Tweety’s last tweet.

Once upon a time, in a land far across the sea, two little girls gifted my daughter a tiny bird.  The little bird had been caught in the rain-forest near their village and  a piece of grass was carefully tied to its little leg to keep it captive.  My daughter loved this little bird and named it “Tweety”. 

Tweety loved to eat insects.  While my daughter and her brother sat on their bed doing their home-schooling work, he would hop around the little hut eating spiders and other tiny insects.  Tweety would never encounter the huge cockroaches that roamed about at night poking their feelers out of the cavities in the concrete block-work. Tweety was murdered in his bed that night. 

The murderer was a huge, hairy bush rat that entered our hut from the roughly hewn timber rafters that held up the corrugated- iron roof.  The rattling of the fishing rods first woke us, announcing that he was coming down to ground level.  We fumbled for our torches and aimed the beam towards the corner of our concrete room.  As soon as the light hit him, he would scamper back up and peek at us from above.  He was relentless. He was determined to carry Tweety away.  Something had to be done. 

Clad in my pyjamas, I would hold the torch steadily while my husband held his spear gun in readiness.  At the appropriate time the elastic band was released and the barb impaled the rat.  The children were told that Tweety died of a heart attack. They believed this. They were eleven and nine.  The next morning, the same man would bury Tweety in a shallow grave alongside his murderer’s body. 

This wouldn’t be the first time our family encountered a home invader in a Vanuatu village.  In one guest house, we would set traps to catch the rodents and would sleep with an overhanging mosquito net tucked around our mattress on the floor.  In another place, our sleep was interrupted by the sound of a rat gnawing on soap on our dresser before it scampered around our room that night.

At no stage, did we fear for our lives. However, our possessions were not safe.  No muesli bar or piece of chocolate was safe from these nocturnal raiders. If we were not careful, the invaders would make a forced entry to steal these items.   While many lived another day, another did fall under the hammer of a trap.  We slept much easier knowing that while we slumbered one less Vanuatu bush rat was terrorising Australian tourists and their possessions.

“Tweety” 2001 R.I.P.