The day of the crispy locusts

At the end of the summer, North Africa unfortunately tends to suffer from two unavoidable scourges of nature.

One is the flash floods that occur in late August afternoons. The sky goes depressingly black. Then, thunder and lightning follow soon after, and finally a torrential rain which lasts no more than ten to fifteen minutes. Despite the short-lived downpour, the shower causes incredible torrents of dirty waters laden with anything that had not been stowed away or nailed down. This may happen to be oranges and watermelons from the outdoor fruit and vegetable market on the hill, hurtling down the road, chased by intrepid young children, broken chairs and tree branches, or sometimes, in extreme cases, light cars and even people. The entire spectacle watched by shop owners from the safety of their front doors.

When the waters have subsided, the sky reverts to a crystal-clear blue, and the sun soon dries the remainder of the rain, leaving trails of sand and earth. Damage due to this seasonal occurrence is generally minimal, unlike the other unfortunate blight that is the plague of locusts.

Individually, crickets are quite shy and often provide a lot of fun for the budding biologist. If you manage to place one in your open hand and then let go of it, the insect will spring into the air uncovering light coloured wings and pleasantly tickling your palm as it takes off. But this harmless creature turns into a devastatingly voracious machine when in company of several thousand relatives.

I was around seven years when I first witnessed this event on our farm.In the heat of the afternoon, a black cloud covering the entire horizon from East to West began moving towards our crop of wheat.

An eerie noise accompanied its progress and when it reached the outer fields, the cloud scattered hundreds of hungry locusts along the width of the ripe crop. Many hopped from one plant to the next stripping it bare while others crawled along the dry ground gathering the fallen grains. The horde of hungry insects progressed steadily across the fields like a slow-moving shadow in the afternoon sun, like an invisible combined harvester. 

For us kids, this was an ideal time for an exciting competition. We chased and grabbed the crickets before stuffing them into whatever container we could lay our hands on, from empty tins to cardboard boxes. Anyone with a cotton shirt was very lucky as the crickets tended to stick to the fibres and were just plucked and stowed in their makeshift prison. Within less than an hour the fields were stripped bare and the locusts soon made their way to another fruitful harvest. While the adults moaned and groaned over the loss of their crop, we sat under the almond tree counting our own.

Once counted and the winner declared, the prisoners were released to re-join the swarm high up in the sky in search of their next tasty snack. 

Speaking of tasty snacks, grilled crickets come at the top of the list in many a Saharan oasis. Not having partaken in this crispy feast, I have no idea what they taste like, but I am told that their flavour is not too foreign to deep-fried prawns or flavoured crisps. I am pretty certain that my adventurous palate wouldn’t be averse to try them sometime just like those minor celebrities in the jungle.