Jonathan Hitchcock - Vhata Vas Hyah

I was warned about the "cricket plague" in Stellenbosch. Now, at first, I had visions of men in white hats and pads going around threatening people with their cricket bats. As I near the end of my fourth week in this town, I realise that we are talking Jiminy Cricket, his brothers and sisters, their cousins, their friends, their friends' friends, and every other bloody cricket they've ever met. The place is swarming with them. I'm not good at quantizing (is that a word?), but I'd say there are about two to every square meter sometimes. One of the little buggers tried to climb up my leg (inside my trousers) while I was eating supper just now. I've never seen anything like it. And why crickets? Why not a decent plague, like locusts, or boils? Crickets are ridiculous little creatures.

Update: the culprit has been identified. His name is Gryllus Bimaculatus. Mr Bimaculatus (or Gryllus to those of us who have gotten to know him well enough to refer to him by his first name) is a small herbivorous cricket, fond of humid climates.