The rats have become landlords

Every town has rats. Some towns hide their rats better than others. Mine have become tenants with surprisingly sophisticated taste in toiletries.

For the past few weeks, I have been going to bed with the sound of tiny criminal activity in form of scratching in the ceiling. They run in the ceiling, the same we we run when we are late for meetings, then there is a pause, and then another sprint, sometimes at 2 a.m. and other times at 4 a.m. These rats operate with such confidence they think they own the place. 

One of them has developed a troubling addiction to my soap. It specifically comes down into the bathroom to chew soap like it is enjoying a gourmet meal at a fancy restaurant. I found teeth marks on it and just stood there wondering if the rat prefers lemon fresness to exotic lavender.

The strange thing is that I own a cat. Her name is Caitlyn Brush. She is elegant beautiful and emotionally unavailable, just like my boyfriend. Unfortunately, the rats do not respect her authority, nor do they, at the very least acknowledge her presence. 

I grew up believing cats and rats were sworn enemies. Tom and Jerry built an entire media empire on this idea. Yet here I am living through a failed war mission. The rats are thriving, while the cat is licking herself, unbothered. The rats continue their operations with confidence and I suspect the security team concluded she is mostly decorative.

This somehow that took me back to the Pied Piper of Hamelin. You remember the story. A town overrun by rats. Then a mysterious man arrives carrying a flute, plays music, and the rats follow him out of town. Honestly, if such a man appeared in Entebbe today, I would not even ask questions. In fact I would escort him personally.

The Pied Piper story became famous partly because rats have terrified human beings for centuries. Entire towns feared them. Ships carried them from port to port. Maybe the explorers brought them here. One rat could become fifty before you finished complaining about the first one.

And human beings, in typical human fashion, somehow made things worse. At one point in medieval Europe, people became suspicious of cats and started associating them with witchcraft. So naturally, they killed the cats, a decision humans made that led to the plague that killed millions.

The rats, meanwhile, must have looked around at the disappearing cats and thought, “Excellent. Expansion.” And expand they did.

That is the thing about rats. They survive everything. Wars, floods, cities, governments, bad plumbing. They move through history like tiny furry economists studying new markets.

Even now, cruise ships still battle outbreaks linked to rodents and sanitation problems.

Humanity has invented smartphones, artificial intelligence, electric cars, and online dating, yet somewhere in the world a rat is still defeating billion-dollar infrastructure with its tiny little hands. Now that is humbling.

For me, the true horror of rats is not even seeing them. It is hearing them. That scratching in the darkness. My imagination immediately starts producing horror films. Every sound is suspicious and threatening. You lie there trying to calculate whether a rat can chew through a ceiling and land directly on your chest.

Then comes the guilt because I bought rat traps that worked. The first time I caught one, I felt victorious for about eight seconds. Then I looked at it properly, its small body, tiny heartbeat, little terrified eyes. Suddenly the great enemy of the household looked like Stuart Little. I still disposed of it, obviously. Let us not become sentimental beyond reason. But I did feel bad.

I suppose that is why rats kinda unsettle me. They are disgusting, destructive, frightening... but also alive in a very determined way, tiny stubborn reminders of survival of the fittest.

Tonight, as I try to sleep, I can already hear them again above the ceiling, scratching. One of them is probably thinking about my soap, meanwhile Caitlyn Brush my cat sleeps peacefully.

Somewhere in the distance, I continue waiting for a flute.