouille rat who became a chef in the heart of Paris, this is the common type garden variety rat that has invaded our farm

. A huge number of you are going to make fun of me, and say what do you expect, you do live on the farm? The rest are going to make fun and be the smart Alec and reply, they are meant to be there in the eco system, some of the fanatics who swear by Maneka Gandhi and her particular animal activism.

One of the persons so affected had tried everything in his quarter. He went for work in the morning, leaving his room perfect and when he came back for lunch, he was in for a surprise. He came to the main house and told me, ‘ In the morning when I had gone for work, the curtains were in place and were of full length, the mattress was fine, and my trouser was hanging behind the door.’ Now the curtain is of half-length, the mattress has holes and the trouser has been bitten at all places.

He was ready to cry and went away after I consoled him that we would look into this matter. I handled everything in the perfect government manner and a bureaucrat worth his service would have been proud of him. The minute he went, I turned and burst out laughing, the curtain reminded me of the chocolate advertisement, where the tailor invariably shortens the trouser to shorts, thanks to mumbling by the boys eating chocolate.

One of the operators at the cold store, who is an ex-army Subedaar sahib, even submitted a letter in English worthy of a classic piece to be kept in the archives for future generations, it was addressed to the Manager and had the usual salutations. The line that jumped out was, Sir, the rats are jumping a not letting me sleep. Mind you, the rats there are white furry albino alien type ones that can scare the enemy away! We think breeding them is a better defense against the enemy of the country.

Rats are vermin for us and we set traps everywhere to catch them. The karigars have a good answer; they say the rats don’t eat or spoil their clothes, they have this reasoning, you respect them, and they respect you back. One of them Raj, said that just because his tadka (seasoning was so good) to his vegetables and dal, did the rats get tempted.

The gatewallah, who was a pro at this, got Rat kill, these are small round balls of poison, chocolate in color and they are put in corners, the rat comes in and eats them and goes out in the open and dies.

However, the ones here on the farm are smart and I think due to genetic modification that has invaded them also, they just jump avoid all these poisons. They also cut the wires to the new hi- tec equipment sold to us unsuspecting Punjabis by this company; they promised that the frequency emitted by the contraption would not let the rats come near the premises of the farmhouse!

However, these rats have outwitted us by not eating the poison, not being affected by the hi tec equipment we put up as surveillance equipment or even being trapped by the rat traps dotting the house by the dozen.

The servants and the others have started wearing shorts; they aren’t cutting them shorter, and also have left them alone. We have perfect harmony now, we live with the rats, and they let us co-exist by not spoiling our food or eating away our curtains.